I'm writing a sad dramatic story set in the war period about a young guy who had an unlucky life and was tortured in prison. When he gets out he is a completely different person (detached, aloof and emotionless, he tries to forget what happened but the nightmares haunt him all the time). He flees and wants to go to Canada, but before that he goes to England to find out about his missing dad (who died years ago but he never actually knew he just imagined it). There he meets an Irish girl who falls for him, she's extremely clever and sensitive and feels like he's the one that understands her, because she's having a hard time at school (her classmates hate her because she's poor, she works too and she is more gifted than all the middle class and high society classmates she has there). She's outcast and lonely, even her family doesn't encourage her (her cousins are too focused on getting an english husband to keep her company or befriend her). He hides her lots of things and secrets and tries to push her away, because he feels like she deserves something better. Then she begs him to take her away and he helps her fleeing to canada but when they disembark the police finds him and forces him to go to first world war. She is pregnant with his child in a foreign country and cries all the time thinking something could happen to him. In the meantime he's having a hard time in war again, and he thinks of her all the time. I dont know how to make it end.

Beautiful, not as in story, but as in the way the author structures and writes his sentences. For me it would have to be Lord of the Rings. What about you?

My friend is a history major and I want to get her something related to that. But im not sure what. I have gotten her a comedic biography of a famous dictator before, i have looked at historical fiction books but since I've never read any i don't know which would be good. Any ideas

I've been trying to convince my friend Crow to start writing instead of being a yahoo on Yahoo Answers. He won't listen. He believes he'll get published by hanging out on Yahoo Answers all day, trying to scam people out of their money. He really believes you should pay money to learn how to write. Can you help me help him?

They offer libation: glorious golden showers raining down from penises in honor of the gods Andrew and Crow.

As this is nowhere near the case now, to make it more relatable what would be the equivalent age now?

It could be one you've read or want to read.

Best answer: I'm going to politely disagree with the positive reviews. I see a handful of outright mistakes and a lot of odd choices with verb tenses that IMO weaken the narrative. And I don't see the semicolon use as correct at all. (Horrors, I've disagreed with my friend Crow!)

I rarely do line-by-line critique here because the writers' reactions tend to be defensive, hostile, or abusive. If you care to see detail and can promise you'll act like a professional, I can try to find time to do a LBL. (And it's perfectly okay if you're not yet ready for that, too.)

Edit: We stay quiet for a while; [<---replace with a comma] [the ←-delete needless words] both [of us<--delete] either too tired or too annoyed to bother talking [to each other<--delete]. It's not like I'm complaining, either. [←-This is wordy, but it also gives your narrator a real-sounding voice] The wind is howling [howls] like a horror movie [opener←-awkward word choice. Maybe ‘soundtrack’?] and the streets are heavily shadowed with a pale late-night glow[←-Switch to active voice, present tense, like the first part of the sentence: ...and a pale late-night glow heavily shadows the streets]. It's comforting [in some odd way, like<--delete][.] I could sink into the dark shadows of the night and disappear if I wanted to. [Comforting as it is, ←-delete] the[The] delayed pain of Ameki's nails digging into my arm [is kicking in now,--delete] [kicks in], and I [Eek, failure to proofread!] [it]takes all my willpower [not] to [not<--delete] ask her to lighten up[ a bit←-delete].

I know, that’s hard to read all marked up. Most of what I did was make all the verbs present tense, removing present progressive (“is xing”) and get rid of words you don’t need. If you agreed with every correction, which you don’t have to do, it would read:

We stay quiet for a while, both either too tired or too annoyed to bother talking. It's not like I'm complaining, either. The wind howls like a horror movie soundtrack and a pale late-night glow heavily shadows the streets. It's comforting. I could sink into the dark shadows of the night and disappear if I wanted to. The delayed pain of Ameki's nails digging into my arm kicks in, and it takes all my willpower not to ask her to lighten up.

Nothing’s missing or radically changed, really, but that first paragraph went from 104 to 82 words. You see if you can reduce the next paragraph, or some other paragraph, by twenty percent. It’s a learned skill, and this is a good time to start.

I am writing a medieval fantasy and I hear a lot of opinions about how they shouldn't all be blond. I have characters with other races in book, but they are minor. My two main characters are blond, and the story is set in a medieval European kingdom. I hear a lot of people saying this is cliche and characters should be biracial. Not discounting other races, but I feel like a racist right now that I am being advised to change one of the blond characters so I wouldn't seem like a racist? Why is this a big deal? Would this be okay if I keep them both blond?

I want to read something worthwhile, something that will broaden my understanding of something: Life, philosophy, nature, art, anything clever and interesting but not boring. I like guys like Richard Feynman, Michio Kaku, Robert Anton Wilson, Terence McKenna.

Best answer: Plot, character, setting which includes when and where, mood, tempo. Beginning, middle, end. Map those out and then start at page one.

I'm writing a story, but not sure what the girls name should be? Any ideas? Thanks!

Best answer: Because they're nosey.

Best answer: Chasing the Dragon

The term "chasing the dragon" is slang for chasing the ultimate high. You know, like "Puff the Magic Dragon." But it generally refers to the high you're trying to get back to that you got the very first time you did a drug because that's usually the best high you'll ever have on it. So when you're "chasing the dragon," you're chasing something you're never going to find because dragons aren't real, and if they ever were, they only existed in the past, which is all part of the metaphor.

She starts out by chasing highs with this guy. Then she finishes off by chasing him. He becomes the dragon. She's chasing someone who may not even be real anymore because he's dead, also chasing a love that may not have been real because it was clouded in the illusory smoke of weed and possibly other drugs. Whether him or the idea of him, she's chasing something she's never going to find -- a long-gone, mystical dragon.

Anyway, to add to the poignancy of the title, you could have him have a dragon tattoo or be called "The Dragon" as some kind of street name or have them smoke out of a bowl that's shaped like a dragon or something like that.

By the way, if you like reading and maybe want some relevant inspiration from an insanely good and not extremely well-known book, read Pepsi-Cola Addict by June Gibbons.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbp9N4Bn...

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The Monkey on My Back

When you say someone's got a monkey on their back, it means they have an addiction, but metaphorically, it can also mean something that you can't shake, like this boy for this girl.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHb2XYeX...

Best answer: What would constitute a "good name" for a character? Was Melville right to go with "Ishmael" instead of "Ezekiel"? Was Nabokov right to go with "Humbert-Humbert" instead of "Lambert-Lambert"? Should Orwell have called his character "Harry Jones" instead of "Winston Smith"?

Think for one moment, would your mother be a different person if she had been given a different name? Would your best friend be a different person if he or she had a different name? Would YOU be a different person if you had a different name? This is the internet, so I could be called "Andrew" in real life or I could be "Bernard" or "Carl" or "Dwayne." No matter which of those names my parents had given me, I'd still have to develop my own personality and grow and mature into the person I was meant to become.

Let's say you write your story and you decide to call your character "Alice", and you end up writing a superb story that you feel proud of having written. Then, afterwards, you decide to change her name to "Beth" or "Carol." Would it really make any difference? It would still be the same story, the only change would be the character's name. Let's say 100 people were to read your story, fifty of them read the first version where she's called "Alice", and fifty of them read the revised version where she's got another name. Now let's say that you could ask each and every one of them their opinion on the story. Some people might say that they thought it was wonderful, some might say that it was awful, some might say that it was all right but not really their cup of tea and some might say that they thought it was just okay and nothing to write home about. So you'd have some stellar reviews, some lukewarm reviews and some poor reviews. That's pretty standard.

Now, how many do you think would give a toss about the character's name? Out of those hundred people, how many would be likely to say "I stopped reading because the character was called __________"? How many would be likely to say "You know what I really loved about this piece - the fact that the character was called __________"?

If you focus your efforts on crafting a great story, you won't have to worry about which names readers might prefer. And you know what? It's YOUR story, so what I think or what anybody else thinks counts for a lot less than what you think. Are you under the mistaken impression that kidnappers always select their victim by name? Are there kidnappers out there who only take people with three-syllable names, or names that begin with an odd letter of the alphabet or names that end in a vowel?

Wasting time diddling over a character's name doesn't serve any purpose at all. Are there exceptions to that? Sure. You could be writing a historical fiction that takes place in 1600s Korea or a science fiction story about an alien planet, with specific times or locations, choosing an appropriate name means selecting one from a much smaller pool of possibilities. But if those things are not a factor in your story, then you can go with pretty much whatever you like.