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for all you writers out there:

donjon has tons of generators. for calendars. for demographics of a country and city. for names (both fantastical and historical) of people, nations, magics, etc.

this site lets you generate/design a city, allowing you to choose size, if you want a river or coast, walls around it, a temple, a main keep, etc.

this twitter, uncharted atlas, tweets generated maps of fantasy regions every hour.

and vulgar allows you to create a language, based on linguistic and grammatical structures!!! go international phonetic alphabet!!!

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Acing pacing in your writing

I’ve read too many books and watched too many shows where pacing has ruined a good story. So, here are some of my tips for getting pacing right:

1. Don’t take too long to get to the inciting incident

Look, showing the ordinary life of your protagonist might be interesting if there’s something strange about their life, but readers want stuff to happen.

At least with genre fiction, you shouldn’t take too long to get to the action - the event that gets the story going.

If you can do it well and have readers invested from the start, you can start with the inciting incident. However, for most works I would recommend having it in the second chapter.

Your readers want to know what the story is about, not what the character thinks of his English teacher

2. Keep it moving, but don’t rush

Action is important. It drives the story and it’s interesting. You should make sure to put enough action in your work. Things should be happening.

BUT a novel is not a play or a movie or a comic. What makes reading a full-length novel so entertaining is the detail. The in-depth characterisation and description. The emotion and thought processes.

So, keep it moving, but don’t sacrifice the juicy details. Don’t skip from one action or dialogue scene to the next without taking your readers deeper into the intricacies of the story and characters.

It’s a delicate balance that can only truly be found by reading a lot and practicing.

3. Avoid a sagging middle

Your beginning is solid. Your end is exciting. But the middle is a chaotic mess that bores the reader. Trust me, it happens more than you might believe.

Sagging middle syndrome is a thing, and the only way to avoid it is to plan.

Look, I like pantsing, but planning the middle of your novel will help your pacing exponentially.

Make a rough outline of what needs to happen to get your characters to the climax. Add a few lighter/character-driven scenes where there are too many action scenes in the sequence. Remove events which are unnecessary. And make sure that everything makes sense!

This counts for second books in series as well. It should be good on its own, not just as a filler.

4. Don’t fast forward to the end

I’m looking at you, Game of Thrones.

If you’ve built up the story and set up everything for the final big bang, you have to deliver.

Keep the pacing somewhat similar to that of the rest of the story. Your readers have gotten used to it. And if they’re still reading at that point, they probably like that pace. Don’t write a relatively slow book and then have the climax be over in three pages.

I know you want the climax to be exciting. So, yes, make it a little more fast-paced than the middle. But not massively different.

5. Trust your characters

As with every aspect of creative writing, character is most important.

Is your character experiencing the scene quickly and choppily? Or are they slowing down and taking in everything?

If you stick with what your characters are feeling, you will get it right.

Look, exams have fried my brain. So, this isn’t the most well-formulated post I’ve made. But I hope that it can be helpful.

Reblog if you found these tips useful. Comment with your own pacing tips. Follow me for similar content.

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Do you have any tips for writing enemies to lovers?

Hi, love!  Thanks for your question and your patience

Enemies-to-lovers is a popular trope, but it’s often treatedcarelessly by writers – especially TV/movie writers who rush through thetransition to fit a single movie or episode arc.  There’s nothing worseyou can do in this situation than to rush your arc.  Falling in love isalready a time-consuming plotline – but transitioning from enemies, who arealready shutting each other out, to lovers?  The quicker it happens, theless believable it becomes.

I have a lot of notes on how to write enemies to lovers, sobear with me as I list them out.

Writing Enemies to Lovers: The Basic Ingredients

1. Give them some similar traits.

No matter what, two people can’t fall in love if they don’trelate on some level.  The first step to creating possible love interestsis to find where they’ll connect.  Are they a hero and a villain? Evil and good?  Night and day?  I bet they both love animals. Maybe they’re both way into politics.  Maybe they share a commonenemy.  Maybe they’re both neat freaks or a bit sassy or super gay or lovethe same music.  It can be a few important things or a bunch of superficialthings – just make sure they have something that can tie themtogether.

2. Put them on the same side of something.

When two people are mortal foes, it can be hard for them tosee each other in any other light.  Bringing in a common enemy (ananti-hero, a natural disaster, a person in power), or a common interest (amutual friend, a school play, a moral cause), can land foes on a teamtogether.  This forces them to become aware of each other’s strengths, andto consider (and worry about) each other’s weaknesses.  This is perfectfodder for an eyebrows-raised, “Hey, they don’t suck at this particularthing,” moment.

3. Get them alone.

With other people watching (especiallyfriends/coworkers/allies), little groundwork can be made for your twohate-lovers.  If you get your characters alone together, you’re given abounty of opportunities to bond them, including but not limited to: actualconversations, accidental (or faux-accidental) physical contact, the sneakymoment of checking each other out, etc. etc. etc.  People are differentwhen you get them away from their friends – less extreme, less rowdy, lessunreachable.  If you have to trap your characters in an elevator theold-fashioned way, damn it, you’re the only one who can do it.

4. Let them fight their feelings.

If these two are truly enemies, there isn’t going to be amoment of, “Oh, I like them.  Huh.  Neato.”  Oh, no. There will be internal backlash – they will beat their emotions back with abroom, and deny them to anyone who asks.  There will be extra hatefulglares, more middle fingers, and basically anything they can do to remindthemselves that they don’t like this person.  If you show thisinternal conflict, it both (a) makes the feelings seem real, organic, and (b)creates a more realistic transition from hate to love.

5. Love can sound like hate.

There’s a reason people say indifference is the trueopposite of love.  When your two enemies start to feel things foreach other, this will probably spark a lot of ranting, arguing, anddoor-slamming.  It creates a fixation – you sit there and you stew andyou tell your friends, “Remember when they did thatstupid thing?  Yeah.  Screw them.”  Your friends roll theireyes.  When will you stop talking about this person?  Just kiss themalready.

6. Sexual tension is a powerful tool.

If your characters experience sexual attraction, this is agreat way to accelerate their relationship against their will.  It’s theage-old, “My mind says no but my body says yes,” dilemma.  Yourcharacters can’t stand each other, or the image they have of each other, butthey’re attracted like magnets and can’t shake it.  This can make for somepretty hot – or pretty hilarious – scenes.

7. Give them a moment of horrified realization.

Eventually, the feelings will grow strong enough that one orboth of them will have to sit there, probably on the bathroom floor a littlebit drunk with one sock on, and realize: “I love that f*cker.”  It’llbe a scary moment for them.  It’s not that they haven’t known it – theyjust have yet to accept that it’s something to deal with, until now.  Thiscan be prompted by a dangerous situation, a shared activity, or a failed attemptat another romance – so when they really sit and think about it, theyknow.  Then it becomes a question of either “how do I get rid of this?”or “how do I pursue this?”.

8. Try their hand at flirting.

Whether one or both characters have come to accept theirfeelings, someone’s gotta start flirting.  A glancing touch across thearm; a small comment that could kind of be construed as amicable; a lingeringglance; that first peek at their enemy’s smile.  Something cute and quickand immediately followed by an existential crisis will do in a pinch. Without this water-testing, readers won’t have any image of what thisrelationship will look like – and if it can succeed.

9. Craft the perfect kiss/hug/confession.

When the time is right, create an undeniable display ofattraction to transition into a new phase of their relationship:the “welp-we-both-like-each-other” phase, which comes right beforethe “we-decided-to-(stay-platonic/start-romancin’)” phase.  The BigKiss/Confession is the most iconic climactic love scene, in which the twocharacters take a chance and become vulnerable with each other – and kiss, orsay, “I love you,” or do anything that can’t be construed in any otherway.  Want to extend the drama?  Interrupt them, or have it beone-sided, or let it turn into a fight until they decide, “Forget it, thiswas stupid.”  Readers will swoon.

10. Finish up with an awkward adjustment period.

If and when your characters do enter a relationship, makesure it’s a little tentative at the beginning, to keep it realistic.  Yourcharacters have made a huge shift in their dynamic – there will be somelingering arguments and love-hate, and maybe a bit of discomfort going publicwith their romance.  Then come the usual growing pains of a new relationshipgetting serious – figuring out how to navigate each other’s flaws, learning tobe open with their feelings, dealing with unresolved fights from before theirrelationship.  It won’t be perfect right away.  That’s the beauty of it.

I hope this helps you, love!  I adore love-haterelationships, and I hope you enjoy crafting your own enemies-to-lovers as muchas we’ll all love reading them :)  Good luck!

– Mod Joanna ♥️

Ifyou need advice on general writing or fanfiction, you should maybe ask us!

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Listen up!

You see a post like this? Where OP might hurt/kill themselves? You hit that button that I circled

Hit that.

Click Suicide or Self-harm Concern

Yes.

Fill in the rest of it, and hit submit. The "content you reported" will fill itself in

Tumblr will follow up and help them.

Warning: this is only for mobile. If anyone knows how to do this for desktop, please add it!

This could SAVE SOMEONE'S LIFE.

YOU HAVE NO EXCUSE NOT TO REBLOG THIS.

I DON'T GIVE A FUCK IF IT DOESN'T GO WITH YOUR BLOG'S THEME.

And yes, REBLOG. Liking does no shit at all. This isn't ig.

You reblog, people see it. You don't, people don't see it. This shit's that simple.

This could save someone's life. It's not a joke.

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When Stede is sitting with Mary and realizes that he loves Ed, it isn’t that he didn’t know he had feelings for him before.

It’s that people keep telling him that his feelings for Ed are a corruptive influence. That they are degrading Ed’s very identity. That they are ruining Ed and his life. That it’s not love, it’s poison.

His encounter with the twin asshole associates his effect on Ed with other things he’s “ruined” (killed).

Ed has just given up two things that symbolize his old identity. His freedom and his beard. Stede has always yearned for freedom, so watching the man who personifies freedom lose his is brutal for him to witness given that he blames himself. And as for his beard, Stede reveres Blackbeard, so believing he has taken that away from the man he loves causes him deep shame.

So yes, in the moment the twin asshole bites it, Stede buys into the idea that he has “killed” Blackbeard. That his love and presence is poison to Ed. (The very touch of you corrupts)

But that moment sitting with Mary he realizes…no. It can’t be some horrible, corrosive, destructive thing. All of these people saying I’m ruining him are wrong.

Stede realizes that what they have is just simple, pure, love. And therefore it can’t be wrong or destructive.

It’s just love. And that’s it. And it’s worth fighting for. It’s worth everything. He just has to do it right this time.

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Ed & Stede: Middle aged guys

I LOVE the fact that OFMD could have EASILY cast two young guys in the Stede and Blackbeard roles and had the draw of babe-appeal. The actors could have been like Jensen and Jared when they started supernatural or any CW show. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, and it would have been SOP Standard Operating Procedure for any Hollywood product they’re trying to foist on the masses.

Their real life counterparts for Stede and Blackbeard were late 20s and into their 30s. Stede was executed at around 32 yo and Blackbeard was killed around 40 yo.

Instead the two leads in OFMD are 48 and 50 (I believe.).

Both Taika and Rhys bring a wealth of knowledge and experience to the roles. And nothing replaces two actors that have been working together for many years and are real life besties.

I'm happy to have middle age representation as well, but that’s not the whole reason I’m all over the wonderful casting. Older people are supposed to be repulsive sexually, and these two are the opposite. I love looking at them being in love! And from what I’ve observed of social media, many other folks, of all ages are loving them too.

so here’s to another brilliant David Jenkins decision.

thanks DJ!

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You know with like zero context stede bonnet looks like the single most badass motherfucker in the sea

Like imagine you are a pirate, and you just casually hear the rumours about this rich dude who just gave up his comfortable life wife and kids to be a pirate and in less than a year he:

Killed two British officers

Had the person who killed Spanish Jackie's favorite husband in his ship

Broke Spanish Jackie nose jar

Told both black beard and his right hand man to suck eggs in hell

Somehow got Blackbeard to follow him around for months

Made Blackbeard ask for the act of grace

(broke Blackbeard's heart)

Went back to his wife and children

Faked his death and went back to sea

With no context of stede being a complete nervous wreck with anxiety and low self-esteem it's looks like this badass killed at least two people with cruelty, didn't gave two fucks about Jackie seduced Blackbeard to ruin and and faked his death so he got to fuck off away from him like a boss

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truly looking forward to skipping the angst and going right into Babby’s First Relationship

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i want this so bad oh my god

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1, 2, 3/X

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By popular request (okay, just @theorderofthetriad asked), I smugly present this abomination as its own post.

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If you call pedophilia a kink please unfollow me and never talk to me again

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Reblog if you’d be okay if your friend came out as transgender

let’s see how many transphobics we can weed out

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remember: the ‘holy’ white doves are just white rock doves, aka the common pigeon!

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When I was little my mom’s meatloaf was my favorite food. But ONLY her meatloaf. I didn’t like anyone else’s, and she told me that she would teach me how to make it when I was older. And when I was like 19? She finally taught me, but she told me never to tell anyone else and I was like weird but okay

Anyway, she was super fucking homophobic and abusive to me when I told her I was gay, so here’s the recipe

4-6 lbs of Hamburger/turkey burger

1 pk onion soup mix OR ranch mix

1 TBs ketchup

1 Tbs spicy brown mustard,

1 Tbs bbq sauce

1 Tbs steak sauce

1 egg

mix, shape into a loaf in a big pan, and bake at 350 for 2 hrs (maybe 2 and a half if you’re feeling dangerous)

You can get almost all of these ingredients at the dollar store, and have leftovers if it’s just you. The leftovers make great tacos if (taco seasoning is also like a dollar). Enjoy your revenge loaf