Writing Quality

In my second draft of Moonscript, I've been working on story cohesion: making sure characters are true to themselves, ensuring actions and turns of events make sense, and so on. Sometimes it is incredibly difficult to come up with a better way to write a scene. My brother has been reading the story as of late and pointing out several problems with inaccuracy of action or plot, which I've been striving to fix.

Just recently, I've discovered the wonder of Sir Terry Pratchett's Discworld. I hadn't read them before, because they are adult books complete with language, dark issues, and innuendos, but I am reading them now, and they are also inspiring works of brilliance. When you are reading them, almost anything else you are reading (except Sanderson and Stengl) pale in comparison.

So Moonscript was looking rather pale to me. While I have no hope of it being anywhere as genius as Pratchett, I am inspired to write my books better. And then it struck me--reading good books isn't enough. Yes, it is good and it will rub off on you. But study them. Not to copy their style or voice or story, but their quality.

In studying Pratchett I discovered that I write a lot about what people's expressions are and how they are saying things all the time. He usually let you imagine for yourself simply by writing the scene and conversation so clearly. But then I discovered that Anne Elisabeth Stengl did often use facial and voice description, and it also read wonderfully. So once again it was a difference of style. I think their quality lies in this--knowing when to use descriptions, metaphors, and on. Timing and placement are tools to be mastered.

I plan on going through some of my favorite authors, (Stengl, Sanderson, Pratchett, Turner) and taking down notes on how they write scenes, conversations, and more. This technique probably occurred to you some time ago, but I look forward to seeing how it helps me shape my writing.