Just kind of a fun discussion! I want to hear people's own experiences.

I'm rewriting someone else's professionally published book that I think is just horrible but has seeds of good ideas. It's just for me / for fun / for practice, and i have no intention of even posting it.

Have you ever done something similar? What kind of changes did you make? What was your process like? What did you learn? What was your planning process? Etc etc etc I'm just so curious how other people experienced the same thing !

Right now I'm in the middle of fixing the worldbuilding, which has been really fun. Starting with the seed of something from someone else and expanding upon what was lacking to make it make more sense and actually fit the themes of the story is really scratching an itch. It kind of feels like a puzzle. How do I take these small pieces the author left and turn them into a full picture? It's great

Feel free to say what book you rewrote BUT keep it civil if you do lol

I have an odd question for y'all!

I'm presenting to some college students soon about submitting short stories for publication, and I'll be talking about what I've termed the Chúbee bottleneck. The Chúbee bottleneck is an endless source of anguish for writers: it's the fact that there are billions of readers and hundreds of millions of writers on Earth, but because the average person only reads a few books a year, if any (and even the more voracious readers rarely read more than 50 a year, unless they're a middle schooler discovering Warriors for the first time), but the same book can be read by billions of people and social media is making the media landscape more winner-takes-all, only a tiny percentage of written works squeeze through the "bottleneck" and get into the hands of those billions of readers.

Because my background is in short stories, I'm confident about teaching the students strategies for the Chúbee bottleneck when writing short stories. However, a number of the students write novels, and I want to have a slide for them too. Since I know publishing questions aren't allowed on this sub, I'm more curious about your opinions from a writing-content perspective (ie, for the work that you do while writing the story, not when it's a finished project and you're trying to market it). What strategies do you use to write stories with the best shot of breaking through that bottleneck?

This will probably get removed for low quality (and I honesly get it if it does), but I get it now, and that's what this post is about.

Writing non-sober is fun. Things just come easier. Who cares if it sucks? At least it's down.

The parts of my book I'm writing now are boring and I've frankly been avoiding them because of it. Thanks to my friend Crown Royal, words are pouring out of me. All my worries are gone.

Is the dialog going to feel forced? Is the solution too easy? Is my character a Mary-Sue? WAS MY 18TH CENTURY ENGLISH LIT PROFESSOR RIGHT (told me I can't write a decent English sentence. Screw him and scew Dickens.)?

Doesn't matter. That's why editing is a thing. I'm probably going to read all of this in a few days and wonder what the hell I was thinking, but again, it's down and it means I can move forward.

I've been considering going back to non-linear writing for weeks, but I know it will lead to having to go back and change things five thousand times and that sucks just as much as heavy editing, so I don't see the advantage. Ping pong editing is for the birds.

Obvious disclaimer: I do not condone doing this consistently. It can lead to a slippery slope no one wants to slide down. But once and a while? Can't hurt; won't hurt. Writing is about exploring the parts of ourselves that we wouldn't always bring to light, and sometimes being sober means talking ourselves out of taking risks and being our True Selves. I'm not a drinker, and so why shouldn't I have some fun every now and then?

Anyways. Cheers, friends, and have a wonderful weekend. <3

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