Stylistic differences are great--as great as the distance between east and west.
Since I had honed my skills writing in academia, I thought it would be an easy task to simply transfer those talents to writing fiction.
What a rude awakening!
When I wrote my first novel, I discovered I needed to "unlearn" some writing skills that were useful for academic publications. For instance, I used the passive voice a great deal in my scholarly writing. An air of objectivity is projected to the reader. There is no need to ask the reader to identify with the writer. In fiction it is just the opposite. I found the active voice to have a much better flow making it less tedious for the reader to trudge through the pages. I began to personalize and make statements more subjective in order for the reader to identfy with characters.
Writing for a commercial audience is a different craft. Although it was a tedious process, I thoroughly enjoyed developing a new approach to writing--one that I am still learning.
Comments