I've been writing fiction, adult and YA/MG, for several years, and have endeavored, with advice from every quarter and by reading the greats, to improve my writing, to see it as an art, for want of a better word. Careful attention to the advice and to the so-called 'rules', however, has made me cautious, perhaps overly so, with the result that what I'm writing often strikes me as regimented and sophomoric. Last week, someone in my SCBWI writing group made the astute observation that advice is just that--advice, and that when a writer goes over the top in applying the rules (kill all the adverbs comes to mind), the writing suffers. Comments?
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