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What has worked for me in the past is to simply concentrate on telling the story. I'm assuming you are on your first draft and have yet to complete even that. In that case, you need to spend less time analyzing and more time telling your story. If you spend too much time reviewing as you write, you'll end up with a case of paralysis by analysis. Sometimes ...

If you're writing in your own original world, try to think of the kinds of things that are present in that world. I actually spent quite a while thinking about what possible phrases could exist in various areas of my current fantasy world. Try to imagine how the idiom you are trying to create could have come about in the setting. Include imagery that would ...

If everything you write is sounding like overused tropes and clichés, it may be that you're simply showing your influences. And when you see your writing, all you're seeing are those influences. Hence, it feels less substantial to you. What, exactly is "bland, generic fantasy" to you? I suggest you define what it is you're trying to avoid. Make a list if ...

On the first draft: you won't. First drafts are almost invariably clunkers. But your first draft is not meant to shine. Your first draft is meant to get the story onto paper and out of your head where it's been languishing for years. Once it's on paper, then you can edit, revise, polish, and get an editor/editors to scrub out the bland and generic. But ...

When a story becomes timeless, I think it is because it tells some universal "truth". The story is just an example of this truth, while the underlying morale can be applied to almost any time in history. And what was present on the earth 2000 years ago, and still is today? People. Human beings. Characters. If you look at the example of 9/11, what mechanisms ...

I think the main issue here is "accessibility out of context" i.e. how accessible is the raw emotion behind the event to someone viewing it with very little context to go on. The most immediate and easily accessible example of accessible emotion is the killing of Bambi's mother in Bambi, it's one of the most popularly referenced moments of movie sadness in ...

The random word approach is not as bad as you think: Divide a piece of paper into three columns Write nouns randomly in the first column and cover it Write verbs into the second and cover it (same amount as nouns) Write adjectives into the third column (same amount as nouns) Phrase a sentence which each row Write ten sentences each day of one week and ...

The essence of a good climax starts with good conflict. You need two (at least two) forces which are going to clash with one another. These need not be warships, or wizards, or anything titanic, if you're not writing Sci-Fi. Or even if you are...remember the classics: 'Man vs. Man, Man vs. Nature, Man vs. Self' that they used to teach in school. Once ...

One kind of off the wall solution I've used in the past to make fantasy/sci-fi feel less generic is choosing another style of writing (genre fiction or otherwise) and trying very consciously to emulate it while I write. If you're writing fantasy, maybe read nothing but noir fiction while you're writing and try to absorb the syntax/diction of that genre into ...

I learnt the hard way that you need conflict, often just at a low level, for a mere scene to progress. Just something as idiotically simple as "the characters need to quietly open an old door". Here, the conflict is doing an action that would normally make sound noise as quietly as possible. How they solve that is what makes the scene. In the same way, the ...

...angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night I listen to readings of Allen Ginsberg poetry. Howl Supermarket in California