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Why the Best Writing Style is Your Own

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First things first — you have a collection of paragraphs from the most iconic, key parts of your story — the rest are still in your mind, and you’re waiting for the right mood to put them on paper.

But how to structure your writing style?  Here’s where I’m going to be controversial with my answer: 

Don’t.

At least in terms of what works for me, that’s the *worst* thing you could do with your writing in the beginning. It’s about capturing those random flashes of insight that make you remember later what excited you about this story-concept to begin with. 

It’s like that moment in Avatar where those floating, magical seeds come to land on Jake’s arm.  He would be ill-advised to shake them off and go,

“Look, guys.  I’m trying to complete my mission.  Why don’t you come back later?”  Chances are, they wouldn’t.  And there goes the story.

 

via GIPHY

So here’s what I’d say about my writing style—

When the spark came back to me, perfect phrasing and all, I’d just often drop everything I was doing & write.  And luckily, I did — and here’s a good example:  

It turns out to be a good job I took the time right then and wrote that down — it turned out to be one of the more iconic scenes of the story. 

Now, I don’t mean to say it’ll never come back to you as good as it did the first time — that, again, is possible, but why give it the chance?

In my next blog, I’ll get down to the nitty-gritty of how I (with help!) pulled together some of those random ideas into larger chunks of text, and then how I structured them into some form of sequential story — a novel-timeline, if you will.

And after that, we’ll get into the juicer stuff:  When and how to work the Snowflake method to your benefit (what I have learned so far in my writing journey)…

Can There Be Too Much Editing?  The pros and cons of editing your precious ideas half-to-death (yes, you are beginning to guess where I stand on this)…

And, even more: How to Capture the Essence of a Lost Era (my favorite! And possibly yours too — for all the historical novel fans out there).

Cheers,

and Keep Writing!

Abena

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3 Comments

  1. Sharon Anderson
    August 9, 2021 @ 5:13 pm

    Love it! Well done and I’m looking forward to reading more of what you have to say. Very interesting!

    • Abena Sankofa
      August 10, 2021 @ 2:37 am

      Hey, Sharon! I’m soo thrilled to see your comment! Thanks for dropping by and I’m glad you liked it!

  2. Abena Sankofa
    April 18, 2022 @ 12:43 am

    Thank you!🙏🏾Feel free to look around, so far I’ve done a few more posts with writing tips, and lots more to come!

    Also do check out my author interview, (By the book blogger Fraser), which features more tips on how to think about writing fiction, under the heading “What would you say to those wanting to become an author?”: https://timetofeedmyreads.blogspot.com/2022/01/abena-sankofa-interview.html

    Please enjoy!😊