: Re: Not enough real world experience to write convincing situations? I'm faced with a writing dilemma where every real life situation I've tried to write feels forced/inaccurate. I'm a fairly young

In my experience, you write best what you love most. If you love people, you write good characters. If you love conversation, you write good dialog; if you love to observe, you write good settings and descriptions; if you love stories, you write good plots.

I can see two possible ways forward for you. First, you could refocus your writing on own existing experiences and/or interests. Compelling books have been written about young protagonists with limited and/or stunted experiences of the larger world (Room, A Secret Garden, Catcher in the Rye, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, To Kill a Mockingbird), even if most of those still have the larger world in the background. And if plot and dialog aren't your strengths, maybe you should try non-fiction, or poetry.

Second, you can try to live a bit more, and also "love" a bit more. By living more, I mean things like traveling, if you can, making new friendships, going on blind dates --things that will put a few more experiences in the hopper. By "loving" more, I mean putting more focused attention into the areas that you are weak in. For instance, since I'm not great with descriptions, I sometimes spend time trying to carefully observe a particular setting with loving attention to details. Otherwise, I know my descriptions will be as fuzzy as my usual careless observations of given places. Maybe you can do the same with whatever part of your writing is ringing false.

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: How to describe a husky, low, sinister voice? Hello! While I was writing for my fantasy novel, I was stuck on how to describe a very scratchy and low, but malicious voice for a grim reaper

@Samaraweera193

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: One interesting variant I've seen on this was Mercedes Lackey's Elemental Masters series. In that series Ice was not a separate element from Fire, but instead a different aspect of Fire. Sort

@Samaraweera193

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: For what it is worth, this seems quite effective to me. It is always difficult to write in first person, and when the narrator is challenged in some way, it also challenges the writer.

@Samaraweera193

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: Just wanted to mention The Novel Factory here, as keeping track of characters was one of the main reasons it was developed. Disclosure - I am the creator of this software. This is a screenshot

: Re: Not enough real world experience to write convincing situations? I'm faced with a writing dilemma where every real life situation I've tried to write feels forced/inaccurate. I'm a fairly young

More posts by @Samaraweera193

: How to describe a husky, low, sinister voice? Hello! While I was writing for my fantasy novel, I was stuck on how to describe a very scratchy and low, but malicious voice for a grim reaper

: One interesting variant I've seen on this was Mercedes Lackey's Elemental Masters series. In that series Ice was not a separate element from Fire, but instead a different aspect of Fire. Sort

: For what it is worth, this seems quite effective to me. It is always difficult to write in first person, and when the narrator is challenged in some way, it also challenges the writer.

: Just wanted to mention The Novel Factory here, as keeping track of characters was one of the main reasons it was developed. Disclosure - I am the creator of this software. This is a screenshot

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