: EvilSoup is right. If you've got English grammar and spelling down--the meat and potatoes of any language--then the next step is to practice it. 'Literary' American English is so wonderfully

EvilSoup is right. If you've got English grammar and spelling down--the meat and potatoes of any language--then the next step is to practice it. 'Literary' American English is so wonderfully diverse! There's really no single style and it's constantly evolving. My suggestion? Don't try to "study" and "memorize" anything--talk to Americans, ask them about their lives, watch how they use language. Immerse yourself in the culture and you'll understand not just how they use words but why they use them the way they do. That will also help you take care of the other aspect of good fiction--real, fleshed-out characters.

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: I'd call that development. It covers everything in Dale's excellent list and dmm's couch time.

@Debbie451

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: My sense (as a reader, not someone who's published a YA novel) is that you kind of want to liken it to a PG-13 movie. If it's too graphic for a 13-year-old to be watching in a movie

@Debbie451

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: If you can't boil down your novel into a logline (or "elevator pitch," which is how I learned it), then you may actually have a problem with your novel. You've provided the structure of

@Debbie451

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: No, you can only do that if you're making some sort of break or shift in narrative style. If the story switches to a dream, for instance, or if the characters enter a Fae realm or another

: EvilSoup is right. If you've got English grammar and spelling down--the meat and potatoes of any language--then the next step is to practice it. 'Literary' American English is so wonderfully

More posts by @Debbie451

: I'd call that development. It covers everything in Dale's excellent list and dmm's couch time.

: My sense (as a reader, not someone who's published a YA novel) is that you kind of want to liken it to a PG-13 movie. If it's too graphic for a 13-year-old to be watching in a movie

: If you can't boil down your novel into a logline (or "elevator pitch," which is how I learned it), then you may actually have a problem with your novel. You've provided the structure of

: No, you can only do that if you're making some sort of break or shift in narrative style. If the story switches to a dream, for instance, or if the characters enter a Fae realm or another

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