Editing is do hard because I'm so distracted

Maybe I should stop writing...
I restart stories and never finish anything. Every time I think I have grown, I'm still it is shit.
Honestly, why even bother? I'm not getting enjoyment from it.

>>25357985
Perhaps you are writing in the wrong environment. Maybe goals too lofty and feedback to sparse has led to you failing to have fun with it.
There is a privilege that children get where, no matter the quality of what their work, the reception is complimentary. So they can build the foundations of a craft without the facing the adult need for critical seriousness. If you didn't get a solid base in writing while you still had that privilege, then I think it is expected you would end up in a rut like you describe. You would be expecting of yourself and adult's quality while struggling through the initial steps unsupported.
Perhaps you just need a writing buddy or two that you can share silly little works with, providing enough critique for each other that you do improve, but without the risk of being told to kill yourself as may happen here. Think of Mary Shelley writing Frankenstein. That all started from friends writing ghost stories for just for each other. Imagine the motivation you would have if you had a tiny audience bound by social convention to not treat you too harshly.

Please refrain from engaging in genreslop here. That’s what /wng/ is for.

>>25358243
When /wg/ parades around Victoria, litrpgs and YA fantasy look like Brothers K

>>25357985
Go outside.

>>25357985
No you’re just getting better at such a fast pace that you’re going to reach master level much sooner than you thought. Just keep churning and you’ll hit that level.

My story has 3 primary characters that are together nearly the entire time. I can't decide which to make the more main character. One leaves just before the end to go get help, so it can't be that one, but the other two are in almost every scene. They both have weak arcs right now, so I'm trying to decide which one to focus on more.

Literary mastery is such a joke because all you do is elevate your writing from out of the objectively poorly assembled and into the realm of the perfectly subjective. Meaning you could very well master English, still write about magic elves who reenact Tolkien or a sadboi with a lonley pp who does nothing, and thus exclude someone with my taste from enjoying your work.

>>25358338
Go the opposite direction—add more characters and make it a true ensemble story

>>25358339
Where's our sad boy magic elf story?

>>25358382
Lonley PP sad boy goes to magic Tolkien-reenacting elf world, a harem isekai

>>25358338
I was in the same situation so I switched one to first person to indicate a ‘main’ character and added some extra conflict to their arc.

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Starting a new piece while I wait on a rejection

>>25358342
I thought about that, but it's a screenplay so, on the off chance it ever gets produced, every character costs money. And my pathetic brain can barely generate enough for 3 characters, it would never be able to handle more.
>>25358422
Yeah, I'm trying to do something similar, though I don't want to add first person narration. One character is more experienced in the situation, so that one naturally appears first in most scenes (as the implied leader), so that's the one I'm leaning towards... but that's also probably the most boring character of the three and has the least arc... I may have fucked myself with this one.

>>25358437
Honestly, that’s why first person would help, you could add some introspective dimension to the character instead of having to rely on interactions and actions. I get that it might not fit thematically though, have to consider that for sure.

>>25357498
Just a note that if you do chose fall of Roman Empire in "England" that you are dealing with a Celtic culture and the Welsh language (or early Welsh/brythonic), there is nothing really "English" about the place/period.

Though I do also like this period and would love to write something about the clash of culture between the Romans and Celtic/Druidic Welsh at the time. Caesars accounts of the Welsh as he arrived are fascinating.

>>25358473
Eh, just wouldn't make sense for this kind of story. It takes place over a short time period, about 1 day. I'm doing some introspection through the dialog scenes, but not quite enough yet. I need to come up with things for them to be introspective about though...

>>25358338
You don't need to make one of them the designated protagonist. Depending on how the story is structured, both of them can fill the role. But if you do want to choose one of them then I'd suggest going with the most relatable one.

>>25358558
Whatever, asshole

>>25358473
Can you even do first person in a screenplay? Like obviously you can do it as voice over, but that's not really considered good writing in that medium.

>>25358674
You can. "Casino" comes to mind as one that did it well. It's the classic "telling a story after the fact" perspective. There's obviously many other examples of that.
https://youtu.be/cxwF0SgLXRA
But then there's also David Lynch's "Dune". There's a bunch of reasons that movie bombed, but the weird first person present tense internal monologue voice overs probably didn't help.
https://youtu.be/rR9QUBKXbpI

How am I supposed to obtain the skills necessary to write a book about how a person commits "good" but is actually the work of the devil?

>>25358731
Study theology?

https://www.literotica.com/s/sexy-depressed-lady

Someone give me some feedback on this story I wrote. Thank you in advance.

Thinking about getting a cheap laptop or something and making it my dedicated writing device. Does anyone else have something like this? Does it help or is it just a waste?

>>25358906
No
Because writing is a habit. You have to develop a habit. Now if said laptop helps you develop said habit, then it can help. But you need to make a habit of writing first. Every single day write at x time in y place.

>got frustrated with my current writing project
>started writing a short story with the same characters but without the same plot as a way to blow off steam
>one thing led to another and it turned into straight up erotica
>both my characters are men
>fapped while writing it
>mfw no face

Where do I find a develpmental editor that's not some jeet using AI?

>>25358906
Laptops aren't any fun to type on. Some people do it, but I think if you're relying on the novelty of this purchase to get you motivated, it will have a negative impact and be a waste of money. If I was going to treat myself to computer hardware for creative writing, I would start with a keyboard that feels great to type on.
To encourage actual creative output, I would recommend getting a fountain pen (with a converter), a nice pad of loose leaf paper, and some form of folder. Those things will be as easy to carry and use as a laptop and writing by hand is so much better for creative writing than typing on a keyboard. Later on, typing anything worth keeping into your computer is basically a free editing pass.

>>25358970
>>25359090
I'm in the habit of writing I just mainly use my notes app when I'm on the go. That's why I thought a laptop would be easier to write ideas in a more comfortable way. Never really wrote by hand, I've always used a computer. Willing to give it a shot. I'm sure a fountain pen is cheaper than getting a laptop.

>>25359059
Stop being racist, first of all.

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21st June the other day. The summer solstice. 3 months since taking up this dual endeavor. On one hand working out in the park, on the other hand translating a novel.

Working out was good. Those machines intended for boomers aren't half bad. They're always free.
Spring was cold first and warming up was a joy, steaming under fluorescent lights then pulling on the sweater to trap in the heat. Then it got warmer and rainy and I'd leap over worms taking the contour of paving slabs and crouch some more to carry away all the snails cutting across. I got reminded of the scene from Seven Years In Tibet but apparently that's not actually in Harrer's book. No idea what they put in rainwater nowadays but it gums up my hair like something else. The $2 chinkonium shoe drier works unexpectedly well, I haven't set fire to the apartment just yet.
I've gained a bit of weight and a lick of muscle, but predominantly it's still in that Auschwitz-physique range. Maybe next solstice. Maybe more, it started getting hot and mosquito-y outside.

As for the novel, to say I've bitten off more than I can chew would be an understatement. Especially for my first go. It's too specific, archaic, Gothic, inventive, playful and in the magic realism realm, and I'm too finicky to just toss all the original autistically-designated by age/rank/status terms of address under the Auntie-Uncle umbrella. And go with the banal, over-the-counter expressions and risk losing all flavor by forced sanitization. Can't go too Rural South since it's Eastern Europe, can't go too Slavic either. No to mention what a constant backtracking it is after finding a better word and having to replace all previous occurrences for that true and proper rhythm.
I've reached about half-way on the first draft but started progressing considerably less. Mathematically, it's tempting to view it as approaching zero. The stalling point. I feel more than inclined to procrastinate under all sorts of guises, from building a Morse paddle and keyer, putting together a guitar pedal to just normie-ing it out and watching movies and playing vidya.

It does have its moments, though. Like after how much I stewed about this very specific way in which "that" and "those" are used in a slightly derogatory fashion, thinking to Anglophones this would make little sense, as if there should be something the characters are always actively pointing to, until I randomly came across a discussion about Robert E. Lee's use of "those people" and it seemed to just click. Maybe man's not that different after all.

>>25359000
Has this non-canonical affair added a new dimension to their canonical relationship?

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>>25359090
>Laptops aren't any fun to type on.
... I do all my writing on a laptop. I have a shitty old chromebook I use just for it, I carry it around the house and perch on random furniture (I like to pace a lot when I'm thinking and writing always involves thinking) Am I an outlier? I'm at about 70,000 words in my WIP for what it's worth.

>>25359450
No, it's really just me turning what was already there in another direction. While writing them I ended up having their relationship lean in a yaoibait direction here and there but with the ultimate direction for it intended to be towards a type of close male friendship that is not seen or written of very often in modern times, something closer to greek philia than eros. Sometimes I get unbearably horny though and I like to use them as a pressure release valve by writing stuff like this, where the dial points way more to eros than philia.

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hello friends. please rate this excerpt near the end of my story. It is an action beat at 1k words long. excuse the lack of context.

>>25359465
I'm the anon that asked the initial question and I did the same thing. I used an old Chromebook similar to how you did but then the battery went to shit and it won't even charge now. I miss that little fucker like you wouldn't believe.

I use a tablet and a bluetooth mechanical keyboard

>>25359513
Aren’t they like $80? Just get a new one

>>25359482
i personally hate internal thoughts like they're written as conversation. It's not bad.

Pain lanced? What? Don't bother with such "poetic" verbs for such a simple sentence. No need for it. Save those $10 verbs for some really poetic prose. honestly better to just delete the sentence. it doesn't add anything.

You have a bit too many filter words like He saw, he heard, he walked, he called.

it's not bad though after a good edit deleting sentences. I understood what's going on. The action scenes however, should be stuck into one perspective. Just keep everything in Sarlesh POV. Have him see Azarian dodge things, him dodging the slash to his head, getting poked, etc.

>>25359482
>Without another thought, he drew his scimitar, hopped down the stairs to the moat and vaulted over the low wall to the arena.
For me, 'hopped down' is so funny to use here in this heroic action scene. Are you already over your 'leapt' quota?

>>25359557
A little over $100 now. I was thinking to use this time to upgrade but it looks like the Chrome book may just be the best bang for my buck. They're selling thinkpads with no HDD/SDD and battery for $150

Do you sneak memes into your writing?

>>25359644
I think about it so I can enjoy the thought, but I would never do it bc it would drastically lower the quality of the work

>>25359644
If it fits, but it usually doesn't fit

The new edition of The Chemical Divorce is now being crossposted to Royal Road if anyone wants to check it out:

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/176028/the-chemical-divorce

Thank you guys for the feedback. Show, don't tell is bullshit, and the story is much better with a narrator explaining what's going on.

I write on my telephone

>>25359728
that's just a weakness of a writer who can't write in anything but first person

>>25359728
>Show, don't tell is bullshit, and the story is much better with a narrator explaining what's going on.
you say this, but your story uses nothing but show. lol

>>25359749
>>25359760
After /lit/ complained, I went back to figure out why my writing style was so inexplicable, and it turned out I had based everything on Kenneth Thorpe Rowe's book "Write That Play." While that book is excellent, it really only applies to the stage. I rewrote my story inspired by Balkan's narration in "The Club Dumas" instead, and now it's much more intelligible.

>>25359789
>>25359728
it's quite good if a bit short for a first chapter. we have a problem, the protagonist, and what he's doing to cope.

Would it be in bad taste to name the evil wizard David Ibrahim

>>25359871
Glad you like it. The opening scene is actually based on the apocryphal story of Conan the Barbarian appearing to Robert E. Howard at the edge of his bed with an axe in his hand and commanding him to write the Conan books.

>>25351936
Now I'm watching this movie.
I don't like it. At least the script was a good read...
But this was the first time I read a script before seeing the movie, so it is interesting to see how the words turned out.

>write a story
>it's not ready
>publish it anyway
>use reviews as feedback to make changes
>republish a new edition
But what if I don't feel like rereading your tripe, Frank? What if my experience with your work has already been tainted?

>>25359964
triple a gaming had already proven that's a bad way of doing things

How often do you let rule of cool take precedent over accuracy? MGS is the best example I can think of where there's a lot that makes little to no sense but it's still a good story.

>>25360012
All the time

>>25360012
I did but ChatGPT dinged me for it. Said my story strains the limits of plausibility.

https://youtu.be/tVfpgaSXdbg?is=fSauVtns0m3r68v2

I like this woman's advice

>>25360012
Only if it's really fucking cool and accuracy is some highly specific field that no mere mortal could easily scoff at.

Physics, engineering, and other niche fields come to mind. If you get basic shit wrong that a lot of your readers might have contact with, you'll get a lot of people going
>that's not how that works...
But if it's something VERY specific, like nuclear physics, how many of your readers do you figure will be nuclear physicists? You can get away with a lot more shit then.
That being said, intelligent readers appreciate accuracy. If something is REALLY FUCKING COOL, I'm more than ready to handwave accuracy away.

I think material strength is the #1 casualty in the rule of cool. Modern armor makes you basically impervious to bullets, but then it would be really gay for MC's enemies to die from bloodloss a few minutes to hours later from only limb injuries.

>>25359000
No shame there, anon. I think one sign that you're really getting into a story idea is that you start to imagine the characters in lewd situations.

>>25360012
If you mean like in historical fiction, then it's always. You are not writing historical textbook, but a story. It is not taking place in past, but in a fictional world with flavor of past. The fictional world must be consistent with itself (most importantly), it being 100% consistent with past is secondary.

>>25360182
>Modern armor makes you basically impervious to bullets
other way around, even the most advanced armor plates offer resistance to a few hits of specific loads of specific calibers only and with great tradeoffs in weight the more protection you want. the majority of plates used by soldiers today aren't even at that level and will get shredded by most armor piercing rounds developed over the last 30 years. getting shot while wearing a plate isn't fun even if it stops the impact from killing you either.
t. wandering /k/ommando

>>25360221
You are assuming the absolute best case scenario where everyone is running top tier shit and running hot rounds. You can easily see that reality ensues and you end up with bunch of unarmored retards in a warzone shooting rusty soviet stock that would probably do dick to soft armor, let alone a modern plate and its carrier.

>>25360225
Anon you don't understand. Virtually all rifle rounds will fuck your shit up if you get hit. Soft armor will stop some handgun and some shotgun loads but even those will still fuck you up in other ways, and most rifle rounds will go straight through it without a plate over it. Most armor plates are rated for a few hits of steel core rifle rounds of a particular caliber or another, but they only cover a small area (relatively speaking), aren't rated for more than said few hits, and generally aren't rated for true AP threats unless you want to pay an assload and/or carry an extra 20lbs.
"Rusty soviet stock" could mean anything from steel core 7.62x39 (most NIJ Level IV plates probably stop multiple hits) to nasty 7.62x54r AP/API shit that will wreck you.
Either way, getting hit with a plate on sucks even if it doesn't kill you and could put you down for a sec, as you could crack a rib or suffer trauma due to back force deformation or spall if you have steel plates.

>>25360271
>as you could crack a rib or suffer trauma due to back force deformation or spall if you have steel plates.
Anon, I noticed none of those injuries are cinematic or immediately deadly. They're a big concern for the surgeon in the operating room, though.

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>>25360271
Image for reference. This is the US NIJ system, other countries vary. Note the number of hits rated per level and the fact that the rifle rounds tested are all FMJ or steel core, even the .30-06 M2AP (which dates from WWII and has a hardened steel core rather than tungsten, the standard for virtually all AP small arms projectiles today).

>>25360274
Yes, the point of plates is to prevent immediately deadly injuries on the battlefield caused by small arms. However if your plate gets penetrated you're probably fucked. And if you get hosed down by a machine gun burst or someone mag dumping at close range you're also fucked.
Also, today and historically, the leading cause of battlefield death was shrapnel from artillery and mortars (and now drones), which plates don't protect nearly as well from.

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Student theater group didn't want me. This might be the most embarrassing failure of my life.

>>25360410
>didn't want me
As an actor, right?

You didn't try to push a script on some random zooms, right?

>>25360415
>theatre group some of my friends are in was looking for scripwriters and directors
>apply to be a writer
>get rejected
Simple as.

>>25360423
>apply to be a writer
>get rejected
Just applied? Nothing else?
Pure RNG also you're probably too White for that.

>>25360466
>Just applied? Nothing else?
What do you mean, what else would there be? The application did require a 3-page sample of writing but that's hardly relevant now that it was rejected. There's no RNG, it's a matter of quality and my lack thereof. Better to face reality than make excuses.
>probably too White
Literally everyone in that group is white.

If you say pajeet just know that I know your penis is small. Your write sucks.

>he capitalizes the w in white

All I see when I see this is peak insecurity lmfao.

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>>25359964
I based my writing style on heads-up no-limit GTO adjustment where the reader is the villain. Every time anyone complained about anything, I fixed it. I repeated this process 974 times.

>>25358903
This appears to me to be a first draft, just you writing your thoughts as you think them, stream of consciousness. You need to do an edit on your own, where you go back through and rewrite everything so that it's communicable. Right now it reads as internal thoughts, not communication of ideas.

It is littered with things that can be cut out completely, tidbits that are just noise, sentences with words that add nothing, but hurt their readability. Places that somehow have too many commas at the same time they don't have enough. You need to work through that kind of thing before you share it. There is a difference between the writing, just putting spoken language into letters, and writing, using written language to create art.

For a story titled 'Sexy Depressed Lady', she sure isn't very present. I don't feel I know anything about her other than she's black haired, tired, very unwell, and wants to carnalise herself. This is meant to be a romance story, but her character barely exists. Everything about her is just Mars's lust. Yet, you go on and on about him. He's super muscly, imaginative, has no fear of God or anyone, a practitioner of magick (I don't know if you meant that to be real), a great writer, and such a great friend (with benefits), he's so loving to this poor, pitiable, depressed woman.

I am worried I just read a 'nice guy' self insert. I don't know if you, the author, are aware that he is that kind of character. I don't know if you know that the woman in your story barely exists outside of his, that is your, lust for her as an object. Maybe, if Mars was the sole point of view, I could trust that they are his flaws, not yours, but you decided to do random paragraphs from her point of view, and this bizarre part: "her most sensitive spots, like--aah--right there", where it's like he's eating out the narrator.

In all honesty, I think the reason some of the sentences are structured so roughly are because you didn't think about a reader who doesn't share your mind.
I think the reason it is largely unedited is because you didn't care that I would have to work extra hard to parse it.
I think the reason you put so much praise on Mars and provided extra information with no bearing on the story is because you are describing your ideal self.
I think Deathcab being mostly an object in Mar's life is because you want a girlfriend (object) more than you want to know a woman (person).
In this way, there is a being that manifests through your writing. And though I am not very fond of that being, I have to assume they are young enough to still be developing. They are capable of mastering the technical side only if they first teach themselves to think about other people. While they can't do that, they will struggle with the art of communicating ideas about people to people.

>>25360581
Absolutely dessamated.

>>25358903
this is amazing

>>25360482
>There's no RNG, it's a matter of quality
Are they not taking submissions from other people? Because only if not could RNG have played no role. Your work could be the one they almost picked if not for another more closely aligned with their interests.

>>25360642
RNG implies all submissions have equal likelihood to get picked and the choice is made literally randomly, but this is not the case. Higher quality trumps lower quality. Making excuses for your low-quality work, whether by coping with your victim-mentality of boohoo they're picking on me because I'm white or by claiming they picked their winner out of a hat randomly is just pathetic. YOU LOST BECUASE YOU SUCK AND FOR NO OTHER REASON.

>>25358903
No offense, but Mars is basically an incel self-insert, and Deathcab is just a sex object. It's pretty clear that you have a difficult time fathoming a relationship between a man and a woman outside of possessive sexual desire and a transactional kind of utility.
Mars unironically comes across as a predatory, groomer creep. When I say "groomer" I don't mean in the sense that he's a pedophile, but in the sense that he's a bottom feeder that weasels his way into people's lives when they're vulnerable so that he can get what he wants.
He comes across as more of a potential rapist than an actual suitor, and the only thing that nullifies that reading is how he's already fucking this woman he obviously cares about more as a pet to manage and control than as a person.

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>KAFKAESQUE
How about a god becoming a human.
From the god's perspective, it's "KAFKAESQUE!"
For kafkaesque enjoyers only! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8vaoGQCuyg

>>25360581
>>25360755
Thank you for your criticisms.

I hesitate to defend what I wrote from anything either of you are saying but I feel like I should maybe say that it is 100% intentional that the protagonist is out of his mind and he's in some sort of manic state of psychosis that makes a meaningful relationship with another human being impossible. And having Deathcab praise his writing in the story was certainly tongue in cheek.

But if the story doesn't work then it doesn't work, and if that doesn't come across it doesn't come across, it doesn't matter what is and is not intentional on my part.

I'm sorry about the prose. Definitely whatever I write next will have much different/hopefully better prose than this.

>>25360904
And even if the character's flaws are intentional doesn't mean that I'm saying those flaws don't apply to me; I'm still the one who wrote it.

Just in case it seems like I'm defending myself too much, I wanted to add that.

>>25360904
That's the stuff. Despite my scathing critique, I was holding out hope that there were artistic choices that just hadn't landed for me. From your response, I can see that a major part of the problem was just a lack of rapport. As a reader, I couldn't find enough trust. The taboo subject matter and unpolished writing, posted on literotica, all came together to create an image I couldn't move beyond.

Definitely keep writing, it's not like the work is a waste, it just needs another pass or two. Once things are well written it is much easier to find faith in the author and separate them from their characters.

>>25360648
>black & white fallacy
I know it's comforting to think that the quality of your work is to blame because it means all you have to do is improve, and you're guaranteed a spot. But the fact is that luck still plays a huge role in getting selected.

>>25360552
>heads-up no-limit GTO adjustment where the reader is the villain
You casually tossing this game theory jargon out there like anyone will have any idea what the fuck you're talking about is so indicative of what went wrong with your story

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>>25361127
Some readers complained about the exposition being boring, so I overcorrected by removing it. I realized the mistake and put it back in but with 1st person POV. This had the bonus of allowing me to use unreliable narration, which previously did not make sense in a 3rd person perspective.

Overall, everything worked out. It just took a while to reach equilibrium. Thematically the story is about the nature of truth, which is enhanced by there being multiple versions of the manuscript floating around. I obviously prefer the current version and am grateful for everyone's input on the earlier drafts

>>25360904
>>25361045
My original post was so long that I didn't include any praise for the things I did like.

>Six feet is a short distance to walk, but it's a long way going straight down.
I thought this was alright.

>...he took a moment to prepare himself mentally. It was imperative that he visualize the lines before he made them. It was a question of calligraphy, not to mention the simple fact that one spelling mistake would be one too many.
This, juxtaposed with the description of what he actually ends up doing, is very funny. Especially now that I know he is definitely intended to be a bit deranged.

>His muscles were sore and his feet hurt pretty bad but he still wasn't quite all-the-way tired yet, so he read his fighter pilot book for a while in bed until the words starting to blur together and he caught himself reading the same sentence over and over and over, and he let that be his cue that it was time to turn off the light and go to sleep at last.
This, all being one sentence like that, is diabolically funny to me. If it is like that intentionally, that is very ballsy.

>>25361148
I may not have liked your work, but at least you take it with grace, unlike some around here (Boor)

>>25361045
Okay, thank you for saying so.

>>25361172
shut up fag, you haven't even read NJB. criticism requires you to actually read the story.

>>25361160
That is definitely an intentionally long sentence.

I mean, I feel like it's at least somewhat clear that he's deranged.

Incomplete list of things in the story which indicate that he's insane:
(no pressure to read this list if you don't feel like it, that's why I'm spoilering it)
He thinks he has magic powers. The magic ritual he carries out makes no sense, he just desecrates a random person's grave with a crude insult. It's a recent grave and he doesn't really contemplate the distress this might cause to any still living family members. He's fantasizing about his fwb being the president and he's a secret service agent who gets shot in the head defending her, and the climax of the fantasy is his blood getting all over her, and this fantasy is a pleasant one to him for some reason. Then he temporarily breaks out of his psychosis and we see him nervously question his sanity, but then we see him slipping back into a manic state.
Later he's imagining telling the story of something that happened during sex to their grandchildren some day, which is both delusional and inappropriate. He showed a story to deathcab involving a grave desecration at some point; not only is it very unwise for him to have written that story and showed it to someone since that story could easily be used as evidence against him in a trial some day for that very act, but on top of that he somehow forgot that he ever sent it to her. Etcetera etcetera

But don't get me wrong, I do still think that the criticism was useful. I'm just noting that of all the things that stop the protagonist from being recognized as an unreliable narrator, lack of evidence isn't among them. But that doesn't mean I'm saying there are no such reasons. Certainly if the story was in 1st person it would be more clear he's an unreliable narrator, in addition to (much of) the prose being bad.

>>25361249
I didn't really write the last few sentences in that last paragraph very cogently, but hopefully it's clear what I mean.

Well, I'll rewrite it now.
I'm just noting that of all the things that stop the protagonist from being recognized as an unreliable narrator, lack of evidence isn't among them. But that doesn't mean I'm saying there are no such reasons why a reader might not recognize him as such.

Certainly if the story was in 1st person it would be more clear he's an unreliable narrator, and the weakness of (much of) the prose also makes it harder to detect/credit the author with intentionality.

There is someone in this thread right now

>>25361229
I've read it cover to cover lil buddy. The ending with the dying security guard getting consoled by the paperboy was cute. Too bad all that fun cheesiness is locked behind half a novella of nothing happens.

>>25361318
It's me! :)

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I made my sentences more boring and it's still telling me to shut the fuck up

I sell ideas to people but actually I just use ai for the ideas

>>25361381
Anything cringe ? The movie camera writing turned me off

how do I learn to love writing again? I stopped because I got burned out when I realized I needed to rewrite my novel from scratch, and had no interest in writing anything else

>>25361872
The movie camera writing is probably the most cringeworthy thing about it, even counting how silly the characters all are. You might not have gotten to that part but the attempt to emulate crosscutting was plain lazy and a roadbump to reading.

First draft

>Claude
>8/10
>Strong voice, clever formal devices, and a genuinely unsettling atmosphere. Loses points mainly for the murky resolution. The foundation is solid — revision would push this well above average.

>GPT
>8.5–9/10
>It feels substantially stronger than the average self-published manuscript, particularly in dialogue and characterization. The biggest opportunity for improvement isn't the writing quality itself but the editing: trimming repetition and sharpening the progression of the central mystery would elevate an already engaging draft.

>Grok
>Solid 7.2 — promising, atmospheric, and memorably strange.

>Gemini
>This piece is a strong example of "folk-noir" or "weird" campus fiction. It manages to balance with high-stakes existential horror. The ending is a chilling climax that effectively blurs the lines between fiction and reality.
>Rating
>4.5 / 5 Stars

>>25361938
Grok hates my book but Gemini and chatgpt loves it

>>25361938
>guys I asked the smoke-up-your-ass machine to blow smoke up my ass and it did it like an absolute madman
LLM use is an IQ test.

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>>25361938
picrel prompt:
>review & rate as if you were an anonymous user of /lit/'s Writing General

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>>25361950
prompt
>Tear this apart with a scathing, vitriolic, angry review. Bring up no positives, only negatives.
+ a few more to get it to spit out 1 snappy paragraph

>>25357985
I know that feeling very well.

I broke through it by writing shorter projects.
Give 2k-4k word stories a shot. You can finish such projects in about a week and have something to get feedback on.
Maybe it isn't the case for you but for me when I never finished anything I only had myself as a critic with no other perspective, so I became more and more aimlessly hypercritical of my stuff until I was convinced I was irredeemably shit.
However in finishing short projects and polishing them up I could get a second opinion, and almost always that second opinion was that it was not in fact irredeemably shit. It was just ok. Not great, but not actually bad ether.
It also allowed me to explore lots of different genera, themes, story structures, and writing styles in a relatively short time which helped me find my voice and personal writing style.

So again, I will say that you should give short stories a shot to get you out of your funk.

>>25358243
/wng/ is for web novels/serial fiction.

If someone is writing something that isn't meant to be serialized then it really doesn't fit on /wng/.

>>25359344
No.

>>25359482
I rate it a 3 out of 5.
Competent action scene though if I was to nit-pick it could use some additional polish to a few of the sentences to bring it to the next level.

However as it currently is it's fine. At least without greater context.

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>>25362065
I think that's the answer.
But last time I tried it, I quickly realized by 300 word outline probably couldn't fit in 7.5K words.
Seems like I'm incapable of writing an outline that can fit inside a short story. Everything just gets bloated.
I guess the only solution is just to keep trying to something more simpler out.

Do people only write fantasy slop because it's easy? All you have to do is come up with a silly backstory about elves and then make up a bullshit language.

>>25362640
It’s easy and there is a huge audience of adult children and children alike who consume it. I even know a few people at my job who read or create it. One makes comics for it though. They’re all insufferable and would never read an actual book.

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>>25361821
>>25361938
>>25361950
>>25361970
i was about to rip on you for caring what the machine thinks until i got reminded the machine is just a living snapshot of the collective slop and the loudest noise made by the emptiest barrels, so what difference is there? you take someone's opinion at face value because at least he replies to you, writes more than a meme sentence and even peppers in some fancy words you pretend fit so you can fit too but then he also points out what he liked and it's the mundanest of crap

it's not like an llm can ever recognize a break-through, at most it'll stop you from doing it because it hasn't been done before and it's kinda iffy until some other does it and gains popularity and then after the next training it'll congratulate you for doing it like that one did it
so at that point why not just have it write for you, tailored specifically to your audience? why waste time iterating since the end result's more or less the same?

>Strange noises have been reported throughout the building by both staff members and the residents. At times, people claim to hear water dripping, yet every effort to locate the source of a possible leak has proven futile, no matter how thoroughly the building is searched.
On other occasions, residents report hearing footsteps running down the hallways at night while they lie awake in bed trying to sleep. There have also been reports of a pungent sulphuric smell, which has also alarmed everyone in the building.

What's your best guesses as to what's causing what I've mentioned in my opening

>>25362816
LIL NIGLETS IN THE WALLS

>>25362816
>while they lie awake in bed trying to sleep
If insomnia is so concentrated in this building it's probably just hallucinations and hysteria spreading throughout a sleep deprived community. Probably caused by vibrations outside the range of human hearing.

>>25358429
>The blood poured out of him like paint on a canvas and a bloody god damn masterpiece

I'm assuming it's supposed to read "and it's* a bloody god damn masterpiece". If this is an intro, it's a pretty good establishing intro. I didn't realize it was a boxing ring until the third paragraph because you refer to Paddy as a "fallen soldier" at first, but that confusion drew me in more than it took me away.

The only real fear is that a lay period feeling inevitable following the end of the excerpt, because how are you going to raise the stakes beyond a man getting beaten to death in a boxing ring?

>>25360552
ChatGPT larp

>>25363039
>accusing literal photographic evidence of being a LARP

>>25363051
Do you know what LARP stands for, anon?

>>25362816
>>25362828
Literally the pilot of 911.

>>25363054
okay, technically it's 973 times because the initial version doesn't count as a revision

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>>25363030
>>25363030
>The blood poured out of him like paint on a canvas and a bloody god damn masterpiece

It's supposed to read as is, because for some reason that makes sense in my head. Almost like it's mirroring the protagonist's cynical cadence. I'm not sure if that makes sense.

Here is the full intro for more context.

But everybody treats everybody else like shit so how can there be nice people

When you have multiple ideas for a story or a character, how do you pick one to focus on?

>>25363276
Combine them all into one

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>>25362753
>why not just have it write for you
>why waste time iterating
on second thought, the situation's much more dire than it seemed, so no wonder the only way out is to pretend nothing's happened

having it write for you would've actually been decent, sure you would've crowned the middle man instead of cutting him out but at least this would've counted as a purpose-oriented approach, whereas willingly subjecting yourself to endless rewrites in order to please the lowest common denominator hive-mind machine is nothing but pure, unadulterated cuckoldry
you just sit there in your little cuck chair watching your darling get torn a new one, taking endless instructions on how to sculpt yourself into the perfect blob like every other humorless husk thinking he'll make it big if only he's serious enough

>>25363276
Which one do you find the most fun to write? Also there's nothing stopping you from mixing them together.

Guys I realized that my entire life amounted to ambitions that I refused to pursue in a serious way because I was afraid of failing and hurting my ego. For a long time now I've been "trying" to write a novel but failing to finish anything. This tendency has spread through every single thing I've ever wanted in life and it must stop. I've decided to start finishing shorter works and posting them to various websites to escape this loop of merely pretending to pursue my goals. I will make small steps toward what I want instead of just imagining that I'm working toward the larger goal while spinning my wheels.

>>25363552
What are you going to do to actually take those steps?

>>25362753
>>25363324
Any excuse to be miserable, huh?