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Writing that's confusing?



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Fri Jan 30, 2015 2:28 pm
AttackOfTheFlash says...



I come to this forum too often... I'm sorry. :p
Hopefully this will be the last question I ask for a while. Some people say that my writing is... jumpy. Hard to follow. Confusing.
I don't know really what makes it that way. Too many ideas and I can't focus on one while writing? Too excited? Just overall unorganized? I don't know, and I really need help because I want this issue to stop. I really want my writing to be clear and easy to follow!
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Fri Jan 30, 2015 7:26 pm
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Rosendorn says...



It's a little difficult to answer this without a sample, but I will most certainly give it a shot.

The first step is to identify what's going on. This can be any number of things, which I've found usually involves one of the following:

- Not giving information in the right order (placing the cart before the horse, so to speak)
- Cramming too many ideas in a sentence or paragraph (a nightmare to keep track)
- Not properly transitioning between two points (you need to show the connecting events when they're not obvious)
- Not giving enough context (missing key pieces of contextual information that would explain the situation better)
- Too much irrelevant information (the relevant information gets lost)

One thing that can help you with this is letting your writing sit. If you give yourself time to forget the scene (so you stop reading it from short term memory and read the scene for what it is), then reread it, you can usually see where you messed up. Simply because once it's gotten out of your head, you can tell what's going on.

When you reread your writing while you still remember it, you end up basically reading the story from your memory instead of what's on the page. This can be even worse when you know everything that's going on and all backstory information, because all the motives/setting details make sense to you and you can forget other people don't have all the details you do.

When editing, go through the story and ask yourself "does this action make sense if readers don't know x?" It can be a hard question to answer that can need a certain amount of talking to your critics to answer (I have fixed many a confusing scene by telling critics what my intention was, which lets them point out where you fell short so I can know what to fix), but once you have, you'll get a sense of what you're doing wrong.
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Mon Feb 02, 2015 12:23 am
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LadySpark says...



Is your plot fully fleshed out? If you only have a faint idea of what you want to convey, or wide gaps in your plot that you're filling with random things, it could also make your writing jumpy.
I find that when I write jumpy, I don't have a clear idea of what I want to say or the image I want to convey. My brain starts going off in different directions, and as a result, my writing is alllllllll over the place.
Another reason it might be jumpy is not editing properly. If you're skating over things and not really getting down and dirty when you edit, you could be missing a huge problem in your own writing.

What I'd suggest is to look at your own writing critically. Read it aloud. Note where the spots are that make you go "uh that doesn't work". Edit it. Do it again. Work on fleshing out your plot until you have a clear idea. Make every sentence mean something and have a specific purpose. And go from there. Jumpiness is something that is easy to fix, you just have to work on how you explain your ideas to the world and edit properly. Like Rosey said, I can't really help anymore without seeing a sample of your writing. It's hard to pinpoint what your problem is when we have nothing to base our guesses off of.
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Mon Feb 02, 2015 2:04 am
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AttackOfTheFlash says...



Thanks guys for your replies and advice! I appreciate it!
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Thu Feb 12, 2015 4:07 pm
Tenyo says...



You can never ask too many questions! There's always someone else who is going to have the same issues as you, and can recycle the advice in this thread.

I have the same issue as you, and I see traits of my own writing in yours. For me there are too many ideas in my head and if I don't get them down fast enough then half of them are missed, and I forget that my readers *need* that other half.

It takes a little discipline, but try slowing down- in your mind, not your writing. Before you write your sentence pause for a second and consider what it is you're actually writing. Take this for example;

"The flashing lights of the police cars and ambulances lit up the night sky. The little community center was now a ransacked, bloody mess. A teacher and two students had been brutally murdered."

In a space of three lines you've included the blinding flashing lights, the blood stained community centre, and the brutal murder of three people. Since it would take the average person nine seconds to read this, that's like trying to fit three powerful ideas into nine seconds of screen time.

If you slow down and explain the significance of your character reflecting on these things then it might make more sense to your reader. Maybe expand and describe the ambience a bit more, or even chop out the sentences that aren't significant enough to be expanded.

I hope this helps. Also, I love zombie stories =D Keep that one up.
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Thu Feb 12, 2015 5:18 pm
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AttackOfTheFlash says...



@Tenyo thanks for your advice!! I thought this thread wouldn't get anymore replies, haha. I'll definitely work on what you've said. :)
And thanks for actually reading one of my "examples." (Glad to know that somebody likes an overused genre!) :D
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Fri Feb 13, 2015 2:35 am
Pretzelstick says...



Well I am not an expert and I have had this problem as well, but I have really worked hard on it.
What I have learned from personal experience is:

-try to do one idea per paragraph, really just clear your mind of everything else and focus on just this one thought
-a good way to smooth over your writing is to connect the dots if you know what I mean, make your ideas be similar and make sense
-Remember, it's just a first draft it's okay to be a little bit jumpy because you can always rewrite things or edit them.
-sometimes the problem could lie in your fast-paced story and you and I have to learn to slow down and hold the reigns. Pace yourself, maybe with a novel do one major event per chapter or whatever works best for you

I hope that this helps, because these are tips that I used on my self! Please PM if you have any questions at all!Thanks!
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Fri Feb 13, 2015 2:57 am
AttackOfTheFlash says...



@pretzelsing Thank you for your help as well! I swear these comments and tips make me want to write more (and I was going to take a break)! :)
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Mon Apr 27, 2015 3:27 pm
MelindaOsteen says...



Hey!

I am here to reply because I had the same problem just like you some time ago.
The first thing I did when decided to upgrade my writing was reading. I read a lot, and I am talking not only about fiction. I read a lot of writing blogs, for example, as Writer's Digest - http://www.writersdigest.com/ or Positive Writer - http://positivewriter.com/, where people shared their writing tips and experience. This helped me to get the general idea about my writing problems.

The next thing I did was taking tutor classes. I am still grateful to Helen from Papers Gear writing service, who spent hours reading and editing my writings, explaining my mistakes.

And the last thing I did (and do now) was writing a lot. You will never improve your writing just by analyzing your mistakes and thinking of how to solve them. The main piece of advice you need is : Write! Write every time you have a free moment, write anywhere, write anything.

That is why there are 3 steps to a better writing:
1. Learning of basics, discovering your mistakes
2. Practising with professionals, professional classes
3. Everlasting practising by yourself

Good luck!
Last edited by Kale on Wed Apr 29, 2015 5:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Fri May 08, 2015 12:41 am
Vikingr says...



It might be worth considering the person reading your work themselves. Like whether they are in the target audience in the first place. For instance I like Tom Clancy books and they usually feature complex political, Economic, and military scenarios; I dig it, others are going to say that they are boring and confusing.
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Fri May 08, 2015 12:52 am
Vervain says...



@Vikingr, but there's a difference between someone finding the subject matter (politics, economics, taxes, taxonomy, etc.) confusing or boring, and someone finding the writing itself confusing or boring.

It's entirely possible to have a confusing/boring subject matter told in an engaging way, and to have an exciting subject matter told in a confusing or boring way—and it was the latter problem that AttackOfTheFlash was concerned about. No matter how good the idea, and how well-targeted the audience is, if the writing is confusing or boring, it's not going to do well with the audience.

My two cents for Attack (if it's not been stated already): sometimes it helps to strip the words down until you have just what the characters are doing/feeling/thinking about, so you can make sure it's happening in the right order. For example, you can write "Walking through the doorway, she closed the door behind her"—a minor confusion, but in this scenario, you'd be stating that she's closing the door while she walks through the doorway. If you watch for some of that kind of syntax, that might help a little.
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Fri May 08, 2015 4:17 am
Vikingr says...



Arkhaion wrote:@Vikingr, but there's a difference between someone finding the subject matter (politics, economics, taxes, taxonomy, etc.) confusing or boring, and someone finding the writing itself confusing or boring.

It's entirely possible to have a confusing/boring subject matter told in an engaging way, and to have an exciting subject matter told in a confusing or boring way—and it was the latter problem that AttackOfTheFlash was concerned about. No matter how good the idea, and how well-targeted the audience is, if the writing is confusing or boring, it's not going to do well with the audience.



Alright.
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Fri May 08, 2015 1:50 pm
AttackOfTheFlash says...



Wow, I try to leave this website and get an email stating I have three replies to this old thing.

Thank you guys, I really to appreciate your advice!

I was really looking for the whole actual *technical* stuff that sounds confusing. Not the actual subject matter (but sometimes I feel that way!) But I really appreciate it guys. I swear advice like this makes me want to stay on here. XD
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Fri May 29, 2015 2:11 am
Stori says...



So stay!
  








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