Kuroshitsuji Writing Guide: 

Chapter 5

Necessary things to use when writing a story:

Paragraphs:

This may seem like an obvious to most people reading this, but some Kuroshitsuji fanfic authors do not appear to feel that paragraphs are a necessity. I cannot pose a possible explanation as to why though. Laziness or poor teaching are possibilities.

Some authors do a variant of no paragraphs. They do use paragraphs, but they are few and far between and are used in the wrong places.

Example of a passage of text without paragraphs:

Ciel was woken by the sound of his alarm clock. "Fucking shit," he cursed colourfully and pulled himself out of bed unwillingly. He put on his my chemical black bullet brides t shirt on along with black doctor martins and went downstairs. His aunt patted him on the head. "Remember you're starting high school today. Have fun." She downed a pint of lager and fell asleep on the table. Ciel shrugged and walked to school. In his first class was the most fit boy ever. Ciel thought his eyes were pure smexiness. After class he tapped the boy on the shoulder. "Hey can I come over to your house after school so we can bang?" The fit boy smirked "Yeah, sure. I'm Sebastian by the way and I just fell in love with you." Ciel blushed. "I did too." "Do you think we should elope then?" Sebastian asked. "Sounds legit," Ciel shrugged.

Besides the lack of paragraphs there were quite a few things wrong there, but paragraphing will be the focus for now.

The main purpose of paragraphs is that they make a passage of text readable and can be used to emphasise certain lines if needed.

For those that do not think they are necessary for a good story:

· Open a real book (The dictionary does not count)

· Do you see all the text bunched up on every page?

If you did I want to know what book it was.

When to start a new paragraph:

· When there is a new subject or topic.

· When there is a new place.

· When there is a different person speaking.

The earlier example therefore changes to this:

Ciel was woken by the sound of his alarm clock.

"Fucking shit," he cursed colourfully and pulled himself out of bed unwillingly.

He put on his my chemical black bullet brides t shirt on along with black doctor martins and went downstairs.

His aunt patted him on the head. "Remember you're starting high school today. Have fun."

She downed a pint of lager and fell asleep on the table. Ciel shrugged and walked to school.

In his first class was the most fit boy ever. Ciel thought his eyes were pure smexiness.

After class he tapped the boy on the shoulder.

"Hey can I come over to your house after school so we can bang?"

The fit boy smirked "Yeah, sure. I'm Sebastian by the way and I just fell in love with you."

Ciel blushed. "I did too."

"Do you think we should elope then?" Sebastian asked.

"Sounds legit," Ciel shrugged.

It is still a very bad piece of work, however the addition of paragraphs make it more legible.

Getting character names spelt right:

It is understandable there are spelling variations for some characters as they romanise differently depending on interpretation. Eg. Bard/Bardroy and Midford/Middleford

However a lot of the names have unmistakable singular spellings:

· Sebastian is spelt Sebastian. It is not spelt Senastion, Sebation or Sedation.

· Ciel is Ciel not Ceil.

· Michaelis is spelt Michaelis and not Michealis.

I would like to say I was joking about this, but I am sadly not. Getting the names of main characters spelt right should be easy.

Also, check your work, summary and title for obvious typos like that. It makes you look like you watched or read a completely different series to everyone else.

Chapter length:

A chapter can have a varying wordcount. That said it should not really be below 1000 words. I aim for around 2000 myself.

A lot of Kuroshitsuji fanfics on Wattpad have chapters that are about 200 words or lower. The example paragraph I gave was 152 words. This short length means a story either progresses extremely fast or nothing really happens for a number of chapters.

The example given was a very fast progression. For more details on why it was poor characterisation, see Chapter 3.

Another reason for it being very short and fast paced did not contain any description besides Ciel's outfit and Sebastian's 'smexiness'. There was not any description of his house, school, the other students, what his first lesson actually or what Sebastian actually looked like. It still is a very bad chapter, but it would be improved with some description so the reader has a better impression of the events and it would make it a little longer.

The most obvious thing about the example is that is extremely cliché and this will be addressed in a future chapter as Kuroshitsuji clichés deserve their own chapter.

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A/N: I would like to add informally that nothing about the chapter was exaggerated. You can find Sebaciel fanfictions on here written in that style with that fast development.