Pacing is a very subjective part of writing, and is hard to make sure you're 'doing it right'. My biggest tip is making sure everything has a purpose (mostly in the revision phase, write filler to your heart content, your story still needs slower, calmer scenes to look at the emotions of your character, and to peovide variety so that high stakes scenes hit harder), every (or at least 95%) should have a mostly clear thing it does, whether thats character, plot, worldbuilding, etc. Keeping banter from being like 3 pages of basically nothing. Making sure you're not exploring the same ideas in depth over and over (callbacks or references to the theme you explored work just as well), repeated information in general gets redundant easily, and overall having some progress made every chapter.
I'm definitely not one for fast-paced writing in general, but that's exactly why this was very interesting to hear! A lot of good points! Your channel is very analytical and starting with the disclaimer that no solution fits every story was bang on 🙏🏻💕
soooo many good tips here, i wish i had this video a year ago when i was in revision mode ahhh. i'm such a hoe for dialogue personally and so much of my editing ends up being trimming conversations LOL. i think choices/consequences is so important for creating momentum in your story!
*A great sense of doom gripped at her heart. Her fingers twitched nervously, goose bumps bloomed across her skin as she reached, then terror overwhelmed when her fingers grasped the sweating glass of water. With her shaking hand she slowly raised the glass to her trembling lips to take-* Just drink the dang water already! - The reader. Great tips. Thanks!
I recently edited my novel and i was merciless with the cuts. My critique partner told me now it's too fast and jarring. Go figure. Thank you for sharing your tips. I hope everything is going great with you! 🎉🎉
As someone who's struggled a lot with this, I definitely recommend making sure you have transitions between scenes/settings and not just "setting 1, [Most of scene]. Setting 2 with no info on how we got here" Another thing, keeping story beats separate. The big realization shouldn't be the same scene as the big kiss or as the reconciliation between 2 characters or whatever applies. If it is, break it up with chapters and don't go straight from one to the other. Do the opposite of Lynn's tips (lol) and let some of those filler lines of dialogue stay in. One or two here and there won't hurt the story.
Pacing is tough. I'm looking at the middle of my book where, just after the big twist that really shifts the action, I have several long dialog scenes... Structurally there's no way to move these around. It's either accept the stop-start nature of a few chapters before the book barrels to its climax, or cut those dialog scenes... I'm now working to shorten them as much as possible. Anyhow, great video! YT showed me a first one from you just yesterday and now I've watched 4. Lots of great advice there, thanks.
As much as it may feel 'wrong', if those scenes are as important as they sound, don't worry about it too much. Will readers say 'this part was boring too slow not engaging'? Maybe. But that's fine. Prioritize a functioning story and canon(worldbuilding) over 'good' pacing any day.
It's definitely one of the more challenging aspects of writing!! I think dialogue scenes can still have engaging pacing in their own way especially if they're providing answers to strong questions the reader might hold, if that makes sense. Welcome to the channel and ty for watching!
tracking is such a good tip!! i think pacing is difficult because pacing could exist at the prose level but also at the story level, and it might be hard to figure out what's what. i think prose level pacing like tracking and filler dialogue is extremely effective once they're cut or reworked!!
Thank you!! I was proud of myself for figuring out how to identify that particular writing quirk lol. It's so true that line level and story level pacing are two different beasts. Fixing up line level pacing feels like a little makeover but prose level is straight up plastic surgery
Awesome tips video! Pacing is so tough! I find especially because I adapt my own work, going from a script to a novel with pacing is a tedious process. I definitely edited and cut mercilessly in the latest draft of my Adult contemporary fantasy novel (my PhD dissertation novel). My third draft was 73K and my most recent fourth draft is 67K. Now I gotta bulk it up. But cutting filler/repetitive scenes, filter words, and dialogue tags helped a lot! I’m ready to work on Draft 5 (waiting on beta reader feedback to do so) and then will be querying. I definitely can see how these tips will be useful when I have to revise again in the future! Thanks for sharing! 🥰🫶
"You can tell if a writer has really studied something like sword fighting because they will literally describe every tiny movement that the swordsman makes." 😬😬😬😬😬 Yeah, finding the right balance for fight scenes when you've actually trained can be quite tricky. You want to write down everything, because that's what makes things more interesting for you, but if you get overly technical, then things get lost. Fundamentally, most people's understanding of fighting is boom, boom, smash. And you have to account for that. What I've found, though, is that you don't necessarily have to dumb down your writing to get people to follow. You just need to make it clear what to focus on. Your reader might not know the difference between a jab or a straight, or what the false and true edges of a sword are, but they'll know what a bloody nose is, or what happens when the bad guy gets plucked by the pointy thing. By focusing on the _effect_ of the attack, and using dynamic adjectives for the attack itself (i.e., " a crushing right hook" or a "sharp, piercing left") it gets the job done. That way you can make your fights accessible without having to fully compromise on your vision. Actually, that's what they tell you to do to make fighting more exciting in DnD as a DM. (Of course, as the writer, it's up to you to decide who you want to write for. Maybe you want your work to be more niche, and you want to build an audience that takes pleasure in you going to into technical details with stuff like that. Or maybe you just want people to sit back and have fun and turn their brain off. In which case, boom, boom, smash away. The choice is yours.)
Definitely agree that the special knowledge is valuable, and personally I've never minded the use of technical terms as long as it makes sense from the pov we're reading from (a well-trained individual with years of practical experience vs. someone who's in their first fight). So it all boils down to context! Also, dynamic adjectives are a great tip for fight scenes! Love that
This is me with riding 😂 I got feedback from reader saying 'this is too technical for the character' for some horse vocab that didn't personally even register as such because of how normal it is to me.
@@ellieblackwell9754 i appreciate the kindness but unfortunately I can't accept gifts by mail at this time, but if you'd still like to support the channel I do have both Kofi and Patreon links in my bio!
Pacing is a very subjective part of writing, and is hard to make sure you're 'doing it right'. My biggest tip is making sure everything has a purpose (mostly in the revision phase, write filler to your heart content, your story still needs slower, calmer scenes to look at the emotions of your character, and to peovide variety so that high stakes scenes hit harder), every (or at least 95%) should have a mostly clear thing it does, whether thats character, plot, worldbuilding, etc. Keeping banter from being like 3 pages of basically nothing. Making sure you're not exploring the same ideas in depth over and over (callbacks or references to the theme you explored work just as well), repeated information in general gets redundant easily, and overall having some progress made every chapter.
These are excellent tips, purpose is definitely key when it comes to pacing! ty for watching
I'm definitely not one for fast-paced writing in general, but that's exactly why this was very interesting to hear! A lot of good points! Your channel is very analytical and starting with the disclaimer that no solution fits every story was bang on 🙏🏻💕
Slow and fast both work for different stories imo, thank you so much!
soooo many good tips here, i wish i had this video a year ago when i was in revision mode ahhh. i'm such a hoe for dialogue personally and so much of my editing ends up being trimming conversations LOL. i think choices/consequences is so important for creating momentum in your story!
*A great sense of doom gripped at her heart. Her fingers twitched nervously, goose bumps bloomed across her skin as she reached, then terror overwhelmed when her fingers grasped the sweating glass of water.
With her shaking hand she slowly raised the glass to her trembling lips to take-*
Just drink the dang water already! - The reader.
Great tips. Thanks!
I recently edited my novel and i was merciless with the cuts. My critique partner told me now it's too fast and jarring. Go figure.
Thank you for sharing your tips. I hope everything is going great with you! 🎉🎉
That's happened to me too before lol, it just takes a bit of fine-tuning! ty for watching, and i hope everything is going great with you too
As someone who's struggled a lot with this, I definitely recommend making sure you have transitions between scenes/settings and not just "setting 1, [Most of scene]. Setting 2 with no info on how we got here"
Another thing, keeping story beats separate. The big realization shouldn't be the same scene as the big kiss or as the reconciliation between 2 characters or whatever applies. If it is, break it up with chapters and don't go straight from one to the other. Do the opposite of Lynn's tips (lol) and let some of those filler lines of dialogue stay in. One or two here and there won't hurt the story.
Much to consider here. Especially with regard to an outline of each chapter, especially the beginning and ending of ... Thanks so much.
i'm glad, thank you for watching!
Pacing is tough. I'm looking at the middle of my book where, just after the big twist that really shifts the action, I have several long dialog scenes... Structurally there's no way to move these around. It's either accept the stop-start nature of a few chapters before the book barrels to its climax, or cut those dialog scenes... I'm now working to shorten them as much as possible.
Anyhow, great video! YT showed me a first one from you just yesterday and now I've watched 4. Lots of great advice there, thanks.
As much as it may feel 'wrong', if those scenes are as important as they sound, don't worry about it too much. Will readers say 'this part was boring too slow not engaging'? Maybe. But that's fine. Prioritize a functioning story and canon(worldbuilding) over 'good' pacing any day.
It's definitely one of the more challenging aspects of writing!! I think dialogue scenes can still have engaging pacing in their own way especially if they're providing answers to strong questions the reader might hold, if that makes sense.
Welcome to the channel and ty for watching!
tracking is such a good tip!! i think pacing is difficult because pacing could exist at the prose level but also at the story level, and it might be hard to figure out what's what. i think prose level pacing like tracking and filler dialogue is extremely effective once they're cut or reworked!!
Thank you!! I was proud of myself for figuring out how to identify that particular writing quirk lol. It's so true that line level and story level pacing are two different beasts. Fixing up line level pacing feels like a little makeover but prose level is straight up plastic surgery
GUYS WAKE UP MOTHER POSTED 🗣️🗣️
Awesome tips video! Pacing is so tough! I find especially because I adapt my own work, going from a script to a novel with pacing is a tedious process. I definitely edited and cut mercilessly in the latest draft of my Adult contemporary fantasy novel (my PhD dissertation novel). My third draft was 73K and my most recent fourth draft is 67K. Now I gotta bulk it up. But cutting filler/repetitive scenes, filter words, and dialogue tags helped a lot! I’m ready to work on Draft 5 (waiting on beta reader feedback to do so) and then will be querying. I definitely can see how these tips will be useful when I have to revise again in the future! Thanks for sharing! 🥰🫶
tysm Lara as always! That's am impressive amount of cutting, fingers crossed for your querying journey!
Pacing is so tricky so I loved all these tips!! such fire advice 🔥✨❤️
ahh i'm so glad you liked the tips!! ty
"You can tell if a writer has really studied something like sword fighting because they will literally describe every tiny movement that the swordsman makes." 😬😬😬😬😬
Yeah, finding the right balance for fight scenes when you've actually trained can be quite tricky. You want to write down everything, because that's what makes things more interesting for you, but if you get overly technical, then things get lost. Fundamentally, most people's understanding of fighting is boom, boom, smash. And you have to account for that.
What I've found, though, is that you don't necessarily have to dumb down your writing to get people to follow. You just need to make it clear what to focus on. Your reader might not know the difference between a jab or a straight, or what the false and true edges of a sword are, but they'll know what a bloody nose is, or what happens when the bad guy gets plucked by the pointy thing. By focusing on the _effect_ of the attack, and using dynamic adjectives for the attack itself (i.e., " a crushing right hook" or a "sharp, piercing left") it gets the job done. That way you can make your fights accessible without having to fully compromise on your vision.
Actually, that's what they tell you to do to make fighting more exciting in DnD as a DM.
(Of course, as the writer, it's up to you to decide who you want to write for. Maybe you want your work to be more niche, and you want to build an audience that takes pleasure in you going to into technical details with stuff like that. Or maybe you just want people to sit back and have fun and turn their brain off. In which case, boom, boom, smash away. The choice is yours.)
Definitely agree that the special knowledge is valuable, and personally I've never minded the use of technical terms as long as it makes sense from the pov we're reading from (a well-trained individual with years of practical experience vs. someone who's in their first fight). So it all boils down to context!
Also, dynamic adjectives are a great tip for fight scenes! Love that
This is me with riding 😂 I got feedback from reader saying 'this is too technical for the character' for some horse vocab that didn't personally even register as such because of how normal it is to me.
AS ALWAYS SUPER INFORMATIVE AND HELPFUL! You are awesome. Thank you!
thank you so much for watching!
This was really helpful!! Thank you
Great video!
Thank you!
Pacing such a hard thing to pin down. Think a lot of times it's on a line level with too much needless description or dialogue.
It can be finnicky for sure. I agree!
If I 'pace' any of my writings, just show me the door. Put the 'creative' in creative writing.
Do you have a P.O. Box by chance?
I do not!
@@lynndjung is there a way I can send you a gift :)
@@ellieblackwell9754 i appreciate the kindness but unfortunately I can't accept gifts by mail at this time, but if you'd still like to support the channel I do have both Kofi and Patreon links in my bio!
@@lynndjung oh ok! I was just asking because I make writing journals and was wanting to ship you one!
This was amazing advice!
thank you so much, i'm glad you think so!