Hmm, I think my view might be of some small worth here.  As a new writer
(well, ok, two college degrees and A's in English since I was theeees high
- But I've never really tried to actually write my own serious, lengthy
personal fiction before - just the junk you crank out to make teachers
happy (and boy, was I good at that! :)), I NEED to hear things like what
people have been talking about here. All I have is the "correct" rules for
writing.  I need to know that you shouldn't abuse he said/she said within
conversations, that its ok to ignore that and other rules to some extent.
I need to know what makes good mechanics - this doesn't lock my personal
style into some tight mold, it frees me from the tight strictures of
English grammar and punctuation and sentence structure and paragraph
mechanics that 16+ years of english classes has imprisoned me in.

Some have said, if you need these things, just go look at the works of
writers you admire and see how they did it.  That's nice, if I had years
to reread the numerous books I have read and analyze them for writing
style and mechanics I'm sure I would.  As a new writer, what I need is for
someone to say, that bit you wrote was sort of a cliche (something I
usually know, but get stuck at, not knowing how to get around).  Chris
gave me good advice on that, he said pull out Roger's and find some new
words.  That helped.  Being told to seek my muse, ignore what others have
done, develop my own style and ignore the advice of others is some of the
worst advice I have seen here.  Good writing is NOT about just what I
think of my own writing, its very much about how others see it.

Other good things have been reading C&C on other new writers first tries -
these help me know what to avoid (well, most of the time :).  People
posting about the music they listened to while writing was a revelation to
me - some of my most creative thoughts have come while listening to
certain pieces of music, but I had never tried playing music while I
actually wrote.  I just waited til the mood hit me, which was rare.  It
has been a joy to crank the stereo up and feel the mood hit me when I want
it.  If I'm feeling critical of my writing and thus afraid to edit since I
will probably delete most of it, Wa La!  Presto!  Play music, mood comes
back, and my brain can work right again.

Just like any art form, you need teachers, mentors, fellow artists at the
same level - they help you past the hard points, they challenge you, and
they help you to exceed yourself.  Even the greatest of artists have been
able to give a long list of those whose works have inspired and influenced
them.  Oh, oh, darn, my rant button is getting stuck on . . . sigh.  Ja!

Charles K. Hurst - ImageNation Corp. Wage Slave/Employee - RPI graduate-MechE
Chocolate and Anime Forever!  10 months a fan and counting.
MI = eps. 96  MB = eps. 64 - 0/12 episodes each to utter boredom or Fushigi!