Reading On Writing

So I guess I agree with King et. al. on the sparing use of adverbs. But his crusade against the passive voice I find ideologically limiting. What if I want a character to sound like a stuffed shirt? What if someone is afraid and uncertain in their head and you want the passive voice to help reflect their indecision? I agree that it's got more limited uses than the active voice, but it's not like it should be done away with.

I find I have missed Steven King's kookiness. I had forgotten how charmed I am by his writing style in the . . . holy carp, son of a fish, twenty years since I last read anything of his. I will have to pick up some of his stuff when I'm done writing this.

In other news, not reading anything in the Marvel fandom today and yesterday has made it easier to get things written. I'm not fighting other people's versions of characters, I'm figuring out my own. Maybe I should be on an input/output diet, where I don't try to consume anything in a particular fandom on days when I'm writing in that fandom.

I also got a recommendation from a co-worker, who saw me reading. She says that if I like Steven King's non-horror then I should try GK Chesterton. I'll put him on the list. He's old school enough that some of his work is probably on Project Gutenberg by now.