Bad Hobbit's Erotic Writing 101

Bad Hobbit's (Erotic) Fiction 101

A (slightly) tongue-in-cheek guide on how to improve your writing and prepare it to present to an editor -- and when not to even try.

Introduction -- writer attitude

OK, here's a scenario: You've written your amazing story. It's based on a fantastic idea -- and hey, fiction is all about the idea, right? It's totally original (and I mean totally), with a great storyline, fantastic characters and really hot sex. So all you need to do is submit it to Literotica and the job's done. But -- OMG! -- they reject it! You can't understand why anyone could fail to accept such a gem, especially for something as petty as, say, 'punctuation'; I mean, who cares about that these days? Meh! So you decide you might need an editor to just fix this little problem so you can get past the nasty moderators and publish your erotic classic onto Literotica.

So you contact an editor -- let's say he goes under the handle of 'Bad Hobbit'; funny name, but whatever -- and (unlike almost every other editor you try to contact) he replies! But he seems like a grouchy kind of person. His profile is full of conditions, and so is his response to your request. He seems to feel that, before you submit a story, you should know something about writing, and do all sorts of boring stuff first -- like checking your own story for mistakes, FFS! I mean, come on! Writing is all about getting your idea down, right? Then the editor can sort out the boring crap...

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So, change of PoV ('point of view'), which is not normally good practice in writing. (See below).

This is me, Bad Hobbit (aka Jack), sitting here, trying to get my own stories finished. But I happen to believe that if you want to write well, you should also try editing. This helps you see problems with -- or clever techniques in -- other people's stories that you may not be noticing -- or applying -- in your own. It's also good to read work that others have written, and maybe collaborate with them if they're good. So, a while back I decided to volunteer as an editor on Literotica, and I got loads of requests -- probably because none of the other supposed volunteer editors ever seems to feel the need to respond. (I know -- I've tried repeatedly to get someone to edit my stories, with virtually no response whatsoever -- Literotica staff take note).

So having agreed to look at some of this work, I get sent stories that have stuff in them like this:

"Amy and Lucy had been hiding in the kitchen, but from their drunken laugh I made sure they had a good time.Several times they had brought more alcohol and nuts. With each subsequent loading of the table, I felt Lucy's nipples swell more and more." (At least 6 errors. I have a mental image of a foot-pump under the table, connected to Lucy's tits. The more you load the table, the more her nipples swell. Great idea for a TV challenge game!)

Or this:

"With that I was lead to a smallish cell with a ben in it and that was that, apart from I still had a hard on from the anal probing..." (At least 7 errors. I'd certainly give the guy who wrote this an anal probing, possibly with a hot soldering iron).

Or this:

"He backs you against the wall in your entryway, and starts kissing you again. Only kisses, some light touches, and lingering sensations that resonates throughout your body. It felt new, refreshing, like this time was special.He backs you up against a wall in your entryway." (At least 6 errors and a wonderful potential double-entendre; is having a wall in your entryway a form of contraception, or like a chastity belt?)

Some would say "surely it's an editor's job to correct little things like switches of tense, poor punctuation, repeated words, spelling mistakes, etc?" Answer: NO! It's very, very time-consuming and boring as Hell. (I'm assuming that one of the big down-sides of Hell is that it will be mind-numbingly dull, but I'll have to wait and see when I'm consigned there by the people whose work I've criticized). "But isn't that what editors are for?" I hear some of you ask. "No -- not necessarily to be consigned to Hell, but to do the dull bits that, like, anyone can do (dude) and allow the brilliant writer to explore and expand their fascinating ideas, unhindered by the shackles of petty things like grammar, spelling and punctuation?" (Of course, it's only people with a vocabulary and the ability to write a coherent sentence who would say it that way).

Well -- again, NO! In fact, absolutely not! Like, totally absolutely not, not, fucking NOT! It's YOUR job, you no-hope would-be writer! If you don't care about the quality and readability of your own work, why should I -- or any of your intended readers?

I'm reliably informed (though I've never counted) that the English language has the largest number of words of any language in the World. It's the language of Shakespeare and Milton, Austen and Dickens, Hardy and Laurie Lee, Hemingway and Steinbeck, Tolkien and Mervyn Peake, Orwell and Huxley, Salman Rushdie, Gil Scott-Heron, Benjamin Zephaniah, Graham Swift and Jon McGregor. What do these writers have in common? They shape the language they use -- English -- to create something beautiful; not always pretty, but often poetic, or evocative, or stark, or disturbing, or thought-provoking, or inspiring, or deeply emotional. So when someone writes something like:

I'm looking at him, but his look is unwaveringly still. He didn't flinch at all even after hearing relationship between me and Alice.

"You didn't have to tell me about this phase of your life.", Justin, my lawyer said curiously.

I feel as though I have to apologize to the English language for letting people mangle it like that. (BTW, I love that last 'sentence'. Depending on how you read it, there's a wonderful ambiguity about who Justin is, and I'm intrigued to know what was curious about the way the lawyer said it. Was it in a high-pitched whine, or a growly, Louisiana accent? I'll let you decide how many errors there are in those 3 'sentences'. It's not quite into double figures, but close). But I digress.

So here's something you budding writers should all take on board. I'll emphasize it, because it's really, really important:

You, the writer, MUST be the first and most critical editor of your own work.

Got that? Good -- I hope so, because every time I receive another half-finished pile of clumsy drivel, I'll get more and more abusive toward the self-styled 'writer'. We Brits have a picturesque word to describe something of poor quality: that word is 'shite'. It means exactly what you think it means, but sounds more polite. (My friends in the North East of England have an expression that means "you're kidding me!" It's "hadaway and shite!" which sounds to me like a firm of lawyers. I'm sure that in my dealings with the legal profession, I've met Mr. Shite on several occasions).

Yes, the role of the editor is to improve the work presented to them. They may point out that: the author has introduced some barely-credible plot twists; or there is too much exposition; or that certain character traits are not consistent; that some characters are under-used and should either be fleshed-out more or removed; that there may be unnoticed inconsistencies or anachronisms; or that the time-line doesn't work. An editor may make suggestions about pace, about the order in which events are related, or perhaps whether it might work better in first- or third-person. They may even find a few typos that the author has missed, some inadvertent lapses of tense or POV.

Yes, some editors -- I assume the type who also like to be locked in a dungeon, tied to a bench and then regularly beaten with a split tawse -- specifically advertise that they would be happy to correct spelling, grammar, punctuation and other basic errors. And sure, you can use these people if you like, assuming they're any good. They are the ones whose selfless service at this mind-numbing task will earn them points in Heaven.

But what about you, the writer? Is your ambition to be able to write about sex in a semi-literate manner and then just squeeze past the moderators. Or do you want people to read and rate your stories? Surely the main reason for getting published on Literotica is to find that people like your work. If it's barely-readable drivel -- and there is, sadly, a lot of that on the site -- then you'll just get ignored. So why not learn to be better? Why not improve your writing -- and your ratings -- by polishing your skills?

So IMHO, the author absolutely must be the first and most critical reviewer, and shouldn't release the story to an editor until it is in a good 'final draft' state, with all obvious errors removed. (Of course, if your name is Katie Price, David Beckham or Sean Hannity, these petty rules don't apply to you, as the editor will be paid handsomely -- or at least, paid -- to knock your self-obsessed pile of drivel into a best-seller. Or, if you're Hannity, the GOP will at least buy your book by the truckload to push it to the top of the best-sellers list).

So having got that off my chest, here are some things that you may actually find useful.

Advice on approaching editors

I've approached a load of volunteer editors on Literotica, and as I said earlier, most of them are a waste of time. "Hey, isn't that just arrogant crap?" I hear you ask. No -- because, in my experience, only one of the 'editors' on the site has EVER replied to a request, so sending them a carefully-crafted plea for help is literally a waste of time. Try as many as you like; from what I've seen, I'm the only editor on the site who bothers to reply to every request. Please DO tell me if you find one who regularly responds, as I'd like some of my own work edited.

But let's say you strike lucky with me or someone else. Before you send me -- or any other editor -- your story, it's important that you complete ALL of the following:

• Read this short guide, and make sure you haven't fallen into any of the numerous traps I've listed. If you realize you have, fix these things first.
• Then spell-check your story & correct the genuine faults. Word's spell-checker isn't always right -- it has an annoying quirk about 'which' and 'that', and sometimes even 'there' and 'their' -- and it often misses some pretty-dire punctuation errors, but generally it will find the majority of real howlers, although it gets stuff wrong. (It wants me to change the contraction "it's" to the possessive "its" in the next sentence, which is bollocks). If you use Grammarly, good luck; I find it's right only about 50% of the time, which is about the same as Word's spelling & grammar checker. (I turned it on to check this document, and it wants me to change 'numerous traps' in the previous bullet to 'numerous trips'. It's also objecting to things like 'in tense' in the paragraph below, even though 'intense' would be stupid, and it has an obsession with what's called the 'Oxford comma', of which more below). I find Grammarly useful to remove redundant adverbs and adjectives -- words like 'really', which I tend to over-use -- but otherwise, it's pretty poor.
• Next, read it through again carefully and weed out the type of errors that an editor will find on first reading. Repeated or missing words, poor punctuation and lapses in tense are horribly common. Getting a character's name wrong is another. One would-be author misspelled their main character's name 3 times in a 5-page story. I've even embarrassingly published something myself where I used the wrong character's name at one point. (I hurriedly corrected this when someone kindly pointed this out).
• THEN, put it away for a week (at least), come back to it & read -- and correct -- it again. You'll be amazed at how much you missed the first time through.

If you've done all of this, then go ahead and write to me or another editor -- but take care over your request: I've rejected several because the would-be author didn't even bother to check the wording of their message before sending it to me, and it was choc-full o' typos. (If your introductory email shows carelessness, the chances are that your story will as well, and that's a huge turn-off for an editor). Tell me/them what you're looking for. Speaking personally, I reply to every request, and if that request seems literate and reasonable, I'll look at the story. (If it's clear you can't string a sentence together, I will decline).

It's really important to recognize that, in reviewing your work, an editor is giving you many hours of their time for free. As a business consultant, a client would typically be charged around the equivalent of $100-$200 an hour for my expertise, so for me to allocate (say) half a day of my time to looking at your masterpiece and providing constructive feedback, I'll be giving you something worth well over $500 for nothing. So don't fuck me around.

But what if you're unsure about how to get your story into good shape to start with? Well, in the following sections, I'll try to summarize a few simple techniques that have helped me -- and others -- write compelling stories. I have over 50 pieces on Literotica, almost all of which score around 4.5 or above. (But then, of course, they may just be wank-fodder; it's up to you to decide). My observations are based on what I've seen in the 40-odd submissions (some of them very odd) that have been sent to me. These points are not definitive rules -- I'm not a professor of English Literature, a creative-writing tutor or a professional editor or agent. However, I've written and/or edited around 1,000 business documents and at least 100 pieces of fiction, won a few prizes for my work and, most importantly, I've also read a lot of stuff by good writers.

I'm assuming that, as you're still reading this, your objective is to be a better writer, not just to get some half-finished rubbish past the Literotica moderators. (If that's genuinely your plan, kindly fuck off). What follows should be seen as almost a 'tick list' of things to do and things to avoid, rather than a real 'how-to-write guide'. There are some superb books out there on the basics of how to write (and also a lot of tedious shit that doesn't help). An excellent place to start is Stephen King's 'On Writing' -- the middle bit, where he gives some very helpful tips on basic writing techniques, not the first and third sections which are only of interest if you're a fan of Stephen King. His key recommendation is that you should 'read a lot and write a lot' if you want to be a writer -- excellent advice. Two other useful and entertaining books are 'The Elements of Eloquence' by Mark Forsyth and 'The Short Story Writer's Toolshed' by Della Galton.

I've also largely assumed that you'll be using Word or some other functionally-rich word-processor. For all its many faults -- and bugs -- Word is much more usable than Pages, so if you're using a Mac or iPad, try Office 365 or, if you want something for nothing, LibreOffice. You'll need a tool that at least has reasonable functionality that's easily accessible from the standard user interface. By this, I'd include things like styles and templates, a decent spelling & grammar checker, the ability to set the proofing language, a powerful track-changes capability and the ability to export into other formats. While Pages may have these features, I find them hard to access, as if Apple have hidden them away under layers of menus because no-one uses them. From my relatively-limited experience, Pages appears to have been created for people who want to write an occasional letter, but not for serious authors. A friend who is an Apple evangelist agrees -- and uses LibreOffice (though he also rates Grammarly, which I don't). I'm sure someone will tell me we're both wrong, so if you're happy with Pages, that's up to you.

So here goes: some important things you need to get right if you want to write decent -- or even indecent -- fiction.

Punctuation

I spend inordinate amounts of my time correcting other people's punctuation. Punctuation isn't that boring, pointless stuff that, like, only nerds are interested in, dude; it's the stuff that turns your otherwise-meaningless drivel into properly-structured and comprehensible English. Take this example.

Where are you going sir joshua asked the old man with a fierce look in his eyes

This could be punctuated in at least 3 ways, with 3 completely different meanings:

"Where are you going, sir?" Joshua asked the old man with a fierce look in his eyes. (Joshua is perhaps a child or is otherwise being deferential to the rather scary old man, possibly trying to help).

"Where are you going, Sir Joshua?" asked the old man with a fierce look in his eyes. (Sir Joshua is being stopped on the road and being asked for his destination, with possibly sinister intent).

"Where are you going?" Sir Joshua asked the old man, with a fierce look in his eyes. (Sir Joshua is demanding of an old man, possibly a vagrant or peasant, where he is going, in a threatening and unfriendly manner).

Quite apart from the simple concept that you might actually want your reader to understand your story in the way you intended, if you can't punctuate, the Literotica moderators will kill you stone dead; they're really fussy about punctuation, especially in dialog. Any half-decent spell-checker will help you with the absolute basics -- though, as I said above, Word's spell-checker is far from perfect and (IMHO) Grammarly it gets it wrong at least as often as it gets it right. So here are a few simple rules you should follow:

• Firstly, commas are your friends, helping to give your sentences structure and meaning. Try reading your story out loud. Every time you pause for meaning, to identify part of a list or, as here, to parenthesize, please ensure that there's a comma. I probably over-use commas, but this is much better than massively under-using them, which is what I often find. Typically, you don't need a comma before 'joining words' like and, or and because, although there are exceptions -- mostly if the following text is a separate sub-clause -- but it can often be a matter of 'feel'. (Grammarly LOVES and insists upon the so-called 'Oxford comma' where, in a comma-separated list, you insert a comma before the 'and' or 'or' preceding the last item. I hate that, and most writers don't do it, but unfortunately you can't switch this off in Grammarly. It also sometimes insists you remove a 'parenthetical' comma before an 'and', where you've used commas to delineate an 'excursion' onto a different but related topic. It can be deeply irritating).
• You should write in sentences, I keep telling people that they need to use periods but they won't listen, they keep using commas instead, it drives me mad. OK, so if you can't see what I just did, please, please don't ask me to edit for you. (Clue: the first four commas should all have been periods/full-stops). If you're starting to say something new, make sure you've used a period/full-stop and a space. A sentence contains a verb and is complete in and of itself. You can break the 'verb' rule occasionally if you know what you're doing, but don't push it or your story will sound jerky and disjoint. If you can write, it should just feel natural to apply full-stops/periods to make logical sentences. If it doesn't, PLEASE don't try writing -- or at least don't ask me to edit for you.
• Why do people put a question mark/point in? and then continue as if nothing had happened. Or drop an exclamation point! into the middle of a sentence? Look, the rules for these punctuation marks are the same as for a period/full-stop. You ALWAYS start a new sentence afterward, with a capital letter. If that doesn't read right, your punctuation is in the wrong place. And please stop over-using exclamation marks/points! All the time! It drives me mad! MAD, d'you hear! Keep these little beasts to a minimum or you'll start sounding hysterical. And do make sure that a question really is a question. "I wonder what he's thinking," is NOT a question; it's a statement of what YOU'RE thinking/wondering. Most questions begin with Kipling's six honest serving-men -- "What and Why and When and How and Where and Who" -- and end with a question mark/point. "Who are you?" "Where are you going?" "How is this ever going to work?" "What is the point?" "Why would anyone vote for Donald Trump?" "When can I stop writing questions?"
• If you start a new theme or topic, or a digression away from what you were saying before, a new paragraph is required. As you'll see, I leave a blank line between paragraphs and I don't indent. This is how I write business documents, and I feel it improves readability. Others don't leave blank space but do indent, which is the style used in most novels -- probably because it saves paper. Whatever, DO break your text into clearly-differentiated paragraphs or you'll make it unreadable.
• Beware more subtle punctuation, such as semicolons and colons. You need a really good feel for writing to use them successfully. If you know you're a novice in this respect, stick to commas & full-stops/periods. I touch briefly on these below, but check out the rules carefully on somewhere reliable like GrammarBook.com. (I've seen other sites that claim to tell you the rules and are utter shite).
• Next, spacing. I've seen many pieces with random spacing, and it isn't pretty. Most punctuation is there to show the END of a phrase, clause, sentence, question or paragraph. Therefore spacing -- a SINGLE space OR a new line -- comes AFTER, NEVER BEFORE the punctuation, to separate it from the next bit of text. This applies to just about everything -- a comma, semicolon, colon, full-stop/period, exclamation/question mark/point or closing quotes & parentheses. Got that? If it sounds complicated, just look at how I've punctuated this document, and the example below.
• The only places where you need a space BEFORE punctuation is where it's STARTING something -- essentially just opening quotes & parentheses (brackets). And NEVER use two spaces together; I used to write business documents like that, but it's considered old-fashioned and publishers hate it. I've edited countless documents with random multiple spaces in them and it looks horrible.
• If you use a dash (or, more correctly, an 'em-dash'), you need a space on either side of it. (More on this below). A hyphen joins two related words ('partly-finished', 'no-hoper'), and therefore DOESN'T have spaces around it. (If you find this confusing, again see the example, below).
• American English also continues to use periods after abbreviations such as 'Mr.' and 'etc.' In the UK, we seem to have dropped these. Some blogs, sites and publishers are fussy about this, others not.
• In American English, commas and full-stops/periods, etc, ALWAYS come INSIDE closing quotes, regardless of whether this makes logical sense. This is the only style of punctuation that Literotica will accept. So, my fellow Brits, if that's your intended publishing vehicle, forget what you were taught at school or in your creative writing classes; it's their way or the highway.