grahamsealby

Thanks, guys, for responding to my question. Jason Rimaud raised an issue that I hadn't thought about - what do you do when you have a group of people talking? I'm going to check my 'Dummies for Creative Writing' - the only textbook I possess. There again, I might try AI. I'm going to continue ignoring the phrase 'I; He, She, They said' and stick to the more creative dialogue. I may be dogmatic but I'm only 89 so if I'm a bit naughty Ill have to live with my bad. I just love a challange. I'm really keen on dialogue when writing. Good dialogue helps the reader understand who and what a chracter is. It's the same as 'listenning' to a person in oral mode. If you come accross any new developments, please contact me. Once again, thanks for responding!

Your comment that 'He/She said is nearly invisible to most readers' I find a bit curious. If the readers are ignoring the descriptive phrase, then why do publishers insist upon it? As well as writing, I'm a prolific reader, and I've noticed that many authors don't include the phrase but rely on creative dialogue to tell the reader whose talking.

Krista raised an interesting subject on using the word 'said' when writing dialogue. I don't like, and don't use I, he/she, or they said, trying to identify whose speaking. It is plainly boring to read a story where dialogue is interrupted countless times by the phrase He/She said. I'm told that editors and publishers require the phrase before going to print. Nonetheless, I don't use the phrase in any of my writing. You can structure dialogue so that it's obvious who is talking. All it takes is a bit of skill. After several lines, you can insert a person's name as an identifier. For instance, if 'Peter' is talking to 'Mary', you can say 'Thanks, Mary, that's a great idea'. If you abandon the phrase He/She said in any manuscript, the word count would greatly diminish. I claim it's unnecessary, and I don't know why publishers insist upon its usage. What do you guys think?

Thanks, Jason. I'll take a geek at JMS Becoming a Writer because the more you read, the more you learn. I definitely do not post chapter by chapter. Writing any story is a fluid procedure and may require many changes to text and structure until you're happy with the finished product. At least I'm comfortable with this approach. I take your point about writing every day or at least as frequently as possible. Mia Culpa! I tend not to be that organised. However, I believe in planning because if you know where you're headed ( i.e the ending), it should make the lead-up easier. I still don't know what to do about my unfinished scribbling, and it's giving me the '@#$%'s. I might try writing the ending and then fill in the middle stuff. Ive never done that before, so it's gonna be something of a learning curve. Anyway, thanks for all the good advice - I appreciate your responding to my post.

Thanks mate, I've got a couple of videos from eBay, being careful they will play here in Australia. I'm just surprised that there isn't an app dedicated to Gay males.

Thanks to all who responded about using the word 'was' too frequently. If I understand Zombie's response, he finds no problem using 'was' in colloqual dialogue. I agree with this and intend to use 'was' when writing dialogue. I will maintain using the active tense in all my other writing.

I couldn't find anything to do with Writer's mental block. I'm sure the subject has been raised before, but I couldn't find it, so I created a new one. I'm writing a story about 3 young gay lads who have finished their National Service and split to follow each one's life's path. I envisioned that the book would end sometime in the future with a recounting of their adventures along the way. I breezed through the first lad's tale and started the second boy's story, and then it happened. . . my mind went blank. I tried leaving the story for 3 weeks and revisiting - but no luck. I still can't proceed. Has anyone experienced the same problem? What do other writers do to overcome the fearsome writer's wall? I've written about 20,000 words about the first lad and thought, maybe, I should just stop there. But I don't want to. I believe the original concept is sound, so I would like to continue. HELP!!

Don't feel bad, Jason . . . I'm the same. I seem to think in the passive tense using ' was.' I've been doing it for years, always going back to try and fix the problem. That's why I decided to ask my peers if anyone had a similar problem

I've got Tubi here in Australia. Sure, they are the best streaming platform for Gay movies, but they're still mostly Lesbian. I just can't believe that there isn't a site that caters to/for gay males. I've looked on EBAY but you have to be careful, the movies aren't region specific. We had a bookshop here in Melbourne, Australia, but it closed down when streaming became popular. I've got about 50 videos acquired from the bookshop before they closed, but now they're getting old and dated. Is there a site that lists gay movies along with relevant data? I'm not averse to buying from IMDB

thought for a moment. Or, rather, tried to think. ”We couldn’t agree who was the designated driver”, he replied, speaking slowly and with exaggerated precision in order to avoid slurring but having particular difficulty with “designated driver”, which he had to repeat several times until he was satisfied he had correctly enunciated the phrase (he hadn’t).

The verb "was" denotes a passive approach in creative writing. I find it can be overused, making writing very cumbersome. I once read a story in GA where the author used "was" so frequently that it affected the story's readability. I've tried to eliminate 'was' as much as possible. Using the 'active' tense produces much cleaner sentences, making prose more elegant. Does anyone agree or disagree?

I'm keen to watch Gay MALE videos, but I'm not having any luck with the usual streaming services such as Netflix, Stan or Prime. Sure, they have Gay videos, but they're mostly Lesbian, Gay theemed or short grabs of around 15 mins. I don't like the latter because the time restriction doesn't allow for characters or themes to develop. Obviously, I don't want to watch Lesbian stuff because, all due respect to our female cousins, they (the movies) don't turn me on. My benchmark is a movie called "Latter Days", and I'm trolling to find similar movies. Is there an app or a website that contains movies like "Latter Days'? If so, can you let me know, 'cause it would be appreciated.

I've been using Grammarly for some time, but I'd now like to switch to something better, if possible. Any suggestions?

I need to update my credit card . I searched every ware and couldn't find how to.

I can't read any further. I take offense to training underaged kids to use guns. I'm totally opposed to guns of any kind and anyway what have guns to do in a gay story! ;

Sorry but I don't know where this story is going. I'm really uncomfortable with the militarist tone of the story? It seems that doing militarist things is more important than helping gays. It's starting to get booring

I don't know where this story is going. I'm disturbed by the level of homophobia which is apparently accepted. Our community approach is that Adam doesn't have a problem . . . all the other homophobic jerks do! I'll keep reading . . reluctantly

I don't understand the obsession with the color black. It's a depressing color.

Why did you do that? If I'd known the story had such a tragic end I wouldn't have started reading. The ending was so unessasary

Well I finally finished. I thought the ending was a little drawn out and Theo the use of a first name as a family name (Marcus) had me confUsed at times but a wonderful story and well written. I intend to follow you. I've written quite a few stories for GA and have to do my own editing. I looked around in the past and found that editors charge 3c per word. Is this what you pay? Thanks for an enjoyable read.

I don't usually comment on a story until I've finished reading but I need to tell you that you're an excellent scribbler. I'm enjoying the story and your writing style. You write clean and efficiently. Congrats!

Thanks for your comments. I thought a lot about that and finally decided I didn't want the relationship to imapct on the basic story. Thanks again.

I really loved this story. You are a very good writer. Your sensitivity shines through in every chapter. Well done!

Thanks!. I've often thought about writing a gay detective series. Something with a financial investigation background would be interesting.

. . . and thanks for your interest. As I mentioned Jaimee got inside my heart and I'd like to write a sequel. I'm thinking . . . I'm thinking . . . thanks again.