book.dreamblog’s Book Reviews!

Anachronisms (especially in language)  What is an anachronism?  Simply, it is something that is out of place for the time and/or place that it is occurring in.  In literature, this most predominantly affects historical fiction. It can occur in many forms, such as a piece of technology or type of medicine appearing in a story set two years before such a thing was discovered in real life. It can be the usage of calling Russia “Russia” in a story set during the country’s time as the USSR. It could be setting your story in 1954 in the US and failing to acknowledge that segregation was still in effect. It could be your character mentioning that she saw a Siberian Tiger while in India. It could even be as slight as using slang that wasn’t popularized yet during the time period of your novel, or not regionally correct. (If your story takes place in the Southern US, your characters should probably be saying “y’all” not “you guys” and if it’s set in the UK, you should be saying “c...

What Scenes to Keep in a Story (And Which Ones to Cut)  We’ve all been there. We’ve read a book that was arguably really good, but just felt way too long. Like it was good, but could have been condensed. That 700 page epic fantasy that could have stood to be about 200 pages shorter.  The reason this happens is largely because authors choose to leave in “filler scenes,” or scenes that didn’t necessarily add anything to the story and should have been cut in the final draft.  Even professional published authors struggle with this sometimes, so it is definitely difficult to know what scenes are necessary to the story and which ones (though you may personally love them) don’t really add anything to the story. So let’s dive into it!  Generally speaking, all portions included in the story should advance the story in some way. This most predominantly includes any scenes that move the plot forward, but also extends to scenes that are used for significant character development...

When deciding how much description to add to your writing, you may be wondering how much is too much and how much is not nearly enough. Readers will dislike it if you put too much needless description into your narration, but what about when there’s none? How do you find the balance? Generally speaking, some description is a good thing—even if it’s not necessarily relevant to the story’s plot. You should give your reader some idea where a scene is taking place, otherwise reading a scene without any description at all is going to feel a lot like that scene from Spongebob where SpongeBob and and Squidward are walking around a void of white and a few colorful tiles. If the scene takes place outside in someone’s backyard, tell us. If it’s taking place in a tiny, cramped apartment, tell us! It’s also not a bad thing to describe briefly and sparingly that it was an autumn day and the tree leaves were already brown. These small details don’t necessarily do anything to the plot, but they do al...

Story Endings and Their Misconceptions Endings are one of the hardest parts of a story to write—especially when trying to wrap up a long, complex story or a long running series. Not only is there pressure to try and wrap up the story’s plots, themes, and character arcs with minimal plot holes, there’s also the added pressure of trying to craft an ending that readers will love! All too frequently, the endings to beloved franchises are deplored by fans and critics over complaints of not tying everything together, or being rushed, or not doing the story justice, or just simply not being what the fans wanted.  How can this be avoided?  The best answers I’ve ever found are: 1. It can’t (not fully, at least).  2. Have a general idea of how the story ends ahead of time.  Wait, what do you mean you can’t fully avoid criticism of the ending?  Well, I mean exactly that. The belief that any writer can create a story ending that is devoid of criticism or dislike lies firmly...

Writing Tip #1: Using Dialogue Tags Writing Tip #1 is a tip that might be difficult for a lot of new writers to accept: you should use "said" for most of your dialogue tags! A common mistake that many writers, especially new writers (and even some well-established, published writers) make is to try and show their skill with ~fancy~ vocabulary. Often they do this by replacing the word "said" in their dialogue tags with better-sounding alternatives.  The problem with doing this is that dialogue tags are not there to sound good. That's what prose is for! Descriptions and use of literary devices, such as metaphors, are the opportunities for writers to show their strength at making written words sound lovely and practiced, and to establish their own unique voice. Dialogue tags have one very simple job in writing--to tell the reader who is speaking.  In fact, you don't necessarily even need to use dialogue tags at all after every line of dialogue. If only two char...