Young Writers Society

So I was reading a story today, and I got so invested in it that halfway through when there was a sad moment, I started crying.

Now I know it doesn't take a lot to make me cry (I'm sappy), but still. The story had characters that were so fantastic, and they were so REAL and so THERE. The story was woven perfectly and seemed complex even though the idea wasn't, and I'm honestly in awe of it.

But I'm actually really sad because I feel like I'll never write like that. I've never made someone cry over my stories. I know lots of them are happy too, but not even the sad ones.

I just feel like mine will never be that way. There is certainly a place for fun, cheerful pieces that are just meant to be that way. To be clear, I'm not saying there's anything "wrong" with my writing. More that it can't do what I wish it would.

But I really want to connect to someone with what I write. I feel like my writing is lacking . . . well, substance. Not in plot or characters or setting. It's not technicalities or something you can really learn.

I feel like I can't provide that substance to make my story do that to people and to actually connect on some sort of deep level to a person, which really sucks because that's what I want the most as a writer. Even when I try and convey who they are, when I've thought deeply about them, I can't imagine someone being so emotionally attached to them besides me. They don't have to cry, that's not really the aim, but I want it to mean something to them. I want to write something people will hold in their heart or want to reread.

I'm just ridiculously sad about it and really bummed.

What do you guys think? Have you ever felt this way? Is it just the way it is? I'm sure someone will tell me that it's because I'm young, but the author of the story I cried for is even younger than me, and a lot of you lovely people are really young and still write amazingly. Anyone have any advice or help?

It has nothing to do with how old or young you are. The only thing that comes with age is experience, but the amount of it depends on the time invested, not time passed.

It's also important to remember that different people react differently to different things. What's really sad to you might be bland to someone else, and what you consider lacking might be someone else's idea of a masterpiece. When it comes to experiencing another person's writing, it's extremely subjective, and more often than not depends on the reader's personality and state as much as the writer's.

That said, there are things that resonate with the readers better than others. Fleshed out characters and plot are obvious things that give depth to a story, right up there with wordchoice and rhythm of the whole piece. People can start caring about the characters and the situations when they can relate to little things, when they can see how the plot affects the characters and vice versa, and when they can let themselves get invested into the story without strange wordchoice or sentence structure throwing them out of balance.

I can't really give you any extraordinary advice you've never heard before. We get better at writing by writing more, simply as that, and by reading and analysing others' writings. If this story speaks to you or makes you emotional, try looking at it critically. See what kinds of methods the writer uses that have an effect on you, read and review stories here and other things you've read to see if they use similar methods and if they work there as well, and try to combine and apply all those things to your own writing (not by copying it, obviously, but testing the formulas that work for others are okay). And share things, talk about it, ask people to focus on that in their reviews.

I hope that helps a bit.

Ditto to what she said ^^

Also, write about things and characters you care about. If you don't deeply care about your characters and your story, no one else will. Some of the best writing advice I've ever heard is to write the story you want to read.

Definitely pay close attention to what you read and when you really connect with a character, critically think about why you're connecting with them and what the author did to make you connect with them. And on the flip side, if there is a character you're just not connecting with and you just don't care about, critically think about why and what the author did (or didn't do) that left you wanting more. Then use that to inform your own writing.

I would also try to notice people as much as possible. How do people show their emotions? How do people react to different life circumstances? Highs? Lows? What kinds of things do people struggle with or have to deal with and how do they deal with it? What kinds of human variations exist in any of these things? Stuff like that. All of this goes into a personal bank of sorts and you can use little bits of this information you have at strategic times in your work to make your characters seem super authentic. Use things that happen in your life or in the lives of others to inspire parts of your own work (but remember you're writing fiction and this should only inform your writing).

No one gets good at this over night. Just like any other writing skill it will take time and practice. Keep working at it and trying different things because different things will work for different people. When people read your work, let them know that this is something you're working on and hopefully people can give some specific suggestions about your characters.

If there's anything you're working on now that you would like some specific feedback on in this realm, let me know and I'll take a look for you!

My current pet project is a story that I really want to resonate with readers, so I've been struggling with this myself.

In addition to what the others said, I've found it really helpful to think about what exactly it is about the story that I find the most meaningful and teasing out the reason why. If you know the what and the why of the story, it's a lot easier to figure out the how.

Like, my story has a lot of dysfunctional family drama ranging from estranged grandparents, infighting between in-laws, deteriorating parent-child relationships, and dying parents/spouses, all of which are pretty tragic and quite capable of wrenching heartstrings if brought to the forefront, and if my goal were to wrench up the tragedy and tear readers' hearts to shreds, they would be prime fodder for emphasis. Including these sorts of things in character backgrounds is a pretty standard technique for making characters more sympathetic, even.

But a tragic tale of family dysfunction is not the story I'm trying to tell. Those typically tragic things are just the contrasting backdrop against which the main story unfolds, and while all that stuff affects the story, it's not the story's heart.

If you forget the heart of your story and focus too much on the technique, you'll likely wind up with something that makes emotional connections with your readers... except they'll be different connections than the ones you intended, and they'll be the result of emotional manipulation rather than a genuine connection to the heart of your story.

So what is the heart of your story? How can you bring this to the forefront? Are there some elements of your story that need to be downplayed or brought forward? How are your characters affected by these things? How do your characters effect these things?

Ultimately though, you have no control over readers' feelings, but you can get lots of feedback and make adjustments to your presentation that will convey what you intended to convey more clearly. This only works though if you keep in mind what it is you intend to convey, which is the heart of your story.