New to this

[Dragonheart]

Hey all,

Im new to the fourms and this site in general pretty much. Ive been reading some of the other posts in this section and such, so I was wondering some things. Is there any point in writing a story, if you havent had any training in doing so? I mean as in, I seen how in a query letter you would/could put down what school you graduted from. Also Ive never really wrote a whole story. I did a short story once for a class once, but that was only around 3 pages long. Ive wrote a few stories, but never have finished one. Right now on this computer, theres 2, one being 6 pages long and the other being 3. Plus i have a old notebook in my closet that has a few stories in it (only a about 3 to 4 pages long at the most) and on my old computer there was about 3, but those were lost when the computer died. So would it be worth giving it a try?

Thanks
-Andy

[JBI]

You really don't need any clases or anything. If you are really interested in writing and stuff, you might want to check this site out.
http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/index.php
Generally if you are writing in Sci-fi or fantasy you should do your own non-fiction reading to learn what to write about and basic facts to build your story. As for form, you can pick that up pretty easilly with practice.

For places to write to, that site generally has a lot of useful links and things.

[Dragonheart]

Thanks, looks like a good site.

I was thinking of getting some of the books mentioned in the Writers Writing Resources thread as well.

[Annaren Girl]

sooo dragonheart have you read the naming and the riddle? *waves*
just wondering?

[Dragonheart]

sooo dragonheart have you read the naming and the riddle? *waves*
just wondering?

umm huh? I guess ill have to say no to that, sense i really dont know what that is lol

[Annaren Girl]

oh i just figured that since you were in this forum that you were a fan of the books by alison croggon....... The Naming, The Riddle and the most recent the the quartet The Crow? If you haven't you should really start!!! they are great!

[Annaren Girl]

opps!! sorry just realized when i went back to the main page that you were in the writing forum!*blushes* sorry ....

[Dragonheart]

opps!! sorry just realized when i went back to the main page that you were in the writing forum!*blushes* sorry ....

lol np. Was a little confused there.

[Annaren Girl]

Lol sorry my bad your thread showed up on a fantasy forum someone that was in here must have replied to ya!!
have a good nite and good luck with the writing thing

[Holbrook]

JBI, while absolute write is a good forum for information on the writing world, I personally find it a very abrasive one, especially for a newbie feeling their way.

[choppy]

All you need in order to write a story is the urge to write one. Don't worry about formal training or past experience. If you have an idea - write it down and see where it takes you.

Remember that writing is a craft as much as it is an art. Don't expect it to be perfect on your first try. The more you write, the more you will hone your skills.

[JBI]

JBI, while absolute write is a good forum for information on the writing world, I personally find it a very abrasive one, especially for a newbie feeling their way.

Yeah I did to. The trick is just to pick a few forums to search such as the novel forum, and the science fiction and fantasy forum. The chat is helpful as well. It just takes some time to get used to the site since it has about 10x as many viewers, and a much broader target than these boards.

[Dragonheart]

Thanks all.

How many pages is the usual fantasy novel? I mean I have one that is 6 pages long right now in microsoft word, times new roman font with font size 12, any idea how many pages that would be?

[Jacquin]

Change the font to Courier and double space it then you can go pretty much page for page. If you are under 100,000 words then it will be pretty short for a fantasy novel.

J

[choppy]

Go by word cound. In MS Word, just hit Tools then Word Count. Typical first novels are in the 80-120 thousand word range. Often in epic fantasy, this can get larger.

For a first draft, don't worry too much about word count. Get the story down in whatever form it needs to take (although try to avoid being too verbose). Then you can decide how many words you can cut or need to add.

You may get about ten thousand words into a novel and find out that what you're writing will work best as a short story. Or if you pass 200 thouand words, you might want to think about making your work into a series.