Recent content by ravenowl

Update: thanks for all your advice. I sent the writer a pm and just mentioned that the quality of the translation wasn’t good and hurting her sales. I got back that her skills were above average and that native speakers were happy with it. Time to step back, waste of time, she doesn’t want to...

To the aside of translating. Amongst other things I'm also a translator. It is a wonderful skill to have and a really difficult one as well because to a degree you have to interpret what the author might have wanted to say. Sometimes translating one to one just doesn't work. A good translation...

An angle I hadn't looked at so far. Thanks for posting, I'm going to give that a try some time. Its definitely more interesting than most 'writing excersises' you find otherwise to help improve writing skills.

Thanks skip, that was my instinct as well. Better to have no book than 'burn' the author's name with a really bad one.

Perhaps it might work for you to write the backstory as if the character is telling you about their life over a cup of coffee. You could even write it as a conversation. Something along the lines of this: Across from me sits X, her eyes dart.... his eyes never move from.... she has a scar under...

For me writing a story always means something is happening. Dialogues can be useful, relationships deepen character but if my characters just kind of hover without getting their skates on to act, there is no story. I use a very simple 'formula' to test my story (I only write genre, so how or...

Thanks for you insights. She is definitely publishing to sell, not a hobby writer. That is a good point of difference. I might actually send her a private message and just ask wether she would like feedback. That way I don't end up 'clobbering' her over the head with something she might not be...

Not sure if this is the right place, so please ignore or delete if it belongs somewhere else or nowhere at all. In a group just like this one I know a writer who has self published several books. She prides herself on her (very thorough) research and getting things 'right'. She also criticises...

Since psychologically we are all the same (apart from cultural training to decide out preferences about just about anything from how often we want sex to how we like our toast) just write people you enjoy creating. Since that is who we all are :)