Originally posted to Instagram on July 11, 2021. Edits for clarity and grammar have been made.
What is filtering?
Filtering is when you add unnecessary words to your document explicitly telling the reader what the character sees, hears, feels, and thinks. It’s the most obvious in first person POV, but it occurs in third person POV as well.
There are specific words that indicate filtering such as: noticed, saw, heard, felt, knew, wondered, believed, decided, hoped, smelled, watched, (and many, many more).
Examples of Filtering:
I see the birds flit from one branch to the other. I feel the humid, summer air wrap around me and I think about all the summers that came before this one. I hope that Grandma will be proud of what I’m doing… who I’ve become, but I don’t think she would be.
An example of filtering in the first person
He wondered about all the sorcerers that came before him—what they wanted him to be. He felt his stomach sink and the stave slip from his fingers. He heard it clatter to the ground, saw the oak wood split, and he tried to hold back a gasp and hot tears. He knew there was no going back.
An example of filtering in the third person
Here are the examples with the filtering bolded:
I see the birds flit from one branch to the other. I feel the humid, hot air wrap around me and I think about all the summers that came before this one. I hope that Grandma will be proud of what I’m doing… who I’ve become, but I don’t think she would be.
He wondered about all the sorcerers that came before him — what they wanted him to be. He felt his stomach sink and the stave slip from his fingers. He heard it clatter to the ground, saw the oak wood split, and he tried to hold back a gasp and hot tears. He knew there was no going back.
It’s super repetitive to read, right? It’s shocking how many times it crops up in those two short examples alone. Getting into other “good writing constructs”, you don’t want too many sentences starting the same way because it bores the reader (there’s more to it than that).
Now, let’s compare it without the filtering.
Birds flit from one branch to the other. Humid, hot air wraps itself around me. This is just like all the summers before: same warm yet chilled with loneliness days that never end. Hopefully Grandma will be proud of what I’m doing… who I’ve become, but she isn’t.
He wondered about all the sorcerers that came before him — what they wanted him to be. His stomach sank and the stave slipped from his fingers. It clattered to the ground, the oak wood split, andburning tears pressed against the back of his eyes. There was no going back.
I kept some filtering in the second example. Why? Because the third person is removed from the subject inherently. Generally, when it comes to thoughts/thought processes of the POV character, you can filter or place the direct thought in italics. Don’t filter actions or sensory details (there isn’t a need for it!). However, to push myself I’m going to eliminate all the filtering from the second example.
The disappointment of his predecessor sorcerers slammed down onto his shoulders and ripped the air from his lungs. What were they thinking? What were they going to do? His stomach sank and the stave slipped from his fingers. It clattered to the ground, the oak wood split, andburning tears pressed against the back of his eyes. There was no going back.
And still, the writing improves — there’s more details and a stronger sense of immediacy. Despite this being third person, we’re in his head. We feel what he feels. This dips into deep POV, which I adore.
Should filtering be used?
Like anything else in writing, it has its uses, but for the most part, ditch it. Filtering, at worst, alienates your audience and reminds them “hey, you’re not here”, and at best, it’s a drag and an eyesore. Sure, it’s grammatically correct, but it limits you as a writer. Most of the time you can cut it out and the sentence will be stronger for it.
First person POV has little to no excuses for filtering. The sentence doesn’t work without the filtering? Reevaluate the sentence. The vast majority of the time, you can cut out filtering and come up with more impactful, creative ways to convey what you need to. Removing the filtering in the first example shows me a lot of weaknesses within it, which I won’t edit for the sake of comparison. But in seeing those mistakes, I can work to make the deeper edits that need to be made in order to improve it.
Conclusion
Surface-level filtering is easy to spot and eliminate and it instantly cleans up your prose. However, there is more to filtering that’s deeper and more difficult to explain (which I’m in the process of learning about).
Want more examples and to do further research of your own? Check out Alexa Donne’s YouTube video titled “Filter Words and How to Fix This ‘Telling’ Problem”.
To be frank, I am heavily biased against filtering because it is one of my writing and reading pet peeves. Filtering annoys me because it’s such an easy fix but it clogs up a manuscript like nothing else. Once you see it, you can’t not see it.
Thank you for reading, and hopefully, you found this helpful.
As we near the end of November, many of you will be feeling a little frazzled and burnt out on your projects. But with plenty of time left to go, you need to try and avoid burnout as much as you can.
As some background, this past summer I hit some of the worst burnout I’ve ever had with writing; right at the beginning of it I finished the book I had been drafting, and I had no clue what to work on next and I had no motivation to actually work on another project. Having pushed through that, I’ve come to some realizations.
1: Consistently consume media while writing
This is one of my biggest mistakes, and it always leads to a “dried up” creative well. I don’t read as much as I should, I don’t watch any TV shows or movies, thus, I’m not studying stories.
It’s so important that you take the time to read/watch other media as you write — not only so that you don’t run out of ideas, but also because it allows for you to study story. Most of our knowledge on the subject is intuitive, and in order to continue learning, we must continue studying.
Take some time out of your day to pick up a book, or read a poem from a collection. Maybe listen to an audiobook while you do chores. Find the time to squeeze it in during your hectic schedule.
2: Don’t force yourself to write when you’re feeling sick of it
Or, if because of Nano you have to, break it up into smaller, more manageable chunks throughout the day. Listen to your “heart” when it’s telling you it’s tired. Sometimes, yes, you need to persevere, but there are times where it’s better to cut your losses and rest. If you can’t tell if it’s one of those times where it’s better to push through, set a ten minute timer and do a writing sprint. How do you feel after doing that? A lot of the time you’ll want to continue, but if you don’t, then simply don’t continue writing.
3: Schedule times to not write
I tell myself that I don’t need to write in the evenings, however, I need to write in the mornings. An extension of this tip is to have a writing schedule, but so much of the time we’re focused on when to write that we neglect how important breaks are.
You can prevent a crash-and-burn burnout by allowing yourself one or two days out of the week where you expect yourself to not write, or write very little. It’s like knowing you have a weekend, but with writing.
4: Don’t guilt yourself over not writing
Life happens. Motivation ceases. Brain does that thing where it’s unhappy. Whatever the case, beating yourself up over not doing a very time-intensive hobby is not going to make you want to do the time-intensive hobby. Take a deep breath.
And I’m here to remind you that if you haven’t written recently, that’s okay! You’re still a writer and you’re still doing amazing, wonderful things.
5: Do things that are adjacent to writing
One of my favorite examples of this is drawing my characters. Do something that’ll make you think about your WIP without having to expressly work on your WIP. Or, you can go for a walk, workout, generally do something physical to get yourself out of Writing Mode™ while you brainstorm ideas.
6: Journal your feelings about the project.
I do this via social media, but putting this in your personal journal or keeping it separate really helps. If you have a writing buddy, chat to them about all your feelings about the project. I find that when I’m feeling unmotivated, or I’m on the verge of burnout, seeing the passion I have for my project fuels me to keep going (or at the very least spite the honeymoon phase Jay).
7: Don’t take yourself too seriously
Tease yourself about your mistakes, pretend you’re a bestselling author giving an interview about your project, make memes/jokes about the characters/plot of your novel. Whatever you do, make it fun so that you don’t feel like you’re carrying the weight of this project on one shoulder.
Thank you for reading, and hopefully you found this helpful! No matter what you do, know that I’m proud of you and you’re doing so much better than you think you are.
I am a lier and I am a fool. When I walk, the bells attached to my jester’s hat jingles. Not only am I the a clown; I’m the whole damn circus.
The dramatics aren’t called for.
Okay, you’ve waited two paragraphs for my point: I’ve started writing a new book!
I said that I would take a break, take a KitKat or whatever.
Lies.
The lot of it.
My brain is just in this mood for novel writing right now, and it’s fantastic! And I know that the Muse will eventually leave me in a nasty divorce (who keeps the kids?) and I will have to work off of good habits and pride.
I was so lost down this spinning spiral of my other project that I made myself cross-eyed. And considering that I don’t have an outline, only like, the vague idea of a climax and whole bunch of cute scenes and dialogue, I’m hoping for the best.
That means that I am in the Disaster Draft™ (thunder booms in the distance) stage of my writing. Not worth being called a “zero draft” nor the honor of a first draft. Nay. It doesn’t even get a number it’s so monstrous.
What is this new book about? you may (or may not) be asking.
That’s a good question. I uh… I barely know. All I got is that it’s a contemporary YA romcom.
There could be ghosts (I love me some ghosts), it’ll be a little meta, and a whole lot of fun.
I don’t want to give away the core concept I’m working with mainly because even core concepts can be subject to change while I frolic around in the Disaster Draft™.
Fun fact: I even have a little blue notebook for this new project! And I’m brainstorming working titles for it.
Point being, I’m going to ride this high while it lasts. I’m going to jot down everything that comes to mind, and I’m going to have fun. I’ve already made myself laugh so many times, and that’s exactly what I need.
There’s something magical about writing a new book, so I’m going to try and preserve this glee in a little glass jar, and use it when Disinterest rears its ugly head (the plan being to chuck the jar at it and see what happens).
I better like revising or else my thoughtless ass is doomed.
Thanks for reading, and I hope you stumble upon a lucky coin later.
At 12:22 am I wrote the last sentence of my very first book, Heaven’s Hellions. Delirious from working on it for the past four hours, I made many questionable decisions and wrote an ungodly amount of typos. But it’s done.
I wrote my first book and it is over.
Now I want to dissect the experience, tell you what I loved doing and what I hated, ponder my victories and failures, chat about where to go from here.
Stats:
Word count: 51,143
Number of pages: 114
Number of chapters: 27 (not including the prologue)
Started: June 15, 2020
Finished: November 15, 2020
What I thought Heaven’s Hellions was going to be:
It was supposed to be a paranormal mystery. Everett the Believer would be trying to convince Henry the Skeptic that ghosts exist. In the meantime, both boys get haunted. That’s about as far as I got in the original concept.
Then it divulged into something where Christan mythos would come into play (hence the title of the book). Nothing came of that.
However, I do have the sketchbook that contained all the early brainstorming for Heaven’s Hellions.
This was the first time I write down anything related to Heaven’s Hellions.These were the initial character sheets.Me working on and refining the plot.
We would be here all day if I were to go into all of the little changes that were made to the base concept.
What Heaven’s Hellions turned out to be.
Dark. I didn’t know that I the ability to do that, to hurt characters like that, to put them through some of the worst hardships that anyone can endure. I truly reached into the noir depths of my soul — pockets of darkness I didn’t even know I have.
The gist of the novel (I get to call it that!) is after four teenagers mess with an ouija board in the woods, two of them run away into the cover of the night, one gets possessed, and the last has to pick up what’s left. We follow Henry and Everett, the two that didn’t run off, as they try to figure out what happened to the others, Clay and Addison.
Clay’s body shows up. It’s rumored that Everett was the killer. Out of desperation, he tries to find Addison to clear his name.
The reader watches in horror as Everett keeps flinging himself into more dangerous situations in a desperate attempt to alleviate his guilt. He finally brings Addison home, and while the cheers of the search party bounce off the trees, Everett finds out that his best friend and his father went into the woods to search for him. Three weeks pass and they haven’t returned.
Everett snaps like a toothpick. Sure that he can bring home his loved ones, he goes after them and dreams of a happy ending.
He gets captured by a cult.
Unspeakable things happen to him.
In the end, when he’s face to face with the people he tried to save, he kills himself.
10 things this books has taught me:
1: I am not a planner. At all.
I tried my hardest to write an outline. I tried a loose outline, I tried an outline that was very detailed, I tried character cards, I tried scene cards. All of that planning suffocated me. When I sat down to write the thoroughly planned draft, nothing felt right and I hated it.
I loved the mystery of not knowing what was going to happen when I sat down and wrote. I let my characters take my hand and pull me through the story.
There were very few things I knew I wanted to implement from the getgo that actually made it.
2: How to motivate myself to write when I didn’t want to
This is something all writers struggle with at some point. This isn’t to say that I never had writer’s block — I most certainly did — but I had to learn what was me not being motivated and what was me genuinely having problems with my story, and how to deal with each accordingly.
3: How to write a book (wow really? No way.)
I had to adopt this “eh, fuck it” mentality that allowed me to make mistakes, write awful scenes, and some of the worst prose I have ever laid eyes on (I’ll get to that in a second). I had to learn to let go of making this book flow, having it be pretty, hell, having it be readable. I had to constantly remind myself that not only is this the first draft of a book, it’s the first draft of my first book, ever. Just let it be bad. And this is a mentality I adopted fairly early on which is what allowed me to write a book in five months.
4: I’m a character person through and through
I kept writing because I wanted to be with my characters. I wanted to see what they would do next, I wanted to write them interacting and doing things. They are what kept me going when I wanted to quit.
5: Don’t share first drafts
This is the first book I didn’t share the first draft of with my friends, and it’s the first book I’ve completed. Sharing those first drafts puts eyes on the most vulnerable stage of my work, and it placed unnecessary pressure on me to make it flow. Not having people see it gave me the space I needed to make Heaven’s Hellions exist.
6: I need to vent my writing somehow
Shout out to one of my closest friends Emily for having to put up with my constant writing rambles. I would send her monstrous texts talking about something going on with the characters, or scenarios that could happen, or ideas I wanted feedback on. And while she was extremely encouraging, she was never afraid to give tough love.
Thank you, Emily, you mean the world to me and this book wouldn’t exist without your support.
7: My plot bunnies mutate
A plot bunny is another idea for a completely different story. For example, you could be working on a fantasy novel but you get the idea for a contemporary romance instead. Plot bunnies become problems when you start chasing them instead of finishing your current project.
Because I grow so attached to my characters, I can’t stand to let them go. So, when I get a new idea for a seemingly completely different story, I just pick them up and drop them into that narrative. It’s not pretty and it muddies up my mind and my draft.
8: I’m not good at implementing preexisting ideas
When I go for my walks, I get tons of ideas for my stories. In fact, I was planning on having Everett be the son of Satan (among other plot ideas) that never got woven in.
When I sit down to write, I reread what I wrote, then I go from there; I improvise. So all that I had planned gets left out and sulks at the edge of my project.
9: I really enjoy breaking formatting
I love having words float around on a page, make sentences run on, or mash sentences together. Towards the end of the book, I used a lot of filtering to show how my character no longer feels in tune with himself. It’s so much fun to alter the style of the prose to fit in with and extenuate the character’s state of mind.
10: How to make first-person POV work
Does that make me sound conceited? I love first-person POV, but I knew that already. I learned how to make first-person, well, personal. I learned how to keep filtering to a minimum, and when used, make it feel authentic. Now, authentic to Ett or myself has yet to be determined. I wouldn’t say I’m the best at it, but writing 51k words in a certain POV is bound to teach me something.
What I’m good and bad at
That header was a lie; I can’t tell what I’m good and bad at. I’m so close to my work and I have just finished it, I can’t objectively tell what I succeeded and failed at. This isn’t to say that I think I was good at everything I attempted, or that I bombed everything at every turn. I simply don’t know. So, in a few months, I’ll make a more in-depth post about what I did right and wrong in my first novel. Stay tuned.
My favorite parts:
Here are some of my all-time favorite quotes of the book (I feel weird saying that I have favorite quotes in my own damn novel).
For context, this is when Everett and Henry are looking in the woods with a search party for Addison.
“Do you think she’ll be found alive?” Henry asks, his voice barely trumping the whisper of wind in the trees.
“Of course she’ll be found alive.” I say.
“Then why haven’t we been calling her name?”
I also love the last two lines, edgy as they may be. But they’re indicative of the negative character arcs I tried to implement into the novel (let me have my angst):
“I soak in the boy I used to know; I pretend I push up his glasses, and I imagine that he tells a joke.
I laugh as I put the gun to my temple and pull the trigger.”
For much of the book I was torn about whether I should give Ett a negative character arc or not; to keep him as a harmless little lamb or a wolf parading around as a doting sheep. I think I ended up somewhere in the middle.
It was so much fun to write him gaslighting people, lying, convincing himself that he was doing the right thing, among other things. It was exhilarating to write an almost unwittingly manipulative person, to learn about how manipulation works, and to explore the complexities of abuse cycles. I’m not saying I did it well, or that it was effective — I have no clue, but I tried.
I didn’t write any romance and I’m glad I didn’t. Heaven’s Hellions also touched on toxic friendships; Henry and Ett were overly reliant on one another. It wasn’t just that they bickered badly or that they were mean. I wanted to explore codependence and resentment. I wanted to write people that were so afraid to let go that they practically killed themselves and others.
My least favorite parts:
There are so many. My god. I know for a fact this book has tonal and pacing issues. There aren’t enough characters and only two were actually developed. There are plot holes the size of the Grand Canyon. Again, I can’t say what they all are because I’m too close to it right now.
Many of the mistakes I’ve made are the typical novice pitfalls. Either way, when I can, I’ll look back over Heaven’s Hellions and figure out what I can improve upon going forward.
Here are some of the worst lines:
“He chuckles, and I move right along with every movement of his.”
“My limbs are too heavy to lift. They drop to my side as the light now burst in complete darkness.”
I’m sure there are so, so many more, but I don’t feel like mining for them. Trust me, they’re there.
Now what?
I’m not going to edit or revise Heaven’s Hellions any time soon. There is too much that needs to be done, and frankly, I’m tired of working on this book. I’m glad it’s over with. I need to move on to something different, something happier. But that isn’t to say that I won’t ever return to this project. I think that when I’m older, when I have a better grasp on characters, plot and plot structure, and how to write emotionally charged scenes effectively, I’ll give this another shot.
I’m planning on working on a project that’s a fluffy, cute, romance that I will try to push into a further phase of development. This new book is something that I want to revise, I want to edit, I want for people to actually read. Not sure if I’ll publish it or not, but I do know that I want critiques on my long-form work. I want this new project to be something that I’m proud of beyond it just existing.
Because I now know that I don’t like outlining, that I’m reliant on characters and that I may go to the very darkest corners of the universe for conflict, I need to plan for that. I still need to do so much brainstorming for this new book and frankly, I’m not quite ready to jump into another long-form project just yet.
I don’t know if I’m going to keep Everett and Henry and transfer them to a new world (not the romance project). I have the idea for a steampunk paranormal adventure, but I need to do a ton of research for that project. A ton. And it’s sad to say, but this may be the end of the characters I have been with for so long.
I’m going to work on short stories. I’m not burned out, exactly, but I definitely need to recalibrate so I don’t spit out the same thing again. I need to get passionate about my new world and characters, I need to get familiar with them. I want to work on this new website, write different stories, do more beta reading, and try things I haven’t been able to because I was so consumed with Heaven’s Hellions.
Thank yous
Thank you, Heaven’s Hellions, for being my first book. Thank you for all that you’ve taught me. Thank you for your adventures. Thank you for giving me something to latch onto while the world explodes around me. Thank you for giving me a reason to continue through some of my darkest times this year.
Thank you Henry for being the less confusing of the two; for being reliable, sarcastic, and bringing balance. Thank you, Everett for being so loose, for allowing me to project my deepest fears and the darkest parts of my soul onto you. Thank you Clay for being my first fictional dead body, and Addison, my first massive twist.
Thank you Emily for always being there and telling me the shit I needed to hear.
Thank you Google Docs for being available offline.
Thank you spell checkers.
Thank you to all the random authors who give writing advice on YouTube; you’ve taught me so much and provided me with endless entertainment.
And finally, thank you, dear reader, for getting to this point. I hope that you have faith in me, my writing, and my future endeavors.
Photo by Adisak u0e23u0e31u0e01u0e43u0e19u0e2bu0e25u0e27u0e07u0e15u0e25u0e2du0e14u0e01u0e32u0e25 on Pexels.com
We’ve all been victim to picking up a book we really wanted to read and when we get knee deep into the story, there’s this dark wave of realization that the book is awful. Some of us love rant reviews. Others get really bothered by bad books and don’t want to talk about them. Some power through them and I never do.
We all know what a bad book is, as in, when we hear someone say “this wasn’t a good book”, we know precisely what they’re talking about. I want to dive deeper into elements that make up a “bad book” or “poor writing”, then I want to explore why we’re so bothered by it.
This is one of the easiest problems to identify and one of the most irritating. It grinds gears because it takes the reader out of what’s being said. For example, a phrase that is poorly worded, there’s a run-on sentence the size of Moby Dick, words are misspelled, or any number of atrocities committed against commas remove readers from the work.
Most aren’t looking for excellent prose; it’s just that readers don’t want to be tripping over words in their own head. If you can’t properly word a sentence, then people aren’t going to take you seriously. Janky grammar and or prose is by far the most common mistakes made. Most fluent English speakers have taken an English class or have peeked into the wild world of grammar, so they recognize a mistake when they see one. Compare that to things like pacing or intreite prose rules, where most won’t be able to point a finger at why the sentence doesn’t flow (they’ll still notice that the sentence doesn’t read right).
You don’t need to be an expert in grammar, but you do need to be familiar with it. People aren’t stupid and they will notice. Maintain a grammar standard.
Note that I’m not referring to folks who are just starting to learn English/don’t have a fantastic grasp on the language. They obviously get a pass. This is more so directed at people who are native speakers or are extremely fluent.
This is the more artistic side of our previous prose problem. Voice is the extra little umph to a sentence; it’s what adds character and distinguishes one writer’s work from another. For example, word choice or general sentence structures. Voice isn’t the be all end all of everything, and if you don’t have a distinct voice just yet, don’t worry — soon you can also go through the anguish of finding your writing style.
It’s easiest to illustrate voice through examples. I’m going to be using a situation from Johnathan Stroud’s The Whispering Skull.
“Quill Kipps is annoying to the point where it reaches his looks, and it’s not like he has the skill to back up his smack talk. I would love to punch him then walk away.”
Me, in a tired daze
It’s not awful per se, and having a brief description like that can be useful shorthand — like reminding a reader of someone. However, this is the first time in the book that I’m using that the character Kipps is being described. It’s… fine. About as spicy as a cardboard box but passable.
Let’s now compare that to how it’s originally written:
“Being undiplomatic (but more precise), I’d say he’s a pint-sized, pug-nosed, carrot-topped inadequate with a chip the size of Big Ben on his weedy shoulder. A sneer on legs. A malevolent buffoon. He’s too old to be any good with ghosts, but that doesn’t stop him from wearing the blingiest rapier you’ll ever see, weighed down to the pommel with cheap jewels.”
The Whispering Skull, page 18
Found on Pinterest
This passage conveys so much sass, so much, well, voice. It’s oozing with it. My sentence is, again, passible, but you’re given only the barest, most brittle of bones. With the passage written by Stroud, you get a marvelous idea of: what the narrator thinks of Kipps, where they are approximately, how Kipps looks, and wee bit of world building. This is essential to making a story stick with your reader; giving them something to hold on to on a molecular level.
Before this excerpt, there was a physical description of Kipps, but that paired with the voicy description of him brings up the saturation of the piece. Lucy — the narrator — is filling these pages to the brim with her personality, and everything is through Lucy-tinted lenses. The book would be extremely different if it were told through the eyes of another character. A little bit of Stroud shines through in his writing (naturally), but this is all Lucy.
Voice can be polarizing. The enjoyment of prose isn’t entirely dependent on how it was created, rather, the reader. The example I presented to you is right up my dry-humored alley, but you may have thought that Lucy was being too harsh, or think that my mish-mash of words is entirely unpleasant to the eye (in which case I don’t disagree).
When it teeters into “objectively” bad territory is when the voice overwhelms what’s trying to be said, or, it’s blandness seems to suck up color like a sponge. You don’t need to be weighing down your writing with cheap jewels. Think purple prose (where the prose is so outlandish and insubstantial it overwhelms the reader). You want to use voice to accentuate the characters, or bring the world to life. Author and YouTuber Alexa Donne made an excellent video entitled, “Writing With Voice — Does it Truly Matter?” where she goes into detail about how important it is to be a voicey writer in today’s writing climate.
There is also something called passive voice. Passive voice is when the subject of the sentence is standing by while the object of the sentence performs the work. This pertains more to my previous grammar section, but it fits snugly here.
“The chocolate cake was made by Sam.”
That’s an example of passive voice. The subject is Sam and the object is the chocolate cake.
You may hear advice that tells you to avoid passive voice. That’s because passive voice has a nasty tendency to be muddled and drags the sentence. It can be utilized tactfully when you want to make the sentence muggy (or other cases), otherwise, just use active voice.
Active voice is when the subject is acting upon the object.
“Sam was making the chocolate cake.”
Here’s an article you can read that goes into more detail about active and passive voice.
This a massive one for me — if I don’t enjoy reading about your characters, I won’t enjoy the story. Some readers love purposefully unlikeable characters (like Mr. Darcy), but all that backfires when it’s made apparent that this character was created to be likeable. This is evident in the way that other characters and story treats the protagonist: everything is too easy, they’re too well liked, or they act like an ass but no one does anything about it (but they can).
Let me introduce Mary Sue/Gary Sue. Mary Sues/Gary Sues are often overpowered, the world and other characters always bend to their will, and more often than not they’re beyond perfect. They lack a substantial personality, and most importantly, they hardly ever learn impactful lessons. These characters are plain annoying because they aren’t challenged in meaningful ways. Sure, a baddie may do a Bad Thing to them, but they always bounce back up like springs — never bothered and always winning.
Readers can’t empathize with these sorts of characters because they’re virtually flawless.
Crappy characters also appear when they aren’t fully developed. They can be unbalanced (ex: the hero without flaws, or the villian with no humanity at all), lack motivation, autonomy, or personality. No one wants to read about a potato sack being dragged around by the plot.
You can have a good set-up to a character, have them all lined up for a nice arc or what have you, but they never get fired off. Or, if they do, they’re a dud and land in the mud with a little splat. The main character(s) have to be dynamic, going from good to bad or vice versa is up to the writer, but they need to change in some way over the course of the story. If they don’t the reader is going to wonder what the point even was. Side characters need to be people in the sense they have their own lives, but they don’t need arcs all of the time. Pick and choose your battles because you don’t want to overwhelm your reader with too many moving parts.
They don’t always need to be good people or be the most well rounded, but they all need to have a point. Readers recognize pointless persons and they’re going to get bored.
There could be a lack of connectivity between the reader and character. Not every character you create needs to be adored by readers, nor does everyone need to have this deep connection with the fake people. But, there needs to be something there. That exact “something” isn’t for me to define. We all have read about characters that we just don’t give a shit about, find borning, etc.
If no one cares about the characters, they’re not going to care about the story. Simple as that. Character creation is complicated and I highly advise you to do further research. Here is a free MasterClass article entitled, “How to Develop Fictional Characters: 8 Tips for Character Development” to get you started.
Everything is moving at a gallop in the book, then everything stops for some info-dumping or a really windy dialogue scene. Or, we’re running at a breakneck speed and there’s no room to breathe. Pacing is one of the trickiest things to nail down with writing.
There’s two types of pacing, both of which play into each other. First, is line level pacing. This is when you have a super short, choppy sentence, or a sentence is long and windy such as this one. Massive blocks of text are an eyesore for me. No indentation? No em dashes or fun formatting? Come on.
The other type of pacing is the overarching one. This pertains to how bigger parts of the whole interact with one another. The length of a chapter, scene, and act/part. It’s the difference between the sprint that’s a battle scene, and the Sunday stroll that can be investigating clues for a mystery.
Here’s where it becomes a problem: When it takes too long to get to the point. Where we’re going scene after scene of just talking when this was supposed to be an action book. When it takes forever for obvious information to be revealed to the characters. When it feels like we’re just wandering around aimlessly looking for the plot. The reader could also be suffocated by how fast things are moving, and they can’t grow attached to the characters, or get invested in the story because everything is moving so fast.
Pacing is a delicate balancing act and one I’m not terribly familiar with. If you’re newer to the writing scene, don’t worry about this as much. But definitely do care. Take note of pacing in books you read, see when and why you’re growing bored, and all manner of different things. As always, do some further research.
One of my least favorite “harmless” tropes is the “very quirky and not like the others” kinds of characters. Ooh, they just annoy me to no end. You just really like comic books. Congrats. Don’t care.
A trope is something that is commonly used in genres (like a magic boarding school) and doesn’t necessarily have a negative connotation. A cliché is a trope that is overused and something most people are sick of seeing when not subverted (like some random kid stumbling into powers and becoming super powerful and is now adjacent to a god).
Anyhow, we all have those tropes that we could go on for ages about. Whenever they make a sudden appearance we roll our eyes or want to toss the book across the room. There is a time and place for all sorts of tropes and clichés, and just because one is being used that doesn’t mean it’s inherently cheap. I’m going to list some of the more vile ones out (in no particular order):
Pointless Racism, sexism (both ways), homophobia, transphobia, and ableism
Glorified abuser
Toxic Love triangle
The one useless best friend who’s only there to serve the protagonist
Sugarcoated relationship abuse
No one gets to be happy because this is dark and broody and super serious
Forced romance
Girl on girl hate for no better reason than to get the attention of a boy
A friendship must always turn into a romantic relationship
Men always have to fight each other and have sex because reasons
The female lead is a glorified sex object
Slut shaming
Fat shaming
The villainization of minority coded characters (LGBTQ+, people with mental or physical disabilities, people of color, and a whole host of others)
Stereotypes of minorities — especially racial
The savior complex
A character being outed for the sole sake of plot/the other person wants to be in a relationship
The glorification/downplay of sexual assault
I’m sure there’s so many that I’m forgetting. Now, these can be used if they’re utilized tactfully. They’re horrendous if it’s transparent that this is reflective of the author’s viewpoint, or there’s nothing counteracting these tropes, the characters don’t learn from these toxic viewpoints/actions, etc.
Here are some more commonly disliked tropes/clichés — though, these are far more subjective:
Chosen ones
“It was all a dream”
Here comes the calvary!
No communication whatsoever
The wise old person that always gets killed off (always)
Dead parents
Everybody has this terrible tragic past yet they don’t have any form of trauma
NO ONE GOES TO THERAPY NO ONE HAS TRUMA?? HOW? Y’ALL AREN’T OKAY
Bro I just met you but I’m so totally in love. Mm yes, true love.
Long, long descriptions of the characters examining themselves in the mirror
And you’re overpowered, and you’re over powered, and you’re overpowered, and…
This is how the human body works, oh yes, absolutely.
‘Yer a wizard Har—
Responses to my question of “What annoys you in books?” from my followers and friends on Instagram.
Obviously I’m a top psychologist in every field imaginable and know everything that has to do with humans. I’m just overqualified to speak on the human condition and why we do what we do.
Here’s what I think: when we notice faults in the prose, or we grow bored by the pacing, or any number of things I mentioned previously, we get taken out of the story. We’re reminded that this is all fiction and it ruins the flow.
We want to effortlessly be sucked into a new world filled with impossible scenarios and loveable characters, and when faulty writing interrupts, we lose that connection. This is especially true if it applies to published works that readers have paid for. With most online content, we’re more forgiving because we’re getting this for free and obviously it’s a work of passion.
Besides, mistakes can simply be annoying, and we don’t want to be annoyed while doing something pleasurable.
Being (presumably) human, we make mistakes; it’s inevitable. People aren’t expecting flawless work, but we do expect polished work — especially if we had to pay for it. I know I have made just about all of these mistakes in my own fictional work, but that’s okay.
If you think your writing is “bad”, that’s fine, but don’t let that stop you from trying to write and thus improving. If you think that your work is void of any mistakes whatsoever, then, well, I don’t know what to tell ya other than it isn’t as perfect as you think.
Naturally, all of these things have the possibility of being subjective, and what looks like a major flaw to me may not be a big deal to you. Taste exists.
Thank you for reading and I hope you get to have a buttery croissant later.
Please consider following this blog!
~ Jay
Oh dear, some of this advice is terrible! Nice blog btw 😀
[…] have a whole article detailing my experience with “write in your lane”, and in short, it made me (temporarily)…
[…] Write short fiction if you want to! I enjoy it because it breaks up the monotony of a novel.…
This is very true! They certainly aren’t harmless, and have proven to be quite the opposite, but I think it’s…
While the algorithms may not be “evil” or monstrous they are frequently full of biases that can have real impacts.…
J. V. Montague 
Oh dear, some of this advice is terrible! Nice blog btw 😀