My Process of Writing a Novel, Walkthrough

Bonus Material

My take on Passive Voice:

I use passive voice in dialogue all the time. It's how people talk. Narrating the story however, it depends.

I wrote, 1: "Later, Gero and Dr. Tabib discussed what could be done for his control implants." The keywords here are, (be done.)

It's introducing a conversation at the beginning of a scene, and I think it is okay for it to be in passive voice.

I wrote, 1: "Seeing the ship being identified as the Rook #36, the Polis knew right away who's ship it was." Keywords, (being identified.) The word (was) is fine, though I did remove it to make a better sentence.

I rewrote it as, 2: "Identifying the ship as the Rook #36, the Polis knew right away who's ship had come through."

I see the second sentence as a better sentence.

Here are some standard examples.

1: was breathing.

Change (was) + ing word to one ending in ed.

2: breathed.

1: He was singing

2: He sang.

Words to keep an eye out for, (am, are, being, had been, has been, have been, is, was, were, will be, will have been).

1: Mom, who had been using her bow to shoot targets, tired out her arms. This one with (had been) does not flow so great.

2: Mom's arms got tired shooting targets with her bow.

1: She had been gone a long time, and everyone worried for her safety.

I have no idea how to rewrite that sentence to improve it. It works perfectly well for me. It could be written out as a scene; show don't tell if there was a point to showing it in the story. As in, people pacing about and checking the time, etc.

My take on Show Don't Tell:

I admit when someone recites a saying it can be annoying. If someone says "Show Don't Tell" without additional information, it is kind of thoughtless. However, if someone spells out the meaning or gives an example, then it is something I look forward to reading/hearing.

I wrote a sentence, 1: "Exploring around cautiously for a bit, she then smacked her fists down on the blankets of a bed, grumpy." The keywords here are cautiously and grumpy. It is telling not showing.

On edit, I rewrote, 2: "Exploring, she peeked around corners, lifted blankets, and sniffed the air while looking up at the ceiling. Smacking her fists down on the blankets of a bed, she glared at Soren, then looked away and crossed her arms."

I see the second sentences as much better. Some people react with, yeah but sometimes telling has its place. I do not deny that. This particular sentence though is one of the ones that should be rewritten to show not tell. If your response is, yeah but, then maybe you should consider if that's a knee jerk reaction to hearing it all the time. Do you know what "Show Don't Tell" means? Search it on Google or YouTube to find someone who explains it well to you if my article does not help.

1: "She accidentally spilled her coffee." Sometimes you can spell the adverb (accidentally) out into more words.

2: "She leaned forward tilting her mug too much and spilling the coffee."

1: "He planted himself in the seat and adamantly refused to budge." Sometimes you can remove the adverb (adamantly) altogether.

2: "He planted himself in the seat and refused to budge." If you are refusing to budge, then you are adamant about it the whole time you are refusing. At the point you do budge, you are no longer adamant about it.

3: "He planted himself in the seat, and no matter how much his sister pulled on him he would not budge." You can decide which sentence is better. Hopefully, people will at least stop telling you to "Show Don't Tell."