On Writing Advice

I’m going to meet a writer who needs advice today. A friend of my wife’s asked for feedback on a manuscript. I gave it. Now, there’s food involved. And because I think about what I’m going to say in situations before they come up, I’ve got some thoughts. Assuming we talk about the writing, how do I advise them?

Didn’t Ask, Don’t Tell

Imagine a world where if someone doesn’t ask for your opinion, you don’t give it. Difficult to picture, I know. Life is all about probabilities, and the chances someone follows advice you foisted on them is miniscule. You could exit the restaurant with blood coming from your mouth, telling the guy about to come in not to eat here because there’s glass in the food and he’ll still belly up to a table and order off the lunch menu.

Don’t Expect adherence

I’ve had maybe one or two friends who ever came to me for advice and did what I told them. Aside from bad advice, the reasons for that are nuanced, but the behavior holds up as a trend. People are weird about taking in ideas that aren’t their own. It’s why consultants and gurus have careers. Turns out if you pay for the advice, you’re more likely to follow it. Note that I said “more likely” because even then it’s all about chances.

The point is, knowing this tendency, you can reduce your own frustration as an observer after the fact. They asked, you spoke. Done. When you read about the man choking to death on glass soup in the paper the next day, shrug and move on. You gave advice. They were warned, advised, and informed. Do not over-invest on the outcome because that is up to them, not you.

Cold, but think of the advising as a conversation. Hopefully, an interesting one, but that’s it. The choice to follow it is theirs, and while you can modify your approach to get them to realize what’s correct about your advice, it’s their choice.

One Question Leads to More

When someone does ask me for advice, it’s seldom a simple answer. Heck, the question usually doesn’t cover the whole problem. That’s why it is a conversation. “Why was this story rejected?” or “What could I improve in this manuscript?” are never simple one-bullet answers. Stories don’t get rejected for one simple problem; if it were that simple, the editor would fix it.

It’s always a mess. So expect to get more information and ask questions, first. The other benefit of asking questions is that the advisee might start to see where you’re going and build up the solution in their head along the path you are going.

That’s the primary reason people don’t follow advice: they need to feel like they came up with the idea. Not in a credit-stealing way, but that their mind connected the dots from start to finish and the path is theirs. So walking people to the self-determination of the solution is how you get them there more often.

Start with the Mess of a Manuscript

Let’s assume you are not an English teacher, and the person in front of you can write; they just haven’t got the whole toolbox filled in yet. You are not here to teach them everything, but also, a bit of shared knowledge and advice might set them on a better path to rewrite. As I said before, a single question is seldom that simple to solve. You’re looking at mechanical and storytelling issues in a manuscript. Maybe it can be fixed, maybe it’s a demonstration of what not to do next time.

If we’re going to have that conversation about the whole thing, where do we start? Do we fix all the mechanical issues so it reads better? Or the storytelling issues? Are we fixing the whole thing?

Let’s start with the beginning, on the assumption that the entire thing has the same problems, and that with a cleaner start, if they can get that solved, reworking the rest will be obvious to them.

Mechanics Last, But Make a List

Ideally, you’d focus on the story, get feedback from a friend, and when the story is solid, edit the stuffing out of it. But we all know everyone hates reading a draft riddled with grammar and punctuation errors. Don’t mark up their first ten pages. Make a list of the common mistakes you are seeing, marking up the first few so it’s clear what they are. Very often, these are things the write is unaware of (like writing numbers as text, not numerals), or dialing down the amount of passive voice. Once you point it out, they can work on self-editing in general.

With your list, you can either hand that to them as an extra item to consider, or say you’ve found some patterns of mechanical mistakes but we should focus on story-telling first. Plus, if you do multiple discussions about storytelling with improved examples from them, you can nibble off pieces from the mechanics list over time.

Story-Telling Comes First

The biggest priority of storytelling is telling the story. Done well, a narrator with terrible grammar can still enthrall around a campfire (where people can’t see the mis-used commas).

Let’s assume you’re looking at a morass of first ten pages. Which has two challenges. It’s not how you would do it, and they shouldn’t have done it the way they did. Harsh, but while there are many ways to tell a compelling story, there are many more to fail at that.

Find out what book/authors they’d like to write like. Not as perfect imitation, but to narrow in on the style approaches. If you’re familiar with their sources of inspiration, it will be easier to contrast those to this. Determine who the main character or primary point of view characters are versus should be. Just as often a write can bounce around, and a story can be tightened up by locking in on a single person. Figure out what the main arc or plot of the story is. Back of book blurb or movie trailer spoilers aside, there should be hints at the start of the story if this is about fighting aliens or zombies while raising a family as a single parent.

The conversation you have to get those answers (because you couldn’t figure it out from the text), are how you lead them to dial those in. Which sets them to consider rewriting a stronger start with a clearer focus. Yes, that’s homework. Its work. But that’s literally what writing is. And if they actually wanted to tighten up their story, they will need to try a new approach and type some more.

When You Save a Manuscript

There’s a Japanese saying about saving a man’s life and becoming responsible for them. You are not responsible for another writer’s manuscript. You were asked to read something, found problems, pointed them out, and maybe gave thoughts on what to try differently. That’s it.

If they go home and make changes and come back to you, it’s up to you on whether you want to keep looping on that. Congratulations, you are a mentor. If they don’t make meaningful changes, continue to write the way they did, you’re in for a slog. Avoid that. One of the amazing things about writing is that you can start with a blank page, setting your prior work aside and try something new. If they don’t try the exercise, they aren’t listening to your advice, so they can compare the results. Which is amazing, as most big questions are a do this now or the opportunity is past.

Wrap It Up

You could drown a writer in feedback. It’s better to pick the top three changes to consider, which would improve the work. If they do it and come back, great. Hopefully, the work is better.

For myself, we haven’t met yet. We might not talk shop. They might tell me what they’re writing now. I might not be able to help them. I’m a small potato author who can tell what’s very wrong with a story, but couldn’t guarantee how to make a story great. Can I help someone else fix theirs? Have I got time for that?

You could drown in this stuff. Eat food. Talk. What they do when they go home is up to them. Maybe there will be something new to talk about next time.

PS. I know you're wondering, was this person's MS a mess? Maybe. Maybe not. It's less relevant than the core thing that it needs work. Which is why they asked for feedback. And no matter the scale of the problem, it always feels like a big deal to the author because it is their soul bled on paper.