PJO & HP for Dummies

Writing Tips ✍️

Here's some writing tips 😃👍

Tip #1: Paragraphs

Have you ever clicked on a book and all you could see was this:

ESMERELDA HAD BEEN IN THE American foster care system since day one. She remembered one of the workers informing her that her mother, a woman whose name had escaped them, had walked into the building with a small bundle in her arms (Esmerelda) and insisted that the staffers took her in. She had only given them the baby's first name and birth (September 8) and was gone before the files could be completed. That was it. Nothing else. No 'tell her that I love her' or 'one day I'll see her again'. Her mother had just dumped her in the building and walked out without another word. Babies had the highest chance of being adopted from foster care since they were what every couple looked for. Esmerelda, however, was different. Weird things always happened around baby Esmerelda which would lead her foster parents into giving her up, thus rendering her to another cycle of fostering. Foster parent to foster parent, she was always been returned with weird reasons such as 'she made the lightbulbs break with her wailing!' or 'she somehow set our curtains on fire!'. The workers thought they were high or something, but complied nonetheless and sent Esmerelda to another pair. The first foster parents that she could actually remember were Lucy and Melvin Moss. She was five when she was sent to them, and they were very pleasant towards her. She was pretty sure they were even contemplating on officially adopting her but she managed to screw everything up as always.

It's just one big block of text that goes on, and on, and on... Ugh 🤮 Not really flattering, is it?

Nobody wants to read a book where every chapter is just one huge chunk of text or multiple huge chunk of texts, it's painful for the eyes to handle so please try to space it out. Paragraphs are your friend, use them!

ESMERELDA HAD BEEN IN THE American foster care system since day one. She remembered one of the workers informing her that her mother, a woman whose name had escaped them, had walked into the building with a small bundle in her arms (Esmerelda) and insisted that the staffers took her in. She had only given them the baby's first name and birth (September 8) and was gone before the files could be completed. That was it. Nothing else. No 'tell her that I love her' or 'one day I'll see her again'. Her mother had just dumped her in the building and walked out without another word.

Babies had the highest chance of being adopted from foster care since they were what every couple looked for. Esmerelda, however, was different. Weird things always happened around baby Esmerelda which would lead her foster parents into giving her up, thus rendering her to another cycle of fostering. Foster parent to foster parent, she was always been returned with weird reasons such as 'she made the lightbulbs break with her wailing!' or 'she somehow set our curtains on fire!'. The workers thought they were high or something, but complied nonetheless and sent Esmerelda to another pair.

The first foster parents that she could actually remember were Lucy and Melvin Moss. She was five when she was sent to them, and they were very pleasant towards her. She was pretty sure they were even contemplating on officially adopting her but she managed to screw everything up as always.

That's easier to read! Each paragraph pertains to a specific subject, they're all thematic. The first one's about how Essie got into the foster care system. The second is about her life as a foster kid. The third is about one of her many foster parents. It's easier to understand, especially since they're not all bunched up together in one paragraph.

Tip #2: Spacing out your dialogue

I don't know WHY people do this or why they thought it was a good idea, but I sometimes see people write their dialogue like this: