I love my stories, but I hate my writing.

If you're here from a review thread and are looking to review something: I currently am looking for reviews on Tracer.

I'd like to give a shout-out to Dreamers-Requiem, who is automatically awesome for being one of two people in history to read far into one of my stories and actually comment/review along the way. If you're looking for a good read, you should also check out Into the Night by Dreamers-Requiem.

I'm limited. I'm 22.

My screen name represents my position in writing for as long as I've been doing so. From many writers that I've met, I've found that I have quite a different attitude toward writing than many. For an explanation of my screen name, go here: http://www.fictionpress.com/topic/2560/1260254/1/#1530332

Namely, I don't really write my stuff to be effective, I write them kind of just however I write them. The whole prospect of having other people read stuff that I've written was only brought to my attention about two years ago, when one of my best friends found out about this site and repeatedly prodded me to post on it. I was really reluctant at first, I had never given any thought to letting other people read my stuff, but well, I'm here so we all know how that turned out.

Second is that I haven't really spent any time to edit / tune / polish anything that I've written. I've found that this aspect of my writing has really offended some writers on this site, because they take it as me saying that editing / tuning / putting thought into the technical details and all of that is not important, and that's something that the majority of writers have spent a lot of work on. But, I don't think that at all: I think refining the writing is very important to write something good, it's just that for me in particular they're lower on the priority list for me in particular than fleshing out the story. This is why: I'm a 1st year graduate student working on my PhD in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. That takes up about 40-60 hours a week (or more if its a really bad week). So I write mainly to let my imagination run wild and kind of get caught up in creating these stories and their worlds. It's a major mechanism of decompression at the end of the day after spending the majority of it in the lab running around working with computer models, turbines, biodiesel fuel, tanks of hydrogen and solar panels. So what engages me the most about writing is not so much the craft itself, but the indulging in and fleshing out / imagining of my story concepts. That's my first priority when it comes to writing, which is why I say that I want to finish a story first before I go back and do any editing.

Think about it this way. I have n hours of free time to write per week. Sometimes, n = 0. But otherwise, say it's finite. Now, if I wanted to both write my stories to a fulfilling level of progress and put the time to edit / polish / etc... the writing and make it more effective, that would require at least 2n hours of free time. But I only have n. So in order of hierarchy, I'm going to use that n amount of free time on the aspect of writing that I get the most fulfillment out of - which is story concept. If I had more time, I'd edit and put more thought into making the writing all nice and shiny, but I don't, so that's why my stories are all unedited first drafts. So to summarize, I think getting the writing 'right' is very important, I just don't have time to do it, and it's not the central focus of why I write.

Some people still find it offensive, but oh well, that's just how it goes.

If I put some more thought into refining my writing, and some time into polishing it, yea, my writing probably be more effective. It won't be anything amazing, but it would be at least respectable compared to what it is now. And contrary to popular belief, I'm not a complete idiot when it comes to writing elements, I've thought about many conceptual things regarding it quite a lot. I just don't really execute them that well, but I haven't really gone at lengths to include them in my stories at this point. Although, since there has been a mounting pile of suggestions, I am considering taking the 1st chapter of "The Voice in my Head" and actually editing / fixing it just to see what it would turn out like. As soon as I get over writer's block.

You may also notice that I'm very careful in my speech, and I tend to include a lot of disclaimers. Needless to say, my experience on FP during the first few months of me being here was less than stellar, because I happened to get unlucky enough to run into some very hostile writers. I don't mean people who criticize my work - that's fine. I'm talking about people who attack me as a person or as a writer. Those people can go to hell. I realize that the majority of people here are nice and all, but I have seen the other side quite extensively, so that's why there tends to be an initially defensive undertone to the things I say. Don't read too much into it.

My stories have a bi-polar disorder.

If you plagiarize any of my stuff, "you gonna get a hurt real bad".

I have had no formal training in writing that is of note. I've only learned by trial and error. I don't know much about writing, so take anything I say in a review with 10 metric tons of salt.

That is all.

Stories:

The Voice in my Head: Active. ~23 percent complete. Most recent story concept. It's about this 17-year-old kid named Slade who just joined the military academy, and has a freely-talking voice in his head, who turns out to be the spirit of the guy who discovered magic, and also a type of fugitive that many forces are seeking to capture. It goes without saying: Slade gets involved with a lot more than he bargained for. See summary below. This is my more developed story concept (world, plot, characters, etc...). It takes a while to pick up, though, and isn't very easy to get into.

Tracer: Active. ~49 percent complete. Second most-recent story concept. This is about two best friends, Tristan and Selphie, who find out that not only are they rune users - people who draw magical symbols to fight monsters called spirit slaves (among other things) - but they are also two key pieces of an ancient anti-apocalypse protocol, a role which has given them powers which they never asked for. Ones which many forces seek to try and use to their advantage. See summary below. This story is easier to read and starts off better than TVIMH. Overall though, the total story concept (world, plot, characters and whatnot) are not as thorough as TVIMH.

The Twelve Seals: Hiatus. I don't have a completion percentage for this one since I haven't even planned how the story will play out. I started this story when I was 16 and I haven't worked on it since I was 18. That's over 4 years ago, buddy.