Okay, so I have some spare time on my hands today and i decided to pop into nairaland and see what has been going on. I came across what promised to be an interesting story and i settled down to my oatmeal breakfast and began reading.

The first few lines shocked me to bits.

It described the raping of a helpless little girl child by an obnoxious fellow.

Now, sure, things like this happen in our wicked world and all that but the thing that bothered me is that i honestly didn't see the correlation of that first shocking act to the rest of the story. Please I am not trying to criticize or bring down the writer, far from it and due apologies if feelings are hurt but i decided to say something about ti because I noticed it is a kind of trend on this forum by certain writers and i also wanted to know if i was the only one that feels disgusted and turned off when i see stuff like that at the beginning of a story.

Its not the first time I have been disgusted by stuff like that on this section;

1. There was a story with a very nice first paragraph i was reading. Things were going well for the little girl and her family. Suddenly some assassins came to the house ,killed the father then went on to rape and kill the mother and siblings in front of the little child's eyes, then went on to rape her and turn her into an assassin.

Haba. That was too much in my opinion. Why all the evil, as if stretching your mind as far as it can go? what did the character do to you?

2. Another case of a man and his lady who were strolling down the street then were attacked by assassins(again), the woman was raped and killed in front of the man and the baby in her womb stabbed severally( ), and the man made to watch and then they came for him and he begged and then was gutted like a fish and killed. All because they wanted to steal from them! Shuo!

3. Another child case where the child was gleefully raped by the father, in fact, many stories where the child is gleefully raped by the father and the mother is dead or doesnt care and the child wished someone would come and help but nobody came etc etc etc.

What's with all the extended violence? Or am I reading too much into it? And the strange thing is that for stories that i manage to push past my disgust and continue reading, from the next chapter onwards the story continues as if nothing happened in the first paragraph at all. Why start a love story with so much violence, where is the moral in that? Even an action story doesnt necessarily have to start with someone shocking the hell out of the audience.

There are certain literary bodies that will turn down a story simply for heavy content like that.
There are certain rules that follow(even though strictly speaking there are no rules when it comes to storytelling---stay with me here, I'm ranting )

1. You can't kill babies: or even if you do, make it a one-liner. No one want a description of how the baby was stabbed severally for God's sake. its a baby!

2. you can't kill kids. you even see it in hollywood movies and novels, most times the kids survive and even when they dont the director doesnt create a scene for it. one minute the kid is backing away from the assailant, the next minute the body of the kid is seen(usually face down). they know why the do it like that. Its a huge turn off focusing on how the killer gutted a kid, makes one wonder if the writer is ok emotionally.

3. Same rules above go for pregnant women, no matter how evil they have been.

4. literaly anything can happen for men, but still, why subject the man to inhumane torture and raping and hacking and taunting and killing and pissing on his body( i read this one somewhere too) only because you want to steal his car come on!



Is the idea to garner readers?
Or am I too sheltered and such stuff is now commonplace?

Even if it is true that as writers we are allowed to let our imagination run wild but i think if you want to achieve international acclaim some storytellers need to tone it down a little on the disgust and violence. (unless you want to go the way of Stephen king and even he toned it down after a while)

My spare time is up

p.s This writeup was done in a hurry so pls pardon mistakes and such.
Also pls pls pls no beef intended on writers, just had to express my feelings somehow.




cc larrysun
ishilove
standd
dyoungstar
senbonzakurakageyoshi
divepen1
d9ty7
etc

So with all your talk, all you really needed was to make frontpage?

youngpol:
So with all your talk, all you really needed was to make frontpage?

And with this comment of yours, you want to be the first to comment in case this makes frontpage abi?
If you have nothing to add, why not swerve?

D9ty7:

And with this comment of yours, you want to be the first to comment in case this makes frontpage abi?
If you have nothing to add, why not swerve?

Ok someone just took the bait that was not even meant for them.. You sure you wanna do this bro?

youngpol:
Ok someone just took the bait that was not even meant for them.. You sure you wanna do this bro?

Lolz.... I am way above that.
This thread is meant to serve a purpose and the purpose must be served

You should read those by the yet unknown writers, sir Roy. The evil's in scrolling down till you find a story scribbled by a popular writer.

Funny peeps

You're right Royver. Babies and pregnant women are to be respected

*enters thread*
*reads comments*
*spreads mat*.

ThR0NeKiD:
You should read those by the yet unknown writers, sir Roy. The evil's in scrolling down till you find a story scribbled by a popular writer.

But that's what I do, honestly.
The first thing that draws me to a story is the title, if its something that catches my interest then I dive in, only to see people eating murdered babies after raping their 5yr old daughters. (I'm exaggerating a little but u get the point).
It turns me off completely.

I don't blieve so much in this

Royver:

But that's what I do, honestly.
The first thing that draws me to a story is the title, if its something that catches my interest then I dive in, only to see people eating murdered babies after raping their 5yr old daughters. (I'm exaggerating a little but u get the point).
It turns me off completely.

Mmm, attimes, sir, the writer might not be able to hatch up a catchy title. Just like me, you could check my stories out. I would be pleased to have you there.

Skillfullulu:
I don't blieve so much in this

Okay. God bless!

These are pointers for WRITERS generally. Expensive one too.


I understand him completely.

Just like ravishing an action movie with too many actions ,

Another is over feeding a romantic movie with too much of romance scenes. I'd be like 'when do the characters get to live a normal life '?

ThR0NeKiD:

Okay. God bless!

yeah God bless

Hmmmmn.
I think these are pointers for those who have eyes to see.
Thanks Royver, you should do more of this in your spare time.

D9ty7:

And with this comment of yours, you want to be the first to comment in case this makes frontpage abi?
If you have nothing to add, why not swerve?

And remain swerved?

Royver, you are very right. However, the world is an evil place and art imitates/reflects life. Kids get raped every day, wives get murdered by husbands and vice versa, robbers rape wives in front of their families etc. That is the cold, unfortunate fact about the kind of world we live in.

However, the mode of presentation of these evils is what makes us writers and not barbarians. The deficiencies in the presentation is what you have pointed out and hopefully will be corrected.

youngpol:
So with all your talk, all you really needed was to make frontpage?

This is not a polite statement. Besides, Nairaland frontpage is not the apex of publicity, so kindly stop assuming that every thread is created with the sole aim of gracing the frontpage.

If you had understood what the OP has written, you would have seen that he gave an honest opinion about what he saw to be wrong.

@Royver, there is no doubt that a great deal of errors can be blamed on our 'Thriller' writers; a large part of their gory descriptions is not that thrilling. Such crude descriptions are parts of the fulcrum of our literary disequilibrium. And the sex scene in every chapter makes me want to set fire to every bed in the world.

ThR0NeKiD:

Mmm, attimes, sir, the writer might not be able to hatch up a catchy title. Just like me, you could check my stories out. I would be pleased to have you there.

Sure, send me the link.

Ishilove:

And remain swerved?

When will you pay me for this, huh?
We had an agreement yesterday and you came and gave a paltry 'ok' on the thread..who does that?


Don't dare use your alternate moniker, antispambot to ban me, don't you dare

Royver:

Sure, send me the link.

Here it is, sir-

https://www.nairaland.com/2193676/strings-webs

Expecting you, there!

LarrySun:
This is not a polite statement. Besides, Nairaland frontpage is not the apex of publicity, so kindly stop assuming that every thread is created with the sole aim of gracing the frontpage.

If you had understood what the OP has written, you would have seen that he gave an honest opinion about what he saw to be wrong.

@Royver, there is no doubt that a great deal of errors can be blamed on our 'Thriller' writers; a large part of their gory descriptions is not that thrilling. Such crude descriptions are parts the fulcrum of our literary disequilibrium. And the sex scene in every chapter makes me want to set fire to every bed in the world.

Divepen1 please come and copy this post. It would really help in that your thread of how to write.

Royver thanks for this.

Must a topic make front page before it pass it message? If this doesnt intrest you, then i guess go to were intrest you

youngpol:
So with all your talk, all you really needed was to make frontpage?

Dunce. Sorry for appearing on your mention. But it really worths it.

Ishilove:
Royver, you are very right. However, the world is an evil place and art imitates/reflects life. Kids get raped every day, wives get murdered by husbands and vice versa, robbers rape wives in front of their families etc. That is the cold, unfortunate fact about the kind of world we live in.

However, the mode of presentation of these evils is what makes us writers and not barbarians. The deficiencies in the presentation is what you have pointed out and hopefully will be corrected.

hi, i dnt really knw u bt hav heard alot abt u dat makes me run weneva i see ur posts. But i tell u, reading ur comment for d first tym today got me tinkin if u were really dat bad.

Royver, this world is turning to something else and i tell u, u wont believe some terrible things dat happen around us evrytym.

youngpol:
So with all your talk, all you really needed was to make frontpage?

Unfortunately Roy is not a "FrontPage freak" like some lots ( they know them selfs) . Some times it pays to be a silent reader, so u don't come across like a ret.ard.d fellow

stuff46:
Divepen1 please come and copy this post. It would really help in that your thread of how to write.

Royver thanks for this.

I think you are absolutely correct, i already copyed it to my own saved page

Somebody tell me, am I guilty of this?

frank317:
Somebody tell me, am I guilty of this?

When it comes to writing gory stuff, you have no equal. But you describe intelligently. You're a Stephen King incarnate...even though the popular writer is still very much alive.

Royver:
Okay, so I have some spare time on my hands today and i decided to pop into nairaland and see what has been going on. I came across what promised to be an interesting story and i settled down to my oatmeal breakfast and began reading.

The first few lines shocked me to bits.

It described the raping of a helpless little girl child by an obnoxious fellow.

Now, sure, things like this happen in our wicked world and all that but the thing that bothered me is that i honestly didn't see the correlation of that first shocking act to the rest of the story. Please I am not trying to criticize or bring down the writer, far from it and due apologies if feelings are hurt but i decided to say something about ti because I noticed it is a kind of trend on this forum by certain writers and i also wanted to know if i was the only one that feels disgusted and turned off when i see stuff like that at the beginning of a story.

Its not the first time I have been disgusted by stuff like that on this section;

1. There was a story with a very nice first paragraph i was reading. Things were going well for the little girl and her family. Suddenly some assassins came to the house ,killed the father then went on to rape and kill the mother and siblings in front of the little child's eyes, then went on to rape her and turn her into an assassin.

Haba. That was too much in my opinion. Why all the evil, as if stretching your mind as far as it can go? what did the character do to you?

2. Another case of a man and his lady who were strolling down the street then were attacked by assassins(again), the woman was raped and killed in front of the man and the baby in her womb stabbed severally( ), and the man made to watch and then they came for him and he begged and then was gutted like a fish and killed. All because they wanted to steal from them! Shuo!

3. Another child case where the child was gleefully raped by the father, in fact, many stories where the child is gleefully raped by the father and the mother is dead or doesnt care and the child wished someone would come and help but nobody came etc etc etc.

What's with all the extended violence? Or am I reading too much into it? And the strange thing is that for stories that i manage to push past my disgust and continue reading, from the next chapter onwards the story continues as if nothing happened in the first paragraph at all. Why start a love story with so much violence, where is the moral in that? Even an action story doesnt necessarily have to start with someone shocking the hell out of the audience.

There are certain literary bodies that will turn down a story simply for heavy content like that.
There are certain rules that follow(even though strictly speaking there are no rules when it comes to storytelling---stay with me here, I'm ranting )

1. You can't kill babies: or even if you do, make it a one-liner. No one want a description of how the baby was stabbed severally for God's sake. its a baby!

2. you can't kill kids. you even see it in hollywood movies and novels, most times the kids survive and even when they dont the director doesnt create a scene for it. one minute the kid is backing away from the assailant, the next minute the body of the kid is seen(usually face down). they know why the do it like that. Its a huge turn off focusing on how the killer gutted a kid, makes one wonder if the writer is ok emotionally.

3. Same rules above go for pregnant women, no matter how evil they have been.

4. literaly anything can happen for men, but still, why subject the man to inhumane torture and raping and hacking and taunting and killing and pissing on his body( i read this one somewhere too) only because you want to steal his car come on!



Is the idea to garner readers?
Or am I too sheltered and such stuff is now commonplace?

Even if it is true that as writers we are allowed to let our imagination run wild but i think if you want to achieve international acclaim some storytellers need to tone it down a little on the disgust and violence. (unless you want to go the way of Stephen king and even he toned it down after a while)

My spare time is up

p.s This writeup was done in a hurry so pls pardon mistakes and such.
Also pls pls pls no beef intended on writers, just had to express my feelings somehow.




cc larrysun
ishilove
standd
dyoungstar
senbonzakurakageyoshi
divepen1
d9ty7
etc

lolz...rovyer,your observations were right but I would assume the writers never knew the rules to writing or never thought whatever they started with matters though they love writing.....

standd:


When will you pay me for this, huh?
We had an agreement yesterday and you came and gave a paltry 'ok' on the thread..who does that?


Don't dare use your alternate moniker, antispambot to ban me, don't you dare

I was half-asleep, that's why. I am allowed to sleep, am i not?