~*~ ICU Chatterbox ~*~

[Niphz]

Oh yeah, I'm pretty good at essays, wrote a piece for Jurisprudence literally an hour before it was due and got a 2:1 in it <3  

[Minielf]

Liani Vine

For non-fiction, I am good at writing short poetry analyses, but other than that, all my essys are 5 pages+ ¬.¬

My friend has already written a book and is waiting until she's old enough to have it published (I think the publishing agency that accepted it has a minimum age limit of 18 ). I looked it over and it was full of horrible sentence structures and cliches.
Fortunately, I can criticise it to my heart's content, because she's not that affected by people being mean to her, and she knows I'm not the most generous person in the world xD

You should tell your friend that she shouldn't publish her book, not until it's undergone extensive editing by a professional. One of the golden rules in writing is to never publish your first works. I wrote a 160K word novel a few years ago and initially dreamed of publishing it, but when I looked over it with a critics' eye I was horrified at how derivative and cliche-ridden it was. There was no way I could have published it. I've decided to stick to the fanfic scene for a few more years to practice my craft and get some feedback before writing a serious novel.

@Niph: How long was that piece? It must have been less than 1K words if you could get it done at the final hour. blaugh I used to do the same thing for short research essays in the 1st and 2nd year but it's impossible for me to do it in my Honours year. The teachers can tell whether something's been codged up at the last minute.  

[Niphz]

1600. <3  

[tamcharles]

ninja  

[Sphenni]

@ Yalie: If they can accept Twilight, they'll accept anything ¬.¬

@ Elfy: Her parents agree as well ¬.¬ I was like: "Get an editor!" Apparently she cried loads that she couldn't get it published. But who reads a book by a 15-year-old anyway? If I saw that on the back cover, I would throw it away.

@ Niphy: Wow that was fast- I can't write quickly to save my life. I keep on going back half-way through the essay to self-criticise the stuff I wrote above. In the end, I just get bored of it -_-'  

[Minielf]

Niphz

1600. <3

Ah that's still a pretty short length. Did you need to do a lot of referencing?  

[mymiridon]

@Lv: lolz that's true. I totally wiped twilight from my mind.

But you know there are plenty of books by teens out there, of course they're geared towards other teens. I def. think she should cultivate her writing skills a little more. She really shouldn't be crying loads for getting rejected, she wouldn't be able to handle the real world that way lol.

@niph: lolz for a second there I thought you meant the year 1600 XD  

[Niphz]

@'elfy - It was quite short, but it was very quick XD

@LV - I almost never read back my essays until after I get them back from the tutor. The best thing to do is just keep at it until you finish, you can always make corrections at the end. Also, structure is the most important thing. <3

@yalie - Hahaha, I just love Shakespeare that much..

In other news, I'm going to our Hallowe'en party dressed as Pikachu XD  

[Sphenni]

@ Niphy: OMG Awesome! -is still obsessed with Pokemon-

Actually, you should dress up as a Poochyena:


You caught one on my gameboy, and called it after yourself, remember? xD I'd gotten it to evolve, but that was before my sister deleted the game ¬.¬

@ Yalie: But the problem is, her book isn't aimed at teenagers! It's aimed at like... Old ladies! Seriously, what kind of person says to their sister: "You are the best pair of siblings one could possibly possess"?! And ALL her characters are like that! She even talks like that herself... Someone who was a friend of hers on facebook even made a blog entry on how he thought she was at least 19 years old... It's because she reads too many classics. She also has a really bad taste in modern fiction- though thankfully she hates Twilight too.

We were teasing her at lunch last week. She'd just started talking about "William of Orange" (there is a place called Orange in France, apparently). We all burst out laughing at the mention of his name, and my friends all started going "Oh, I'm Kathy of Lemon! I'm Joyce of Plum!"
She started retorting in her lady-like manner, so my friend commented: "Um, Chloe? Are you from the same era as William of ORANGE?" It was so hilarious xD  

[Niphz]

Wouldn't diss William of Orange if I were you, he's a pretty cool dude.  

[Sphenni]

He has gay hair crying

So who was William of Orange, exactly?  

[Minielf]

Niphz

@'elfy - It was quite short, but it was very quick XD

@LV - I almost never read back my essays until after I get them back from the tutor. The best thing to do is just keep at it until you finish, you can always make corrections at the end. Also, structure is the most important thing. <3

@yalie - Hahaha, I just love Shakespeare that much..

In other news, I'm going to our Hallowe'en party dressed as Pikachu XD

Not reading your essays with an objective eye before you hand them is okay in high school and the first years of uni, but once you get to Honours level or above, doing so would cost you severely. I frequently double check and edit my work even when it's only 40 or 50% finished, and a few times I've been forced to completely rewrite an essay from scratch when I realised it sucked badly. For short 1500 word essays it is easy to write it all in one go, but for the 3000+ word essays I normally write, it is impossible to maintain consistency without throughly checking it over.

@Liani: I think he was a dutch Prince who became the King of England after overthrowing James II in 1688, although I could be mistaken. I don't really have much an interest in Shakespeare in any case. Did a subject on it in first year and I absolutely hated it.  

[Niphz]

If you have the structure set out before you start writing and you stick to it, there is usually no need to re-write whole chunks that you've already written; at most you will have to move some paragraphs around or make minor corrections.

There were a few Williams of Orange. One of them did indeed become King of England. Another of them - 100 years previously - led the Dutch revolution which established the Netherlands as separate from Spanish rule.  

[Niphz]

See fb for more. XD  

[mymiridon]

@mini: don't worry, no one actually likes shakespeare other than shakepeare nuts and niph XD

@LV: haha your friend sounds like she should read more books... not by strange awkward novelists who don't have the faintest idea of reality.

@niph: lolz, so many williams of oranges, we should start assigning numbers.