Tips and tricks for writing?

[Turbo740]

Does anyone have any tips and tricks for writing fics, I've planned out a main story and events for each chapter, but i'm finding it a bit hard linking it together/ creating a flow in the piece, I'm also finding it difficult to get different words for 'Said'. if every word after a line was 'said' the reader would lose interest quickly.

[Damhoof]

Easy fix. Don't use the words said, and instead just imply it was them that said it by having them perform an action either before or after the talking.

Generally speaking, flow comes naturally, as characters are rarely static which might be part of your problem if you are not using fully fleshed out characters. If I were you I would sit down, imagine the characters in question as they go about their daily lives and build it from there.

Also a word of advice. You're better off asking for input in the google doc or requesting someone to read it and then point at the problem rather than ask for general advice.

[Caliban]

'Said' is kind of an invisible word. Its existence is more assumed than anything else. Most readers won't notice it; in reality it's far worse to try and 'freshen up " ' he/she/it saids'. 'Replied, 'shouted' and the like are fine, but don't go overboard or it'll grab the reader's attention in the wrong way

[shadethepony]

'Said' is kind of an invisible word. Its existence is more assumed than anything else. Most readers won't notice it; in reality it's far worse to try and 'freshen up " ' he/she/it saids'. 'Replied, 'shouted' and the like are fine, but don't go overboard or it'll grab the reader's attention in the wrong way

A nice consequence of this (and an extension of what damhoof wrote) is that, once you've established who's speaking with your initial "saids", you can often get away with dropping the "saids" until the order the characters speak in is interrupted. So if you've got Applejack and Rarity arguing back and forth, once the reader knows Rarity spoke first, then AJ, you don't need the speech tags anymore until the back-and-forth pattern is broken, or a character does something before/during/after a line, or a more specific tag would be more appropriate.

The best advice I can give is to grab a couple of your favorite books/stories, find a few scenes of dialogue you like, and pay attention to the way those authors use speech tags.

Best of luck!

[otherunicorn]

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WMM ... w?sle=true