9 - #TipTuesday Three writing/life tips

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1 - g o o d  +  e v i l

Author of The Strange Case of Dr. Jeykll and Mr. Hyde, Robert Louis Stevenson is a master of manipulating a single character so that both the real and fictional community war with love and hate over his central character. Yes, technically, it's about a man with borderline personality disorder, but my point is that the character is multi-dimensional.

In modern-day (unless it's a satirical piece with the explicit purpose to poke fun at too good/evil characters) you cannot get away with characters that lack corrupt/redeeming qualities!

Do not (I implore you) create a Professor Dolores Umbridge. A quintessential villain, it's my opinion that she was just written too awful for realistic interpretation. (*confession time pt. 1* She ruined Harry Potter for me. I never finished the series and jumped to the cinema adaptations for the rest. I love JK Rowling, but that witch was too much. *eerrrrggg* Even in the books, her inward deplorableness reflected on her appearance. So, it wasn't like Umbridge was this siren type of woman. ...Idk, maybe this was JK Rowling's point, and if it was, I didn't see it in time.)

Same note, do not write God. (Woooaaah, don't come out with your pitchforks! (lol, I wrote pork in the draft. 🤣) *surrenders* I'm just making a point, mmm-kay? Lol) No one wants a perfect angel that only sings hymns and thinks happy things, even Cinderella has flaws!

We're all like onions. Sometimes your eyes might water when a layer peels back. Take inspiration from the people in your life! Your parent(s)/sibling(s)/partner(s)/etc. aren't flawless/foul. (If they are...well, you're either waaay too optimistic/cynical or you haven't been around them long enough to discover their quirks.)

2 - a d v e r b i a l s

Ripped straight from Stephen King's On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft an adverb is a verb modifier that tends to end in '-ly.' Sometimes, they're necessary, but they can become the paving stones on hell's road. The general rule of thumb is to avoid adverbials if you can, and if you can't, space them out! Writing with adverbs is seen as lazy.

Furthermore, King writes, "To put it another way, they're like dandelions. If you have one in your lawn, it looks pretty and unique. If you fail to root it out, however, you find five the next day... fifty the day after that... and then, my brothers and sisters, your lawn is totally, completely, and profligately covered with dandelions. By then you see them for the weeds they really are, but by then it's — GASP!! — too late."

Another author, Patrick E. McLean should clear any confusion with his explanation: "Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all his sentences short, or that he avoid all detail and treat his subjects only in outline, but that every word tell."

3 - l au g h t e r

(Unless you're on America's Funniest Home Videos and have decided to share your pain with the world. ...*confession time pt. 2* My favorite clips are those "ooooowwww, that's gotta hurt. *laughs anyway* Glad I'm not a guy," general people stupidity, running into clear doors, basically anything that doesn't involve baby/animal hurt or where the kid is crying. That's not funny.)

While I've never seen a single thing Charlie Chaplin has done, I feel like we would have been great friends. For some comedians, laughter is a remedy. I value it over everything else because it's my relief (escape, if you will) while I navigate life's obstacles. I choose joy, how about you?

For more tips and tricks (free writing advice), take a look at Wattpad author, EliciaHyder, I'll link her book in the external and comments section! ;)