Writer Senses

So I'm working on a book about grim reapers and I just discovered its almost exactly like the plot of "dead like me"....I'm so mad. Ive never even seen this show before. How can I fix it without redoing all my work? ******** Dear Writer, Audre Lorde said, "There are no new ideas, there are only new ways of making them felt." She is getting at the heart of your question. This concerns tropes and how to use them. Fact is, at this point in history, no one is going to write something that has never been seen before in at least some respects. Every writer must at contend with this truth, get over it, and keep writing. My advice is that you not concern yourself with how much your original work may overlap with existing work in your medium or another medium. This happens to all of us from time to time in varying degrees. Focus on the unique things you bring to the table. Research and be inspired. Your perspectives, passions, and expertise

So I'm writing a book. This book is about Japanese people. It's a fictional book. I chose Japan as the setting because I thought it was different from my native USA. I read once that so many novels take place in the Anglophone world, it's boring. And I thought it would be interesting to explore Japan for a few other reasons that I won't go into here, but you can ask me if you like through PM. Anyway, I don't want to misrepresent Japan. I only know what little I've read about, and of course what they allow you to see through anime. I know from "educating" myself that anybody from any culture can be spunky and fiery. But it's hard to believe when you've never experienced that culture for yourself and can't vouch for the types of spunkiness allowed. Is it spunkiness filtered through misogyny? What sort? I want my one of my characters to be curious about Western things, but be ultimately patriotic and pro-Japan. I want another to be

My protagonist is a doctor who euthanizes the terminally ill and suicidal - anyone who asks for his help to come to a quick and painless end. Now I'm at a scene where he and another character are arguing their philosophies, with my intent of digging into the nuances of each position: life vs death. However, I'm so far stuck in my MC's head that I'm drawing a blank on his opposition. His argument: "Everyone suffered and died. He wondered why anyone lived these days." So what would justify a miserable existence suffering indefinitely to the mere possibility that life gets better? (Also note that this is a low-tech fantasy world, where there aren't psychologists or psychiatric drugs. So no one's going to get any professional help.) So can you answer him?: If someone wants to die, why don't you let them? Why shouldn't you help them come to a quick, painless, and humane end if their life isn't worth living anymore? If they're suffer

Writer: Is it ever OK to deliberately write poorly, as long as it serves a function of the story? I have a character who, throughout the story, has their memory altered to forget certain events, or to influence their perception. From a critic's perspective, it would seem as though the character just isn't written well; they don't react the way a normal character would given their circumstances, except that's intentional on my part. Flowers for Algernon did something similar, I remember, with its main character's speech changing over the course of the story. The MC's dialogue, in the beginning, has poor spelling/grammar, but it's OK because the story allows for this. In Flowers for Algernon it's easy to accept the poor grammar and spelling because we, as readers, know it's a part of the story up front. Is this OK? Can poor writing be excused by the plot? What about if the plot requires it to be kept secret? Can it be conveyed in other ways that so