A Sketch Ain’t Worth a Thousand Words

[scribblemyname]

So I just remembered/realized why I love writing flash fiction and have such a hard time getting it to pass muster with my awesome, wonderful, incredibly stick-me-to-it beta: I write sparse. Always have; probably always will. Oh, joy.

In short, I’m one of those odd and rare writers that sketches in a story and, if I’m wise enough to not consider it done, fill it in later. This usually takes a lot of filling and it’s a pain in the butt and I’m often bored with the exercise long before the exercise is bored with me. Cue beta shipping it back to me with a note telling me to “Bake it longer, chica.” :headdesk:

This is also probably where my major problem with novel-writing is coming from, and it certainly stems from all my time mucking around in fandom where I can play off a certain set of standard assumptions. I’ll be the first to admit (in fact, I already did somewhere) that “Crossing the Barrier” could have been deepened quite a bit. I was nowhere near ready to tackle that kind of work though, didn’t have enough interest in the story left to want to, and knew that the story worked without it. So I didn’t. It probably would have been good practice.

What about you? Do you write long or short? Do you have to layer in details later or trim the fat?

Originally published at Liana Mir. You can comment here or there.

Comments

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

One of my favorite (although kind of annoying) things is when I go into a story knowing who the protagonist is and some low-life scumbag OTHER character steals the spotlight.

It happens pretty much all the time. Then again, no one goes through life thinking "oh, I'm a minor character." They're all the stars of their own show, at least in their minds and in their own world-view, and merit as much exploration as the darling ones do. Then again, all my stuff is intensely character-driven, rather than plot- or idea-driven, so it makes sense.

[scribblemyname]

:giggles: Well, I won't call Annie a scumbag, but I certainly didn't intend to make her the lead. Gotta love characters. They don't really care about what we minion authors desire. :grins: