# Has Anyone Ever Wanted To Intentionally Write a Bad Story? (1 Viewer)



## Rojack79 (Aug 15, 2019)

I know of a group of people who wrote a bad story on purpose just to make a point. They got it published only for the publisher to pull it from the store as soon as they could. I personally have felt an intense pull towards the idea of writing the worst story in existence just to see if I could get it published. And to see if anyone would actually read it. Has anyone else ever felt the need to let there inner novice just run loose and create the worst piece of literature in existence?


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## seigfried007 (Aug 15, 2019)

Dude, you ain't so awesomely bad as to compete with the likes of My Immortal. Juss sit yo butt down, son.  

https://myimmortalrehost.webs.com/

https://myimmortal.fandom.com/wiki/My_Immortal/Chapters_1-11

[video=youtube;qdv6Q68EutU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdv6Q68EutU[/video]


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## Rojack79 (Aug 15, 2019)

seigfried007 said:


> Dude, you ain't so awesomely bad as to compete with the likes of My Immortal. Juss sit yo butt down, son.
> 
> https://myimmortalrehost.webs.com/
> 
> ...


 Pfft! LOL! I can't even read the description without my eyes bleeding. But i want to actually get the worst book published. There should be a Guinness World record for worst piece of literary work ever. And I want it!


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## seigfried007 (Aug 15, 2019)

Rojack79 said:


> Pfft! LOL! I can't even read the description without my eyes bleeding. But i want to actually get the worst book published. There should be a Guinness World record for worst piece of literary work ever. And I want it!



Dude, you gonna be bleeding out every orifice you have (and some you didn't even know you had) if you think you can compete with the likes of My Immortal. 

Think of all the terrible fiction you'd have to read just to be sure yours was the worst. You'd have to actually compare yourself to these things! So you'd have to read them! And there's probably thousands of similarly awful POS manuscripts out there to be pouring over--just to be sure yours was the worst! 

And then--to make it _even worse_--taste is subjective. Yours can never be objectively the worst POS manuscript because somebody out there is going to disagree with you! and someone out there will be writing to compete with you (even if they're not really trying! They might just be that earnestly bad!).


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## Rojack79 (Aug 15, 2019)

seigfried007 said:


> Dude, you gonna be bleeding out every orifice you have (and some you didn't even know you had) if you think you can compete with the likes of My Immortal.
> 
> Think of all the terrible fiction you'd have to read just to be sure yours was the worst. You'd have to actually compare yourself to these things! So you'd have to read them! And there's probably thousands of similarly awful POS manuscripts out there to be pouring over--just to be sure yours was the worst!
> 
> And then--to make it _even worse_--taste is subjective. Yours can never be objectively the worst POS manuscript because somebody out there is going to disagree with you! and someone out there will be writing to compete with you (even if they're not really trying! They might just be that earnestly bad!).



I see your stakes and raise you my check list. I'll see if I can at the vary least scrounge up a check list of the worst pieces of fiction and see what they all have in common. Then I'll be sure to hit one of those boxes with mail and hammer. Or I'll just wing it and see just what I can come up with. Not trying to argue your point. I'll loose enough blood to drown a red cross supply depot but I'm the end I'd like to see if I can at least leave a footprint In the literary world.


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## Ralph Rotten (Aug 15, 2019)

I never wrote a bad story intentionally, but I did once write a book that was almost entirely character driven, just to see if I could pull off a Seinfeld.
The book sold...meh.
Readers liked the story, but it never really fulfilled its potential.
So that was a 150,000 word experiment.


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## Megan Pearson (Aug 16, 2019)

Rojack79 said:


> I'll *loose* enough blood to drown a red cross supply depot but I'm the end I'd like to see if I can at least leave a footprint In the literary world.



Hmmm...loose? Rojack, if you keep up the craft errors, you may very well be on your way to writing the absolutely worst book ever! ;-)

I just heard an interesting thing today. While listening to a podcast on writing fiction, the published author being interviewed noted there is a distinct difference between telling a good story and telling a well-crafted story. The difference, he said, was that the good story will outsell the well-crafted story every time. Is this true? I dunno. 

The point is, according to this certain & so far nameless published author (because I don't remember who he was & am too lazy to go look!), a badly written book is not the same as a poorly told story. Therefore, based on this certain author's advice, you should just try to tell the best story possible -- and not worry so much about how it's told.


I'm not sure I'm all on board with his thinking. Except for this. As a teenager, my then favorite author began as a rather poor writer but excellent storyteller. Surely that statement, that he was a poor writer, would be contested if I shared who that was (as he went on to become quite famous in his genre). But, the last time I tried reading this favorite YA story, I found myself mentally stopping and correcting every last irksome error I ran into. Now, maybe it's not _quite_ as bad as I remember it, but his storytelling did far surpase his then ability to craft the story he told. So, who knows. Maybe certain podcast author is right and we should worry less about craft than about the story we tell.


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## Ralph Rotten (Aug 16, 2019)

Michael Creighton was no great shakes as a writer. He wrote at a 3rd grade level.
But he had some great ideas, and had friends who could turn them into good movies.



But no, never in a million years would I intentionally write a bad story.
I don't get up at 0400 every day, seven days a week, just to write crap.
I am always trying to write a better story than the last.


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## seigfried007 (Aug 16, 2019)

Ralph Rotten said:


> Michael Creighton was no great shakes as a writer. He wrote at a 3rd grade level.
> But he had some great ideas, and had friends who could turn them into good movies.
> 
> But no, never in a million years would I intentionally write a bad story.
> ...



The second part I totally concur with. 

The first... well, I hope you don't mean Michael Crichton. If you think that's third grade material... _yeesh_. 

Grade level reading calculators are kind of a joke anyway and are determined in many ways. There are numerous calculators for it, and they all look at different things--sentence structure, sentence length, word count, big words, uncommon words... A lot can go into it, but not all calculators look at the same things or grade them the same way. 

Jurassic Park, for instance, generally scores between 6 and 9 by most calculators--and I can tell you that, while I read it in sixth grade, I didn't understand it nearly as well as I do now with a BS in biology--and that book's 30 years old.


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## Art Man (Aug 16, 2019)

Megan Pearson said:


> I just heard an interesting thing today. While listening to a podcast on writing fiction, the published author being interviewed noted there is a distinct difference between telling a good story and telling a well-crafted story. The difference, he said, was that the good story will outsell the well-crafted story every time. Is this true? I dunno.
> 
> The point is, according to this certain & so far nameless published author (because I don't remember who he was & am too lazy to go look!), a badly written book is not the same as a poorly told story. Therefore, based on this certain author's advice, you should just try to tell the best story possible -- and not worry so much about how it's told.



You make a great point there. Storytelling and literary crafting are similar but very different. In storytelling, the author or orator already has the whole story in memory and will relate it to you in a much more direct fashion and each time he tells that story the wording might change and his emphasis on certain details might shift but in the end he tells essentially the same story every time.

Crafting a novel on the other hand is much different and often times an author will start at point A and finish at point B and not really know what he is going to write next. Or he will plot out the book and jump back and forth filling in each chapter. Point is that crafting a novel is a much different task than relaying a story. A novel author doesn't memorize his work and oftentimes would write certain passages once and forget about them and perhaps never revisit them.


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## Art Man (Aug 17, 2019)

I get the point the thread starter is trying to make here and truth is, before this era of self-publishing opportunity where writers of all skill levels can publish their works to an audience, there was a quality control on pretty much all mass print publishing and quite simply "really poor books" were hard to find. You could say that a mass publisher was like a filter and although a book might be uninteresting and mediocre, it would never outright be toilet paper. But nowadays I bet you could say that because of the self-publishing bubble on the internet and so many ways for authors to publish no matter how bad they are, bad storys probably now outnumber the good ones.

Personally I never had intentionally written a steaming heap. I might write something mediocre and unimaginative or I might use bad prose or whatnot but it isn't ever intentional. More like the product of poor preparation. (lack of sleep, bad mood, malnourishment, etcetera)


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## seigfried007 (Aug 17, 2019)

Here's another one you'll have to compete with: The Flame Dragon Knight light novel, which was supposed to be part of the Berserk canon (even had some Miura illustrations!)

[video=youtube;54IO0WPKYyQ]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54IO0WPKYyQ[/video] 

Spoiler: _it's a horrendous dumpster fire._


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## Rojack79 (Aug 17, 2019)

Megan Pearson said:


> Hmmm...loose? Rojack, if you keep up the craft errors, you may very well be on your way to writing the absolutely worst book ever! ;-)



LoL this is actually due to my crappy spell check on my phone. It auto-corrects certain words even if they don't need it. I hate it with a passion. But it at least means that i could potentially write the story on my phone and nail the bad grammer.


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## Ralph Rotten (Aug 17, 2019)

Art Man said:


> I get the point the thread starter is trying to make here and truth is, before this era of self-publishing opportunity where writers of all skill levels can publish their works to an audience, there was a quality control on pretty much all mass print publishing and quite simply "really poor books" were hard to find. You could say that a mass publisher was like a filter and although a book might be uninteresting and mediocre, it would never outright be toilet paper. But nowadays I bet you could say that because of the self-publishing bubble on the internet and so many ways for authors to publish no matter how bad they are, bad *stories* probably now outnumber the good ones.




Actually the Amazon algorithm quickly separates the chaff from the whey.
It works like a centrifuge, and all the crap gets sifted to the bottom of a very deep ocean.
If you have sales & reviews then your book is floated higher than those that are dumpster fires.
Bad books sink so deep in the lists that they are not even visible. (except in KU-KOLL).




And Michael Creighton's writing level was pedestrian compared to Clancy, Heinlein, Heller, Rowling, or Grisham.
His writing is one step above "See Dick run..."
But he had some fascinating ideas.


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## seigfried007 (Aug 17, 2019)

Ralph Rotten said:


> And Michael Creighton's writing level was pedestrian compared to Clancy, Heinlein, Heller, Rowling, or Grisham.
> His writing is one step above "See Dick run..."
> But he had some fascinating ideas.



I'm still not sure if you're meaning Creighton or Crichton (sound like they'd be pronounced the same, but they're not the same person). I found very, very little about Creighton (other than that he won an award for the web series, _Jack in a Box_). You can lambaste that dude til the cows come home for all I care, but Crichton's a hill I'll die on. 

You're free to be wrong if you think Crichton's simplistic 3rd grade material. It's a free country...

...but according to Scholastic, every gosh dang book Crichton put out is rated Grade level 9-12

same as Clancy, Heinlein, Heller and Grisham. And Rowling's only rated 3-8 for pretty much everything. Biggest gap was 5-12 for Goblet of Fire, and I have no idea why anyone would ever think such a thing as 12th grade material out of that book (so I'm inclined to think it's a typo). All of her other books on the site were 3-5 or 5-8--all of which are under every other author you mentioned.


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## luckyscars (Aug 17, 2019)

Assuming you are a relatively young adult now, assuming you live an expected lifespan, you have about 20,000 more days, or 480,000 more hours, left of your life. At most. 

Approximately 1/3 of that you will spend asleep. So 13, 000 days, or about 300,000 hours, is your remaining time on earth, of which if you're lucky a fraction of it will be spared to write. That's it. That's all.

Does anybody actually think spending time writing bullshit to 'make a point' is a good investment? 

If so, have at it. Some of us would prefer to spend the time we do have to be as good as we can at something, not pursuing five minutes of fame for the sake of internet lol's.


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## RLBeers (Aug 18, 2019)

A very respected and best-selling science fiction author was given a challenge to write a story so hackneyed, so misogynistic and so filled with cliches that no publisher would take it. Unfortunately, this author's agent was in on the gag. The manuscript, to the author's chagrin, was not only accepted but he was then asked to write a sequel, and then another, eventually completing over a dozen volumes in the series. 

I was told this story by another author who apparently knows the fellow involved. He would not tell me which series it was, but I have my suspicions.


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## Rojack79 (Aug 18, 2019)

RLBeers said:


> A very respected and best-selling science fiction author was given a challenge to write a story so hackneyed, so misogynistic and so filled with cliches that no publisher would take it. Unfortunately, this author's agent was in on the gag. The manuscript, to the author's chagrin, was not only accepted but he was then asked to write a sequel, and then another, eventually completing over a dozen volumes in the series.
> 
> I was told this story by another author who apparently knows the fellow involved. He would not tell me which series it was, but I have my suspicions.



Wow. Good on him for being able to churn out and entire series based on the concept alone. Now i wish I could read this series just to see how it go's.


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## Harper J. Cole (Aug 18, 2019)

There's thread for bad writing here if anyone fancies honing the art.


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## Rojack79 (Aug 18, 2019)

luckyscars said:


> Assuming you are a relatively young adult now, assuming you live an expected lifespan, you have about 20,000 more days, or 480,000 more hours, left of your life. At most.
> 
> Approximately 1/3 of that you will spend asleep. So 13, 000 days, or about 300,000 hours, is your remaining time on earth, of which if you're lucky a fraction of it will be spared to write. That's it. That's all.
> 
> ...



I have to say that for me it's therapeutic. It will help me get all of my junk & scrapped ideas out of my head and into one big glob of a mess. If i decide to see if it can be published then hey I'll gladly do it under one my many aliases. If it happens to actually become famous for being the worst steaming pile of garbage ever written then hey props for me.

 Personally I don't really care about game or money when it comes to my writing. I write so I canshare my imagination with the world and so I can tell awesome stories. If I happen to get famous for it then great. If I happen to get only one sell oh well then. I personally don't see it as a waste of my time doing something I love whether it be writing a serious piece of fiction or writing the next great troll fiction.


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## Rojack79 (Aug 18, 2019)

Harper J. Cole said:


> There's thread for bad writing here if anyone fancies honing the art.



Really? Where?

P.S. I couldn't see the link due to my screen not being bright enough. LOL!


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## Rojack79 (Aug 18, 2019)

Oh and I just thought of the perfect protagonist for this dumpster fire novel.

Ace Deleheart, he is a human being who's parents died when he was very young. And so he grew up on the streets, stealing, running from the law, jaywalking and smoking the whole way while dressed from head to toe in gothic gear. One day he finds a secret box left to him by his dead parents. Opening it reveals that he was adopted. He was found on the steps of an orphanage as a baby and taken in. He also finds out that he is not a normal human.

He is secretly from a parallel universe where he is the long lost son of the last king of Atlantis, a race of super men from outer space who tried and failed to conquer parallel earth. When the city was being destroyed he was wisked away to safety by powerful techno-magic.

What do you think? Cringy enough?


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## James Wolfe (Aug 18, 2019)

Intentionally? nah, bad writing is just Par for the course with me.  But it doesn't stop me from writing anyways.


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## James Wolfe (Aug 18, 2019)

Rojack79 said:


> Oh and I just thought of the perfect protagonist for this dumpster fire novel.
> 
> Ace Deleheart, he is a human being who's parents died when he was very young. And so he grew up on the streets, stealing, running from the law, jaywalking and smoking the whole way while dressed from head to toe in gothic gear. One day he finds a secret box left to him by his dead parents. Opening it reveals that he was adopted. He was found on the steps of an orphanage as a baby and taken in. He also finds out that he is not a normal human.
> 
> ...




Hmmm... how about like the King of Alantis's steward or whom ever washes is rear, something humiliating.... we are going for cringey right.


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## Rojack79 (Aug 18, 2019)

James Wolfe said:


> Hmmm... how about like the King of Alantis's steward or whom ever washes is rear, something humiliating.... we are going for cringey right.



That could be an idea for the main villain. He can even have a lot of "shitty" puns as well.


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## James Wolfe (Aug 18, 2019)

Rojack79 said:


> That could be an idea for the main villain. He can even have a lot of "shitty" puns as well.



I was thinking the "Villain" could be the actual Prince of Atlantis, who was also sent to earth, with the protag begin sent as his servant, but they got separated. Then growing up the crowned Prince ended up becoming his bully, and of course the crown prince would be a stereotypical jock, large muscles with long flowing hair.  

When the protag finds out the truth, he was decide whether to tell the Prince the truth or not....  

which could lead to a possible ending where the Prince reclaims atlantis and makes the protag his steward of the wash (aka bathroom assistant)


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## Rojack79 (Aug 18, 2019)

James Wolfe said:


> I was thinking the "Villain" could be the actual Prince of Atlantis, who was also sent to earth, with the protag begin sent as his servant, but they got separated. Then growing up the crowned Prince ended up becoming his bully, and of course the crown prince would be a stereotypical jock, large muscles with long flowing hair.
> 
> When the protag finds out the truth, he was decide whether to tell the Prince the truth or not....
> 
> which could lead to a possible ending where the Prince reclaims atlantis and makes the protag his steward of the wash (aka bathroom assistant)


 That would not really work all that well for this story mostly because the whole thing hinges on the prince being the MC.


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## James Wolfe (Aug 18, 2019)

Rojack79 said:


> That would not really work all that well for this story mostly because the whole thing hinges on the prince being the MC.



gotcha, role reversal where his bully growing up ended up to be a fellow Atlantian, who was sent to be his steward of the restroom. and tries to wrestle the crown from him when it's discovered. and ends up forfiling his destiny as being the steward of the restrooms, like his ancestors. 

edit: so to clarify my ramblings.  

the Bully is the antagonist, whose ancestors have been the royal stewards of the wash for the royal family (Ass wipers)... then he was sent with the prince to serve him as they grew up.. but, they got seperated and instead grew to become his bully.

at somepoint they both discover the truth and the bully tries to wrestle control from the Prince and in the end forfills his destiny of being a royal but wiper.


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## BornForBurning (Aug 18, 2019)

Funny bad isn't something that can be done intentionally, so no. While I am a great fan of all things hilariously incompetent, any time some well-meaning friend has suggested that "we could do something like that!" I immediately shut it down. You can't capture pure chaos in a bottle. It just _is_, and we're lucky enough to watch the show.


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## Phil Istine (Aug 19, 2019)

I'm totally capable of writing crap without intending to, so I'm not sure why I would bother doing it on purpose.


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## Rojack79 (Aug 20, 2019)

Phil Istine said:


> I'm totally capable of writing crap without intending to, so I'm not sure why I would bother doing it on purpose.



I'm shooting for a Guinness Book of World record for the best or worst troll fiction ever written and then published.


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## seigfried007 (Aug 20, 2019)

Rojack79 said:


> I'm shooting for a Guinness Book of World record for the best or worst troll fiction ever written and then published.


I guess as a labor of love and coping mechanism, it's a worthy goal. Writing and life are hard sometimes, and writing really bad fiction on purpose can actually be a great stress buster. If I'm particularly blue, I know a certain terrible story I can turn to to perk me up. And looking at other people's heinously bad fiction can inspire some greater confidence and schadenfreude, at least.


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## Rojack79 (Aug 20, 2019)

seigfried007 said:


> I guess as a labor of love and coping mechanism, it's a worthy goal. Writing and life are hard sometimes, and writing really bad fiction on purpose can actually be a great stress buster. If I'm particularly blue, I know a certain terrible story I can turn to to perk me up. And looking at other people's heinously bad fiction can inspire some greater confidence and schadenfreude, at least.



Yup. Just reading how bad some stories are and seeing how awful they can be makes me very happy to have put some time, effort and energy into developing my skills as a writer. I cringe at all of the blatant Sue characters I read about in a whole lot of fanfiction. Every now and then I find a diamond amongst the piles of crap and I am extremely grateful to have such art.


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## Gumby (Aug 20, 2019)

seigfried007 said:


> I guess as a labor of love and coping mechanism, it's a worthy goal. Writing and life are hard sometimes, and writing really bad fiction on purpose can actually be a great stress buster. If I'm particularly blue, I know a certain terrible story I can turn to to perk me up. And looking at other people's heinously bad fiction can inspire some greater confidence and schadenfreude, at least.





Rojack79 said:


> Yup. Just reading how bad some stories are and seeing how awful they can be makes me very happy to have put some time, effort and energy into developing my skills as a writer. I cringe at all of the blatant Sue characters I read about in a whole lot of fanfiction. Every now and then I find a diamond amongst the piles of crap and I am extremely grateful to have such art.



We actually had a thread here in the long ago (maybe it's still around) for that very purpose.  It had some really bad writing but what a fun and useful exercise it was!


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## luckyscars (Aug 20, 2019)

The closest I’ve ever been to wanting to write a “bad” story was wanting to get into the supermarket bargain basket trashy romance/thriller/mystery market (Danielle Steel type stuff), partly because it seemed that so many of those books were badly written that it would be sort of a challenge to emulate, mostly because it seemed like that was were the money was and that a modicum of effort would be enough to get somewhere...

...But I kind of don’t agree with that attitude. Yes being successful is important but not totally at the expense of one’s integrity and certainly I don’t like the idea of writing something I don’t believe in. I’m still all about expanding one’s horizons and trying different genres but I would want to take it seriously. Otherwise it’s not writing, it’s typing.


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## seigfried007 (Aug 20, 2019)

luckyscars said:


> The closest I’ve ever been to wanting to write a “bad” story was wanting to get into the supermarket bargain basket trashy romance/thriller/mystery market (Danielle Steel type stuff), partly because it seemed that so many of those books were badly written that it would be sort of a challenge to emulate, mostly because it seemed like that was were the money was and that a modicum of effort would be enough to get somewhere...
> 
> ...But I kind of don’t agree with that attitude. Yes being successful is important but not totally at the expense of one’s integrity and certainly I don’t like the idea of writing something I don’t believe in. I’m still all about expanding one’s horizons and trying different genres but I would want to take it seriously. Otherwise it’s not writing, it’s typing.



That's what spawned Pinocchio--husband and I had just moved and were looking for work, eating through his severance pay after the Air Force had botched a knee surgery on him.  Three young kids, lots of mouths to feed... and I decided selling my soul to the trashy romance scene was better than my kids going hungry. 

If I'd kept it trashy romance, it'd be finished by now, I swear, but even trying to write something trashy and simple proved impossible. It had to go morphing into something incredibly deep and complicated. (shakes fists at heavens). 

Feel your pain there. If you ever want to try for it, Red Room's always open, and I promise to beta read it for you. I could use a laugh--and more exposure to the genre. 

You see, I've never read Steele. I'm trying to write something similar-ish and bust into a market without have ever read anything much like I'm writing. Steele might not write stupid-deep LGBT science-fiction thrillers that are more chock full of nuts than a football locker room, the DSM-IV and a Planter's factory, but... that don't mean I don't want to snitch some fans of hers.


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## Rojack79 (Aug 20, 2019)

seigfried007 said:


> That's what spawned Pinocchio--husband and I had just moved and were looking for work, eating through his severance pay after the Air Force had botched a knee surgery on him.  Three young kids, lots of mouths to feed... and I decided selling my soul to the trashy romance scene was better than my kids going hungry.
> 
> If I'd kept it trashy romance, it'd be finished by now, I swear, but even trying to write something trashy and simple proved impossible. It had to go morphing into something incredibly deep and complicated. (shakes fists at heavens).
> 
> ...


 
I think my mom may have some Steele novels laying around our house. I'll have to pick one up and read it sometime this week.


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## luckyscars (Aug 20, 2019)

seigfried007 said:


> Steele might not write stupid-deep LGBT science-fiction thrillers that are more chock full of nuts than a football locker room, the DSM-IV and a Planter's factory, but... that don't mean I don't want to snitch some fans of hers.



In hindsight I feel a little bad mentioning Danielle Steel here, because she is by no means a terrible writer, she was just the first one that popped into my head. I don't really remember _bad _writers because I seldom get past the first page. I have, however, read a Danielle Steel novel so that's something!

Steele's writing isn't bad, technically it's pretty good, it's just very formulaic, very tropey, and that's sort of what I was getting at. It's essentially James Patterson with no Y chromosome. But it's hard to criticize somebody who has sold hundreds of millions of books, to that degree - obviously she is doing something right.

I just think there's a happy medium. Accessible, commercially viable, literature can still be challenging and innovative to read _and _to write. Truly bad fiction I would categorize as lazy fiction. And I think that's the main reason I think it's a waste of time and don't really think 'it's enjoyable' to be an adequate motivation. Laying in bed all day can be enjoyable too, but we don't celebrate its merits. 

But, as mentioned, it's a personal choice. I get the artistic intrigue in bad-for-the-sake-of-bad as exploring the boundaries of our culture. There's a reason 'The Room' still exists in public consciousness.


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## seigfried007 (Aug 20, 2019)

luckyscars said:


> In hindsight I feel a little bad mentioning Danielle Steel here, because she is by no means a terrible writer, she was just the first one that popped into my head. I don't really remember _bad _writers because I seldom get past the first page. I have, however, read a Danielle Steel novel so that's something!
> 
> Steele's writing isn't bad, technically it's pretty good, it's just very formulaic, very tropey, and that's sort of what I was getting at. It's essentially James Patterson with no Y chromosome. But it's hard to criticize somebody who has sold hundreds of millions of books, to that degree - obviously she is doing something right.
> 
> ...



Ah, see when I think of bad romance, I think of The Catch of Texas by Lass Small (well, that and Lady Gaga... and Twilight... and Fiddy Shades). It's like the Sharknado of romance.


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## James Wolfe (Aug 20, 2019)

Phil Istine said:


> I'm totally capable of writing crap without intending to, so I'm not sure why I would bother doing it on purpose.



Same, Order of the Broken Pen,


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## Sir-KP (Aug 21, 2019)

'Bad' as in intentionally bad quality, trainwreck product? No. Especially in this age, thinking of doing so is like thinking how to fail on purpose.

But if the 'bad' is rather towards contentious/controversial stuff, then yes, I have the wish for it.


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## Rojack79 (Aug 22, 2019)

Sir-KP said:


> 'Bad' as in intentionally bad quality, trainwreck product? No. Especially in this age, thinking of doing so is like thinking how to fail on purpose.
> 
> But if the 'bad' is rather towards contentious/controversial stuff, then yes, I have the wish for it.



Oh the train wreck that I have planned will more than likely be very controversial. I plan on shoving every single bad trope, cliche, meme, and just in general the worst parts of fiction I can think of into one semi-cohesive mess of a novel. It's going to be fun.


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## JustRob (Aug 22, 2019)

My only substantial fiction writing output has been a novel written when I had no previous experience at all, so I had every expectation of it being bad by conventional measures and none of it getting published. Therefore purely for my own entertainment I tried to incorporate the sorts of things that would convince critical readers that it was badly written when actually it wasn't, at least in the ways that I was aware of. Any critical reader out to find fault with it would therefore enjoy reading it as much as anyone who read it with the innocent expectation of reading a good story. In other words readers would see exactly what they expected to and be happy about it. Readers who like criticising stories must be disappointed by ones that are hard to criticise, so why not make it easy for them to be critical if that's what they enjoy? 

If a critical reader reads my novel knowing that it has been written by a complete novice then they are likely to be unwary enough to fall into the traps that I have set and think that they have correctly assessed it simply because they didn't try to understand it. In fact a professional critical reader to whom I sent an extract told me that it was an easy read, but he'd completely misunderstood it because his job was to be critical and his mistake was thinking that it was an easy read and not paying enough attention because I was a novice. Even novice writers can be profound thinkers though.

A more experienced professional reader who actually lectures on English literature at an American university took the trouble to read the entire novel twice and realised the second time that he enjoyed it even more than the first, so evidently he'd broken through the outer shell and found what lay hidden inside, but then we'd been corresponding for a couple of years and he knew me well enough already to expect as much. In fact he was the person who first suggested writing the story. They say that you shouldn't judge a book by its cover but equally you shouldn't judge it by the author's name on the cover. Good and bad writing may simply be fictions in the minds of the readers.


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## Terry D (Aug 22, 2019)

Planning to write shit is a shitty plan.


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## Rojack79 (Aug 24, 2019)

Terry D said:


> Planning to write shit is a shitty plan.


 
That is the plan so far. At least for me I see as a nice way of getting all of the "crappy writing ideas" out of my system.


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## luckyscars (Aug 25, 2019)

Rojack79 said:


> At least for me I see as a nice way of getting all of the "crappy writing ideas" out of my system.



Methinks you underestimate the resilience of crappy writing ideas.


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## Rojack79 (Aug 25, 2019)

luckyscars said:


> Methinks you underestimate the resilience of crappy writing ideas.



Honestly I will say that I most likely am underestimating them. But I've noticed that when I write something down it usually leaves me alone after that. Usually... but hey It'll be a fun and whacky adventure from start to finish so never a dull moment. Thinking of how I'm going to outline this train wreck. That is the real brain teaser.


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## Terry D (Aug 26, 2019)

Rojack79 said:


> That is the plan so far. At least for me I see as a nice way of getting all of the "crappy writing ideas" out of my system.



There are no crappy writing ideas, only crappy execution. So, by trying to write crap, you aren't purging yourself of anything, only practicing writing junk. Musicians don't practice hitting wrong notes, ball-players don't practice striking out, why would you practice writing badly? Writing skill isn't something you can turn on and off at will.


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## luckyscars (Aug 26, 2019)

Terry D said:


> There are no crappy writing ideas



View attachment 24269


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## Terry D (Aug 26, 2019)

luckyscars said:


> View attachment 24269



I see a story about global effects of a renewed faith in 'scientific-astrology' and the rise to power of a skilled scientist/con-man. Or, perhaps, an SF novel about here-to-fore unknown acoustic properties of dark energy/dark matter and their religious implications on human expansion throughout the solar system. Possible title, _The Capricorn Aria_. No. Bad. Ideas.


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## Ralph Rotten (Aug 26, 2019)

That book is really tearing up the charts [sic]

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,790,635 in Books (See Top 100 in Books[FONT=&Verdana])
[/FONT]#47986 in​ Occult & Paranormal

​Even in the weirdo category it is in the 5 digit rankings.


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## Rojack79 (Aug 26, 2019)

Terry D said:


> There are no crappy writing ideas, only crappy execution. So, by trying to write crap, you aren't purging yourself of anything, only practicing writing junk. Musicians don't practice hitting wrong notes, ball-players don't practice striking out, why would you practice writing badly? Writing skill isn't something you can turn on and off at will.


 
I think you might be misunderstanding the point of this post. I'm not trying to write with bad grammar or use crappy text speak. I'm purposefully using every kind of cliche, meme and overused trope that i can to write an intentionally bad story. For me i see it as a great exercise to help get all of the bad ideas that have cropped up in my head down on paper and on the plus side i get a great troll fic that i can possibly publish.


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## Terry D (Aug 26, 2019)

Rojack79 said:


> I think you might be misunderstanding the point of this post. I'm not trying to write with bad grammar or use crappy text speak. I'm purposefully using every kind of cliche, meme and overused trope that i can to write an intentionally bad story. For me i see it as a great exercise to help get all of the bad ideas that have cropped up in my head down on paper and on the plus side i get a great troll fic that i can possibly publish.



Do what you want. If practicing dumb ideas turns you on, go for it.


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## luckyscars (Aug 26, 2019)

Terry D said:


> I see a story about global effects of a renewed faith in 'scientific-astrology' and the rise to power of a skilled scientist/con-man. Or, perhaps, an SF novel about here-to-fore unknown acoustic properties of dark energy/dark matter and their religious implications on human expansion throughout the solar system. Possible title, _The Capricorn Aria_. No. Bad. Ideas.



I think we may have a new WF challenge in the making. How about this one? 

View attachment 24270

I see a modern-day Frankenstein retelling. A lonely farmer, pictured, turns serial killer in an attempt to acquire the parts he needs to build a woman capable of pulling a cultivator.

(Set in Iowa, of course)


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## luckyscars (Aug 26, 2019)

Possible title: "The Land Maid's Tale"


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## Aquilo (Aug 26, 2019)

luckyscars said:


> I think we may have a new WF challenge in the making. How about this one?
> 
> View attachment 24270
> 
> ...



LMAO, oh god -- no. Now that combine harvestor song just won't go away now, thanks....

[video=youtube;tb63PdPweDc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tb63PdPweDc[/video]


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## Rojack79 (Aug 27, 2019)

Aquilo said:


> LMAO, oh god -- no. Now that combine harvestor song just won't go away now, thanks....
> 
> [video=youtube;tb63PdPweDc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tb63PdPweDc[/video]



Wow. How did this "gem" of a song get past the music police? Where they sleeping on the job? Did they go out for more than coffee & donuts that night? I mean it's not that bad. I've heard worse, wish I could get a sample up but I'm 100% sure I'd get banned on the spot.


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## seigfried007 (Aug 27, 2019)

Rojack79 said:


> Wow. How did this "gem" of a song get past the music police? Where they sleeping on the job? Did they go out for more than coffee & donuts that night? I mean it's not that bad. I've heard worse, wish I could get a sample up but I'm 100% sure I'd get banned on the spot.


[video=youtube;N1ZpAp8-ILo]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1ZpAp8-ILo[/video]


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## Rojack79 (Aug 27, 2019)

seigfried007 said:


> [video=youtube;N1ZpAp8-ILo]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1ZpAp8-ILo[/video]


 
Man I thought i'd seen it all. Evidently not.


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## seigfried007 (Aug 27, 2019)

Rojack79 said:


> Man I thought i'd seen it all. Evidently not.


Always good for a laugh


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## Trollheart (Aug 27, 2019)

_Wanted to? Intentionally?_ Um, no. Just good (bad) luck I guess....
(Somebody please ship me a shycouch emoji. My Paypal account is....)


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## Rojack79 (Aug 28, 2019)

Trollheart said:


> _Wanted to? Intentionally?_ Um, no. Just good (bad) luck I guess....
> (Somebody please ship me a shycouch emoji. My Paypal account is....)



What is a shy couch emoji? For some reason I just picture Fluttershy sitting tentatively in a couch waiting to hear some bad news.


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## Rojack79 (Aug 29, 2019)

So a quick update on this story. I have most of the villains drawn up and two out of the five main characters written down. I'll probably post up the outline for this one as I finish each chapter just to have something to tease everyone here with. Until then so long and good luck in your writing endeavours!


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