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Ksenia Anske

February 14, 2016

Don't explain, stupid. Your reader is not an idiot.

by Ksenia Anske


Art by Charles M. Schultz

Art by Charles M. Schultz

Art by Charles M. Schultz

Art by Charles M. Schultz

This is as much for you as it is for me. Because I know you do it. I've seen it. And I have to thank Royce for catching me doing this. I was blind to it. To the point of him having to repeat it to me several times until I got it. 

I tend to do this in the beginning of the chapters. In the opening sentence. I've written a post about it a long time ago, about summarizing your whole book in your opening sentence (and paragraph, sort of) as I've seen Stephen King do. I've interpreted it my own way and took it to heart. Well, I was both right and wrong about that. Right in that the first sentence has to hook the reader, and often the hook is the almost-spelling-out-the-whole-story kind of line (much like book summaries tell you everything you need to know minus the reveal, which is why I don't read them). Wrong in that when the goal to summarize the book (or the chapter) overrides the goal of the actual story writing, it makes the story weak.  

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TAGS: smart shit, you should read this, actually you owe me cookies now, because I shared my secret, to flawless writing, or whatever, I want a warm pig