avsanderoth

[avsanderoth]

What reasonable person would have an issue with this

"i hate spamlikers" "spamlikers dni!" "spamlikers are so annoying" "spamliking = blocked" SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UUUPPP MAYBE I JUST LIKE YOUR POSTS

[avsanderoth]

Writing Techniques #7c: Worldbuilding Groups

Hello again! This third installment in the worldbuilding mini-series is dedicated to a fairly niche but surprisingly prevalent topic - the groups, orders and organizations your story features. I’ll discuss what elements I think matter most, how I like to portray them in a consistently intriguing fashion, and some other miscellaneous things I believe are good to keep in mind. Hope you enjoy!

What makes a coalition

When I say “group”, I refer to any kind of gathering of people that has a clear cultural, disciplinary and/or existential definition. Secret orders, cults and religions, companies and guilds - regardless of the sort, a group will have certain aspects that define them and contrast them to their surroundings. 

One thing I will always recommend is to start by figuring out the ultimate ideal or goal for your group towards the start of the worldbuilding process, as it ends up being an easy, definitive foundation to build off of. That goal might be profiting, or achieving infamy, or proselytizing for a deity, or carrying out some grand scheme - as you lay out these goals for yourself, it becomes much easier to imagine how a group dedicated to it would be shaped, and what their history might be. 

There are a lot of free liberties to be taken when it comes to designing your group, so I don’t want to be especially “strict” with how the rest of the process should be done. Instead, I have compiled some general, surface-level questions below that I try to ask myself as I go into designing a group. 

Who was/is your group’s founder? If the leadership has changed, how were they chosen? Has the group’s values changed with the new leader(s), or has it kept in line with the founder’s original vision?

Why was the group formed to begin with? Was the founder’s personal reason identical to what they told others, or was there a secret motive?

Does your group have a headquarters, or preferred meeting locale? If so, is the location significant to their history, or otherwise important to their practices?

If your group were to spontaneously dissolve, what would change in the world? Would a competitor be allowed to run rampant, or would a God fall out of favor, or would a great evil have no-one left to keep it contained? 

Weight of the allegiance

As you go into the nitty-gritty of your group, it can be good to consider the “weight” of taking part in it. What oaths a new member must swear, the secrets they must keep and the call to action they must obey should the day come. 

Secret orders, religions and cults often mean a commitment for the newly induced. Speak not a word of the group’s secrets, always act in line with their ideals and heed the call to represent them when the situation demands it. How strict are your group’s decrees, and how must a prospective member adapt to make the cut? What kind of people are usually induced, and are there any exceptions? 

The greater a presence your group has in your story, the longer you will want to take to reveal everything there is to know about it. That’s not to say there should always be more to their motives than what the reader is told - at least, not more than you can adequately foreshadow - but if you say all there is to say about your group immediately, it’ll lose its dynamic in the eyes of the reader.

This isn’t quite so much an issue if your protagonist happens to be the leader or adjacent, but even if they’re just a member, it can be good to remember that writing is, in many respects, like painting a canvas for someone and only giving them the full picture come the climax of the story. You progress the outline and grant depth to what is already there as you go along, but the final details that make everything hit don’t come in until the very end. 

I already partially covered this with the fourth question above, but the “weight” of your group for the world it exists in is worth considering as well. What runs through the mind of a regular person or someone in a position of power when they hear the group’s name? Society is an ecosystem of coalitions, and a healthy one has them interact with each-other in noticeable, world-shaping ways. 

The little things

I’ve already covered the big points I wanted to include with the sections above, but I compiled some additional questions below that you can ask yourself if you feel like getting a better idea of your group or want to add some extra little tidbits. 

Does your group have certain phrases or physical gestures they do as part of their work? Greetings, salutes, hidden languages like Thieves Can’t, hand signals that communicate danger, safety or allegiance?

What does it take for somebody to leave your group? How would it affect them personally and culturally? Should they express wanting to leave, how would it be received by the rest of the group?

Should your group be devoted to a deity or multiple, how great a role do the patron deities play in their activities? Are major decisions somehow communicated to them, so that they may choose rather than the mortal leadership? How does the image of the deities pervade the group, be that decor in their buildings/headquarters or their uniform?

Does your group have a uniform? Are higher-ranked members given fancier or different clothing, or are they only differentiated by emblems or pins on their person? Is there a cultural, practical or religious significance to the uniforms?

Were a member of your group to express a new opinion beyond the decree/doctrine, how is it handled by the authorities/the other members?

If a group member were to be asked about the group by an outsider, how would they describe it?

What is the general vibe of the group, and how does it differ between downtime and work/meetings? Can people make jokes or speak ill of the leadership, or is the air rigid and strict to where you can never quite “relax”?

How present is the leadership in the group’s activities, or are their orders and announcements always relayed by someone else, never made in person? 

The end

Thanks for reading! I might do a series on its own of these kinds of shorter questions, maybe even for the topics I’ve talked about before - if that sounds interesting, do tell!! For all the strangely specific things I know about writing, I am really, really bad at gauging interest… This is so sad…

Next blog post is the final part of the worldbuilding series, tackling a very, very big question: magic. Hope you look forward to it, and bye!

[avsanderoth]

Sorry for the (repeated) delay in posting, battling a crippling addiction to The Binding of Isaac and the fervent assaults of my feline overlords

Next post is a continuation on worldbuilding, focusing on the traditions, hierarchies and disciplines that make them pop in storytelling!!!

Apology cat picture below

[avsanderoth]

Writing Techniques #7b: Worldbuilding Civilizations

Be it the central kingdom in which your story takes place, an ancient cabal whose ruins are found across the world or a system your characters must take up arms against, there are few stories where the civilizations involved do not occupy a central space in how the world is built for the reader. Society is such an inherent aspect of real life that whether a book’s fantasy equivalent is understandable and logical can be the make or break of a classic. 

Indeed, the importance of civilization to any story is both an opportunity and a challenge. To keep all the integral components of society in mind as you create your own is hard, and getting them across in a way that feels natural might be even harder. For that reason, I’ve compiled some things I think help when creating and describing a civilization. Hope you enjoy!

Depth and width

I like to think of worldbuilding as having two main axes, depth and width. 

Depth is the y-axis, how closely you regard very specific systems, be that a civilization’s economy, history, culture or ruling system. To say a kingdom relies on its fishing industry for trade and food is one thing, but to describe the particular techniques used in preserving or preparation of the haul is to give that note depth.

Width is the x-axis, the sheer number of unique systems you write down for your civilization. The military, mining projects, trade unions, religion, or cultural outlets like theaters, concert halls and museums. The more aspects to your society that the reader is clued into, the broader a view they are granted. 

You can go as crazy with these two axes as you want when writing them down - want to have an extensive timeline of the workers’ rights movements for your kingdom? Go ahead! Feel like describing the wheat shortages that led to pastries momentarily outvaluing gold? The world’s your oyster - literally!

However, when it comes to deciding on what makes it into your final draft, there are a few things to consider. 

Less is more, more or less

Broadly speaking, you want every element you introduce to play a role in what happens in your story - to describe a kingdom’s supply lines is to sow the seeds of a rebel attack blocking out the food supply, or of the protagonist smuggling something or other through the system. 

In essence, the greater a role a system plays in your story, the more you are at liberty to describe it in depth. On the contrary, the more space your civilization occupies in the story, the wider should the viewer’s lens of it be. There are times you will want to exclude things you put a lot of work into describing, and there are times you’ll have to dedicate a paragraph or two to a system you haven’t yet spared a thought. 

The balance is volatile, and can change as you revise your story. Ultimately, the best thing you can be is patient - civilizations are, unsurprisingly, very complex! The more time you lend yourself to work on it, the better the result will be! 

Finding that balance isn’t always easy either, which is where I highly recommend seeking out feedback. You get such an all-encompassing view of your world in your head that you end up accidentally excluding vital details because you think you already wrote them down (at least, that’s what happens to me). Having somebody else to review your text is great for filling those gaps!

Getting it across

So… How do you go about actually describing a civilization to the reader? 

Most writers will tell you that dumping everything in a big block of text is not the way to go, but how else are you supposed to tell the viewer how the royal council works, or the procedure behind getting a trade deal, or just about anything not entirely “physical”? 

I talked about this in a previous blog on precisely exposition, but especially with the systems that govern a civilization, one of the best techniques is to introduce them as they occur. Describe the royal council across a scene of them convening for the trial of a traitor to the crown, have the protagonist sit in as their merchant ally meets with a colleague to strike a deal - allow the forces of your society to take hold, and describe them procedurally as they appear. 

You can be a lot more lenient when describing things like your civilization’s history. Larger passages retold by a character or read from a book work just fine - hell, your protagonist could just as well recite everything internally for the sake of plot convenience, it all works! 

One final note: you don’t need to immediately describe the systems of your civilization when they appear! There is a suspense in not fully understanding what is happening, but the characters reacting as if they do, like the opposite of dramatic irony. Give your systems time to show themselves, then do the telling. 

Bringing change

A lot of Y/A books I read feature a coup against a corrupt system, often a kingdom or other “almighty” force. If you look at history, at all the revolutions and coups of the past, very few have been anything short of messy. There are so many consequences to dethroning a king or taking hold of a state’s power that don’t make themselves apparent until after the fact.

Should your story involve something similar - a change in governmental system, essentially - it can be good to seriously consider what will happen afterwards, beyond the main characters getting their way and everything suddenly being awesome. How are the other royal houses going to react when the king is usurped? What of the kingdom’s neighbors, which they trade and war with? 

The best thing I can recommend is to look at previous rebellions and revolutions and observe what the consequences were, cultural, economical and political. At that point, you can pick what feels logical for your world, change it up a little, and suddenly things’ll make more sense! 

The end

This was supposed to come out yesterday, but I forgot to take my ADHD medicine and spent the whole day staring at my screen without getting anything done… So sad…

Anyway, I hope this second installment is as good or better than the last! One thing I’ve realized troubles me with these things is figuring out what actually needs saying - what tips I give are completely obvious and which ones are legitimately helpful. 

One thing that helps is when people send me their requests for things they want tips on, so if you’ve enjoyed this series of mine and wanna help me decide on a topic for the day, feel free to comment, send an ask or shoot me a dm! Thanks for reading, and see you next time!

[avsanderoth]

Writing Techniques #7a: Worldbuilding Regions

I’m back!!! This time with a multi-parter on a very, VERY big topic: worldbuilding! This first installment is focused in on how you create the canvas of your world - its geography, and how you should think about the geography in terms of creating a clear, interesting image for the reader. 

Where, when & why

As you sculpt your world, the aspect you’ll likely spend the most time on is the purpose. The shape of your world ought to have an effect on its history, force its civilizations to take particular shapes and, as your story plays out, act as aid or ailing for the journey of your characters. 

Say you have a world where two kingdoms are separated by a many mile long mountain chain. The trade they exchange is quite necessary, as one kingdom has the vast forests to support a massive logging operation, while the other has fertile soil in excess for the cultivation of food. To trade, the kingdoms must send caravans that move around the mountains, through areas beyond their jurisdiction. 

The geography that separates these two kingdoms creates an issue, the difficulty of trading, and the need for a solution: an easier path to the neighbor. Maybe a mining project begins to dig through the mountains, and then that leads to the awakening of some ancient horror? 

Using the geography of your world to provide challenge, solution and then challenge again is a means of making your story’s very foundation feel dynamic, both affectable and affecting. It provides a weight to the way you describe rolling hills that allow for strongholds to be built, massive peaks that provide respite from the horrors beyond, forests spanning miles that allow easy hiding, or massive fields that leave the wandered exposed and vulnerable. 

There is a lot of potential research to be done into how these elements come to be in the real world, what forces shape a country and how they’ve been observed to act. Generally speaking, your world doesn’t need to make geographical sense in the tinier aspects. Keeping where rivers run to and from and considering how temperatures give way to deserts and tundras and why they might not be appropriate to put directly beside each other is really all you need at base. Still, if that interests you, go nuts! I personally feel I can always tell when the author of a story has gone real deep in the logic of their geography, and that enthusiasm makes the story pop all on its own!

The full picture

Just considering the isolated dynamics of places and civilizations and natural forces can create a vibrant world, but a step beyond is how you make it all fit together. 

The more complex a society, the more dependent it will be on resources that cannot be harvested from its own territory. Whether obtained through trade or conquest, a civilization will have to shift its attention to the people beyond its walls, and a damn good portion of them. 

It can be very complex if your world has many distinct civilizations to engage with each-other, but there is no dynamic quite so intense and true to life as how your story’s societies must interact to fulfill their needs. How it establishes relationships, whether solid or strained, how it forces compromising on capital or moral loss in exchange for the missing resource. 

For example, Kingdom A is secretly contracted by Kingdom B to use its expansive weapons manufacturing infrastructure to prepare for a war Kingdom B is soon to enter against Kingdom C. Meanwhile, Kingdom A and C have a somewhat strained trade relationship where Kingdom A receives food to combat the growing famine after its potato fields were stricken with disease, while Kingdom C receives a comparatively much larger amount of timber. 

This is a tiny example between three kingdoms, and there are many more things for three societies to rely on each other for than weapons, food and timber, but I want to exemplify how this interweaving dynamic is critical for granting your story’s civilizations the relevance that earns them a place in the world. I also want to show that you can tie these relationships and their nature into the events that fill the timeline of your world, be that famines or wars or coups or plagues. 

A world beyond

What I haven’t brought up yet is the centerpiece of most fantasy worlds - the magic. As a concept entirely imaginative, you’re free to do whatever you damn please with your world via magic. Want a desert and a tundra to be right beside each other? Sure! A mountain with a separate mountain hovering upside-down above it! Go right ahead!

Floating islands, ravines spanning a continent, singular plants growing to encompass entire regions in vines and leaves, the very planet being alive - how you sculpt your fantasy world is forever up to you, and there are no geographical laws to follow beyond maybe considering one particular detail: the cohesion. 

Filling your world with a myriad of fantastical things is great fun both to write and read, but even here, you will want to establish a sort-of logic for how the abnormalities in your geography appear, where they appear and why.

That last question is particularly important! The first question your reader will be asking when you show them your world’s magical elements is just that: why is like that? You don’t always have to answer that question in your story, especially if the location that brings it up is minor enough, but you should be able to answer that question for yourself, ensuring that you know what’s going on in your own world. 

There’ll be a worldbuilding post wholly dedicated to magic, though, so if that’s something you think might be interesting, feel free to stick around!

The end

Thanks for reading! So sorry about the multi-week hiatus, I’ve been on rapid-fire vacations and haven’t really had the opportunity or environment to get into the zone. This is probably the hardest writing aspect to write about so far, if only because there’s so much to say. Still, I hope this guide ends up being useful. Bye, and see you soon!

[avsanderoth]

My writing time has been erased by rapid vacation and a lack of motivation... But there shall soon be a new post on worldbuilding... the next series of A.V. Sanderoth... Epic...

a certain very entitled lady is currently to blame for my lack of progress (pictured below to expose her)

[avsanderoth]

99% of writers settle for their current draft right before finding the greatest setting and perspective ever concocted in literature history

just entered the “what if i restarted the whole story from a different pov” phase of adhd-fueled writing. my outline is screaming. my characters are shaking. i am experiencing bliss

[avsanderoth]

Sowwy guys but I'll be away on a road trip this week, and then I'll be on a boat for like another week after that :((( I will try to post writing stuff in the meantime but they won't be daily

also I may or may not be having a hard time deciding on what to write next so if you have a writing aspect or anything like that you think is hard feel free to send an ask or dm about it!!! bye!!!

[avsanderoth]

Writing Techniques #6b: "Show, don't tell"

Part 2, baby!!! This’ll be the last of this technique, largely composed of more examples on how you can connote emotions and stuff rather than stating it blankly - or sometimes, ways to do both in tandem. Like last time, these things aren’t meant to be copy-pasted into your work, it’s just me collecting some fun connotation mediums in a tiny story. Thanks for reading, and enjoy!

Little bits of big stories

The monster killable, knowledge emboldening: Blood, ebony and miasmic, flowed from the wound on its forelimb, precious mortality. Somewhere, a switch flicked. The contours of the room grew sharper, the beast’s labored breathing losing its unknowable inflection. Her heart settled into a rhythm, breathing following suit - grip on her blade loosening, no more panicked. The eyes across its amorphous face slivered, and so did hers. If it could bleed, it could die: if it could die, she would win.

Separated, the long-sought reunion: And in the chaos of the battlefield, identical eyes locked. Stumbling over the dead, . The ache in his feet turned numb, the terrible smell in the air an afterthought. He embraced her lightly, afraid to hurt her more than he already had. And yet, she wrapped her arms around him so hard it had his rubs aching - another pain that soon faded. His heart raced still, the battle was not yet won, but it was alright - everything would be alright now.

Betrayal - shock - fury - vitriol: The smell and taste of iron battered him. A thud, her lifeless body meeting the stone floor. Blood seeping into the cracks, staining the blade yet planted in her back. And at its side, his savior. Features shaded in the torchlight, eyes boring into their victim. No sorrow, no regret, no satisfaction. A single reflexive inhale. Fingers stiff, stuck clutching at that which was no more. It wasn’t a need for air that had him lightheaded, the first fact that hit him. One blink, then another - hoping for things to clear, for her to stand there again, whole and happy and safe. She wouldn’t, no matter how many times he blinked, the second fact. Again, instinct carried him, forced his muscles to tense, grit his teeth and dulled the pain. Her killer stepped back, taking their blade from her corpse. Studying the crimson stain disturbing its splendour - disgusted at the sight, he knew, and his thoughts grew quieter before the beat of his heart. His hand closed around the grip of his blade, though still sheathed, knuckles whitening from the pressure. The third and final fact: revenge did not discriminate.

A great epiphany, and the power beyond: Once more, she gripped the cover of the tome. Just like before, it wracked her with violet sparks the moment she tried to pull it open, wreaking havoc on her arcane reserves and drenching her study in umbral light. A pause followed, as she let the ringing in her ears dissipate. It was taking longer and longer with every attempt, but she couldn’t give up now, not when the object of the last ten years of research laid before her. She had gone through hell to get her hands on it, and yet it refused her attunement. Made a mockery of her efforts, laughed at how desperate she was. Worst of all, it was right - the bags under her eyes were even larger than usual, and her arms felt weak as she placed the tome back on the table after it flinged itself across the room for the umpteenth time. No, she couldn’t let this thing be right again. It wasn’t telling her she was incapable of succeeding, it was her method that was wrong. She needed perspective, a new plan of attack. Sighing, she placed her hands on the cover again, traced the unfamiliar glyphs littered across with her fingers. Then, her eyes closed, and she envisioned the tome - made herself an image of its cover, let it fills itself in with every beat of her heart. As she breathed, its pages fluttered - as her eyes squinted, the image grew darker. She would see it, wield it, as she believed it was. And finally, it responded. Sparks dancing up her arms, bright enough to be noticed with her eyes closed. Testing her, exploring her soul, her compatibility. Her heart fluttered as the image in her mind flipped open for an instant, giving her the tiniest glance at its contents. An immediate migraine, but she wasn’t gonna let that stop her. Slowly, one hand gripped the cover’s edge. Touching the ancient pages behind it, an offer of collusion. Were they this powerful apart, who knew what they could do together? She would treat it with the respect it deserved, wield it rather than conceal it in a forgotten tomb. That was all she needed. A foreign power forced her eyes open, and for a moment, she saw nothing but the tome. Wide open before her, displaying pages littered in glyphs she was starting to understand. “A deal is made”, it read, among another million confirmations. Then, the world returned. Heart beating out of her chest, breathing bordering on hyperventilation. Exhaustion unlike anything else washed over her… But none of it could dim the grin on her face. Finally.

The victory and the fatal wound: The giant of steel and misery he’d once called a brother fell. A wince forced its way out of his mouth, the blade lodged in his stomach sliding out as its wielder joined the corpses littering the battlefield. His daughter had her own battle, and there was nobody coming to save him here. Dirt kicked into the air as he slumped to the ground, hoisting the helmet off his head. It rolled down his knee, planting itself in the grass, bloodstained visor staring at him. The sun set against the horizon, fading light his last cradle. Heart steady, though the world grew blurrier with every ounce of blood that stained the grass he sat on. She would mourn for him, and that was his biggest regret. His father had been his guiding light when he became king, but she would have no-one. But there was no changing fate, for either of them. There was no stopping the blood flowing from his stomach, no stopping the weakening of his pulse, no end to the blurring of the world as golden sky, blue sea, green grass and crimson blood blended together like his daughter’s paintings. He smiled, closing his eyes in preparation - a man’s last thoughts ought to be of what he loves most.

The end

I hope these things are actually usable, the last few are definitely way longer than I wanted them to be. Still, nothing kills me quite like downsizing, so hopefully it just kind of works out. I probably could’ve made these things a bit more dense as far as “Show, don’t tell” goes, but I couldn’t think of a way to do so that wouldn’t result in me just saying the same stuff over and over. Again, I’m still kind of unfamiliar with how you do some of these blog things, but with any luck, I’ll be a bit more orderly next time I do something like this. 

Either way, have a nice day or night and goodbye!!

[avsanderoth]

Writing Techniques #6a: "Show, don't tell"

Hello! Welcome to the first installment in this series that’s about an actual writing technique rather than a writing component. Please don’t ask why I decided to call it that, because I have no idea. This is another multi-parter, because I am NOT making the exposition mistake again!!

Abiding, ignoring 

I feel like “Show, don’t tell” as a concept can be very misleading. The saying’s meaning isn’t too complex, it just means that you should go about describing and entailing things without stating them directly. Describing a character’s racing heart instead of saying they’re scared, or having a character clutch a photo of them and their father rather than stating he’s dead or missing. It makes the things you describe feel more real, and allows the audience to create their own attachments and imagery beyond what you spoonfeed them. 

But I don’t think there’s a single writing rule, saying or tip that doesn’t warrant ignoring when the story does not need it. Art exists to break conventions and thereby establish new ones, and what is “Show, don’t tell” but one of the biggest, most ambiguous conventions in writing? Sure, it’s good advice, and I plan to get into why that is, but relying on it is hardly any better than being as curt as possible. 

When less is more

To imbue your writing with subtlety is to sacrifice conciseness for immersion, and not always equally. “She felt tired that morning” is a lot less clunky than “The yawn escaping her lips had her eyes watering, muscles yet shaking off the lethargy of waking up early”, and by no means is the latter “better” for its fancier phrasing and “subtle” communication of tiredness. 

This method of getting feelings and such across, like all writing techniques, is only advantageous if used to a reasonable degree. Too much of anything is a bad thing, and overuse of “Show, don’t tell” will inadvertently draw out scenes/moments that very well could’ve been a fraction of the length and been just as - or even more - effective. 

The human brain is crazy good at filling in holes and expanding on things when they don’t feel complete, and that works for both subtle storytelling and blank statements, but only if one is not relied on too much over the other and only if they’re used in the right contexts. So, what are those contexts?

Your story’s “physicality” will vary as it proceeds, rising in moments of tension where you describe the deeply textile, fear and anger and all that affects the body no less than the mind, but falling in moments of normalcy and contemplation, where the wiles of the flesh fall short of the mind’s. The presence of “show, don’t tell” in your work can easily follow that curve, your descriptions turning more subtle and physical as the characters experience things best described by that medium, then turning more concise when you need to leave room for monologues, exposition, other writing components that take a whole lot of time to get through. 

Still, there are exceptions, and one of them happens to be my absolute favorite line in all of literature. 

“I’m scared.”

There is something so immediately terrifying about being in any situation where somebody would have reason to say that to you, and even though that fact warrants physicality, an intense scenario, “I’m scared” is maybe the most concise way a character could convey how they feel!

And that is what makes it so raw. So much vulnerability packed into two words, the very opposite of what you’d typically achieve via “Show, don’t tell”: explaining something technically simple in a more elaborate way. 

Exceptions like this, however, are fairly isolated cases. Even as your character bluntly states “I’m scared”, you will want to lend credence to it, show them shaking or flexing their digits or describing the horror staining their expression. 

For lack of a better phrase, it’s all about figuring out what requires the most emphasis. You do not need to emphasize the lethargy of having to get up early, because that’s something just about everybody has experienced. The picture paints itself, and the reader’s mind will serve itself just as well as you can. It’s with great fury, or sorrow, or fear that you can delve into rushes of adrenaline, shaking limbs and gritted teeth. 

Miscellaneous things

Like most writing techniques, “Show, don’t tell” has way too many possible applications for me to give advice on all of them. Anyway, below are some feelings/scenarios I thought up and suggestions on how you can write them. At times, I make simultaneous use of subtlety and blank statements, so I suppose you can also find examples of that if you want some!

Feel free to take isolated parts of these or mash them together or look at them and think “These are way too specific, I don’t think a single one applies to my story! Man, what the hell? Wow. Not cool, A.V.! Yeah, that’s what people call you! Definitely!” 

Relief for survival: His pulse and breathing slowed in tandem, an ache settling through his muscles as the adrenaline wore off. Even so, the hand he clutched the railing with as he pulled himself up felt much lighter than before.

Envy for the lost competition: Her eyes traced the outline of the three-story cake, then returned to her own creation, slivering at its size in comparison. Again, she eyed the fruit of the winner - again, her hands clasped tighter at her waist.

Betrayal, for their own good: The pain in her chest tightened at the sight of his crumpled form, made so tiny by the bars trapping him in his cell. She reached for the cold iron, dragged a finger across it with her metal glove… Then pulled back. She hadn’t the right to be this close, to even wish she could be - he would live, and that was all she needed. He would live, and he would hate, and she would deserve it.

Isolation, then breakdown: A door closed in his face - that growing lump in his stomach. Stepping back, and back, until he leaned against the wall. Legs shaking so hard he could barely keep himself from falling as he slid down, landing on the floor and pulling his knees in. Clutch them, instinct called - clutch them, and be something smaller, something harder to hurt. Tense every muscle, then relax, cry only with your head sunk to where nobody can see, and cry until there are no tears left to cry.

The second part in this series on “Show, don’t tell” will consist of many more of these tiny little guides, but I have to cut this one short because I’m super tired and it’s past midnight and uggugugugghghgh…

The end

Thanks for reading! I see a lot of other writing blogs on tumblr that do this “Ways x character would display/react to/show y” and I’ve always been afraid to try doing something like that because I’m really bad at coming up with a bunch of tiny ideas instead of one big idea I can just roll with for a whole post, but these ones were a lot of fun to write! If you’d like me to make those kinds of posts on certain topics or whatnot, feel free to send a DM or ask about it!! Bye!!!

[avsanderoth]

hi guys I have my own pfp now, and that's VERY important!!!

the loss of the cat sitting pondersomely on a watermeloné shall be grieved, but you may still gaze upon its wise and experienced form on my blog background

new post later today... yes...

[avsanderoth]

Writing Emotions: Fear

He sprints down an alleyway, clutching the gash across his stomach. The hand he holds to it is warm and slick, though the heat flushing his face is worse. Steps, rumbling and in pace with his own, follow behind - eyes glued to him, their infernal pressure lost as he rounds a corner. It’s darker here - safer, he hopes.

The pressure returns, his sprint grows quicker. Whispers in voices he recognizes reach at him, a dozen mouths speaking the same message. “Give in,” they hum. “Let yourself rest. Let yourself be remade.”

His foot meets a box on the ground, and he trips. Face meeting concrete, head pulsating in the agony. The taste of iron fills his mouth, but he rises - gets on his feet, and keeps running. He can’t be caught, he can’t be caught, he can’t be caught.

The whispers grow louder, more panicked. They scream now, but they scream the same things, the same invitations. His legs ache, his arms ache, his heart is on the verge of exploding, but he can’t give in. The end of the alleyway is so close, a flush of light, of safety. Just a little longer. 

But it grows impatient, moves faster. Limbs pushing against the concrete, the sound of tearing leathery skin being dragged along the floor, along the walls. He has to move faster, but he can’t - his heart can beat no faster, his muscles have no energy left in reserve. 

Almost there, he reaches for the light, for its gentle embrace. Then, he stops. Tendrils coiling around his ankles, dropping him to the ground for a second time. No air in his lungs to scream with, only the power left in his arms to drag his nails against the concrete. Red stains the ground in lines, but he feels no pain. 

It drags him back, and the air grows hotter. False relief invades him, and he hasn’t the strength to fight it. The very least he could do was turn his head, look his killer in the eye.

…

Fear is a pretty easy emotion to display in a character, but a very tricky one to imbue in the reader. It factors well into tension, which was the subject of my last post. Deriving from the example above, I’ll try to explain how you convey fear in a character and how to make your reader feel it as well. 

Fear is possessing

One way to think of fear as it affects a character is that it has a sort-of “priority” in the brain. Fear is invasive and overbearing, it subdues what other feelings a character might be experiencing to take center stage. For all things, fear is the equalizer - the influence that can reduce anybody to sheer instinct. 

Fear stems from many things, but the effect it has on you doesn’t differ in anything besides strength. It slows the world down, forces your eyes open and makes you hyper-aware to a point of threatening overstimulation. You often want to focus on the physical with fear, and it can be good to show its effect on a character by making them act or speak in ways they usually don’t when afraid. 

Take the example above - an unnamed character is being chased by some sort of monster down an alleyway. We don’t know how he is outside of this scenario, so there is no observable contrast, but we can still see how fear affects him. Adrenaline has taken the pain of his stomach wound from him, leaving only the flush of heat across his face. He can’t see his pursuer, but he feels their gaze, and in the moment, can’t bear to meet it. 

In the example, I try to show fear through how it affects him physically and how desperate he is to not be caught. The second part is basically just saying “the character is scared” through their internal thoughts, which I think can go a long way in giving some substance to the fear they experience. 

Again, having a character feel fear isn’t the hardest thing to write. Now, having that translate to the audience isn’t quite so easy. 

Fear is contextual

Broadly speaking, there are some key components I like to keep in mind when making a scene scary for the reader. Those are:

The setup

The scenario

The uncertainty

The victory

The setup is the context to your scene, what knowledge your reader has of the characters and threats present. If the source of fear is a known antagonist who you’ve shown to be dangerous, that’s a setup for making the reader feel tense. You can also leverage initial tension by having a fully unknown threat, but that will require some more dynamic descriptions to not slow the scene with a big block of appearance before the chase can begin. The setup is also establishing vulnerabilities for your characters, things they are afraid of or weak to that the threat can take advantage of. You don’t technically need vulnerabilities initially, but using scenes of fear/tension to create them for later can be a good idea. The example above doesn’t have much opportunity for setup, but it could if it had an initial vague description of the threat (and naturally, why the unnamed protagonist is in this situation to begin with). 

The scenario, is, well, the scenario. What is going on, and why is it dangerous? What obstacles stand in the way of survival, and how can the “victim(s)” surpass them? Do the characters think they’re in danger, and if so, how is that expressed? This component tends to come fairly naturally, but I’ve had times where I forget to write down some bit of this, even though I had the idea in my head. 

The uncertainty is how you take advantage of the fear of the unknown, maybe the most consistently terrifying thing the reader can experience. The nature of the pursuer, why they’re after the victim, what they’re capable of, what will happen if they’re caught… And worst of all, whether they can even escape to begin with. Leaving some of these things unanswered and then placing weight on that fact is instrumental to generating fear for the audience. I can’t say I recommend leaving all of them unanswered though - you gotta give your reader something to work with, or else the scene might turn from creepy to confusing. 

The victory is how you give the reader a means of survival, or escape, or other win condition for the characters. At base, having one is very important, since a chase scene with only one outcome doesn’t give as much room for tension. For the example, the victory is the light at the end of the alleyway, kept intentionally vague because this post is already way too long. Your scene’s win condition ties back into uncertainty, since it doesn’t need to be a clear “I will survive” and can very well just be a chance at salvation. 

Just to clarify, you shouldn’t write your scene tackling these things one after the other. Keeping them all in mind and inserting their qualities where they fit best is how you make your “fear scene” dynamic! 

The end

This is another long one, sorry about that! I could’ve definitely been more concise with the example (and really the whole post), but I think that might be my biggest weakness as a writer - I’m really bad at getting to the point. Still, I’m glad that so many people put up with that to read these things. Thanks, and see you tomorrow for a writing techniques post on “show, don’t  tell”!

[avsanderoth]

Me when I consistently encourage people to message me with writing components they want me to talk about and leave my messaging to people I follow only for two weeks

Uhhh ummm uhhh anyway I fixed it now!!! So if you want me to talk about some super-specific thing in writing I am very open

[avsanderoth]

Writing Techniques #5: Tension

A potential umbrella term for everything spine-curling in your book, tension is the means by which a work generates intentional discomfort for the reader. Putting the fates of the parties involved into question, forcing the question “what will happen next?” into their head and gluing their eyes to the page until a resolution comes. 

Be that as it may, generating tension isn’t as easy as putting your characters in a bad spot - it’s conveying that through language, emotion and action. 

Do you want me to die?

What I like to consider first is precisely what is going to generate tension in the scene I’m about to write. Maybe it’s the protagonist being chased by a monster that suddenly appears, maybe it’s a deal with a mob boss breaking down while they’re surrounded by their goons, maybe it’s an argument between friends or lovers that risks to destroy the relationship.

The context will determine what you need to do in order to generate tension, since the “stakes” aren’t quite the same. The monster kills, the mob betrays, the heart breaks - then, the question becomes what to say and describe in order to balloon those ideas in the mind of the reader. 

I would broadly sort the three scenarios above into the categories physical, capital and social loss. Below are some general tips for handling each one. 

Physical loss is all about threatening the reader with injury, and so you want to draw attention to that as much as you can. Focus on gnashing teeth, sharp, jagged claws, blades that shimmer in the sunlight and destruction in the name of killing. The threat needs an identity, and so don’t be afraid to give it one: describe the monster’s features, the collapsing building’s cracking supports and rumbling foundation, the cold-blooded assassin’s empty glare and inhuman efficiency. Note that, if possible, having the victim “fight back” can often generate even more tension than if they flee.

Capital loss is the result of a gamble, and often with forces beyond the gambler’s power to ward off. It’s losing macguffins, homes, money, other supplies they need. That last word is especially important, the need. If your protagonist is robbed or otherwise has something taken from them, it must be something important, something they would want back or cannot continue without. Generating tension for a capital loss can be done via forcing the protagonist to negotiate with people much more powerful than them, and not being afraid to have the deal fall through. Tension doesn’t mean anything if it’s always resolved positively.

Social loss might be the easiest to outline, but is by far the most nuanced to write. There are so many things that factor into a relationship breaking down, things that make the scene shine when included but leave the reader confused if forgotten. The main thing I can recommend for something so diverse is to not “punish” a character with social loss out of the blue. There needs to be a build-up of distrust, suspicion that something’s off. One exception is the protagonist or similar betraying a supporting character, which can be more sudden since the reader can follow the protag’s thought process throughout. Even then, don’t make the choice easy!

Importantly, tension can be generated from multiple sources of loss at once. Physical and social loss interface when the protagonist is forced to betray an ally, and they immediately begin fighting - capital and social loss interface when the result of a deal determines whether a harsh parental figure will continue to support you. I wouldn’t stress about threatening the reader with the same kind of loss multiple times, but variation is always nice!

Fight or flight

With that in mind, the nitty-gritty of generating tension will come down to the emotions you communicate to the reader. For your audience to feel tense, the characters have to feel the same. Especially when you generate tension, you have to show stress, or fear, or adrenaline, not just tell it. If there’s any point in your work where the reader should get so immersed they might as well be the protagonist, it should be here. 

Describe their racing heart, digits flexing and unflexing, breathing growing faster and faster building up to hyperventilation! A flush of heat, the cold sweat, building dizziness, fear for what could be that gets pushed down by a rush of adrenaline so intense it practically puts them in autopilot! Be physical, be painful, be scared.

On the topic of fear, it’s quite integral to generating tension. Alas, for fear of this post being way too long, it will get its own blog… And very soon.

Be that as it may, once the tension is resolved (for better or for worse), you’ll want to think about the comedown phase. That doesn’t always mean your character’s heart slow down, or that they feel any sense of relief. Maybe the comedown is curling into a ball wherever the conflict has left them, and allowing the tears they’ve held back to flow freely. Maybe it’s a sense of anger over the result, lashing out physically whether at objects or people. 

Or, maybe it is relief. Maybe the deal did go through, maybe they managed to save their relationship, maybe the monster lost them. How does that feel? Are they elated, exhausted just relieved, or some mixture of the three? Even after your tension is resolved, a period afterwards will be just as physical. The pulse that eventually slows, long breaths in and yet longer exhalations as your character does their best to calm themselves. In scenes like these, your characters can show themselves for who they really are - don’t be afraid to use that opportunity. 

Rock bottom

Finally, well… What should happen to resolve the tension? Should there be victory, or loss, or something in between? 

The ratio of victories and losses that your characters experience has the effect of determining the “energy” of your work, to an extent, but in a very particular way. The genre or nature of your story doesn’t necessarily mean you have to resolve tension positively that many times or negatively this many times. There are definitely worlds where the “feel” encourages one of the two - for example, a story in a grimdark world might want to include more loss to fit the theme - but it’s nowhere near as controlling for how you want to tell your story as something like pacing. 

I can only say one thing concretely: you need to have both. A story of undisturbed victory loses tension for the reader knows the characters will always win. Meanwhile, a story of constant loss risks becoming so gloomy it loses meaning: sorrow as the characters experience it becomes empty, just another instance of the same plot device. 

Ultimately, these kind of things tend to solve themselves when writing, but keeping them in mind when editing is a very good idea. 

The end

Again, thanks for reading! This is my twelfth writing tips post on this blog, and I’ve somehow already got 25 followers!!! You’re all so awesome and cool and epic!! Knowing that somebody’s benefitting from these things is what keeps me writing them, so again, thank you all so much for the support. Some upcoming blogs I have planned are a post on “show, don’t tell”, and a new writing emotions installment. Hope you enjoy them, when they come out!

[avsanderoth]

Writing Techniques #4: Character descriptions

Giving your reader a clear idea of your world is to paint it for them, and to paint those who inhabit. As you detail rolling fields and high-rising buildings, must you remark on flowy hair, azure eyes and lanky figures. While it may seem straightforward at face value, there is a great deal of nuance to this art. 

Composition & presentation

First of all - how do you describe a character? If you’re unfamiliar with how to do so, don’t fall for the idea that if you can’t “prettify” your language, it’s pointless.  You need to start by outlining their appearance, even if only to yourself, and that outline need not be fancy in the slightest. Feel free to describe their hair, then their eyes, the shape of their nose, their jawline, etc. etc. 

When you have that idea, however, it’s time to shave off the fat. Here, there are some things you will want to focus on, and some you will want to minimize or completely exclude. 

The focus is best placed on what your character wants to express about themselves, the parts of their appearance that communicate the emotions and aesthetics they want people to see in them. A very confident and outward character may unconsciously move in ways that draw attention to their features, like swaying their hair or tracing the zipper of their leather jacket. 

On the opposite end, a more timid and clammy character might “close up”, move in ways that keep them subtle and unnoticeable. Hoodies and other featureless attire helps communicate this, but it’ll really come down to the energy you use when describing them - more on that later. 

What you’re better off minimizing or excluding is everything that doesn’t serve to communicate something about your character. Details like jewelry, shoes and earrings need to carry a meaning, if subtle. Maybe your character wears very worn shoes, to convey they’re not very wealthy? Or maybe it’s the opposite - maybe your character enters the scene wearing a brand new pair of shoes since they were last seen? Jewelry and those kinds of accessories do much the same, but you can also plant things like family heirlooms or trinkets of personal value through them. 

Emphasis and the consequence

One of the smoothest methods of conveying a character’s importance to the story is by placing weight on their appearance. The cashier your protagonist meets in the supermarket might just “look tired”, but their best friend waiting outside may wear a bright smile - one that hasn’t waned in the thousand times the protag’s seen it - and run one hand through their wavy hair while the other clutches a worn handbag. 

Placing emphasis on a character’s appearance is an opportunity to establish them for the audience, both in terms of importance and personality. For example, see the brief descriptions below:

She flicked a stray lock out of her eyes, where it joined its locky brethren in nestling behind her ear. That same hand quickly returned to the pocket of her torn jeans, while the other had the strap of her backpack in a vice grip. The setting sun was her spotlight, shading the rolling sea of brown strands cascading down her back a slight gold. The furrow in her eyebrows combined with her defiantly straight posture made her seem many heads taller than she really was.

A stray lock of hair fell atop her right eye, her hand twitching to flick it back but ultimately relenting. Instead, it remained in the midst of her bangs, washing through them in some search for comfort. Her other hand rested loosely in the strap of her backpack, holding on with just a finger or two while the rest hung slack. The setting sun seemed intrusive on her skin, shaded her brown hair gold like a thief illuminated by a flashlight in the middle of a heist. Her eyes boring into the asphalt and sunken shoulders made her look guilty, as if she’d been caught doing something she wasn’t supposed to. 

Two instances of the same character with the same appearance, but vastly different energies. To use your language in conveying a person is elementary if you want to concisely tell the reader of a character’s importance and features, and is the centerpiece for writing an amazing introduction. 

Leaving breadcrumbs

Another element you may want to take advantage of is saving some of your character’s features to introduce continuously, rather than dumping it all on your reader at once. This works especially well for tiny details like accessories, and other things that your character might fiddle with. “With his right hand, he pulled his wristwatch back into his sleeve,” or “The silver chain of her necklace wound up her finger, turning her rosy skin white”. Body language is a significant aspect to any character, and pacing their introduction lets you work on both without every sentence becoming the same thing. 

Notably, you should not do this with every aspect of their appearance. Giving the reader a baseline idea of clothing, faces and demeanour is best done immediately, so that your character has a face before they start defining their personality. 

It might also occur that your characters change outfits between parts of your work. Be that the case, it’s important to remember that if you place a lot of emphasis on a character’s shirt in their intro, you will want to place a similar or equal emphasis on the new shirt they’re wearing. This is to establish consistency in the “mechanisms” of your book, which makes reading a lot more comfortable. 

Eye of the beholder

This last point isn’t quite so important, but can be fun to consider. If you’re following a particular character, especially in first person, it may be that their gaze is drawn to certain things before others, which could affect how people appear to them. 

Maybe your character is someone well-used to fighting, and so they focus first on a person’s size, or musculature, or general feeling of “danger”? Or maybe your character enjoys fashion, and places more emphasis on how people dress and carry themselves? 

Here lies the third application of character descriptions: expanding on the protagonist. The cautious, searching a stranger’s robe for the bulge of hidden weaponry; the romantic, imaging the body beneath the jacket of the person on the other side of the bar; the terrified, scanning their every friend’s faces for the slightest sign they’ve done something wrong and are going to be punished for it. 

I really do mean it when I say character describing might be the most versatile element of storytelling among those that are practically guaranteed to appear in a work. There’s so much opportunity for exploration that I can’t describe it without doubling the length of this post. Alas, I will spare you from that. 

The end

Thanks for reading! I know quite a few people might struggle with getting this part right - character descriptions - so I really hope this guide helps someone. 

Also, I’m curious: what are some of your favorite character entrances you’ve read/written? Or details you love to see being focused on? If you’ve got one, feel free to reply with it! Bye!!!

[avsanderoth]

Writing Techniques #3: Scene Transitions

Hey again! Sorry for the lack of an upload yesterday, I don’t have much of an excuse. Today’s topic is fairly phoned in, and that’s because I couldn’t think of a larger subject that scene transitions belongs to (and even if I could, the post for that thing would end up WAY too long). Anyway, enjoy!

Almost always when I get into a writing “zone”, it ends with a scene coming to a close and me hitting the brick wall that is transitioning to the next scene. Sometimes it’s making the shift feel natural, other times it’s deciding what scene should simply come next. Over the years, I’ve made some tips for myself that make the process a whole lot smoother. Now, I’d like to share them. 

Scene definition

Before we start, what even is a scene? Is a scene the place that your characters find themselves in, regardless of the topics they discuss or how the move during that discussion? Is it the whole chapter, or just a part of it?

Personally, I define a scene as a stretch of a story wherein a character or characters find themselves in one particular location and/or are discussing a specific topic. A scene ends only when the author decides that it does by cutting to the next important moment. Even if your characters are moving throughout a scene, so long as there is no cut, it is not a new scene for every location or street or otherwise that they pass through.

With that in mind, I like to think of my scenes as knots in the red thread of my story, where events are “collaged” and attached to certain areas or topics. 

The precursor

Scene transition starts with the final moments of the scene you’re ending. Here, you must lay the groundwork for what is to come next - give the story a reason to move as it shall, and through a variety of means. 

First, character motivations. Having done one thing, your character now wants to do this other thing - simple and reliable, so long as it makes sense. A character who just got saved from drowning probably shouldn’t have a hankering for going to the swimming pool right after, nor should a criminal feel like visiting the coffee shop straight across from the police station. These things obviously have exceptions depending on the characters in question, but it’s important to consider the world’s logic as it appears to the reader, as it may very well differ from you, the author’s!

Then, you have events. Sudden happenings that scrap plans and force the making of choices. The first question to ask yourself is: precisely how aware should the reader and/or the characters be of the encroaching event before it occurs? This will really depend on the event in question: a bomb going off at someone’s workplace can very well be a total surprise, but the reader ought to know what’s going to happen when the villain uses a macguffin taken from the protagonist to enact their evil plan. Not everything should be a surprise - sometimes, letting your reader tense up at knowing things the characters do not is far more effective. 

A very tiny note: try to avoid using “suddenly” as the segue into every surprise transition. You can very well just say “a rumbling echoed through the halls, and every alarm in the building started blaring red” and skip on that first word. 

How did we get here?

Making a transition feel smooth is equal parts the above, equal parts the means of transportation. Both in terms of how they physically move between locations, and how the characters’ mood, motives and states of being shift with time. 

Unless your story has some magical means of transportation you haven’t fully described yet, the second part is rarely an issue. Your character can walk, or take the bus, or use any other means to move about, and you won’t need more than a sentence of implications to get that across to the reader - sometimes nothing at all!

Did your character take the bus? Have it drive away behind them at the scene’s start. A carriage? Basically the same, or maybe they step off and the chauffeur waits for them there. Did they get there on foot? 90% of the time, you don’t need to say a single thing. Provided they didn’t walk a really long distance, then you might want to make that clear to the audience. 

A lot of the time, you really don’t need to place any emphasis at all on the means of transportation - again, so long as they aren’t of your own invention and the reader hasn’t been fully familiarized with them yet. 

The second aspect can be trickier. You don’t want to start a scene with a complete tonal shift, rather, you want to ease off of the “vibe” of what came before. If your preceding scene ends with the MC huddled in an alleyway, crying, the next scene shouldn’t be them back at home watching TV with no lingering signs of what they just went through. More appropriately, it could be them walking home, fighting a mixture of despair and exhaustion, and then maybe masking those feelings under the aforementioned sense of nothing being wrong. 

As far as your side characters go, the reader naturally doesn’t have the same look into their mind as they do with the protagonist(s). Still, it can be good to pretend that they do - write out their thought processes and conclusions like you would if their perspective was being followed, then use that basis to make their shift in beliefs and goals feel reasonable. This is just a fancy way of saying “know your characters and they will be easier to write”, but I think it’s worth saying anyway. 

The end

Thanks for reading! This post is much more reasonably sized than the last one, and hopefully doesn’t have as bloated examples. They’re a lot of fun to write, but I have a hard time keeping them small enough to where they don’t get me sidetracked. 

Also, I had an idea for something  to try!! If you have any techniques you use for scene transitions, even just ways to describe characters shifting locations or otherwise, feel free to describe them in the comments! Chances are you know at least half a dozen things I don’t and haven’t included here. Bye!!!

[avsanderoth]

Writing Techniques #2: Exposition

Beware!! This post is ridiculously long!! I am very sorry!!

Exposition is an element you will need to incorporate more and more depending on how rooted your story is in reality. A work set in someplace like New York isn’t gonna need to bother explaining the cuisine or transportation means or what local terms like “dollar”, “health insurance” and “gabagool” mean. 

But what if those things are all uncertain? What if your city is your own construction, and it has aspects to its infrastructure that can’t be shown through the environment alone? Some dread it, some might enjoy it - exposition is the key. 

To expose or not to expose

Before you get into writing the two-page long text blurb that’s screaming to be let free of your mind, consider whether or not the element you want to convey actually needs to be communicated as factoids. 

If you want to establish, for example, the communal transport means in your city, maybe have your characters see as a bus (or even a magic bus!) accepts passengers and take them somewhere? This is easiest done with elements that are recognizable in human society, but anything is possible with the right storytelling. 

Picture this: your main character wakes, alone, in some strange place. The world they exist in is a world of magic, and that they know for its wiles fill them - sparks travelling ‘twixt their fingertips, or singes left in the grass they rest their hand upon, or winds that help them to their feet. Here lies a secondary means of semi-avoiding exposition: intuition. Your character doesn’t need to be told something if they can figure it out on their own, kinesthetically, and this can supply your protagonist with a sense of belonging, having them interact with the world’s systems by simply existing. 

The same thing can be done for just about all magic, but, like every technique, there’s no guarantee it’ll fit in your story. Maybe magic is an ancient, nigh-forgotten thing that cannot be navigated without antique guides - then, it hardly makes sense for it to be explored via sheer intuition. Still, if the opportunity presents itself, you can easily grant the audience understanding by granting your protagonist understanding. 

The information ambush

Okay, now that that’s out of the way… Actual exposition! 

There are a few things I would consider absolutely integral to proper exposition, such as taking care to not overwhelm the reader! It’s one thing to introduce a new fantasy system to your world, like magic or similar - it’s something else entirely to explore its every facet in the same section. Every bit of information you provide needs time to digest in the brain of the reader, and that time will change drastically depending on how much information is supplied at once, how often that information is actually relevant, and whether or not sufficient weight is placed upon it. 

If you have a lot of information to convey in a single scene or section of your book, you need to pace it out! Consider the rough example below:

Emma Seen is led to a chapel belonging to a group of scholars by an acolyte. When she arrives, their leader tells her of a force inherent to the world she now finds herself in: magic. They talk about its origins, known or unknown, then its applications, then its concerns, then its relevance to her - maybe they do a little spell at some point for demonstration - and she gives fairly vague reactions throughout. Then, she is lead into the catacombs, where she may seek council on what to do from another member of the scholar group.

Emma Seen awakes in a clearing of charred trees in the middle of a thunderstorm. One has fallen atop her, pinning her across the abdomen. In her delirium, she sees someone in robes adorned with crests approach from the side. Their hands reach from long, comfortable sleeves, patting at the earth and suddenly rising - with the motion, so does the tree lift from her hovering above and falling down on the clearing’s opposite side. They seem exhausted by the effort, but step to her all the same. She is picked up by this stranger, who introduces themselves as Seid Karika Tear, or just Seid for short. They walk across an old stone path, and Seid mutters something, makes weird symbols with their hands again. Emma realizes they’re chanting something like a poem, this one vying for “Downpour’s amnesty”. Immediately, the sensation of raindrops hitting her already soaked clothes ceases. She looks up, and sees the rain bounce against a barely-visible barrier of some sorts. Seid leads her to a chapel, which they describe as their home. There, she is lead inside, and meets Seid’s instructor, in a sense. They ask if she’s alright, but she steers the topic elsewhere: what is all this? How did Seid lift that tree, or protect them from the tree? Smiling, the headmaster tells her she better focus on getting rest, but does say that the world she now walks is controllable through words - that those who know how to flatter the laws of reality can make them bend, if only for a little. Then, she is given a room, and time to think of what has happened - of what it means, of what she has left behind in being shoved into this world, of whether or not she feels the buzz of magic picking at her. 

I will admit this example is longer than it needs to be, but I want to exemplify the difference that pacing your exposition can make. The first example is largely featureless, failing to describe this world’s magic as anything more than a concept. There is no concrete showing of it, no spectacles great or prevalent enough to convince the reader this is important. 

In the second scene, I have done my best to rectify that. Before Emma even speaks to the headmaster, she knows that:

There is magic

It is taxing on the body when used to great lengths

It consists of poems in the honor of what the user wants to achieve

The design upon Seid’s robe may have given her some insight on what their order believes in/believes is important

The headmaster then clarifies some of these things, but does not immediately reveal the whole puzzle. In fact, they introduce a new mystery - remarking on her being new to this world, though they had not been told so by her or Seid. What does the headmaster know that they aren’t sharing, and why?

Maybe come morning, the headmaster gives her a basis for understanding magic, but does not continue for fear of overwhelming her in such a state. You can create excuses to delay exposition through these kinds of means, not saying more than necessary at once due to time constraints or poor health for central characters or otherwise. 

Wow! Woah! Crazy!

My examples tend to go back to magic, and that’s not because these tips are only applicable to that one element of exposition, it’s just the most universal topic I can think of for this subject. 

Another extremely important aspect to exposition is the energy in which you convey it. Think back to the early Harry Potter books (NOT J.K. Rowling or any of her bullshit just THE BOOKS). Hagrid smashing down that door after the buildup of more and more unnatural things happening to Harry’s “family”, and then that reveal. Through the lens of Harry as a child and Hagrid’s joyful demeanour, magic enters the story as something grandiose, but in a way that Harry can understand. 

What I’m trying to say is that grandiose elements deserve reveals that give them appropriate respect. Maybe your magic system has a forbidden school, dark magics or the like: introducing it with some guy the MC finds in a bar just saying “oh, yeah, dark magic’s bad man wow” won’t work out! The reader needs reason to remember and think about elements you introduce, and you create that reason by having characters speak of dark magic in hushed tones, looking over their shoulders for fear of listeners, swearing the listener to secrecy lest terrible things ensue. 

Ultimately, exposition is not something you should compromise on, at least in your final draft. Once you get the hang of it, seeing what’s wrong with your exposition is fairly easy - fixing it is the hard part, something I know very well. Still, that effort will pay itself off by making your fantasy elements pop like nothing else.

The End

Thanks for reading! Again, sorry that this post got so bloated - I overestimated myself and thought “Oh, yeah, I don’t have to split the next writing techniques thing into multiple parts like with characterization, nothing has that many components!!” Alas, my hubris has got the best of me, and here we are…

If you’ve read this far, you might be thinking to yourself “wow! This individual is so cool and well-versed in literature!” if that’s you, feel free to check my profile for the pinned post that describes my awesome review-and-analysis service, where I read your text and give advice you can actually use! Thanks, and goodbye!