Writing Club!

[Meds]

Hello, all! Meds here ^^

So we've been discussing for a while that a 'writing club' would be beneficial to WWM. We're an intermediate-level Rp, which means that we require correct grammar, spelling, punctuation, and sentence structure at all times. Everybody struggles with this sometimes, so that's why this thread is going to be so great!

If you have ANY questions about grammar, ask them here! I, or somebody else that knows the answer, will respond. If there is ever an incorrect response given, please don't be offended if somebody corrects it—we are all here to learn.
Now there are also plenty of tools online to help with grammar and spellcheck and what not, so don't forget about those—but add this into the rotation. The responses probably won't be full-blown lessons or anything like that, because we aren't experts and don't have time for that (ha), but it WILL be a quick place to get answers and examples for the questions that you have.
And don't be embarrassed! It is 1000% less embarrassing to post here with a question, than to make a sloppy post in an actual Rp ^^

Fire away!

[Deleted]

Is the first rule of Writing Club that we don't talk about it?

[Meds]

HA!

No, that’s fight club—which I know that that’s the joke BUT WE ACTUALLY HAVE ONE! Fight Club Logistics. Fight Club.

I’d say the first rule of Writing Club is to talk about it very much, so people can fix all of their errors xD

[emorli]

Ooh! I'm going to be the first one asking for some writing help!

If you're using brackets in a text like this:

Mr. Jim walked into the classroom with a funny walk (It seemed like he was limping)

Where would you put the end of the full stop/period? Would it be before the brackets, on the inside of the brackets like in quotation marks, or on the outside end of the brackets?

[Meds]

Yaaaay!

So brackets are some of the most picky and involved kinds of punctuation. There is tooooons of rules and examples. Typically, I don’t capitalize the first word, and I only include punctuation inside the brackets if I’ve said a full sentence; however, punctuation can also be needed at the end. Honestly though, I rarely have a full complete sentence inside. I use question marks inside a lot, but rarely do I need periods.

Example: I really love to eat cake (but only chocolate).

When I use question marks as I mentioned, it’s mostly if I’m typing from somebody’s point of view.

Example: She grinned at him when he made a joke (was that normal?), but the grin faded when he did a dance.

Hope that clears it up! Like I said there is about a thousand different rules and exceptions, but that’s what I do ^^

[emorli]

This definitely helped me a lot. Thanks!

[Deleted]

Wow, there's a fight club here? Anyway, I actually do need some help. It's on the 'and' rule.
Sometimes I see it like this -
She opened the door, and she smiled deviously.
Or like this.
She opened the door and she smiled deviously.
Is it okay to use commas before 'and'?

[Tiel]

Yes! Fight club is bomb (but kinda dead right now). You should sign a char up for a fight, it’s fun! But ANYWAY…

Ok so I’m going to try to answer this as best as I can, but in all honesty, I make mistakes with ‘and’ all the time so we’ll see, but here goes nothing:

It is correct to put a comma before ‘and’ when linking two independent clauses. An independent clause is a clause with a subject and verb. A rule of thumb is to see if the clause can stand alone, so in the example you gave—

She opened the door, and she smiled deviously.

Both parts can stand alone, like—

She opened the door. She smiled deviously.

So it is correct to put the comma before ‘and.’ However, if you hadn’t used a subject in the second clause, i.e. ‘She opened the door and smiled deviously,’ you would not use a comma.

This rule goes for any coordinating conjunction (and, but, for, or, nor, yet)
For example....

I do, yet I do not.
~or~
I do yet do not.



Hope this helps! @dogwolf12

[Deleted]

Thanks! I always thought it was never use commas before and.

[Meds]

Thanks, Tiel!
There can also be a period before “and” if it’s an Oxford comma (or serial comma). That just applies for when you’re listing stuff.

Example of a list NOT using an Oxford comma: I love soccer, rugby and football.
Oxford comma version: I love soccer, rugby, and football.

I almost always use Oxford commas

[Tiel]

Same, Meds!
Also, I think in your first paragraph you accidentally said period instead of comma

[Deleted]

Thank you all so much!

[Meds]

Lesson in: speech!

So I notice that some members are still struggling a little bit with speech, but I've also noticed that some that I've given pointers on have really taken the lessons to heart! I'm just going to give a big ol' front-load on the basics of writing speech for characters here, though!

So typically, the first thing is that every piece of speech is represented by inverted commas: " One at the beginning, and one at the end. Here at WWM, a lot of us like to make our speech bold so it's easier to discern from the rest of the text.

Next, is that each piece of typed speech is treated like its own sentence. That means that all speaking needs its own punctuation. Example: "I'm speaking, which means that when I'm done I will add a period." OR "I'm speaking," She said. "Isn't that fun?"
See how I either have a PERIOD at the end of speech, or if I want to add a hesitation or a bit of text in the middle of the character's words, I add a COMMA before the inverted commas. There should always be some sort of punctuation before the last inverted commas in a piece of speech.

AS WELL, before each piece of speech there should be punctuation.
Example: Kanga smirked as he figured out what to say next. "Something clever, I'm sure," He said with a wicked twinkle of his eyes.
An easy way to remember that each piece of speech needs punctuation before it is the NEXT pointer.

Typically, when a character starts to speak, the speech will be on a NEW line. If the same character keeps speaking after some normal text it doesn't need a new line, but if a NEW character were to speak, it would. Example:

Kanga and Manaaki were dragging their latest kill through the forest.
"This is so heavy," Kanga complained as he dug in his powerful heels and heaved. The deer's hooves were sticking out at odd angles, making everything much more difficult to work around. "Is it more heavy than normal?" Manaaki rolled his eyes and shook his head in response.
"No, Kanga." He ducked a branch before speaking again. "Maybe you've just gotten weak."

That is a perfect example to look at for a quick reference of a crash-course in how speech should look in type! Kanga's first speech had a comma at the end, because the next words I typed were in reference to what he said. Manaaki's first words had a period, because him ducking the branch had nothing to do with his words.
So, yea! A quick, basics-approach to speech

I hope that helps some people! ^^

[🌅Phoenix🌅]

That’s super handy, thanks Meds! I’ve always been a little unsure on that whole ‘new line’ rule so this really clears a few things up.