Writer's Block
Being stuck in your plot, lost for ideas, missing character motives... answering questions about writer's block and how I deal with it when writing my novels.

Writer's Block

Being stuck in your plot, lost for ideas, missing character motives... answering questions about writer's block and how I deal with it when writing my novels.


By EelKat Wendy C Allen

I find Writer's Block to be a baffling thing. Partly because I published my first novel in 1978 and since than I have published 138 novels, 30 non-fiction books, 2,000+ short stories, a dozen plays, a few comic book scripts for Disney's Uncle Scrooge and Donald Duck comics, a few dozen novellas, and 10,000+ non-fiction articles. Plus I've written 3 times as much that never got published (yet). Andin all that published and none published writing, in nearly 50 years, I've yet to experience Writer's Block. Not even once.

And so I am left to wonder, does Writer's Block even exist? I think not.

It is my personal belief that Writer's Block is nothing but a cop out excuse that procrastinators and lazy people use to fall back on when they simply do not want to write and can bring themselves to accept the truth, so have to lie to themselves and others by saying: "Oh It's Writer's Block."

There seems to be a trend in wannabe writers, WANTING to be writers, but not actually wanting to WRITE.

They want the fame of being an author.

They want the money of being a bestseller.

They want the prestige of being published.

But they don't want to do the work.

They don't want to put in the time.

They want to write so they can escape the 9 to 5.

They think they can become a bestselling millionaire with a single novel.

They think being a writer means not having to work "a real job".

They think a novel is 50k words and a shocked when they find out publishers won't accept drafts under 120k words.

They think writing a novel means writing 1 hour a day or 1,000 words a day, than lazing around with free time for23 hours of the rest of the day.

They think writing equals sitting down, writing an entire novel in a single night, sending it to a publisher the next day, getting published a week later, and being a millionaire by the end of the month.

They act like we how achieved success, did so by waving  magic wand and POFF overnight instant success.

They don't realize that the first draft takes hours, days, weeks, months to write. The 2nd draft takes weeks or months to edit. They don't know most novels go through 7 or more drafts.

They don't know that authors, work 1, 2, or 3 "regular" 9 to 5 jobs stocking shelves at WalMart or flipped burgers at MickeyD's, because the average royalty of 2% of cover price, while the average advance is $2,000 and MOST books, never sell enough to reach their advance so NEVER start earning royalties. 

They don't realize that authors who live full time off their writing only, write 8+ hours per day, 5 days a week, in a grueling 9 to 5 schedule, complete with a 45 minute lunchbreak, and that they don't have time to OT write, because they have bills to pay.

They don't realize that writing is more hours a day than the 9 to 5, most authors putting in 80 to 100 hour work weeks, NOT 7 hours a week doing the writing one hour a day.

They like the IDEA of calling themselves a writer, but they balk at the REALITY of what being a writer actually means... and THAT is all Writer's Block is. It's a wannabe, being hit in the face with reality and realizing there is now way in hell they can pump out 4 novels a year and a short story a week and an article a day, in order to pay the bills, and still not make enough money to make ends meet.

NEED ADVICEHow do you guys deal with writer's block?

>>>I'm very interested in writing and directing but I can't seem to have any good ideas lately.

If you need ideas? Try this page. I tell you where to get ideas there.

Now...

Grammar.

Learn it.

You want to be a writer, but you don't even care enough about perfecting your writing skills, to be able to write a proper sentence.

People who are writers, love words.

They love reading.

They love writing.

And guess what: they also love diagraming 100 sentences per day, reading high school grammar composition books for light reading before bed, reading dictionaries, reading encyclopedias, handing writing on paper copying entire sections of dictionaries every day.

And THIS is why writers never get writer's block and are never short of ideas.

When was the last time YOU copied out every entry in a dictionary? Never? Than believe me, you ain't a writer because this is a common hobby done by most every published author.

And guess what, it not only teaches you new word so you have a rich vocabulary, it also gives you ideas.

Try it.

See how fast your writer's block melts away.

Think sitting in a park, hand copying an entire dictionary into a spiral bound notebook is boring? Than I guarantee you ado nota have what it takes to be a writer.

>>>I have written 2 screenplays for short films but i want to start working on a another project. But no matter how much i try i cant seem to get any new ideas.

Again, grammar is your friend. Please learn it before you try to pass yourself off as a writer.

Professionals of every craft, know the basics of their craft inside out.

A beadworker who doesn't know how to thread a needle is never going to sew a bead.

A writer who doesn't know even the most rudimentary basics of grammar like capitalizing the word "I", isn't much of a writer now are they?

Think of it this way: would you trust a brain surgeon who couldn't tell the difference between the skull and the brain? No? Then why would you trust a writer who doesn't know grammar?

Learn the basics of your craft if you want to become a professional. ALL careers, all crafts are that way, not just writing. Why do so many writers think they are qualified to write when they don't even bother to learn HOW to write first?

If you want to become a writer, at the very minimum, you need to at least learn HOW to write CORRECTLY.

Just because you can stab a scalpel in the brain of a dead frog in Biology class, doesn't mean you are qualified or have the required skills to preform brain surgery on a live Human.

Writing is the same way. Just because you know how to text words on your cell phone doesn't mean you are qualified or have the required skills to write professionally.

But...

>>>I have written 2 screenplays for short films but i want to start working on a another project. But no matter how much i try i cant seem to get any new ideas.

Have you considered the possibility, maybe you only had 2 stories in you?

Not everyone has endless stories in them. Most people don't in fact. Nothing wrong with that. It just means you are better suited to a different career path.

There is no shame in giving up on a hobby or career if you discover it's not right for you. Try lots of hobbies, lots of careers until you find the one that works best for you.

>>>But no matter how much i try i cant seem to get any new ideas.

Again... Try this page. 

Here's what other's say:

What do you do when you're stuck on the plot?

I often complain about people who don't actually write, giving shitting writing advice to new writers who are actually serious about their writing career, but are being lead down the wrong path, by bull shit bad advice they get from people are not published and never will be.

I feel that this is one of those cases.

I feel like, you are very serious about your writing career and you are trying really hard, but you've been side tracked by someone who was talking out their ass and gave you some really bad advice.

I don't know where to even begin with this. So, I guess, let's just start at the beginning and do a line by line answer.

>>>What do you do when you're stuck on the plot?

I put it aside and work on something else.

Now, I've given this advice to many people, and, I hate to call them retarded, but, if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck... you know how it is.

What do you think when I say this:

I put it aside and work on something else.

What came to mind?

I put it aside and work on something else.

You have a brain, I'm sure you know how to use it. How difficult is it to understand what I mean when I say:

I put it aside and work on something else.

Why am I emphasizing this?

Oh, I don't know, maybe because I'm sick of people being idiots and being too stupid the think for themselves. So let's ask again, what do I mean when I say:

I put it aside and work on something else.

It means, this:

I put it aside and work on something else.

Simple, isn't it?

Apparently not.

I've given this advice to many people, and 99.99% of the time, they respond to say:

"But it's the only story/novel/idea I'm working on. I can't write something else!"

Did I tell you to WRITE something else?

No.

I did not.

I said: put it aside and work on something else.

Me? I put it aside and work on something else. I'll go cook something. Or I'll play a video game. Or I'll take my dog for a walk. I DO SOMETHING ELSE! As in, I stop writing. I take a break. I do something that is NOT writing.

Now, you all know I'm a huge supporter of the advice: JUST WRITE!

But, I'm also a big supporter of: TAKE A FUCKING BREAK FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!

Moving on... next line:

>>>I've written my first few chapters and introduced my main characters.


I'm not sure why but something about this feels WRONG to me.

It feels: fake, forced, unnatural.

Why?

Well, look at how it's written.


>>>I've written my first few chapters and introduced my main characters.

The part that feels wrong is this:

>>>and introduced my main characters.

I get the impression you don't read much.

Main characters are ALWAYS introduced, in the first sentence, not in the first few chapters, and the way you worded this it sounds like you didn't know that.



>>>I know what my main character's three try fail cycles look like, and how the story ends.


What is a "try fail cycles"? I've never heard of it before. And, what is the reason for having 3 of them?

Since I've never heard of it, I doubt I've ever used it, not once in 50 years of publishing 130+ novels, or being the editor in chef of 2 literary magazines for 16 years.

I'm always fascinated by things new writers feel they need to use to write, when really all they need to do is just write the story they want to tell and stop wasting time using the useless the tuttie-fruitie, phooney balonee, mumbo jumbo bad advice they get from people who've never published a single novel in their life. It's like asking the town penniless hobbo for advice on how to become a millionaire.

When you write, do you think a whole sentence in your head and then write it down?

>>>When you write, do you think a whole sentence in your head and then write it down? So for example if you were writing, you would think a sentence, write it down, think another sentence, write it down, think another sentence, write it down, is this how you write? Is this the natural way of writing?


I don't see words, which seems to make me the odd one out in pretty much every writing circle. Apparently most people see words and write them down, and it's very rare for someone to do what I do.

I see the characters, like I'm watching a movie, and I start talking and describe what I see, and I write what I say as I watch them do what they do.

I'm not conscious of the words or sentences. And until I go back and edit it during the second draft phase, I also have absolutely no clue whatsoever what I wrote or if the words were even full sentences or not.

It's why I never know ahead of time what the story or plot or theme is going to be, because I have no clue what I'll watch the characters do, and until I read it during the editing phase I also have no clue what I even wrote.

Someone told me once what I do is called "automatic writing". They said it was usually done by spirit mediums during seances as a way to communicate with ghosts. They said they had never heard of someone doing it to write novels before. 

Apparently what I do is rather unique. I've yet to find anyone else who wrote this way.



>>>So you don't think every sentence you write in your head?

>>>>think: "the cat sat on the mat"

>>>>>write: "the cat sat on the mat"

>>>>think: "it saw a dog"

>>>>>write: "it saw a dog"

>>>?

>>>No?

No.

I think that is why I find people who write outlines, look up words in thesaurus, say they can't think of what to say, or say they have writer's block to be so bizarre.

My response is always: 

   *    WHY would you NEED to write an outline? Why don't you just let your characters do whatever they want to do? How can you possibly know ahead of time what the story is to eve create an outline?

   *    WHY do you NEED a thesaurus? Why are are you even looking up words? Shouldn't you be watching the characters to see what they'll do next?

   *   WHY do you NEEED to THINK about what you are going to say? Why do you NEED to say anything? Why can't you just ALLOW the characters to do and say things for themselves?

   *    What is writer's block? I really don't believe it is real. I think it's just writers being too lazy to write down what their characters wan them to write.

It's also why I have to write every day, because if I don't, I'll miss a day of the characters' lives and they aren't going to do it over again. The things they do aren't recorded. I can't put in a DVD and watch them do it again. If I don't take the time to watch them that day and write what they did, I've missed that whole section of the story.

The person who called what I do "automatic writing" pointed out, that, a good 90%+ of my characters in my novels ARE in fact ghosts, spirits, undead, liches, Demons, or Faeries, and that chances are very high that, I'm what they termed "Faerie sighted" and am actually "crossing the veil" (as they called it) to simply watch the very real spirit world and that my novels may in fact be, nothing more than me writing down actual events that are actually occurring in some other dimension.

(If you don't know the series: main character Quaraun is alive, by his companions are all various types of undead and he doesn't know everyone - BeaLuna, Bullgarr, FarDarrig, etc.- are all dead and no one in any of the taverns or villages can see them, so people see him talking and think he's talking to himself).

I'm not sure what I think about that, given that I do not believe in the existence of ghosts and demons and such.

In any case, my method of writing, is apparently seen as "weird" and "unusual" by other writers.

Writer's block has become this romanticized thing ... Personally, I don't think the shit exists. Everybody -- regardless of the profession -- has good days and bad days, productive days and days where almost nothing gets done. I am not sure why writers think their lack of production constitutes some special designation.

^^^THIS^^^

So much this.

This is exactly what I think, as well.

Can the advice to "write your way through writer's block" be bad advice?

>>>Can the advice to "write your way through writer's block" be bad advice?

Yes. I think it is.

Forcing yourself to do a thing, that you really just do not want to do, is always bad for you mentally and emotionally.

The sentiment of writing your way through writer's block, is based on the principle of "Do your school work because you have to, not because you want to" type of mentality. And this is exactly the type of mentality which causes children to not want to do their school work.

Children who WANT to do schoolwork, excel in school.

Children who do schoolwork because they "have to or else" do not desire to do their school work and fail at school.

This is true of everything in life.

You become good t the things you love doing, because you WANT to do them.

And when it comes to writing, writing through your writer's block is just plain bad advice, because it's ignoring the fact that you DO NOT WANT to write.

Sit yourself own and ask yourself why you are writing?

If the answer is ANYTHING other than "It's fun to write and I'm having fun writing" than this is the problem. 

In my experience, people who write for the fun of writing, NEVER experience writer's block because they  are filled with a drive, a burning desire to write what they want, when they want, how they want, come hell or high water, without giving any concern to what others thing about what they write.

And the moment they stop writing for fun, they immediately start worrying about what others think. Will they think it's good enough? Will they think there are too many troupes? Will they think it's bad? Will they think it's worth publishing? Will they give me good or bad reviews? ow do I write to get people to like me? How do I make sure everyone loves what I write?

Suddenly, they freeze up. Stage fright. Others are watching. Worry, fuss, worry, fuss, fuss, worry, about what others are thinking.

Stop worrying about what others are going to think and your writer's block will go away.

But try to write through writers block and you'll just fuss and worry, worry and fuss over perfectionism and what others think, and soon you'll dread writing, give up writing, declare writing too difficult, and soon be bitching and moaning on writer's forums that writer's block is messing you up.

>>>Almost every single piece of advice I've ever read/heard about writer's block is saying push through the block and just write


Yes, and almost every piece of writing advice that you find on forums, subreddits, and blogs is writing by wannabe writers who have never published a single thing in their life and never will.

They are people giving advice on something they themselves don't do and never will do.

It's just people who don't write giving bad writing advice, and it's a plague on the internet the past few years.

What they do is copy and paste what they heard someone else say, and someone else will copy and paste what they say and so on and so forth.

It's the equivalent of the blind leading the blind and we all know what Jesus had to say about that, now don't we?

As Jesus taught us, only an idiot would take advice from and idiot who doesn't do the think they are giving advice for.

When you want to learn to drive a car, you don't ask the guy who only ever drove a bike to teach you, so why when you want to learn to write, do you go to forums full of people whom have never been published to ask them how to get published?

>>>Almost every single piece of advice I've ever read/heard about writer's block is saying push through the block and just write, but I wonder if that's always good advice. 

It's not. It's never good advice. That's the problem. But people are too busy listening to advice from unpublished wannabe writers to bother listening to the actual published authors who actually know what they are talking about.

>>>I think it works sometimes, because often so-called "writer's block" is just laziness or a brief creative stump, but sometimes it's a lot more than that, and "writing your way through it" can even be detrimental to one's one self-esteem as a writer. 

Yep. You've hit the nail right on the head.

>>> often so-called "writer's block" is just laziness 

99.99% of every case of Writer's Block that I've seen posted about on this subreddit IS seer 100% laziness, as can be clearly seen by the way they describe their so-called Writer's Block, so it's quite a lot more than often that it happens.

Maybe you'll find people with ACTUAL writer's block in other places, but not on this subreddit that's for sure.

Half the time, the "I have Writer's Block" posts read like they are just saying they have Writer's Block so they can be a part of the "in" crowd.

The Writer's Block threads get 100+ comments in the first few minutes. They are the biggest threads on this subreddit, and just LOOK at what the OPs and the commenters say in their posts. It's nothing but a circle jerk pity party of them all patting each other on the back and yakking about "oh poor me, I'm watching anime because I can't think of what to write!" - "Yeah me too. What anime are you watching?" And next thing you know the whole thread is a few hundred posts about anime.

Uhm, yeah... they ain't interested in killing Writer's Block, they are just bored and looking for fellow anime fans to talk to. Fuck writing. They don't give a shit about writing. And it shows, just by how they talk about writer's block.

How many times every hour do we see a thread start with: "I have Writer's Block, can you write a scene for me about...?" or  "I have Writer's Block, can you give me an idea...?" and NOT "Hoe do I get over my Writer's Block?" The mods delete the requests for us published authors to write things for the lazy asses too lazy to do their own work and hoping to bum off the rest of us, but if you're like me and refresh the new tab ever 15 minutes, you'll see them before the mods get a chance to delete them and you'll see that there are HUNDREDS of these "write me a scene because I have writer's bock" request posts made every hour of every day for weeks, months, years... I've been on this subreddit for 8 years and this type of most is just a flood. I'm glad I don't have to mod this subreddit. A total nightmare of welfare bums slumming of writers hoping to get a book written without writing a word themselves. It's disgusting.

>>>The writer might hate what they're working on, feel like quitting, and think that something is wrong with them because they can't write.


Yes.

I've never understood this.

I see it all the time.

Writers say they hate what they are working on but they feel they can't quit it because they already PUT SOOOOOOOOOOOOO MANY WORDS into it and than they say it's some measly ass teeny number like 20k words. You can write that much in 3 hours and they bitch about how it took them months to write that much. What the fuck?

Good god! 

I write on average 25k words a day, and they bitching it took them 3 months to write less than that?

Yeah, I can see you hate your work. It's pretty obvious you hate it when you spend 3 months avoiding writing so much that you only get 20k words down in that time.

SHESH!

Write something else for crying out loud!

And than they get all boo-hoo, but I spent 3 months on it!

So what?

If you hate i and are struggling to write it, put it aside and do something else. Find something you do like to write or do something that not writing.

No one's forcing you to be a writer.

And no one is forcing you to write something you hate.

So why do it?

Why force yourself to write when you don't want to?

Why force yourself to write something you hate?

I will never understand what so many wannabe writers do this.

What do you think of "Your actions demonstrate what you really want to do."

>>>I heard this on a podcast yesterday, and I hear variants of it pretty regularly. The caster was basically saying, look at what you do in your day. Whatever it is that you do, that's what you really want to do. So if you say you want to get in shape, are you in the gym? If you're not, then you don't really want to get in shape. If you did, you'd be in the gym.


This is kind of what I've been saying about Writer's Block for years. And I think for most people who claim to have Writer's Block the situation is they really don't want to write.

I've talked with so many newbie writers, face to face at workshops and lectures, not online, who will ask me how do they get over Writer's Block and I'll ask about what they are writing and they'll start listing off excuses to the tune of:

"Well I haven't written anything yet. I have this idea, and every day for the past 10 years, I'll sit down to write it, but than I end up watching tv/youtube instead. It's just so boring to write."

And, there it is.

You'd be surprised how often people come right out and say: "Writing is soooooo boring. I'd rather watch tv."

And this is why I don't like even dealing with people who have Writer's Block, because they don't WANT to do the work, they don't WANT to write. 

They like the idea of writing, they want to be thought of as a writer, or they think writing will give them instant fame or money. But when it comes right down to the actual ACT of writing, they find writing boring, a drag, not fun to do, and come and right and say they'd rather do something else.

Well, if you'd rather do something else, just go do something else and stop wasting my tie asking me how to cure Writer's Block, because clearly you don't have Writer's Block if you don't even like the act of writer! 

Now, sure this doesn't apply to every body. People have jobs and school and health and family that take time and unexpected illness, weather, emergencies, etc come up. There are legitimate reasons why some people don't have time to write every day and may have to put writing on the back burner for a few months or even years. But I'm not talking about those people. Those people WILL write when they have free time to do so. Those people DO write when they have an hour here or an hour there. Those people sit down and they ENJOY the act of writing and their mind isn't going "I wonder what's on tv?" Those people DO NOT think: "I'm bored, I'm going to was the news/sports/sitcoms/soaps." 

No. Those people are people with busy lives and they write when they find time. And these are NOT the people I'm talking about. The people I'm talking about are the ones who DO have the free time. The DO have time to site and watch an entire season of their favorite tv show. They DO have the time to be surfing YouTube. They DO have the time to be toxic on Twitter. I'm talking about the people who DO have the time to write, and DON'T write because they'd rather being doing something else, and than complain they can't write.


>>>And that has a pretty clear translation to writing. If you wanted to be a writer, you'd be writing. So if you're not writing, you clearly don't want it b/c your actions demonstrate that you don't want to write.

Yes. I do think there are a lot of cases where this is the case. Like I said before, not always. People have lives that take up a lot of time and energy. But excluding the people who WOULD write and DO write in between free time, there are still a lot of people who just procrastinate and act like procrastination is an entitled part of being a writer and it's not.

I've seen far too many newbs use writing, as an excuse for other things.

"Honey, take out the trash."

"I can't, I'm writing" - even though he's not written a word in weeks and has no intention of doing so, and is only pretending to be a writer to keep his wife from nagging him to do housework.

Now, here is a very interesting Writer's Block question, that is very specific to their situation, and normally I wouldn't answer a question that is very narrow focused to a single project. I like to answer more general questions that will be of use to a wide range of writers.

But in this instance, the question asker made some glaring grammar errors that have caused their question to have the EXACT REVERSE meaning to what it was they intended to ask.

The way they worded their question, they want to incite hate against Leftists.

BUT... what they actually meant to say was they wanted to incite hate against Right-wingers.

This a case, where their writer's block seems to be caused by the fact that this writer suffers from a very server case of near illiteracy, to the point they can barely say what they mean to say.

And I have noticed that since around 2018, this is a vastly growing trend, especially in American writers between the ages of 20 and 25.

I'm not sure what has caused this issue, but it is pretty apparent that when these people were in high school, something changed on a nation wide level (probably around 2012 to 2015) to cause a mass influx of people today, in their early 20s, not being able to string together even basic 1st grade level sentences.

Incoherencies and inability to convey the intending meaning, has become a massive plague in American youth of this age range.

I am left to assume that apparently there was a federal wide change in how English Grammar & Composition was taught o a nationwide level, forcing ALL public school across the nation to change their textbooks or curriculum or testing methods or something, as there is no other way to explain hw this massive, nationwide, phenomena of tens of millions of youth suddenly have no ability to form a coherent sentence.

In any case, this person was asking how to fix their writer's block so that they could go back to writing ANTI-Right-wing music and because they are so desperately illiterate and suffer from such a severe case of no reading or writing comprehension at al, they ended up wording their question in a manner causing the meaning to be the opposite of what they intended, and because this is a such a huge problem for so many 20somethings now in 2021, I'd like to look at this issue and show why this is a common cause of writer's block.

I believe that many, if not all, cases of writer's block for this age group, are caused by just a general lack of education, and that most, if not all, writers block cases found within this age group, could be cured, by them simply, sitting down with a good Grammar and Composition high school text book and doing the daily "diagram 100 sentences" exercises that GOOD English Grammar text books require you to do.


I want to make art that radicalizes people toward leftist views, or just leftist views in general. Which specific issues are the most useful for this purpose?


>>>I want to make art that radicalizes people toward leftist views, or just leftist views in general. Which specific issues are the most useful for this purpose?

>>>The only artistic skill I have is audio engineering, and I think if I practice a lot and use my “low” voice I can rap too. I am getting a nagging urge to create, and I want to use it for a good cause.

>>>But I’m getting major writers block when it comes to issues to talk about that will get people angry for the right reasons and be inspired to organize and want to overthrow capitalism.

>>>I know that my voice alone can never be the sole thing that does this (especially coming from my place of privilege), but I want to help a collective effort for the betterment of the oppressed and humanity in general.

>>>Any tips on how I can focus my political anger and put my thoughts into words? Ive never been good at it tbh

Okay, so first step to being a writers is to know the meanings of words and use words correctly.

So, step number one, but a dictionary and read it cover to cover.

Step number 2, copy out, by hand, pen/pencil on paper, not typed on a computer, the entire dictionary, at least once per year.

Yes, I DO, do this.

In this way you will learn the meanings of words and will use them correctly.

Why do I say this?

Because you said THIS:


>>>I want to make art that radicalizes people toward leftist views, or just leftist views in general. Which specific issues are the most useful for this purpose?


On a PRO-Leftist subreddit.

Uhm. Yeah.

You just asked how to write ANTI-Leftist lyrics to incite people to HATE Leftists.

And in reading your posting history I can see that you ARE Leftist and are someone looking to write ANTI-Right lyrics to incite people to HATE Right Wingers.

Let's look at your question again and the word choices you made with it:

>>>I want to make art that radicalizes people toward leftist views, or just leftist views in general. Which specific issues are the most useful for this purpose?


If I was to answer your question as you asked it, I would say something like this:

Top leftist view I can think of that would cause outrage against Leftists, would be to write about would be the mass murder of 5,000 to 9,000 children at the hands of their mothers EVERY DAY in America... leftists call it abortion and a woman's right to choose, but it doesn't change the fact that it's legal murder and more babies are murdered in America EACH YEAR, than the total of all Jews, Gays, Trans, Gypsies, Blacks, and Twins who were murdered total by the Nazis in WW2.

But... you ARE a Leftist and you PROMOTE the mass murder of children as the central core of your belief system, and therefore, wording your lyrics in that manner would cause people to hate YOU, instead of inciting them to join you in your goal of mass murdering every child on the planet.

As we can see when you later say THIS:

>>>But I’m getting major writers block when it comes to issues to talk about that will get people angry for the right reasons and be inspired to organize and want to overthrow capitalism.

You wish to overthrow capitalism. And yet you started your question by saying this:

>>>I want to make art that radicalizes people toward leftist views, or just leftist views in general. Which specific issues are the most useful for this purpose?

Which means you wish to overthrow Leftism.

Can you see now, the power of words and WHY, you should learn to be more careful with what you say?

I went back and looked at a few of your other posts and, this is pretty common for you. You seem to be of the habit of writing double standard, double negative, I mean this even though I said that, type of incredibly incoherent writing. It's a wonder that any one can understand anything you say at all.

Based on how you type if I had to guess, I'd say you dropped out of school somewhere around 5th to 8thgrade and and spent most of your school years getting Ds and Fs and never got anything better than a C-.

Yes your writing IS that bad.

Now, that's not to say you can't become a writer, or that you should not write. No. Not at all.

What I'm saying is, you have a serious flaw in your grasp on basic grammar skills, and I believe it is directly the CAUSE of your writer's block.

And I believe that if you were to sign up for a few adult education/remedial reader English classes at you local high school/community center/community college, you would be able to fully end your writer's block once and for all, for the rest of your life, with just 3 months/1 semester of brushing up on your grammar skills.

Think of it this way:

It is difficult to know what to say, when you don't have a firm grasp on how words work.

You can not get your message across to people, if you don't know which order to put words into.

You can not make people understand your views, if you can't express your views legibly.

Learn how to use words, and you will find that it's a lot easier to put your thoughts and feelings to words.

>>>Any tips on how I can focus my political anger and put my thoughts into words? Ive never been good at it tbh


Well, at least you are aware that you lack writing skills, which is more than I can say for most 20something writers who are usually prone to glorify their blatant illiteracy by calling it "art".

Most 20somethings I encounter who write like you do, which is about 99% of the ones who were not homeschooled, are quick to say: "I'm writing art! I don't need to learn writing skills!" and they will yap about how they are great with words, and everyone else is stupid for not understanding them.

You on the other hand are much more mature, because you are willing to admit you have trouble with words.

Well, a lot of people do struggle with words, just not many are willing to admit it and even fewer are willing to work on it and try to better themselves.

Admitting you have a problem is the first step to correcting the problem. You can't try to fix something when you don't believe it needs fixing, after all.

You don't have Writer's block... you just don't know basic grammar skills. Learn grammar skills and your writer's block will go away.

FAQs: What books do you use to look up English Grammar rules?

You probably won't like this, but I am constantly practicing English Grammar, by daily doing High School Grammar lessons. I diagram 100 sentence a day and have done so since 1996. 

Yes. While you all want the instant quick answer to writing rules, so you skip school and take the easy way out, I go through an entire High School manual in a couple of weeks, and when I get to the end I start over again.

I didn't have the luxury of going to school like you did, so I had no choice but to teach myself. I did the entire ABeka Grammar series starting from Grade 4 to Grade 12, then repeated it starting at Grade 7 to 12, and repeat it from Grade 7 to Grade 12, continually ever since. It takes me about 8 months to complete all 5 years' worth of textbooks. And when I reach the end, I start over again, and when I reach the end again, I start over again.

When I say I constantly practice English Grammar, I mean what I say and I actually practice English Grammar and I find it quiet annoying when school-skipping idiots respond to that by saying: "But I write every day and I never improve."

Did I tell you to write every day? No. I most certainly did not. I told you to practice English Grammar. There's a hell of a big difference.

Practice makes perfect. If you want to perfect your writing skills, you must first perfect your Grammar skills. If you continually write without knowing your errors, you only practice the art of writing errors and perfect the art of writing errors perfectly incorrect.

You will never be a skilled writer if you are not first skilled at Grammar.

Before you can practice writing, you must first practice Grammar.

I've not listed all the books below as there are so many. Each grade consists of a set of books:

   *   The Student Textbook

   *   The Teacher's Manual

   *   A Student WorkBook

   *    A Teacher's WorkBook Answer Key 

   *   A Student Tests and Quizzes Book

   *   A Spelling, Vocabulary, and Poetry Manual

   *   A Teacher's Answer Key For The Spelling Book

   *   A Reading/Literature Student TextBook

   *   The Reading/Literature Teacher's Manual

   *   A Student WorkBook For Reading/Literature

   *    A Teacher's WorkBook Answer Key  For Reading/Literature

   *   A Student Tests and Quizzes Book For Reading/Literature

Each book costs between $40 to $70, average that to $50 x 12 books per grade = around $600 per grade, times 5 grades (Grade 7 to Grade 12) = around $7,200 to buy the entire set of books and complete all 5 years from Grade 7 to Grade 12... so, you'll need to dish out quite a bit of money if you seek to gain the same writing skill I have using the same method I use to practice Grammar.

Do note that ABeka books are considered to be 4 grades ahead of the grade listed. For example, what ABeka book teaches in 4th Grade is what is taught in 8th Grade in Public Schools, while the12th Grade books is a college level. ABeka books are not used in standard public schools, they are used by private schools that specialize in teaching gifted/child prodigies that are too far ahead of their age group to be taught at a normal grade range.

Writing Questions - How do you deal with writers block?

>>>Writing Questions - How do you deal with writers block?

I don't believe in Writer's Block.

I've never personally experienced Writer's Block AND in nearly 50 years and talking with tens of thousands of writers, I've yet to find a writer who could prove to me their writer's block could not be cured by one of three ways:


   1: Stop being lazy.

   2: Stop procrastinating.

   3: Take some classes to improve your grammar skills/learn better grammar.


Possibly a side effect of being a 5th generation Mormon, but I believe in self sufficiency. I was raised to believe that laziness and procrastination were vile, evil sins. The sin of Slothfulness.

A Slothful person tries to find the easy way out, seeks to sit on their ass and get others to do the work for them. 

Everyone with "I have Writer's Block" on their lips, seems to just want an instant solution instead of putting in the effort themselves. They don't seem to WANT to write. It's more like they like the IDEA of being a writer, but don't actually want to do the work required of writers.

From my perspective, it just looks to me like a large majority of "I have writer's block" whinners have an idea for a game or a movie and they want some ghost writer to write it for them so they can get the credit without doing the work, so that they can see their name as a writer in the end credits.

In fact very few people who bitch about writer's block, even are looking to write a novel, and worse most of them talk about how they hate reading.

What the fuck?

They don't like to read.

They don't like to write.

But they call themselves writers and bitch about having writer's block.

So, no, answering your question, no, I've never had to deal with writer's block, probably because I'm a writer and, I don't know, there's this little thing we writer's do that makes us writers, you might have heard of it, it's called writing.

>>>So I've been writing stories for a few months now. At first I could make a chapter in maybe a day or two easy.

Wow. A "writer" posting on Reddit, who actually write something. You're as rare as an invisible pink unicorn, you know that, right?

>>>But as I've improved on my writing and become more comfortable with writing longer and longer chapters, I've become a lot more....self conscious I guess? Not sure if that's the right word. But lately I take a while trying to write the perfect sentence constantly.


This is not the first time I've heard of this complaint. In fact, I talked about it earlier on this page.

I don't understand this.

I don't think I will ever be able to understand it either.

I've never done this.

There is no such thing as a perfect sentence.

A sentence uses words, to convey a message. It has a complete thought. It is made up of a subject and a verb and enough other words (adjectives, nouns, adverbs, prepositions, articles, etc.) to tell the reader what action the subject did with that verb.

It doesn't need to be perfect. It needs to convey a complete thought.

When someone says something like this:

>>>I take a while trying to write the perfect sentence constantly.

My first thought is to think, they don't know basis grammar rules well enough to use them without thinking about it.

Take Grammar Composition classes.

Buy Grammar Composition textbooks for high school or college levels and read the book and do the exercises on your own. Dissect no fewer than 100 sentence per day. Strive to do at least one lesson a day, and then apply what you learned that day to your writing.

When you are confidant in how to dissect/diagram sentences, you will be able to let your writing flow without having to think about placement of words or making a sentence perfect.

>>>By putting in more effort, I try to make my story the absolute best I can constantly.

It sounds to me like you are trying to edit while you write, rather than just writing your first draft and editing it later.

You need to just write your first draft. Vomit it out on the page as fast as you can. Don't think about anything else. Don't worry about grammar or spelling. Nothing. Just write the story.

After you have finished the story, THAN, is the time to go back and edit it to fix errors and mistakes, to make thoughts more clear, to fill in plot holes, etc.

Also, this is NOT Writer's Block.

You do NOT have Writer's Block. 

You're just getting in your own way while you are writing, because you are worrying about if your writing is good enough or not.

>>>I pretty much overthink how to perfectly write my chapter/story where I barely make any progress if any at all.

Again, this is NOT Writer's block.

You KNOW what the problem is and it's NOT Writer's Block.

YOU re the problem and you know that, you just said it yourself.

You have admitted that you know what you want to write and you enjoy writing a chapter a day and that writing is easy for you.

You have also admitted that after you started posting on fanfiction sites, and people started reading your work, than now you feel the need to over edit what you are still writing the first draft, and it's causing you to not get your writing done.

The problem is easy to identify.

It's stage fright.

While no one was reading your work, you could write without giving any thought to perfection.

Now that your work is online and strangers are reading it, you are worried about what others are thinking.

You are afraid people won't like your work, won't think it's good enough.

You are afraid of people judging you.

This is not something any one online can help you with.

This is a psychological problem, that comes from swaying to peer pressure instead of having a strong backbone and the will power to stand on your own two feet come hell or high water.

No writer online or offline can help you here.

This is NOT a writing problem, this is a self esteem problem.

>>>Have any of you experienced this?

No.

I'm afraid I've never seen the value in kissing other people's asses, never seen the need to back down in my beliefs, never felt I was a bug under a rug waiting to be squashed by others, so I never feel the need to bend to the whims of others.

Self esteem is not a problem for me, it never has been. Quite the contrary, I tend to have the opposite problem: extreme arrogance.

I am aware that I come off as arrogant. But what many perceive as arrogance is in fact, me being VERY strong willing, very dominate personality, very bull headed, and possessing a sheer determination to never bend, never bow, never break.

I have strong convictions and I stand by them.

I don't let people push me around.

I fight back.

I carry a brick in my purse and if you start pushing me around, I'm going to break your nose and smash you're front teeth out with it, and you wouldn't be the first person I done it to.

You see that's the difference between someone like me, and someone like you.

I'm a survivor.

The world is harsh. The world is cruel. The weak fall by the wayside and strong push on.

You don't have Writer's Block, you simply have a weak will in the face of peer pressure and you desire to kiss reader ass.

>>>How have you managed to work around this?



>>>Is it as easy as just trying to force your way through that?

Your Character Creation
Questions Answered:

  1. When naming your characters, do you give any thought to the actual meaning?
  2. I need help Writing Mixed Race Asian Characters
  3. What would happen if an Elf adopted a Human baby?
  4. I need to write a rape scene, but I don't think I've made the character evil enough. How do you write a sleazy man?
  5. Is the main character a reflection of you, if yes, how?
  6. How to deal with writing racist characters?
  7. How can a non-Human villain who hates Humans learn to love a Human character?
  8. I'm creating my own character and does it matter what I call her, even if it sounds slightly odd?
  9. How do you write a demisexual?
  10. My main character is going to murder his children. How do I handle writing him?
  11. What inspired you to use a mentally ill person as your main character? 
  12. Creating mute characters.
  13. Is a 20 year age difference between my main couple weird?
  14. How to write a bi-sexual character?
  15. Any help with writing a cannibal chef?
  16. What is the difference between transgender, transsexual, transvestite, and intersex?
  17. My character is too much like myself, how do I change her?
  18. How do you pick what mental illness to write about? 
  19. What jobs did Medieval servants have?
  20. What can you tell me about writing a polygamous character?
  21. Should I write incest in my stories?
  22. How do you make sure you get your character accurate or true to life when dealing with mental illnesses?
  23. Any advice for writing a romantic relationship between an adult and a child?
  24. How to Develop Your Characters When Writing a Fiction Novel
  25. Why Character Development is Different for Short Stories
  26. Are In-Laws Family? (Writing Gypsy Culture Accurately)
  27. I'm writing an Autistic character. Can you tell me what it is like to live with Autism?
  28. I heard you write transvestites but it's not Erotica? How can you write a gay transvestite character and the book not be Erotica? It's not possible for transvestites to be in anything but Erotica.
  29. My characters keep being cookie cutter Mary Sues and Stevie Steus. How do you creature such highly detailed complex characters?

Even More Pages Which Talk About Character Creation:

Since people often ask which books I recommend to writers, here is a section of books I use when writing my novels.

Books I use when writing novels:

Note, some of these are writing books, but most of them are NOT. These are the references books that I use when writing almost every novel I write. These books are always on my desk and I reference them constantly, daily, over and over again.

And when you see what books I use to write The Quaraun novels with, than you can understand why they are like they are.

As you can see I rarely consult writing books when I want to figure out how to write something. Which is why I'm continually baffled by so many newbie writers who rush to ask other writers how to write.

You think of a thing, then write what you see in your head. It really is that simple. You just write down everything you see.

You do not need writing how to books or advice from authors to figure out how to write the story you want to tell.

Note too that I bought these books new and for cover price and many of them are self published short run books with only 100 to 1,000 copies printed (if you didn't know DnD books were self published and often had only 100 to 1,000 copies published than, you don't your DnD very well) and as such have been out of print for 20+ years and often sell for $500 to $3k+ now today, so, I don't expect you to be able to amass this same collection of 10,000+ DnD books I have, but, you wanted to know which books I use when I write my novels and here they are:

Wondering how authors find publishers?

Writer's Market -  it's a giant 1,000+ page book, costs around $40, is like a yellow pages style phone book directory of every publishing house, magazine, anthology, newspaper, and literary agent currently seeking submissions. There are around 20,000 publishers listed in it.

They come out with a new edition every year, so get the 2018 edition which comes out in a few weeks.

It's not easy to get listed in the Writer's Market. They do a major amount of rigorous filtering, to make sure no scams get in.

The Writer's Market has been the #1 way authors find publishers since the 1940s.

Here's their website: http://www.writersmarket.com/

They have an online directory that is the same as the print book, but it costs around $70 a year to access it.

More Pages Helpful To New Writers:

FAQs: What books do you use to look up English Grammar rules?

You probably won't like this, but I am constantly practicing English Grammar, by daily doing High School Grammar lessons. I diagram 100 sentence a day and have done so since 1996. 

Yes. While you all want the instant quick answer to writing rules, so you skip school and take the easy way out, I go through an entire High School manual in a couple of weeks, and when I get to the end I start over again.

I didn't have the luxury of going to school like you did, so I had no choice but to teach myself. I did the entire ABeka Grammar series starting from Grade 4 to Grade 12, then repeated it starting at Grade 7 to 12, and repeat it from Grade 7 to Grade 12, continually ever since. It takes me about 8 months to complete all 5 years' worth of textbooks. And when I reach the end, I start over again, and when I reach the end again, I start over again.

When I say I constantly practice English Grammar, I mean what I say and I actually practice English Grammar and I find it quiet annoying when school-skipping idiots respond to that by saying: "But I write every day and I never improve."

Did I tell you to write every day? No. I most certainly did not. I told you to practice English Grammar. There's a hell of a big difference.

Practice makes perfect. If you want to perfect your writing skills, you must first perfect your Grammar skills. If you continually write without knowing your errors, you only practice the art of writing errors and perfect the art of writing errors perfectly incorrect.

You will never be a skilled writer if you are not first skilled at Grammar.

Before you can practice writing, you must first practice Grammar.

I've not listed all the books below as there are so many. Each grade consists of a set of books:

   *   The Student Textbook

   *   The Teacher's Manual

   *   A Student WorkBook

   *    A Teacher's WorkBook Answer Key 

   *   A Student Tests and Quizzes Book

   *   A Spelling, Vocabulary, and Poetry Manual

   *   A Teacher's Answer Key For The Spelling Book

   *   A Reading/Literature Student TextBook

   *   The Reading/Literature Teacher's Manual

   *   A Student WorkBook For Reading/Literature

   *    A Teacher's WorkBook Answer Key  For Reading/Literature

   *   A Student Tests and Quizzes Book For Reading/Literature

Each book costs between $40 to $70, average that to $50 x 12 books per grade = around $600 per grade, times 5 grades (Grade 7 to Grade 12) = around $7,200 to buy the entire set of books and complete all 5 years from Grade 7 to Grade 12... so, you'll need to dish out quite a bit of money if you seek to gain the same writing skill I have using the same method I use to practice Grammar.

Do note that ABeka books are considered to be 4 grades ahead of the grade listed. For example, what ABeka book teaches in 4th Grade is what is taught in 8th Grade in Public Schools, while the12th Grade books is a college level. ABeka books are not used in standard public schools, they are used by private schools that specialize in teaching gifted/child prodigies that are too far ahead of their age group to be taught at a normal grade range.



Answering readers' FAQ:
Why is so much of the Quaraun series set in the 1970s & 1980s? Why not set it in current times?

>>>Why is so much of the Quaraun series set in the 1970s & 1980s? Why not set it in current times?

When Quaraun times travels to the future, the story IS SET IN CURRENT TIMES.

The date Quaraun arrives in is ALWAYS the same day that I wrote the scene.

Meaning, if Quaraun ends up in 1978, it's because I wrote that scene in 1978.

Meaning, if Quaraun ends up in 1982, it's because I wrote that scene in 1982.

Meaning, if Quaraun ends up in 1994, it's because I wrote that scene in 1994.

Meaning, if Quaraun ends up in 2013, it's because I wrote that scene in 2013.

MOST of the short stories in the Quaraun series were written between 1982 and 1987, and as Quaraun is ALWAYS in the current time of the date I'm writing, and because I wrote most of those scenes in 1982 to 1987, that means most of the scenes end up set between 1982 to 1987.

FAQs: When you say to read in order to learn what good writing looks like, but than you say don't read anything self published or written in the past 50 years, what than do you suggest I read to learn what good writing looks like?

I recommend 3 things.

   *   1: I recommend the Reading/Literature TextBooks of the ABeka Grammar series that I previously mentioned above. I also recommend reading EVERY PAGE IN ORDER of EVERY volume of the series starting with Grade 4 and ending with Grade 12. (Those books are listed below).

   *   2: WELL WRITTEN classic literature. (Listed in the second column below)

   *   3: American and World History TextBooks. (Listed in the third column below)

   *   4: Science TextBooks. (Listed in the 4th column below)

These are the books I personally read to see/examine how good quality writing looks on the published page and teach myself to improve my own writing by mimicking the writing style seen in the books listed below.

These books are how I taught myself to read and write. I was not allowed to go to school and spent 27 years of my life, since I was 8 years old, locked in a cage, tortured, beaten, and starved.

As an adult I used these books to teach myself as I had no other way to gain an education.

Again, not every book is listed, as there are too many to list them all, but enough are listed to get you started.

   *   1: I recommend the Reading/Literature TextBooks of the ABeka Grammar series



   *   2: WELL WRITTEN classic literature.

A note here... I make it a point to read no fewer than 100 books a year - 2 books a week. Some years I have as many as 300 books by reading a book almost every day. I own more than 300,000 books and have read more then 10,000 of them with a goal to attempt to read them all. As such, I can't even begin to list anything close to all of the books I read. Though I will point out 90% of them were written before 1950 and all of them are hardcover or paperback, not one of my 300k books is an ebook or an audio book. I don't read ebooks nor do I listen to audio books.



   *   3: American and World History TextBooks.

Yes, I DO classify reading History and Geography books as good, quality recommended daily light  reading that should be done in between regular novel and short story reading.

It is my belief that when one ONLY reads fiction, ones view of what is goof writing becomes warped. Thus I recommend reading historical documents, including to go to your local museums to read important documents about your town/state/region. This is especially important if you, like me, write local tales, stories set in your home town/state/region.

This is also why I have such a strong grasp on describing the places Quaraun travels to in the novels I write, without my ever having set foot outside of Maine.



    *   4: Science TextBooks.

Yes. Once again, like with History and Geography, I DO classify reading Science books as good, quality recommended daily light  reading that should be done in between regular novel and short story reading.

I firmly believe that if one does not have a working knowledge of the world around you, not just it's history and geography, but also it's plants, animals, rocks, functions, ad place in the universe, that one will not be able to successfully write descriptions of the world character in your novels live in, because without knowing how your own world exists, how can you even begin to know how to create a fictional world?

As such, I put reading science books as highly important for anyone seeking to write novels.

And again, as I was not allowed to go to school and was locked in a cage from the time I was 8 until I was 31, I did not start studying science until I was an adult, and as such, I started with Grade K5 and went all the way through to Grade 12, doing so in 3 years, so that I could apply for a GED which I got when I was 37. The Science books listed below are the ones I used to do that with, and again mostly by ABeka as I absolutely refuse to use books with frutie tuttie Evolution or Big Bang hocus pocus mumbo jumbo. 

Also, I quickly discovered that as young as 4th grade, vile degradations of sex perversion and utterly disgusting lessons about sex are in Science books published by perverse public school textbook publishers, so I burned them all in the wood stove I will NOT recommend any of the horrifically horrendous, disgustedly perverted sex fill Science books published by non-Christian companies.

It's no wonder the American population has children so perverse and degraded, when they stoop so low as to spend more than 75% of their science textbooks being devoted to the vile disgusting top of sex education. It's utterly deplorable. Sex has no business being in schools. With that kind of filth being taught to children it's no wonder American's gone to shit.



Writing Disabled Characters








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