# Hi



## gerdun (Apr 22, 2017)

My name is Gerald and I currently doing a BA degree in creative writing/philosophy. I am nearing the end of my second year and will have to hand my EMA in next month. I am studying through open university and my forum feedback hasn't been great. I hope to get more constructive feedback here. 
I look forward to taking your criticism/guidance and maybe offer some in return. 
G.


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## JustRob (Apr 22, 2017)

Hi Gerald, join the crowd. There are plenty of others here seeking constructive feedback and it's a mutual exercise, so start off by taking a look at some of the more recent offerings here and post your comments on them. Ten posts scored up enable you to get access to the other member forums not visible to the public and also allow you to post examples of your work on your own threads for comment. The ten post hurdle is just to show that you are willing to participate fully because it all depends on give and take here.

We are a varied bunch but every reader in the wide world is different as well and that is the readership that one is trying to attract, so every opinion counts for something. You'll get gut reactions to what you offer as well as critical analysis if you're lucky and it all helps, so jump in and start commenting. We're a friendly crowd and you'll certainly get reactions to anything that you write but do remember that the best way to become a good creative writer is to think and write creatively and carefully all the time, not just when producing what you regard as literature.

There now comes a pause while I review what I've just typed for all the things that make good sense and good English. Well, I must practise what I preach, mustn't I? Come to think of it, this computer doesn't even have a spelling checker running. This could take a little longer then, given my appalling typing.


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## gerdun (Apr 22, 2017)

Haha, thanks Rob for the feedback. I am wondering about feedback. Does it have to be extensive? I am a quadriplegic and type/write using specialized software [clickntype]. Time consuming to write anything long but it does have autocomplete thus usually I can be happy with my spelling. :-o


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## JustRob (Apr 22, 2017)

Wow, that's tough, but I am a retired information technologist so always interested in the fundamentals of communication. So far as the length of feedback is concerned, no, it's all about making your words count really. In my opinion the best poem that I have written in the poetry section here contains just sixteen words, which means that the comments that I received about it were probably a great deal longer than the poem itself. I frequently write at length because it isn't that much of a hardship for me and, being retired, I have the time to do it. I do feel sorry for those who have to read my babblings though, but it's just how I am. My angel wife, whom I normally just call my angel for short here, is continually reprimanding me for writing so much to say so little and I am sure that others here can say a lot more in just a small about of feedback compared to me. That's the skill in writing, to pack in the meaning so that the reader feels it bubbling out of the words. The best posts here are often the shortest ones, but the most pointless ones can be as well. It's all about quality over quantity, so why the heck didn't I just say that in the first place? Oh dear, apparently I've done it again.

In your situation I am sure that you think carefully before you write, which puts you ahead of some of us, so you'll do fine. Thanks for sharing though because we'll bear it in mind. Like my signature says, sharing creates a reality. It's what writing is all about.


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## gerdun (Apr 22, 2017)

cheers, much appreciated. 
G.


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## JustRob (Apr 22, 2017)

I see you've clocked up more than ten posts now, so you should get full membership assigned soon enough. There can be a delay before the system sorts that out, but it will get there eventually so don't panic.


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## BlondeAverageReader (Apr 22, 2017)

Hi Gerald
Welcome to the forum, I'm Rob's angel. Please feel free to keep your posts short and to the point, as Rob has enough verbals for all of us! Mine are always short, due to my complete lack of keyboard skills. Hope my poem didn't put you off the beta readers here, most of them are normal. Thank you for your comment.


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## JustRob (Apr 22, 2017)

I see that you've got your profile sorted out then ... and met my angel. It's true that she lacks keyboard skills. She uses an iPad and relies heavily on autocomplete, but then having been married to a computer specialist for almost half a century she's never needed to use a computer at all. Why keep a dog and bark yourself is what they say.

I also see from your profile that you've done psychotherapy. If you want a really puzzling case history then take a look at my website. The link is below. It includes a downloadable copy of my solitary novel, virtually the only fiction that I've written and I'm not even sure why I wrote that, never having had any desire to be a writer. In fact at that time back in 2011 my angel regarded my writing activities as almost dissociative behaviour. In my attempts to work out how and why I wrote the story since then the only conclusion that I've reached is that I based the story on my experiences _since_ that time, which is allegedly a scientific impossibility. From a psychologist's viewpoint this must simply be the result of confirmation bias, but in that case I must be an incredibly lucky and imaginative person to have found all the coincidences that I have. All writers tend to find connections between their work and their own lives eventually apparently, but I find mine particularly convincing when no other explanations are. 

So, if you are interested in creative writing, philosophy and psychology perhaps you'd care to work out where the boundary between fiction and reality lies on my website. What I am apparently dabbling in are purely mind experiments with no physical context and yet they are connected to real chronologically recorded events. It's a puzzle indeed.

But don't let me distract you from your studies. My website is always there for when you become curious about the wider possibilities that may exist in life ... or just writing about it.


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## gerdun (Apr 22, 2017)

Very interesting Rob and when I have time I surely will check your writing. I can appreciate and empathise with what you say about the compulsion to write. For me, I am reaching a parity in life. In a few years time I will be the same time disabled as I was an able bodied person.
I feel the need to write about this before my time and reality runs out. In this current existence that is :]


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## sas (Apr 22, 2017)

gerun,

This probably sounds insensitive, but the very fact that it is laborious for you to write may be an extraordinary advantage. Like a poet, prose words should be picked carefully, so each counts. As I mentioned to someone today, on another thread , the problem with writers is that they love words, too much. They drown what could be a good story in them, especially with those adjectives. Every snow flake on a tongue is described, instead of getting to the rat killing, so to speak. Writer Elmore Leonard, who lived near me, talked about this; few listen.

*I've posted here before Leonard's Writing Tips. *Those who admonish them, should compare their success with his:



*Never open a book with weather.*
*Avoid prologues.*
*Never use a verb other than "said" to carry dialogue.*
*Never use an adverb to modify the verb "said"…he admonished gravely.*
*Keep your exclamation points under control. You are allowed no more than two or three per 100,000 words of prose.*
*Never use the words "suddenly" or "all hell broke loose."*
*Use regional dialect, patois, sparingly.*
*Avoid detailed descriptions of characters.*
*Don't go into great detail describing places and things.*
*Try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip.*
*          My most important rule is one that sums up the 10.
**          If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.
*

He died recently. I missed his estate sale, as out of town. Damn shame, too, because all items were sold as if owned by Joe Doe, as he would want.  A simple man who knew the value of writing with simplicity. We should stop puffing ourselves up with words. Tell the damn story. 

I look forward to yours. I bet you've something to say worth reading.
Onward, gerdun, onward.  Best. Sas
.


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## Bard_Daniel (Apr 22, 2017)

Welcome Gerdun! : D


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## Matt Styles Illistrada (Apr 27, 2017)

welcome


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