“Surprising what you can dig out of books if you read long enough, isn’t it?”
Robert Jordan
I owe Jordan quite a great deal when it comes to my own progress as a writer. In fact, it was promptly after I finished reading his work that I decided to try my hand at creating a story of my own.
Naturally, I set out with lofty expectations, drafting plans for a staggering fantasy spectacle in imitation of The Wheel of Time. I worked eagerly and rapidly, putting together a manuscript over 100k words in length. I was proud, but not for long—each re-read and second glance imbued me with a growing sense of dissatisfaction. Attempts at revision were made, but to little avail. No matter how much I tried to polish and primp it, my work remained intrinsically flat, its characters one-dimensional and its dialogue painfully cliché. As a reader, I scorned such shortcomings, deeming them signs of poor writing. But as a writer? Well, here I was, with a story containing all the depth of a second-rate superhero blockbuster. I mean, just take a look at this snippet.
“You’re breathing hard, old friend,” he taunted, despite hanging in a delicate balance, hair’s length from decapitation, “Getting worked up so easily? Time has certainly taken its fair toll on you.”
“And you’re as weak as always, incompetence matched only by your impudence,” Ethan responded with solely contempt, “I grow tired of your pedantic pestering. Lethargy will send me to the grave sooner than you, Christopher.”
Seriously?
But I learned to prioritize. When it comes to dialogue, less is often better, especially during fast-paced back-and-forth exchanges. I learned to plan. I started plotting out the movement of characters and their driving forces throughout the course of a narrative, like the lapping layers of froth that blend into each other along the shoreside. I learned to narrow my scope, prioritizing meaningful detail over hollow illusions of grandiose scale. And I found the writing process all the more rewarding for it. The time spent in preparation was quickly remedied, and this time around I produced work I could actually be proud of. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a drastic improvement.
And while I still occasionally indulge in wordy, over-the-top dialogue, I try to keep it in good taste.
“You mean to barter with a god,” Inaal murmured, “A hot-blooded inferno of a god, whose veins run thick with molten gold.”
“We mean to lure it out of the sky,” Nakell said to her, nodding at the thatched roof that just barely held the howling winds at bay, “Once it’s down on the ground, it’ll bleed just as we do.”
Dezun