Making Story Word Clouds

[PennyThompson]

Spot the valley girl, huh?!

HOW DARE YOU

 

[YmaOHyd]

Spot the valley girl, huh?!

She's not technically a valley girl; she's from Riverside.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I've made word clouds before and I don't recall that I changed anything. What are y'all going to do with the information?

I do another edit pass to change the repetitive words, especially in the same or adjacent paragraphs. I'm also conscious now of my most common word tics, and find myself changing the worst offenders as I write. My style over time has become richer, I think, with more variation in the language.

I spend most of my edit time on the flow of the prose, because the flavour is already there in the words.

Edit: during writing, I regularly change font, font size and font colour - to make the text look different. I find errors jump off the page - I can scan quickly, don't need to read every word.

 

[kitmarlowe]

I do another edit pass to change the repetitive words, especially in the same or adjacent paragraphs. I'm also conscious now of my most common word tics, and find myself changing the worst offenders as I write. My style over time has become richer, I think, with more variation in the language.

I spend most of my edit time on the flow of the prose, because the flavour is already there in the words.

It's such a good feeling when you start to recognise your own bad habits and can mitigate them in the writing rather than the editing. I know that I always need to take a bit of a running start into everything I write and that the first two paragraphs are pretty much always disposable. Most of the time I don't even look at them, I wait until I hit a natural break in my writing (like the end of a Pomodoro) and just cut them from the manuscript immediately.

 

[NotWise]

Gave it a try with the story I have in for editing (original version, not edited version).



"Back" was also prominent, and I removed it from the list. I think it's there because it can be used in so many ways: his/her back, go back, turn back, back up, back down. On and on. I also removed the characters' names, but apparently missed the possessive Nita's.

"Around" surprises me a little, but I don't see anything I need to change. I was a little curious about "mother" because it comes up only in the context of "Mother Superior", but the cloud gave "mother" more weight than "superior." It must see something I don't.

 

[kitmarlowe]

Gave it a try with the story I have in for editing (original version, not edited version).

View attachment 2520391

"Back" was also prominent, and I removed it from the list. I think it's there because it can be used in so many ways: his/her back, go back, turn back, back up, back down. On and on. I also removed the characters' names, but apparently missed the possessive Nita's.

"Around" surprises me a little, but I don't see anything I need to change. I was a little curious about "mother" because it comes up only in the context of "Mother Superior", but the cloud gave "mother" more weight than "superior." It must see something I don't.

Welcome to Back Club!

 

[PennyThompson]

Gave it a try with the story I have in for editing (original version, not edited version).

View attachment 2520391

"Back" was also prominent, and I removed it from the list. I think it's there because it can be used in so many ways: his/her back, go back, turn back, back up, back down. On and on. I also removed the characters' names, but apparently missed the possessive Nita's.

"Around" surprises me a little, but I don't see anything I need to change. I was a little curious about "mother" because it comes up only in the context of "Mother Superior", but the cloud gave "mother" more weight than "superior." It must see something I don't.

So this is either a I/T story which is not for me...

Or it's a story about horny nuns doing a major building renovation to their nunnery, which is something I didn't know I wanted but I do now

 

[Erozetta]

I just want to say that I love how "back" "hand" and "Richie" are the main words for "Lyin' Eyes" because I know many readers would love to backhand Richie.

 

[NotWise]

So this is either a I/T story which is not for me...

Or it's a story about horny nuns doing a major building renovation to their nunnery, which might be for me

It is almost both, so you are welcome to be confused. It's a (very profane) story about a man who breaks into a convent school run by a Roman Catholic-like sex cult to rescue his sister. Escape from Cimarron is a swashbuckling adventure as much as it is erotica. The pending edits are intended to even things out a little.

 

[PennyThompson]

It is almost both, so you are welcome to be confused. It's a (very profane) story about a man who breaks into a convent school run by a Roman Catholic-like sex cult to rescue his sister. Escape from Cimarron is a swashbuckling adventure as much as it is erotica. The pending edits are intended to even things out a little.

Sounds a little too dark for me

But now I'm imagining a convent renovation story... Some newly minted Sisters knocking down walls, getting sweaty, speckled with paint and drywall dust, finding old dirty messages and love notes scrawled in secret places between the walls by Sisters past... Needing to use the communal showers after a hard day's work...

 

[NotWise]

Sounds a little too dark for me

Nothing in that story is to be taken seriously. Most everything about it is over the top. Thinking back to the "favorite characters" thread, Sister Clarice is one of my all-time favorites, and she delivers this explanation when Steve (Cox, who has a big cock) finds her praying after she's given him head:

“Asking for forgiveness?” Steve sat up, and Clarice crossed herself.

“Giving thanks for this chance to serve.” She smiled up at the confusion on Steve’s face. “We take an oath of service. Father Thomas teaches us that Christ is in all men. By serving your pleasures, I serve His.

“Seems kinda cult-y,” Steve said. “I don’t think our stepdad knew about that when he sent Nita here.”

“It’s not in the brochure.”

Clarice also very humbly confesses to having a "blessed booty."

 

[SinclairGroupLLP]

So this is the wordcloud from the On the Job story that I just finished, with the indomitable Penny Thompson's help.

Oddly enough, if I used a word once, I used it at least three times, so I nuked all the three times words.

Still pretty interesting. This is a cool tool!

 

[YmaOHyd]

#BackClub

 

[PennyThompson]

#BackClub

Literally everyone who has posted a cloud in this thread is #BackClub BUT ME

 

[YmaOHyd]

Literally everyone who has posted a cloud in this thread is #BackClub BUT ME

BUT WAIT:

 

[PennyThompson]

Dare I suggest you've found your next story?

4,000-word stroker about a gym bunny's Core Workout day incoming

 

[YmaOHyd]

4,000-word stroker about a gym bunny's Core Workout day incoming

6,000 and I'll beta-read it for you.

 

[Nynah]

I love this idea! Here's mine for all three chapters of my "The Model Roommate" series (with names removed):



I feel like I've committed the cardinal sin of having my most used word be "just". But hey, at least I'm also in #BackClub (second place).

 

[YmaOHyd]

#BackClub expands at an alarming rate.

 

[PennyThompson]

I love this idea! Here's mine for all three chapters of my "The Model Roommate" series (with names removed):

View attachment 2520532

I feel like I've committed the cardinal sin of having my most used word be "just". But hey, at least I'm also in #BackClub (second place).

I haven't read the story, but I feel like I'm getting a sweet sense of longing and desire from this...

Felt, moments, hands, time, want, anything

 

[YmaOHyd]

I admit, I'm enjoying the "I'm dick, help!" cluster around 4:00. And "Got good head?" at 10:00.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I love this idea! Here's mine for all three chapters of my "The Model Roommate" series (with names removed):

View attachment 2520532

I feel like I've committed the cardinal sin of having my most used word be "just". But hey, at least I'm also in #BackClub (second place).

From the word clouds provided, "just" is chronically over-used by most of us. It's one of the words on my "find and replace" edit run, that's for sure.

 

[CyranoJ]

I'm not sure a word turning up frequently means it's being "over-used." Some relatively "invisible" words should turn up frequently in a story of any length. It hadn't occurred to me that "back" is one of those words, but it makes sense given the number of different contexts it's useful for. "Like" and "just" might... well, might just be similar cases. You could hunt up all manner of synonyms to replace them with, or try to eliminate them, but trying to do so might prove more distracting than anything else.

 

[ElectricBlue]

You could hunt up all manner of synonyms to replace them with, or try to eliminate them, but trying to do so might prove more distracting than anything else.

I've found with my word tic list (which changes over time as I cure myself of too much repetition), that generally speaking, I don't need to change the word at all, because I didn't need it in the first place. After a while, you recondition yourself, and spot the overuse as you write.