Rocky Bridges once said there are three things everybody thinks he or she can do: manage a baseball team, run a hotel, and write a book. And I wish I had a nickel for every time I heard someone say, “Oh, I’d write a book, too, only I just don’t have the time!”
Assuming you now have the time, here are a few helpful hints to get your started.
It’s all about writing fantasy, which is the kind of fiction I write. I have no idea how to go about writing Serious Mainstream Literature, except to obey the cardinal rule of “Nothing happens.”
I’m still interested in learning what words you most emphatically don’t want to see in any fantasy. I’m sure you can add to my list.
Well, I already weighed in on some of my unfavorites in the original thread, so I won’t repeat them here. But I will add another reason for not using contemporary buzz words in historical (or even contemporary) fiction: Your work will be unintelligible and/or risible in ten or twenty years, when the “contemporary” terms will be obsolete or embarrassingly dated. You will then be seen as a dork. (And in ten or twenty years, no one will know what a dork is, or will snigger at the outdated slang — but I’m not writing historical fiction here, so I don’t care.)
23-skiddoo!
End of the day, breaking news, gender-neutral, spot on, and black lives matter.