howtofightwrite:

Writing relies on ‘where, what, how, and why’ to develop a convincing narrative. This is a rule that is an umbrella over of both the entire narrative and the individual scenes that hold the plot together. A fight scene has to fulfill those requirements and it must do so within the greater context of the narrative while supporting the underlying logic of the setting as well as remaining functional and relevant on its own. This should always be your primary goal: making sure that all your sequences work together to support a cohesive and coherent whole. Knowing how to write fights and fighting characters is an extraction and extrapolation from the skills you’re already developing as a writer. Remember, it’s not a separate skill or knowledge: it’s a supplementary one. In American popular culture, martial combat tends to be mystified and it’s ironically done in the same way whether we’re working with the military or overlaying orientalism in the martial traditions of “the mysterious East”. Many writers, ironically or not, treat combat skills like they’re magic or a superpower. Often: it just happens. The discussion of what happens in the scene is vague and often anatomically incorrect. The characters are incapable of supporting their own backstories with important details and outlooks. Violence and its effects are segregated out as unimportant because again the character’s ability to fight isn’t treated as an important part of their personality or a skill they possess but as a tacked on superpower that the author doesn’t feel they need to explain. It just is. It just happens. They’re just amazing. Don’t ask questions.

As easy as this approach is, it doesn’t work and it will handicap both your characters and your writing in the long run. Like so many other skill sets, knowledge of combat isn’t something we can actually fake in our writing. Well, we can’t by being vague about the particulars. You need research and for research, you need a place to start. So, here are five simple pieces of advice to improve both your descriptive writing of your fight scenes but also line the sequences up with your characters.

Remember: your characters are the driving force behind your narrative, if the skills they’re using do not jive with their personality then that’s like throwing a rock through the reader’s suspension of disbelief window. Everything must sync together, a character can only do what they know based on their own experiences, these actions have to be justified by the setting, the narrative, the character’s backstory, their personality, and their outlook. These tips are just as applicable to character development as they are to the single scene on the page.

1) Develop a Functional Grasp of Anatomy

Fighting is all about the body and the body is all about anatomy. You can’t write a strike without understanding where that strike can go and what it’s designed to disrupt once it gets there. A punch to the windpipe will have different results than a punch to the stomach or a punch to the kidney. But what does that mean in the long run? You can only know that if you know what the organs are necessary for in the first place. A punch to the windpipe will either disrupt or destroy someone’s ability to breathe depending on the level of force, a punch or any strike to the kidney risks death from internal bleed out over the course of three days and that’s part of the reason why strikes to the back are outlawed in most forms of professional sport fighting (Muay Thai is an exception), a punch to the stomach will knock their wind out. When working with fighting, it’s good to know the end result and since we’re working with fiction we control what happens. This is both a gift and a trap. So, ask yourself before you sit down to write a scene: how does the body work together? What makes it function? What openings can be exploited? How does your character keep from killing someone?

Anatomy combined with technique is a nice cheat sheet.

2) The Trick is in the Application

Here is where anatomy comes in and becomes important. The trick to convincing your audience is not what the character knows, but in what they can do with the techniques they have. Once you know what the technique is supposed to do when it connects, you can dial it back: is the technique I’m planning to use logical to the beliefs and motives of the character I’m writing. Characters of varying skill level may or may not know what it is that they’re doing in the moment, but the writer better know the difference. I’ve encountered too many well-trained characters who are supposed to be opposed to killing who then turn around and perform kill strikes on a target in the name of subdual. Now, this isn’t bad when it’s intentional but when it’s not? Pitch another rock through the suspension of disbelief window.

If you develop a basic grasp of anatomy you will be more capable of dissecting the strikes and techniques you uncover in books, see in movies, or read about on Wikipedia. Once you know what the technique is supposed to do, you’ll know how the character feels about using it and whether or not they fit into the philosophical and thematic elements their style supports. The writer is responsible for cause and effect in a story, a character is responsible for their actions regardless of their intentions. We have to know what happens to the characters the protagonist hurts and the more skilled the protagonist is supposed to be then the more exacting and greater detail is necessary. You want to write a character that is considered to be the best in their field? They better know exactly what they’re doing and they have to be able to convey that knowledge to the reader. The writer doesn’t need to actually possess the level of skill their character is supposed to have, but they need to support the illusion.

So, stop and consider the techniques your planning on using, what are they designed to affect? How are they applied? What parts of the body are necessary for their application? How does it affect the acting character? How does it affect the character they hurt? Does your character know what they’re talking about?

3) Detail, Detail, Detail

So, you want to prove you know what you’re talking about? Well, the devil’s in the details. Now, you have a functional grasp of how the body works together and possibly some of the techniques you want to use and it’s time to put it all together. Be specific. Be exact. Be ready to explain both the action and the consequences when necessary. For example: what are the intervening steps between someone getting their throat cut from the front: they need to be quick and be able to get close without arousing suspicion, because they are in plain view of the guard or the target, they must keep their blade somewhere where it won’t be visible and drawn quickly, possibly in a wrist sheath as opposed to on their belt. They have to slash before their target can cry out in alarm and also be able to get out of the area before anyone else notices, if escape is part of the plan. A slash across the windpipe reduces the risk of the blade being caught in muscle or bone, it’s also a big strike and more risky.  While a strike to the carotid artery requires the blade go up at an angle, it’s more exact but also difficult to hit without a fair amount of practice in a tense situation.

Remember, detail extends beyond just the action and the description, it’s also important to character. A character’s behavior is based on what they do and don’t know and their outlook. The details you provide about them and in the way they behave will key the reader to the kind of character they are and what they will be willing to do. Violence changes us, a character who participates in acts of violence regardless of what they intend will be changed by it. Their ability to fight will be reflected across every aspect of their personality, inform who they are, and plays a role in what details they notice in the world around them. For example: tensed, hunched shoulders with tightened back muscles in a standing position could be a sign that someone is depressed or angry or it could be a sign that they were in fights as a child, are worried about getting jumped, or that they’ve been to prison. Hunched shoulders and tensed back muscles are a defensive posture used to protect the vitals against assault, someone who has lived a life where they have to worry about being shanked by anyone for anything may stand like this. Whether the character notices will be predicated on their training and their past experiences. A cop will notice, someone else who has been to prison will notice, a military professional or martial artist may not.

These pieces that your character picks up are part of the greater whole of the story. They need to fit into the thematic elements of the narrative and the plot. They are important for creating a coherent picture and part of convincing your audience to trust what you’re saying. Attention to detail for a writer means more than just step-by-step walkthrough of a technique or how many pine needles a branch on the tree has. It is part of putting together a clear picture before the fight ever occurs. Too much information can slow down a fast paced sequence but it can also distract from the story at large with details that are unnecessary. The details you use need to further connect the character to the action, show the character’s personality, outlook, and training, while syncing them together with the setting.

It’s ironic to say that your character fighting, even in a technically well-written fight scene isn’t enough to prove that your character knows how to fight. The believability of your fight scenes is being set up from the very first page and in the first character introduction. I’m not even talking about foreshadowing. I’m just talking about consistency.

4) Know Your Style

So, how do you know what details are going to be important? Well, you need to know what style of combat your character is practicing. This is one of the major problems that writers face when trying to convince their audience that the character knows how to fight. They use terms like “high level martial arts” or “exceptional fighting ability”. Skill means nothing, except when combined with experience. They choose umbrella terms for a bunch of different styles like “karate”, “taekwondo”, or “kung fu”. With the exception of taekwondo, that actually doesn’t really tell the reader anything.

The World Karate Federation recognizes four distinctly different forms of karate: Shotokan, Shito-ryu, Goju-ryu, Wado-ryu. The World Union of Karate-do Federations recognizes eight different and unique styles that fall under the karate header. Those are the just styles that are officially recognized. They don’t cover the different variations between master to master or between different schools or the outlooks of those schools. There’s a big difference in the training a character receives from a traditional school and the training they receive from a non-traditional school. In America, karate is a catch all phrase by most for any Eastern martial art regardless of the country it comes from. When I was growing up it was easier to refer to the style I was practicing as “the karate school” than it was trying to explain the difference between karate and taekwondo ten different times in a single afternoon. Especially when the people I was explaining it to weren’t going to remember the next time I brought it up.

But, if you’re going to write a character that fights, you need to know the specifics of the style they practice and the social customs of the country they practice in. A karate school in America, even with a Japanese instructor trained by a master in Japan or a master trained by a master in Japan or a master who was trained by another master who was trained by a master in Japan will be different from a school based in Japan. There will simply be different values at play on the social end much less the technical end and those will also have influenced the character.

Be specific. Be exact. Know what you’re talking about to the best of your ability and you’ll be less likely to fall on your face. For example: variations of police hand to hand come from CQC, the Military uses CQB. (CQC stands for Close Quarters Combat, CQB stands for Close Quarters Battle.)

How can anyone take your character seriously if they can’t even tell the audience what style they’ve been trained in? This is an important part of their backstory, they’ll know the ins and outs of it, who trained them, and who they trained with. Even if your character has a supernatural level of aptitude, they’re going to need to learn how to refine that skill somewhere.

5) Stick to the Basics

Many writers think that to write a black belt or an extremely proficient fighter they need to show them using advanced techniques. This isn’t true.  In times of crisis, a character will turn to the techniques they are most familiar with, the ones they practice constantly, and the ones they know best. Those techniques are the first ones they learn, the basic techniques. These are the techniques that you can get an easy overview on in any practical handbook relating to the style, go to your local library or bookstore and dig through the many, many self-help books relating to each individual style. These books will provide you with pictures and diagrams and usually an overview of the style’s history, the reasoning behind its development (or why it was revived). Pretty much most of what you need to start to piece together how the style is supposed to work, with background research and other books or interviews with local schools about the style, combined with an understanding of basic anatomy, you should be able to begin the process of writing a decent fight scene.

This is the stuff you can learn in a short amount of time. If you can use these techniques convincingly and effectively in your writing, then you’re golden. You don’t need anything else. Besides, in a real world fight most of the fancy exhibition stuff will get you killed. It will get your character killed. They aren’t usually appropriate as combat techniques anyway or are the risky kill moves. The basics are the safe stuff and they are the easiest to begin working with. You can learn how to write your character using them quickly and learn how to write them well.

Here’s the thing to remember: being able to fight and being able to write a convincing fight scene are two different skill sets. There’s a point of knowledge that overlaps, but that’s it. A martial artist isn’t necessarily going to be able to write about what they do and writer martial artists have a whole subset of potential flaws that they have to work to avoid. You don’t need to be a master martial artist to write a master martial artist, all you need to know is the steps that go into the creation of a master and what the general results are.  

Breaking the pieces apart from the whole picture and puttng them back together is an important skill in any writer’s toolbox. Writing about fighting is supplementary to the skills you already posses, figure out what something is, how it was created, and what it means in the backdrop of the bigger picture and you’ll have what you need.

It’s as easy as that.

-Michi

ehnlee:

Not so long ago, my descriptions of buildings were as follows:

There was an orange-bricked house with four windows and a door.

Mind blowing, isn’t it? So descriptive! said nobody ever. Hopefully the following tips will help us all to give our imaginary buildings a little bit more love.

• Character

Buildings with character are generally defined by the era in which they were built (and how intact the features are). They’re usually early-late 17th century and either exist alongside more modern architectural creations or dominate whole streets.

When was your building constructed? Do any of your buildings have character? What features on the building defines this? Has the building stood well against the test of time?

Architectural style can also be influenced by the country the buildings stand in. If you’re world building, what is one typical building type? For example, what do most houses look like? What do most official buildings look like, and why? Depending on the world you’re writing, they may need specific features or designs.

• Condition

Don’t tell your readers that the building is shabby or pristine, show them that it is. From when the first bricks are laid on the foundations of a house, it will go through multiple renovations between tenants. Larger, more robust buildings are often forced to stand in the midst of newer industry. Questions to ask when you’re thinking about key places in your story:

1. What has changed about the structure since it was first built? This can also include notable deteriorations.
2. How does this affect the appearance and usage? For example, when we see an old, grey concrete multi-story covered in graffiti it’s not the kind of place we want to park our cars in.
3. How can it be compared to other buildings in the area? Is it in need of TLC to bring it up to standard with the rest of the street or does it outshine everything else?

If you need a building to stand out for whatever reason, then the condition can be a major factor. It can contribute to the mood of your piece.

• Location

It’s normal to default a character’s living space to the kind of space you’ve grown up in yourself. But is it suitable for what you intend to occur in and around the place?

How does the immediate location impact on the scenes you intend to write? Characters who need their business to be kept on the down low won’t find any old place to do what they need to do. Additionally, location can really affect the timing of your events.

If you’re building a whole world, then how is it connected? Think of each major structure as a dot in a huge dot-to-dot picture. How close together do the dots need to be? What connects them (roads, pathways, fields)? What is the main mode of transport? How long does it take for your characters to get from one major plot point to another? Will it still work if they were under a time limit?

• Interiors

The inside of a person’s home says a lot about them. It doesn’t just give you an insight into their furniture tastes, but also to how much money they may have, what kind of hobbies they like to indulge in and even aspects of their personality.

How organised are your characters? Do they collect things? If so, how do they display them? If not, what is their home lacking? Do they decorate to keep up with the Jones’, or do they have their own, unique style? How do they live around other people if they share a home? Not everyone has the same cleaning standards…!

Likewise with any other building, the interiors matter. You would feel a little unsure if you went into a bank and the people dispensing the cash were out in the open, taking coins and notes out of a little bag on their waist. What are the standards and codes of the services in the world you’re writing? How does it affect the buildings that offer these services?

• Research

Depending on where you live, there will be notable differences between a housing estate, a retail park and the nearest town or city. It tends to be that the further away from major industry you are, the less houses there are. People build homes to be near things they need. Is it the same in your story?

Take note of your own surroundings, of what kind of things are put where and why. Some buildings can be reflective of the people who use them. Highly religious communities might have more than one place of worship within walking distance of one another. Smaller, rural areas will rely on convenience stores and local businesses. Cities attract big name brands and competitive industry.

Look at the world around you to gain inspiration for your own worlds, or to gain an understanding of what goes where and why.

• Resources/Inspiration:

1. Fuck Yeah Abandoned Places
2. Fuck Yeah Lovely Rooms
3. Your Dream Home
4. Cool Buildings
5. Cool Interiors
6. Religious Architecture
7. Top 50 Interior Design Websites
8. Period Property UK
9. Place Name Generator
10. eplans.com

Happy constructing…!

stsathyre:

Writer’s block is when someone has no ideas. They just cannot think of what to write or cannot commit themselves to an idea because they are all not good enough.

Writer’s constipation is when you have loads and loads of ideas, but can’t dedicate them to paper. Wanna shit, but can’t shit.

Read More

writeworld:

Anonymous asked: What’s the difference between sociopathy and psychopathy?

As you may well know, WriteWorld is not a psychology blog. Luckily, we have an awesome resource in Quel who has graciously offered the following explanation of the difference between sociopathy and psychopathy. Enjoy!

——————————————-

The sociopathy/psychopathy debate is really a long and on-going one, with one side saying they’re exactly the same, other side saying it’s just ASPD and yet another side saying they’re nothing like ASPD or each other. I’ll try to give you a good, quick idea of what sociopathy and psychopathy is, and hopefully give you an idea of how they differ and how they differ from ASPD.

First off, I’ll throw some stats at you; in a maximum security prison in America, 50% – 80% of inmates qualify as meeting the diagnostic criteria for ASPD (anti-social personality disorder), whereas only 11% – 25% meet the diagnostic criteria for psychopathy. ASPD refers to broad behavioural patterns based on clinical observation, whereas psychopathy and sociopathy refers not only to specific behavioural patterns but measurable cognitive, emotional, and neuropsychological differences. In other words, psychopathy and sociopathy assesses character as well as behaviour.

The differences between sociopathy and psychopathy are the following;

1. Sociopaths are very charming. 
2. Sociopaths can be extremely manipulative and will try to con you whenever possible. 
3. Sociopaths feel that they are entitled to everything. 
4. Sociopaths will lie continuously to get what they want. They can even sometimes manipulate a lie detector. 
5. Sociopaths have no remorse, shame or guilt. 
6. Sociopaths will show love and happiness only when it serves their purpose. None of the feelings are genuine. 
7. Sociopaths have no room for love in their life. 
8. Sociopaths need to have excitement in their lives or live on the edge. 
9. Sociopaths have lack of empathy when their victims suffer pain that they have caused. 
10. Sociopaths believe that they are all mightier than thou, there is no concern on how their behaviour impacts others.
11. Sociopaths usually have a long history of juvenile delinquency as well as behaviour problems. 
12. Sociopaths will never take blame for anything they have done to anyone no matter if it is family or friend. 
13. Sociopaths have many sexual partners and tend to act out many sexual acts. 
14. Sociopaths rarely stay in one place for a long time (home/work). 
15. Sociopaths will change themselves if they know it will keep them from being found out.

1. Psychopaths use superficial charm to lure their victims.
2. Psychopaths are extremely self-centred. 
3. Psychopaths must always do something to keep themselves from boredom. 
4. Psychopaths are very deceptive and tend to lie continuously. 
5. Psychopaths show no remorse of guilt towards their victims. 
6. Psychopaths are very predatory and usually will live off other people. 
7. Psychopaths have many sexual partners in their lifetime. 
8. Psychopaths are very impulsive with their lifestyle. 
9. Psychopaths are always blaming other people for their actions. 
10. Psychopaths never have a realistic view of their lives. (king of the world or from another planet)
11. Psychopaths always want psychological gratification in sexual and criminal activities. 
12. Psychopaths tend to try suicide, rarely succeeding.

Essentially, to the casual civilian, the difference between a sociopath and a psychopath is nil. In practice, these two may very well seem the same to those not educated in the differences, but they are, in fact, there.

A sociopath essentially blends in with the crowd, with society, whereas a psychopath doesn’t. Their function is basically the same – they’re bad folks – but it’s genuinely this little fact that makes the difference between a socio- and a psychopath. They’re both narcissistic, grandiose, both have a staggering lack of empathy, remorse, guilt or shame, both are often conmen who don’t take responsibility for their actions and have a habit of blaming others, including the victim.

But the sociopath is much more proficient in “pretending to be a normal person”, often being a family man or woman, having jobs, being friends, neighbours, coworkers, students, etc. Unless they specifically target you, or you become wrapped up in their schemes, you probably wouldn’t have ever guessed.

This is not the case for the psychopath. They’re almost flamboyant in their ways, they tend to stick out like sore thumbs – think Charles Manson, Ted Bundy, Richard Ramirez, etc. Their whole life is wrapped up into this creature they are, and while they probably know what they’re doing is wrong by conventional standards, they can’t or won’t help themselves.

Psychopaths are usually predispositioned to violent acts, whether it be emotionally, psychologically or physically (hence the serial killer trope is usually – though not always – a psychopath), whereas with sociopaths it varies from person to person. Some can be very violent, very abusive, while others are not, or less so. Psychopaths are very impulsive and do things because they “felt they had to” or “couldn’t control themselves”, as Ted Bundy often attested to, while with sociopaths, again, it varies. Psychopaths are very erratic, where sociopaths are very controlled. Psychopaths, due to their impulsiveness and erratic gratification-seeking behaviours, tend to leave clues and tend to be quite sloppy, whereas sociopaths are the exact opposite of that; they’re calculated, careful, take risks they can get away with to minimise exposure or evidence.

Criminally, psychopaths are prone to opportunistic violence, just the same as sociopaths, but they take excessive risks, and honestly, impulsive is a psychopath’s keyword. A sociopath commits premeditated crimes with controllable risks, criminal opportunism, fraud, and their keyword is calculated. Another big difference between psychopaths and sociopaths is that the sociopath is able to commit to superficially normal relationship (that may be less normal under the surface, but as far as any random onlooker would be concerned, they’re normal), and can be considered a social predator, whereas the psychopath is not. They’re usually found in relationships that benefit only the psychopath, and obviously so.

I hope this helps you. (:

ADMIN NOTE: Thank you so much to Quel for this insight! Here are a few more resources on psychopathy versus sociopathy:

• This Is a Towel: Mental Disorders
• Robert Hare – Psychopath/Sociopath – The Difference (video)
• PsychCentral: Sociopathy vs. Psychopathy
• WiseGeek: What Is the Difference Between a Psychopath and a Sociopath?
• Or ask The Writers’ Helpers: Disorder Division

If you have a comment to add or a resource to suggest, feel free to message us here. And be sure to visit Quel over at edwardkenwayrps and check out this awesome masterlist of their resources! 

Cleverhelp‘s Jo Repath has expressed some concerns about this post. We have added Jo’s comments below for the benefit of all.

cleverhelp submitted:

Since writeworld has featured this site in the past and we’ve had a lot of cross-content, I feel dedicated to the content on your blog and I thought I should send you a line about a post that was concerning to me.

Your Psychopathy/Sociopathy guide is severely outdated (the information on Sociopaths is entirely pseudoscientific and based on media tropes). I know it was a submission outside of writeworld, but I thought I needed to bring it to your attention.

The idea of sociopathy is a media construct. Originally conceptualized by a very small minority of psychiatrists as an origin for psychopathy (social conditions -> behavior, rather than inherent traits), the word has been completely scrapped by both the DSRM and ICD (the international standards for medical diagnosis.) And, while psychopathy is still commonly used as a moral scale by criminal investigators who use it to judge if a person is capable of rehabilitation, it’s not a psychology matter but one related to justice. 

The terms are well-loved by authors and script writers, but they perpetuate a misunderstanding of severe mental illness and almost trivialize/sexualize them. I know the interest in these kinds of people have hiked a lot since the Sherlock, Hannibal, etc. adaptions and remakes have gained popularity in the last few years, and that’s led to a lot of people either referencing defunct science or distorting fact in order to make concepts they find attractive or interesting to write about seem true. Especially when these people are very smart and the areas they’re talking about aren’t your expertise, everything can get a bit fuzzy. 

So the presentation of the information your submitter gave you is misleading on its own, and the body of the post focuses on trait distinctions between the two terms that aren’t supported by any experts. Since I have a good amount of history in this area, and I can contact a few friends and older experts in the field, I wanted to offer to write you a full guide to the concepts, debunking the medical myths of either fake disorder and re-explaining ASPD in a non-biased way, along with explanations of the ‘Big Bad’ trope that the concepts are born from in fiction writing. I’ve been planning a post like this for awhile (debunking + trope trivia is kind of my wheelhouse) and I’d be able to supply a scholarly bibliography on the sources and potentially have a comment from a working psychiatrist and/or criminologist on their thoughts on how the mental illness is represented in writing. 

I felt bad just sending in a criticism, so it only felt right to offer a resource in exchange. I love the site and I hope that you’re doing well, 

– Jo Repath

And below you will find Quel’s brief rebuttal:

I mean, she’s not wrong – the idea of sociopathy and psychopathy is, first and foremost, a pop culture thing, or rather, something that pop culture latched onto to explain something they didn’t understand, something so deeply disturbed that they in order to explain it succinctly, they needed to name it somehow.

It’s generally why I prefer, with my own characters, to address the individual traits that make up sociopathy or psychopathy, rather than just label any character as these things. It may not be as easy, but it’s generally what’s right.

However, in the context of the post, I addressed the question as it was asked; the differences – whether true science or pop culture.

Quel 

Thank you to both Jo Repath and to Quel for your thoughts on this subject. We truly appreciate your input. We know this exchange will help inform writers of the complicated nature of psychology and act as a warning for those who try to over-simplify these disorders. Thank you. 

anotherfallingworld:

Because there’s no way I’m the only one who needed this.

Compound Possessives

When you are showing possession with compounded nouns, the apostrophe’s placement depends on whether the nouns are acting separately or together.

• Miguel’s and Cecilia’s new cars are in the parking lot. 
  This means that each of them has at least one new car and that their ownership is a separate matter.
• Miguel and Cecilia’s new cars are in the parking lot.
  This construction tells us that Miguel and Cecilia share ownership of these cars. The possessive (indicated by ’s) belongs to the entire phrase, not just to Cecilia.

Another example:

• Lewis and Clark’s expectations were very much the same. 
  This construction tells us that the two gentlemen held one set of expectations in common.
• Lewis’s and Clark’s expectations were altogether different.
  This means that the expectations of the two men were different (rather obvious from what the sentence says, too). We signify separate ownership by writing both of the compounded proper nouns in the possessive form.

When one of the possessors in a compound possessive is a personal pronoun, we have to put both possessors in the possessive form or we end up with something silly: “Bill and my car had to be towed last night.”

• Bill’s and my car had to be towed last night.
• Giorgio’s and her father was not around much during their childhood.

If this second sentence seems unsatisfactory, you might have to do some rewriting so you end up talking about their father, instead, or revert to using both names: “Giorgio and Isabel’s father wasn’t around much … .” (and then “Giorgio” will lose the apostrophe +s).

Possessives & Compound Constructions

This is different from the problem we confront when creating possessives with compound constructions such as daughter-in-law and friend of mine. Generally, the apostrophe -s is simply added to the end of the compound structure: my daughter-in-law’s car, a friend of mine’s car. If this sounds clumsy, use the “of” construction to avoid the apostrophe: the car of a friend of mine, etc. This is especially useful in pluralized compound structures: the daughters-in-law’s car sounds quite strange, but it’s correct. We’re better off with the car of the daughters-in-law. See the section on Compound Nouns and Modifiers for additional help.

Possessives with Appositive Forms

When a possessive noun is followed by an appositive, a word that renames or explains that noun, the apostrophe +s is added to the appositive, not to the noun. When this happens, we drop the comma that would normally follow the appositive phrase.

• We must get Joe Bidwell, the family attorney’s signature.

Create such constructions with caution, however, as you might end up writing something that looks silly:

• I wrecked my best friend, Bob’s car.

You’re frequently better off using the “of-genitive” form, writing something like “We must get the signature of Joe Bidwell, the family attorney” and “I wrecked the car of my best friend, Bob.”

Double Possessives

Do we say “a friend of my uncle” or “a friend of my uncle’s”? In spite of the fact that “a friend of my uncle’s” seems to overwork the notion of possessiveness, that is usually what we say and write. The double possessive construction is sometimes called the “post-genitive” or “of followed by a possessive case or an absolute possessive pronoun” (from the Oxford English Dictionary, which likes to show off). The double possessive has been around since the fifteenth century, and is widely accepted. It’s extremely helpful, for instance, in distinguishing between “a picture of my father” (in which we see the old man) and “a picture of my father’s” (which he owns). Native speakers will note how much more natural it is to say “He’s a fan of hers” than “he’s a fan of her.”

Generally, what follows the “of” in a double possessive will be definite and human, not otherwise, so we would say “a friend of my uncle’s” but not ”a friend of the museum’s [museum, instead].” What precedes the “of” is usually indefinite (a friend, not the best friend), unless it’s preceded by the demonstratives this or that, as in “this friend of my father’s.”