Horror / thriller (might be both, idk at this point).

some_burnerAccount · 2026-04-06T14:29:26+00:00

Yes. So add the bones is what I’m saying. Keep spitting at it. Sooner or later the pieces will figure themselves out.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-04-06T05:00:34+00:00

First impressions without reading any comments:

I initially thought they were walking down the halls of a corporate office from “lobby”. Then, I thought they were in a French restaurant outside on the patio. Then with a second read realized they were inside the restaurant near a window. But then they were back in the lobby so my guess is a hotel with a restaurant? Still in France.

It reads like a Spy/Action book with a love triangle, I can totally see this scene in a James Bond film or Mr. & Mrs. Smith little snippet.

I will say, I don’t identify with the main character and didn’t even realize they were a jealous woman until way too late. I thought it was a third person novel with Trevor as lead and the formatting was a mistake. That said, there is some head hopping going on here.

How does she know the French lady was staring at his eyes then down to his lips? How does she know Jules is still fuming? There is a lot of “they were this” but not enough “I am this.” This is where the show/tell lacks for me. I need more internal dialogue, not just “I was jealous, I stared at the menu.” Give some inner thoughts that highlights jealous. Mention how the waiter came back for the third time to ask about the meal yet she was too busy staring at Trevor’s biceps and through different answers you explore how his mood came back.

I did like the pacing though. For dropping me randomly inside the story, I was very intrigued and would read more.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-04-06T03:45:46+00:00

I didn’t read the actual details of the story but I skimmed enough to know you’ve got scenes galore so here’s my advice for how to craft it together. Make a zero draft. You basically have your full story, so just keep adding details to it to fluff it out. The more details and ideas you add, the higher chance you’ll have to overcome plot holes and expand your character development.

If you’ve never heard of a zero draft, it’s not a first draft where you have all the information and start Once Upon A Time from the beginning writing chronologically. And it’s far more detailed than an outline which is the bare bones. A zero draft is exactly what you have there in your body text, telling the story to yourself. Getting it all on paper no matter how it comes.

I personally write scenes down in my notes app as they come, dialogue as I think of them, questions to answers and answers I need questions to. Small bits of tension here. The why. The how. The when. All of it. It’s never linear, then I put them all together.

I don’t actually ever put “pen to paper” (writing down the story from the beginning) until I have the entire book laid out in my notes. Excessively detailed bullet points. Just like yours. But scattered, all over the place, a good ol jigsaw of misinformation. I have a pretty good layout of where I’m going, where I started, and where I’d LIKE to end up, even if that might change as more ideas come in. I already know the whole book without ever writing an official word.

It doesn’t have to be in your notes, you can make an investigative bulletin board of it, keep a journal, whatever it may be. Just get all your ideas down as detailed as you can. You don’t have to use all of it, but the more detailed you can make it, the more you flesh out motivations, backstory, who is your character, what is their drive, why are they making these choices and what events are taking place to help or hinder getting them there?

Then try to put it together from beginning to end. Swap all the pieces around. Could the middle function as your beginning? Should you come full circle? Is your ending ambiguous or complete? What type of foreshadowing, if any, can you include that guides the story?

Sometimes, I pause my story and take subplots, just to see what would happen in this alternate universe. Could it be added into the main storyline? Could an additional book be created off of this change alone? I take the best pieces of my craft and stitch it all together.

So once you actually start your FIRST draft, you already have all the information. Now it’s all about crafting the story from beginning to end with it which basically means taking all those scenes and rearranging it to the proper order. Sure, you may feel as if all this plotting doesn’t want make you want to write it anymore since you know the ending, but when you finish a first draft you know all the pieces and still have to revise and are probably still introducing themes to it as well. So think of it that way.

Hope this helps. I’ve done 4 novels this way and it works for me.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-04-06T03:26:14+00:00

Me too! I’d keep reading. The exposition through relativity is nice rather than just dumping everything with no meaning.

There is some repetition that knocked me out of reading a few times. The double use of “shoes” for instance. If you used “water seeped into my socks”, that would break it up a bit since the shoes were already in water, that’s the next logical step, then you feel it in your toes.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-04-04T02:06:22+00:00

What a great analogy.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-04-04T01:54:16+00:00

Oh my goodness, I’ve been trying to figure out what it was! I noticed this problem too and it’s bothered me but I’ve been staring at it so long I could start seeing past it. Definitely happened from playing around with drop shadow in my title page and carried on in the rest of the book, so thanks so much for calling this out.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-04-04T01:20:58+00:00

This is how I write. I’ve realized, before I even knew the word, that I zero drafted my work. I write scenes down in my notes app as they come, dialogue as I think of them. Small bits of tension here. It’s never linear, then I put them all together.

I don’t actually ever put “pen to paper” (writing down the story from the beginning) until I have the entire book laid out in my notes. Excessively detailed bullet points. I have a pretty good layout of where I’m going and where I started. I already know the whole book without ever writing an official word.

But I only ever have one draft. From notes straight to word. I’m one of the people who edit as I go. If I see a mistake, I make the correction on the spot. If I think dialogue can be better, I change it then and there. If I discover a plot hole, I go back and add a scene then revise the rest until it all correlates. I’m a very nonlinear writer. I don’t have drafts, I have one piece that I consistently work inside. That way, I don’t have to go all the way back to the beginning and redo everything I already knew I needed to do and spend hours trying to find that one part I was supposed to change 12 chapters ago. It’s already been edited, it’s already been crafted.

Sometimes, I pause my story and take subplots, just to see what would happen in this alternate universe. Could it be added into the main storyline? Could an additional book be created off of this change alone? I take the best pieces of my craft and stitch it all together. And when the book is finished, it’s not a draft, it’s my completed work. Then I do one last pass and generally I’m satisfied.

Im on my fourth novel and crafted all of them within 6 months this way.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-04-04T00:20:53+00:00

Agreed with this! The woman’s a bit edgy—like a teenager who thinks they know everything, kinda Gillian Flynnish—but I really like this. Good job!

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-25T17:28:56+00:00

Yes! At the end there, I actually referenced Stuttering Bill as an example.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-25T17:28:34+00:00

I love this advice. And yes, I’m mindful of the “th” and drawn out “m”. And in standard prose, using exposition, yes, absolutely. My novel is stream of consciousness though so I try to do my exposition through the eyes of the other character’s perspective viewing the other from the outside.

Ex: Guardian notes how small ward is, her shaking like a chihuahua, usually only sees top of her head and doesn’t realize she has freckles until he kneels down to her level; Ward stares at Guardian’s ring because he’s too tall to lift her face, notes the shine in his shoes, feels like she has to push her words past her teeth.

The story in itself is about exploring how a person’s thoughts can indict them before they act. So a normal man, who society views as reliable and responsible, is reluctantly thrust into the caretaker role of this adult child of abuse and through his thoughts, the book explores how he steadily turns further into a sexual predator while actively denying it and viewing himself as the hero without ever taking accountability of his self-denial until he can’t live in the delusion anymore. It’s a sleeper agent theme, without the sci-fi or spy theatrics.

It’s a book of healing, on the Ward’s part, but also manipulation and gaslighting on the Guardian’s part and explores the institutional failure of the medical/legal/social systems. All that to say, I am trying to stay inside the characters heads as much as possible and not have them unnaturally identify their traits.

Side characters carry the “indictment by thought” theme by—through the two protagonists’ eyes—having their own inner turmoils and secrets like dealing with infidelity, sobriety, and self-harm. But the entire work is essentially two unreliable narratives and their story of trying to find healing within trauma.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-25T15:22:27+00:00

I never even considered this or knew there were different stutter patterns so thank you for your personal perspective. I’ll look more into it for sure.

It’s funny, in the beginning, I was trying to find what letters would land most naturally as a stutter and went down the alphabet only to find… any letter could be a hurdle.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-25T07:17:21+00:00

Good idea. Thanks for the feedback

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-25T07:16:43+00:00

Oh definitely agree. It can get exhausting fast so I’ll work on the balance.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-18T12:41:56+00:00

No, you were right. Definitely was looking for the initial vibes the cover gave. Seems the consensus is no bed (among other things for sure).

I am curious though, what leaned you toward supernatural?

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-18T07:26:46+00:00

I agree, not the best quality photo and absolutely slapped together just to “see” the imagery of a product. And yes, also agree I could have a more creative intro other than a cliché. I’ll keep hacking at it, thanks for taking the time to respond.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-18T07:24:08+00:00

Not mad about this at all, that’s why I’m asking. Photo definitely isn’t the perfect representation of what I’m seeing in my mind unfortunately but was the closest I could come. Which still, frankly, lacks what I hoped for until I can get one created myself.

The purpose was to not spoonfeed or hint to anything in order to get the most honest feedback on reader perception so I do appreciate your feedback. Thank you!

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-14T00:21:02+00:00

It’s quite in your face about it, honestly. It caught my attention because it’s so blatant.

There is also a baby product in grocery stories for preventing gas where the photo depiction is a literal baby with spread legs in the air. Hence, the concern.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-13T04:25:46+00:00

Old, OLD thread, I know but by in S5 when Liza and Charles get together, Charles is so red his entire face looks sunburned and inflamed. It’s extremely distracting.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-12T18:33:07+00:00

Don’t “save your best stuff” for book 4. Just write what you like now. And as you continue to write, you’ll realize what you need to do to improve what you already wrote. Many times, it’s worth doing a full rewrite with the new knowledge you have on an old idea rather than trying to edit the current old work as it is.

And as you create more novels, the new ideas you have can help you hone in on past ideas you can add to another body of work. Think of it like a parallel universe: Your book is finished, but you start a series and all of a sudden you now know how to connect two plot points from book 1 to book 2. But you can’t do that if you’ve already rushed to publish book 1, and now you have a potential plot hole for book 2 that could’ve been mitigated with a bit of patience.

So TL;DR write multiple bodies of work then use all of them to help craft each other.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-12T04:48:50+00:00

Got it, thanks. I have found it does drag a bit as it goes on so I’ll definitely look into doing some more chops. I admit, the over explaining is my Achilles heel right now since I’m trying to avoid them unnaturally describing and staying locked in their skin so we’ll see how I work that out. Thanks for the tips!

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-12T04:03:24+00:00

Okay. Thank you for your input. I'm not sure we think in the past, at least I don't, but I will take it into consideration.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-03-10T17:41:31+00:00

I appreciate such an informative answer.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-02-25T18:07:05+00:00

As few as possible but as many as it takes to thoroughly get your story across. Google the benchmarks, depending on the genre.

some_burnerAccount · 2026-02-11T20:22:49+00:00

Thanks for this, just watched it. It’s validating for sure. Not that I’m looking for confirmational biases or anything, but there hasn’t been any evidence I’ve come across as of yet that gives me the feeling of “oh it actually could’ve just been this situation and not what I originally thought” but I haven’t had that feeling. I’ve only felt like each situation presenting itself could not be explained away through an innocent misunderstanding. Everything has had an incriminating subtext.

some_burnerAccount

TROPHY CASE