Everyone is welcome to join in and chat about writing related subjects, including but not limited to -
Q 1 Do you like using punctuation such as ! and ... or do you prefer to keep things simple?
Q 2 How many notebooks do you have?
As always, feel free to use the photo as a writing prompt if you like that kind of thing. And if you'd enjoy more opportunities to talk virtually with other writers, you might like Writing Chat on Facebook. It's a public group. To take part you'll need to request to join and say what you write - just a word or two to show you realise it's a writing group.
10 comments:
Hi Patsy
1) Keep it simple. I love a ! but it's too easy to overdo it!!! 😁
2) Loads.
From PF twitter today:
We're looking for fiction submissions from mid-January onwards for the weekly, and for late February onwards for the Special. We're also starting to think about Mother's Day and Easter stories.
HB
Great idea Patsy, thanks. Love the photograph, where was it taken?
Q1: I do use but sparingly as I find editors are not mad about it & often eliminate.
Q2: I have too many notebooks some half used, some unused ( usually the really fancy ones) & some tiny cheap ones in my bag ( most used)
I like punctuation but never know what to do with those... er... —? moments, when characters are talking and... er? — hesitate??? And I still don't know the difference between an em and an en dash (and should I worry?) And I use ASCII codes when I want to do é but my repertoire is very limited unless I look them up. 😉
I do use both of those although I tend to overuse the exclamation point.
@ HB - thanks for the PF info - I'll add that into my next post.
@ Sheelagh – It's the stables (you probably guessed that bit) at Attingham Park, Shropshire. We were supposed to go to a castle in Wales that day, but I was navigating!
@ Marguerite – I go for elipsis (...) rather than a dash when characters pause or trail off in dialogue, but I looked up dashes and it seems an em dash is also OK for a pause.
In case this helps anyone, hyphens are the smallest (and used to hyphenate!) then en dashes (length of a capital N) which are used to link things eg the competition requires stories of 1,000 - to 2,000 words, and em dashes (length of a capital M) are the biggest and can be used like a comma, colon or brackets, or for going off at a bit of a tangent – which is how I use them
@ Alex - it's easily done!
It depends on what story the mag is aimed at on the level of exclamation marks I use. I only have one notebook, for jotting down ideas, monthly targets and bits and bobs. Well done to all with positive news.
Q1. I add quite a lot of exclamation marks in a first draft and then realise it’s far too many and edit a lot of them out again in my second draft.
Q2. I’ve just checked. I’ve got 4 notebooks in use in different places and probably just confusing me. And 7 unused and which might never be used because I think they’re too nice. I haven’t counted used ones, which don’t get thrown away. I’m now ashamed of myself!
My notebooks are... a mess! They don't start off like it but they end up with bits of music in I want to look up, songs I hear, the next 'to do' list, phone calls to make. Maybe I've not really got the hang of it? I do try and date things (and then forget to put the year in so that's not helpful!)
Yes, I use … and !, quite a lot. In fact I have just looked at one story and they both appear in the first line…
I can understand not wanting to spoil lovely notebooks. I have lots of ‘to do’ lists, and try to keep them altogether on a clipboard, plus bits of paper and jotter pads dotted around the house. But for writing I made myself a padded, material, notebook cover. It has pockets for pen, memory stick (yes I still use one!), ruler etc. It’s great as it keeps everything together in one place, looks good and takes any old A5 notebook. Dee
I never used to use ! very often but it has recently crept in to my writing! As for notebooks, I love notebooks and have them everywhere with little bits of writing, sometimes whole scenes, scribbled in them.
Post a Comment