I've been in correspondence with some young writers lately, met through various methods. MySpace, emails to me, the Little Owl Mentoring program, contest judging etc. Which is why I think I'd be really happy teaching one of these days. I seem to do a lot of that. Be that as it may, as anyone who's had the opportunity to read work by writers working toward publication knows, there are a lot of writers out there who need to read more and study more about writing. The case is somewhat different with younger writers as they are still learning the building blocks of fine writing, not to mention building up life experience so you'd naturally expect their work to have some issues. All of which is a long way of saying I read a lot of work that needs work.

One of the biggest issues (after plain grammar and language skills) is a story that is being told rather than revealed. There's a big difference between rough writing in which the story is being told to me and rough writing in which the story is being revealed. The second case is rare and it's exciting when you come across it. Grammar can be learned, typos can be fixed. You can teach someone how to identify Point of View problems. But it's really, really hard to teach someone to start their story smack in the middle of something tense happening to a character.

But today, I did read something like that. The talent is there. And it's really exciting!

Now I have to go back to work on Scandal. I hate first draft writing. Hate it hate it hate it hate it. But now I have to go do it.

Labels: Scandal, writing, writing craft