Bad writing advice

I happened across this post by Ann R Allen when looking stuff up for the previous post about “stop workshopping your novel and send it into the world.”

Writers: Beware Over-Workshopping Your WIP

This isn’t a post about over-workshopping, really. It’s a fun post about bad writing advice. Of course I’ve hit that before (pretty often!) but this post is funny and I don’t think I’ve seen it before, so here it is.

What’s over-workshopping? It’s what happens when writers attend too many writing workshops or critique groups where they’re fed dogmatic, my-way-or-the-highway rules. Following rules too closely can slow down your story (and your career.) It can also eliminate what’s creative and original in your work. …

Here are some of the workshop criticisms we can often ignore, says Ann R Allen, and marches through the list, striking down all the rules I particularly hate, so that’s fun. But she starts with one I hadn’t thought of:

1.“Your character wouldn’t do that!”

This is my unfavorite thing to hear in a critique or editorial note. It’s almost always unhelpful because nobody knows your character the way you do.

It often means the critic wants to make your story about herself. What she means is “I wouldn’t do that,” or worse, “My mental stereotype of that kind of person wouldn’t do that.”

There’s more at the linked post,

I have to say, SOMETIMES the observation is not actually “I wouldn’t do that” or “my stereotype wouldn’t do that.” Sometimes the observation is made by someone far more self-aware, someone who does in fact mean, “I don’t believe your character would do that.”

That’s a critique to take seriously, not because your character wouldn’t do that, necessarily, but because you’re failing to persuade the reader that the character would do that. As far as I can tell, my early readers know what they heck they are talking about when they say something like that. When, on rare-ish occasions, one of my early readers points to a specific moment and says this, I either change what the character does or else I put thought into justifying the character’s actions more persuasively.

Also, as a relevant side note, at least once when I pointed at a moment and said to another author, “I don’t for a second believe he would do this,” she took that bit out and revised the flow of action through that scene. And I thought that was a big improvement, because honestly, he would never have done that.

So, this can be perfectly appropriate advice. On the other hand, I know exactly what Allen is talking about, because I do see reviews that say, “I don’t believe this character would do this,” and I think, Oh yes he would. He absolutely would, and I’m sorry you don’t like that, but this is indeed consistent with the character as written.

Most of the rest of Allen’s points are small-scale — she’s pointing at a lot of bad writing advice. She’s hit some items I’ve never thought about or haven’t thought about the same way, so that’s interesting. You should certainly click through and read the whole thing, but here:

2. Don’t repeat a word in the same paragraph

I thought: wait, I hate repetition. But that’s not what she means, and she’s SO RIGHT, because this is ludicrously horrible advice if you actually try to follow it. Like so —

Would A Tale of Two Cities be improved if its first line read: “It was the best of times; it was the worst of historical eras.”

Or maybe Anna Karenina should have opened like this: “Happy families are all alike; every morose clan is despondent in its own way.”

Those are really funny examples, and also they’re examples that make the distinction between poetic repetition and pointless, accidental repetition crystal clear.

3. Never use multiple points of view. 

Does anybody actually give that advice? I’m not sure I’ve ever run across that. Here’s what I have seen: “Oh, don’t try multiple points of view — this is your first book and multiple points of view is too hard for novices!” This linked post is implying the same thing — A single “deep” POV is great for a simple, linear storyline, and it might be best for a first novel, says Allen.

I mean, sure, if that’s how you want to write your first novel. Otherwise, no.

I’m always startled by this idea that it’s harder to write with multiple points of view, because no, it isn’t. It just isn’t. I don’t mean it isn’t harder for me personally than a single point of view. I mean it literally isn’t harder, period. In fact, it’s easier. If you’re writing with just one point of view, you’re limited to showing the reader only what that viewpoint character sees and is aware of. That’s really restrictive! That’s why authors come up with magic mirrors and cloaks of invisibility and whatever: because they are forced to come up with magical ways to get the reader the necessary information. The advantages of multiple points of view balance out the disadvantages, such as they are.

It’s true that your two or more pov characters ought not all be clones of each other, but since your secondary characters ought not be clones of the protagonist, what difference does that make? Saying that you should make your pov protagonists different from each other is like saying “Hey, characterization is important.” It doesn’t need to be said at all. It’s always true and always obvious. Or if it’s not, then that’s the problem; multiple pov protagonists isn’t the problem.

HAVING SAID THAT, one problem truly can arise when you have multiple pov protagonists. One protagonist might be more interesting, more cool, more engaging, and then the reader will be irritated whenever they are pulled away from that pov and pushed into the other pov. That’s a real concern. The solution is: try your best to make both or all your pov protagonists compelling and engaging, so that even a reader has a preference for one, they don’t mind reading the other. That’s good practice, so there’s no need to shy away from multiple points of view.

4. Eliminate “was,” “that,” and “just.”

I’m right there with Ann R Allen for this. She is completely right. That is stupid advice. She’s right about why it’s stupid advice, too. “I just got home, so I haven’t had dinner” makes sense. “I got home so I haven’t had dinner” makes no sense at all. Thank you, Ann! Well put!

5. Don’t use contractions.

Surely no one gives anybody this advice. Should someone say this, surely everyone would ignore them. No one can possibly think this is good advice.

WAIT! I guess if you have never read anything but textbooks, you might think this was good advice. No one who has EVER read ANY fiction can possibly think this is good advice.

Honestly, I think Ann R Allen just made this up. … She says she hears from writers who were told this in workshops. She says she hears this “all the time.” I guess she didn’t make it up? It’s hard to believe.

6. Remove all adjectives and adverbs. 

Right there with you, Ann. I totally believe writers are told this in workshops, by insane instructors who think Hemingway was too ornate and florid.

7. Never use the passive voice.

Oh, pu-leez. The passive voice exists for a reason.  A scene can still be “active” if the author uses the passive voice.

It’s better for your detective to say. “This woman was murdered!” than “A person or persons unknown murdered this woman!”

Thanks for a fantastic example, and I will use that myself when this comes up.

8. Eliminate all clichés.

Good one, and good justification if you’d like to click through and read that. Basically: normal people sometimes use normal expressions when talking to other normal people.

I’m trying to remember a really strained metaphor I saw … not that long ago … in an example of what was supposed to be great writing … Oh! Got it! It was this:

His close-cropped skull was indented on one side as by the corner of a two-by-four. In the crevice formed by his brow and cheekbones, his eyes glinted like dimes lost between sofa cushions.

I thought: His eyes like what, now? I also thought: Maybe there’s something to be said for describing somebody in ordinary terms. This is really over the top. It’s the kind of language that just makes me think the author is trying too hard.

9. Punctuation is so last century.

Do people actually give this advice in writing workshops? Are they out of their minds? In this era when punctuation is hardly taught in schools and people throw apostrophes everywhere and scatter commas through their prose at random, maybe we don’t need to encourage the idea that punctuation is unimportant. People are already right there, being sloppy and incorrect and incidentally producing prose that’s hard to parse because of that problem.

10. Always Show, Don’t Tell.

I bet you saw this coming. That’s the single most overused piece of advise, period.

If you spend ten pages describing the shabby apartment of the murder witness, and we hear the screaming children and the blaring TV and smell the unemptied cat litter box and overflowing garbage can, your story is not going forward.

I’m a big fan of description, but there’s a lot to be said for also knowing when to move on with the story.

Thank you, Ann R Allen. Good post! This post also goes with the previous post about over-workshopping a novel, because Allen finishes this way:

Start another project to avoid over-workshopping.

I know authors who have spent years taking their WIP to writers’ conferences and workshops, obsessed with creating a book that will be universally approved of. But that kind of book doesn’t exist. You can’t please all of the people all of the time. … If you fear you’ve been over-workshopping your book, try putting it in a drawer and ignoring it for a month or two. Spend that time starting another one, or writing a short story or a poem or two. Something short you can actually finish is best. Don’t show the new stuff to anybody until it’s done and you love it. Then take it to your critique group or workshop when you have more confidence in your work and can ignore advice that doesn’t resonate with you.

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Not bored yet with posts about bad writing advice? Another post from Ann R Allen:

10 Dangerous Critiques: Beware Misguided Writing Advice

My favorite misguided advice from this post:

5)      Dr. Phil Meets the Middle Ages

“There are more appropriate ways to establish boundaries,” one critiquer said of a writer’s lady-in-waiting character in her Tudor-era historical novel. The character had just pulled a knife on a particularly handsy duke. The advice was, “She should assert her rights and report his sexual harassment to the queen. Relationship problems should never be solved with violence.”

I don’t know how I would respond if someone gave me advice like that. I think I might actually be rendered speechless.