Bad writer. No biscuit.

[mrissa]

Most lines of dialog should not contain the word "well." "Well" is "um" wearing a funny hat and Groucho Marx nose/glasses/moustache.

NO MORE WELL. The next character who says "well" in this scene is going to get shot through the head and buried in the garden, and the book and its sequel will have to go on without [reads ahead] the most major non-POV character. Crap. All right, so I'll give the shot-and-garden-burial a miss. Still, grumph and grarrrr.

This is my sixth novel, if you don't count the two I destroyed. I also write short stories. You would think that after five other books and N short stories, where N is a largeish number, I would not have to write "Well" every five words! Well, wouldn't you??? WELL???

Also, the next character who sighs in this or any other of my books is going to be beaten with an axe handle.

That is all.

Comments

[rysmiel.livejournal.com]

"So, how are you feeling today ?"
"Very... not sick, thank you. Healthy, even."

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

"And would you like some water?"
"Yes, I'll draw it from the...deep hole in the ground."

[tanaise.livejournal.com]

I'm considering the use of tasers as non lethal, non-especially violent electroshock aversion therapy tools.

Plus, they don't result in bruises, incase your character has a nude scene coming up.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

For once, yes.

After I finished The Grey Road, I really, really needed to write about characters who got to have actual sex, after having done two young-YAs in a row, with kids for whom kissing was a big deal. After having written a few more books, I've decided that really, characters who are having actual sex are so totally overrated. Except I keep having them. Sigh.

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

After way too many years and way too many novels, I still tend to trowel on the wells. I think it's worst when I'm still feeling my way toward the point of a scene.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yes. And since I'd never before written anything this long, I was feeling my way a lot in this book.

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

well is one of those words I am forced to hunt down and kill with a hatchet during revisions. Sadly, sigh is another such case.

[songwind.livejournal.com]

"Well" isn't a valid verbal habit for a character to have?

Or are you noticing a habit to sprinkle it in indescriminately?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Indiscriminately, yes.

But also I think it's a tricky one for a specific character to have as a verbal tic. You have to overdo it to make it noticeable -- anything under the right amount just looks like bad writing -- and then it's annoying.

[stillsostrange.livejournal.com]

May I borrow your axe handle for the next character of mine who shrugs or raises their eyebrows? Snorting also happens far too often. (That's a wry or derisive snort, not coke or pig noises.)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Eyebrows. AAAAAAGH, eyebrows. Yes.

[roane.livejournal.com]

Argh, now we're not supposed to use "well"? I can't use "well" or "um", I can't use adverbs, I can't have characters shrug or snort or raise eyebrows... HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO COMMUNICATE?!??! TOO MANY WRITING RULES! ;)

(Hee.)

I am very much guilty of all of the above, on a regular basis. The only thing that really stumps me is how DO you communicate a character sighing or raising an eyebrow or shrugging--if that's what they're actually DOING in your head? I have some completely unrepentant shruggers and eyebrow-raisers in my stories. Maybe I need new characters.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I think it's perfectly fine to have your characters sigh, shrug, snort, raise their eyebrows, say um-well-er-uh and anything else.

BUT. If you read the draft and find that they're doing it enough that it looks like a tic -- if the shrugs make them look like they have neck problems, if their sighs are making them sound like they have respiratory ailments -- time to cross a few of them out. Moderation, moderation, moderation.

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

Does it matter, for writing purposes, that real-life people often do sigh to the point of sounding like they have respiratory ailments, or say "well" every sentence? Or does it come out looking like bad writing despite possibly being reflective of meat people?

There was one person I used to occasionally work with that was so painful to listen too that when he was speaking (to a large group, not to me in a conversation) I used to occupy myself by timing him to see how many times he said "y'know" per minute. I think the record was 8 or so. It was much less painful doing that than trying to actually listen to him. Also, I worked with a rowing coach this past weekend who would say "Yeah?" after communicating a concept, almost every time. In her case it wasn't so much a tic as a shorthand for, "Am I making sense? Are you getting this?"

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It is an extremely fine line to walk between conveying that the character really is that annoying and conveying that you're an annoying writer. I think if you want to convey that the person really is like that, you need to remove the tic from other people's dialog and dialog tags as much as possible and be as overt as possible about it. "Sandra drove me nuts with her constant sighs and her inability to finish a sentence without using the word 'like,'" or something like that.

Most direct representations of meat people are very bad writing. It may not be a despite. It may be a because-of.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

When I was still drawing my more-or-less defunct webcomic, one of the guys writing for me loved to put in what I call wiffle words - 'well,' 'um,' 'ok,' 'so,' 'er,' 'anyway,' - and would sometimes string 2 or 3 together: "OK, so well, anyway we were going down to the store." I have only 72 pixels per inch! I can't put any useless words in! I'd slash his dialogue by half.

[merriehaskell.livejournal.com]

Well, all I can do is look at you, sigh, pause to consider that, look down, and then stalk off. Maybe turn to glare on the way. And I'll do it quickly, and maybe even suddenly, and definitely I'll do it all angrily or shly, depending.

And those are just my bad habits, and not even all of them.

[miz-hatbox.livejournal.com]

Ugh! "Well," "like," "um," and other filler words drive me crazy--they are my own verbal tics and I am trying so hard to get rid of them! (worst of all, my daughter has started to use them too.)

I was in therapy briefly last summer, and heard myself trailing off into "um, well...what can you do..." after almost every paragraph. Made me acutely conscious of it. Argh!

[wintersweet.livejournal.com]

I usually have to edit my LJ posts and even AIM replies to get rid of all the extraneous "Wells."

[stillsostrange.livejournal.com]

"Just" is another word that is just annoying and often over used. I just can't stop using it. Then I reread what I've written and just sigh.

In speech I've developed an annoying habit of uhmming--thankfully my inner editor kills that before it reaches the page.

[velleity-d.livejournal.com]

Utter/utterly.

Em-dashes. Especially at the end of paragraphs.

Characters looking at and away like they're attending a tennis match.

As though.

Conjunctions. Especially the dramatic ones like 'yet' and, erm, 'though.'

I know there are more, but they're not coming to mind at the moment. They'll come back to me as soon as I sit down to edit again, I'm sure.

But at least I'm not overusing words like, oh, say, 'preternatural.' Which is good, because I doubt I could beat Anne Rice in a preternatural catfight.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I am enjoying the visual that last sentence gives me.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

I have found that the "Find" function on my word processor is great for getting rid of unwanted words. So I don't worry about them at all in my first drafts.

B

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yep, I didn't. That's why they're all there as I work through to draft #2.