writing-related rant

Umbrella SUCKS. It totally SUCKS. I couldn't get through ten pages of it without thinking "CAN WE GET ON WITH IT ALREADY". Don't hold your breaths for it guys; I'm not going to release it till I find myself actually enjoying it.

Well, I have diagnosed it, at least. It's boring. I can't wait for some scenes to be over. Then again it could be because I was reading the last 50,000 words of it, but I really did find myself at some points wanting to yell "WHO THE HELL CARES" and chopping, ripping the entire scene out. Except I was on an ebook reader on my phone, not a word processor, and found myself hopelessly shut off from any means of editing.

I think it's hobbled by a lot of static scenes filled with nothing but redundant musings that readers should be having for themselves, and a lot of useless ones that serve no purpose outside of showcasing the setting/world.

Important Lesson I: a lot of thinking only works when it's not a character who's doing it.

I think it has everything to do the fact that I'm not yet accustomed to writing in the limited third. Who stops in the middle of nowhere to give a history lesson about the building one stands in? It makes more sense in omniscient third because I could be speaking from a generic point-of-view outside the narrative frame. Limited? Naw. Why would she, while watching the sky, suddenly decide to ponder upon the meaning of life and religion and the history of the nation?

I mean, the main character has NO BUSINESS thinking so much. Not even if she just went through hell and heaven and the deep blue sea. Especially because she's not the type to think the shit out of everything she does.

Important Lesson II: prettiness is heavy.

Something I recently learnt from a book I read is that these expository passages are like huge ornaments that impede movement to such a degree that they aren't worth the beautification they afford. It works with OTDOTS, it being the standard Epic Fantasy fare, but not with Umbrella whose plot is supposed to carry itself along without much regard for the world. GAH WORLDBUILDING SENSIBILITIES.

I suppose the strategy for such is to omit whatever I can afford to. The imagination is a brilliant thing; it can recreate a full and lush world from a bundle of sketches. I shall take advantage of that brilliance! I shall not take my readers for idiots!


My action plan for the worldbuilding scenes is to remove them and consolidate them as a separate "guidebook" the way so many authors like to do. I see now why these companion guidebooks are so popular among authors. Worldbuilding in general is so important to me that I feel an urge to include it in narrative even when it'd seriously retard the plot progress. As for redundant, repetitive thoughts on why she lives and what she wants--DELETE. All of it is useless. If my story is effective, the reader would be able to work these points out by him/herself.