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margoblack · 20 days ago

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Isn't it something when your writing is so good, even your tip guide is like reading prose.

Hi! Your writing is amazing! I want to start writing fanfiction but whenever I try it seems bland? Flat? Idk it feels like there isn't enough to describe what's going on and it just feels like everything is rushed.

I get that practice makes perfect, but other than that are there any tips you might have?

I'd really be grateful if you could, and sorry if this is worded weird (I'm not good with asking for things lol) anyways have a good day and remember to drink water !!

First off, thank you SO much for reading my fics, and I definitely hope you join our little guild of writers still clinging desperately to Barisi in [current year]. You have no idea how much it means to be told my writing is tip-worthy!!

I can give a few philosophies that I use as guides, but these are just ways I've developed my own writing style over time—I'm sure plenty of people think these choices suck.

Overdo the first draft: In my first draft, I just throw in every detail that seems even potentially relevant—thoughts, feelings, details about the room, the lighting, how characters are positioned, etc. This gives me a robust starting point so, for the most part, I'm not trying to figure out what's 'missing' later. I'm just taking out the trash. It made my first drafts feel like they took forever to write in the beginning, but over time I started to be able to anticipate what would be trash and not write it down in the first place.

Trim the fat: I used to have my fics overloaded in crap that didn't matter and repetitive phrasing, etc. because I had an attitude of "Well, I spent the time writing it, so it would be a waste to not include it." This only hurt the work in the end. If something fundamentally sucks, I just accept that it sucks and pitch it.

I'm nothing if not indulgent in establishing general vibes: I generally keep sentences that ONLY give an action to a minimum. There are a million ways to enhance sentences—throw in what a character is thinking or feeling, take a spin on a metaphor, toss in an adverb or two. I find that this helps me keep the pacing from feeling rushed. For example, I would change the following, because it doesn't do anything to establish the mood or general vibe. It's just A happens, then B happens, then C happens: "It was the middle of a hot day, and Carisi was sitting on the couch in Barba's office while Barba was sitting as his desk. They were barely getting any work done." I would change it to something like: "The midday sun was cutting harsh stripes of light across Barba's desk, and the air conditioning unit was giving a half-hearted performance. They'd long since shed their jackets and vests, ties loosened and sleeves rolled up. Carisi sprawled across Barba's couch, while Barba had kicked his feet up on his desk, having lost his shoes sometime since Carisi last looked over. Carisi tried to read the same paragraph of a witness statement for the third time before tossing his folder in the general direction of the coffee table." Is this overkill? Perhaps. Not my problem.

The "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn" Principle: If I'm on the fence about keeping or tossing a detail, I ask myself why I care about that detail. If I can't come up with a decent reason, then I pitch it. To use the last example: "The midday sun was cutting harsh stripes of light across Barba's desk [time of day], and the air conditioning unit was giving a half-hearted performance [it's hot]. Barba's desk was a rich mahogany, and there were two chairs across from him. They'd long since shed their jackets and vests, ties loosened and sleeves rolled up [they're so hot that they're a little undone]. Barba was wearing a blue shirt and green tie, while Carisi was wearing a white shirt and gray tie. Carisi sprawled across Barba's couch, while Barba had kicked his feet up on his desk, having lost his shoes sometime since Carisi last looked over [it's a lazy sort of heat]. The leather couch probably cost more than Sonny's rent. Carisi tried to read the same paragraph of a witness statement for the third time before tossing his folder in the general direction of the coffee table [they aren't getting any work done and it's too hot to care]."

Similes are out, metaphors are in: A metaphor almost always gut-punches me more than a simile. I literally just say that A is B, rather than A is like B. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, so I just follow my heart. Some out-of-context examples: - Rafael Barba was nothing if not a self-serving martyr, a savior who couldn’t resist the sound of his own crucifixion. - What a small price to pay, Sonny thought, when he was moonlight touching the ocean. - Rafael was a storm chaser, and being with Sonny was like standing in tornado country. (it's a halfsie, shhh) - Rafael cut himself off, not wanting to show his cards, but knowing it was time for him to either go all in or fold.

If someone does something bad/bizarre/out of character, ponder on why: I once heard a critic say, "Every time a character does something baffling, we can't just throw up our hands and say 'bitches be crazy.'" Sometimes the narrative takes care of it if the bad/weird decision is part of the plot itself, but sometimes it's just a single moment. One way I deal with this is by suggesting things that might drive that bad/weird decision (especially if the characters themselves aren't exactly sure why they're doing what they're doing). Some examples (with a little context explaining why they're bad/weird): - Maybe it was in his blood, this desperate faith in destiny. Or maybe it was just that he had spent so long being alone that the promise of someone made for him had become too seductive to resist. ^^^ (Barba wants to find his soulmate even though his job and parents' bad relationship makes him logically aware that it doesn't always end well) - She moved her hand to cup his face. He couldn’t help but lean into her warmth, maybe because of the bite of the autumn breeze, or maybe because it was the same warmth that once flowed through Sonny’s veins. ^^^ (Rafael leaning in to Sonny's nonna's touch at Sonny's funeral, even though he doesn't know her) - Sonny came equipped with anatomical features Rafael hadn't requested, and didn’t want to look at. Maybe it was an occupational hazard, or maybe he just wasn’t as modern as he pretended to be. ^^^ (Um... Rafael orders a Sonny robot and he mistakenly comes with sex upgrades that make Rafael uncomfortable even though it's totally normal in this universe)

Write from the POV of one character: I believe that @margoblack taught me that this is called "third person limited POV." I do this (sometimes, not always) for a couple of reasons. First, as a reader, it can get tedious (in my OPINION) to read multiple characters' thoughts and feelings at once, especially when there are multiple characters with the same pronouns—and especially especially if it's nonstop (i.e. within the same paragraph or sentence). As a writer, omniscient POV limits my use of pronouns because I have to constantly clear up which "he" I'm talking about. That usually results in 1) overusing their names into oblivion 2) using 'the detective/the attorney," "the taller man/the shorter man," "the other man," etc. which I personally don't jive with or 3) forcing the reader out of the story to go back and sort out who the hell was doing what. Second, me trying to write a bunch of characters' thoughts and feelings at the same time makes for a disjointed and confusing narrative. I try to avoid forcing the reader to have to backtrack to be able to follow the story.

Use suggestion as a way to keep the other characters from feeling flat when writing from a single POV: Speaking of POV, not having access to the other characters' emotions/decisions can make them feel flat. I use the same suggestion method I mentioned previously to sneak-attack dimension onto the NPCs and dolphins. Examples: - Rafael sank back into his seat with drugged-up relief at hearing maternal reassurance, or maybe just that the attention was back on Sonny. - Carmen found Sonny’s eyes, flicking to Rafael and back, biting her lip like they were sharing a private joke. - Barba was still smiling at him, not quite like he was laughing at him, but something adjacent, like he was delighted by Sonny’s floundering. - The dolphins were especially active, maybe because they weren’t fighting a strong current tonight.

Writing accents is like a comedy skit with a song—it has to be good or it's bad: IN MY OPINION, reading accents can become grating really quickly and rip me out of the story. I trust readers to know what most characters sound like (bc this is fic) or otherwise trust them to be able to map voices onto the characters' dialogue based on something I mentioned once. For example, I trust the reader to do the rest if I said a character has a lisp or a Japanese accent or a toddler can't pronounce her R's yet. THAT SAID, I am not immune to Sonny's accent. But I try to keep any accents and other verbal variations to a minimum and in contexts where it makes sense. For example, I write out Sonny's accent sometimes when he's talking to his family or when he's joking around or emotional (I'm not a linguistic expert, but those are instances when my accent thickens). Examples: - “Ma,” Sonny cut in. “I was gettin’ there. Raf has kidney stones.” - "Jesus, keep your voice down, Carlos’s mom is in the fuckin’ office," Sonny hissed. - "I'm trying to see about farm work. Any knowin’ who might need a hand for a couple days?" - "And Nonna, god, she'd be furious right now. Yellin' at me in Italian about how I'm doing everything wrong."

Write human beings: My #1 goal in writing—if I achieve literally nothing else—is for my characters to seem like they could be real people with feelings and personalities and backstories. Especially because I write the same handful of characters over and over, it gets grating to write the same 2-D traits from the show with zero expansion. Like, we get it—Rafael is biting and performative, Sonny is brash yet sensitive. Now do something with it—they don't need to live their whole lives having sex, talking about work, and making lawyer jokes. Add little human details: - Sonny telling Rafael to close his eyes before turning on the light in the morning - Rafael being irritated with a customer service person and having to remind himself to be nice, that it's not their fault - Sonny pressing a cold water bottle against Rafael's neck as he walks by to make him jump Stuttering and hesitating dialogue, interruptions, italics for emphasis: - "Okay," he said. "Okay. We're gonna... we're gonna deal with this. Later. For now, we're gonna put a pin in it, okay? Just... put a pin in it." - "I'm alone," she said, the words emerging between ragged breaths. "I have no one left. No family, no—" / "You have me," Rita interrupted. - Liv was probably rolling her eyes on the other end of the line. "He's willing to reopen the case if you can bring sufficient evidence." Callbacks to details that describe a real past: - Rafael tried to forget all the details Sonny's family would never know he’d accumulated. The color of Bella’s high school graduation dress. The name of the boyfriend that Gina brought home for Christmas in 2011. The fact that Bella liked ‘Bells’ and Teresa liked ‘Tess’ but Gina hated ‘Gigi.’ - Rita held Camila steady, rubbing firm circles on her back the way she had when Camila was a fussy baby. - Marlene's laugh was dry. "Honey, I've lived on this coast for fifty-six years, and I even remember most of ‘em. I've seen red tides that killed everything for miles. I've seen hurricanes that rearranged the entire shoreline in a couple of hours. A few dead sturgeons? Not exactly keeping me up at night." Jokes: People tease and joke around. Not every single line has to be significant to the narrative and not every joke has to be about their stupid fucking jobs. Be normal during sex: Without the characters having conversations or joking around during sex—or at LEAST having some compelling internal dialogue—it just turns into a stale blur of forgettable "oh yeah baby harder just like that you were made for me fuck yes fuck oh my god please fuck kiss me here touch me there hanky panky." Let characters have flaws: Mary Sue's and "I don't like that the show made X Character this way, so I just ignore it" aren't my favorite. I know it stems from writer turnover, but I tend to take the characters' inconsistencies in the show at face value—cognitive dissonance rather than "they would never do that." Rafael is an impulsive martyr and can be an asshole in a way that isn't endearing, Liv is a hypocrite who puts too much pressure on everyone else and has weird opinions about disabled people, Fin used to be homophobic and transphobic and now he's the poster child for absolving the fact that the show is copaganda, Sonny was an overcompensating douche who couldn't keep a girlfriend to save his life for a while and now he's a mid lawyer. In my OPINION, it's more fun to engage with imperfect characters who are layered and inconsistent, who yell sometimes and make tongue-in-cheek jokes and have opinions that I don't agree with.

Women are not allergens: Take or leave the rest, but for this one specifically, I am speaking directly to you, dear reader: if you want to write porn, write porn. If you want to write stories, write women. They are SURROUNDED by women—Rafael's mother and grandmother, Sonny's immediate family is canonically two-thirds women (plus two canon nieces), Liv and Amanda (and Jesse and Billie), Carmen, Rita Calhoun, Melinda Warner. OCs are also permitted to be women. Any variation of "It's kinda hard to write women when we write fic centering two men in a relationship" is um... let's call it a 'you' problem and not an 'us' problem.

Other things that just make writing fic more fun (that usually come with time): - Develop some 'things.' My things are Barisi pressing their foreheads together a lot and finding literally any excuse not to use a condom. - Make some OCs who show up as minor characters. I used to use the same names consistently for minor characters, but recently I've fleshed out Belle and Yasmin, who just pop in as things like nurses and Carmen's friends, and I now I look for excuses to use them. - Related, it's fun to make inside jokes, even if they're just for yourself. Reference your own headcanons, your friends' headcanons, other fics, other writers' names. MargoBlack, Chiazu on AO3, and @malevolent-muse especially reference other writers, and it's a nice way to connect and make writing feel less like a solitary activity. - It's cliche, but don't get caught up in the numbers game. Just write what you want to write. My favorite fic of mine is "1929 post-stock market collapse, pre-dust bowl farmer!carisi x former stockbroker!barba" AU, which—believe it or not—is not something the general public is itching to consume. - Also cliche, but leave kudos and comments. Nobody is getting paid for this shit in anything but encouragement. It's like a "pay what you can" event—no, you're not obligated to give anything, but you're kind of an asshole if you don't. And finally, if you read this whole post, please get your head checked. XOXO, Regina George

#even the tip post is beauitiful

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