bluntnessismynature - Tumblr blog

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I just saw a post that deeply annoyed me because it went, "Here's a story that's like a Regency romance, but I FIXED it by making the characters sexually liberated and shame-free and polyamorous!"

This is like saying, "Here's a story that's like a thriller, but I FIXED it by having the serial killer go to therapy instead of trapping victims in his evil maze and dismembering them."

.

The thing a lot of people don't seem to get is that the entire appeal of a Regency romance is watching a deeply repressed, perfectly controlled, buttoned up, straight-laced person who has never expressed an emotion before fall so hard for someone that something in them just breaks and they come completely unhinged.

It's a very specific kink that this genre is tapping into.

People who think the characters in a Regency novel are boring are missing the whole point. The characters are supposed to be boring, right up until they fall so madly in love that it drives them insane, at which point they become very interesting. Regency romance novelists are doing the writing equivalent of putting plain white featureless uncooked whole eggs in a microwave and waiting for them to explode.

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#murdertrending trilogy thoughts

i originally read the first half of book 2 before realizing it, whoops!

murdertrending:

Beginning is maze runneresque with abrupt opening Kinda wanna draw dee as cinderella Ya know, i like this, the news has a sinister tone hidden in it Mash if hunger games too I wonder if this was unspired by the Walt Disney once wanted to have a section of the theme park where actors pseudolived and pretended that life was a fairy tale type of stuff

The ending reminded me of harry potter solving the puzzles in book 1

I liked the red herring turning out to be a true clue, good plot twist

At this point i realized that i dont particularly enjoy books that are set in high school

This book would have intrugued me at 15, if i were the type of person who had not yet read good mystery books

Ah well on to book 2

#murderfunding

murdertrending thoughts(to help keep track of the plot)(back when figuring out book 2 instead of starting book 1)

This is a world where everyones obsessed with watching people be killed(and very few that do have a conscience get mocked for it)

(this would have worked so well if they wrote adverts trying to advertise/promote unsolicited murder and torture) and then the audience is slowly led to the horrifying conclusion that"oh dear, why did we fall for it??!!!"

(Editors notes= lol the ads were there, past me just hadnt read book 1 yet)(it still would have begun to look suspicious if suddenly they are convicting teenagers there)(and they werent shown mercy)(seriously what the heck of a world is that?!)

So theres this group= postmanics, and antipostmanics

Postmanics care abt the postman and are avid fans (seriously were people this brainwashed??even after the accusations came out against the Postman they still wanted to kill Dee cuz what? SHE WAS WRONGLY CONVICTED YOU FOOLS WHY THE GECKO DO YOU WANT TO HUNT HER DOWN???)(yeah ik there was an incompetent prez but still)

Anti postman just there to sue and file evidence against leader

There was an Alcatraz 2.0 investigation, alcatraz being the crime and The Postman being the culprit

Death row breakfast club survivors(this sounds like an anime name)= dee guerrera, nyles harding, griselda sinclair.

Postmantics trying to hunt down survivors cuz they think survivors know who Postman is

A 3rd group, ie part 2 anti-Postmantics=fedexers= investigating real identiyies of those lost in the Humger Games dystopia

Uh huh poorly disguised aro bait, WE KNOW YOU GAY BECCA

Alcatraz santioned executioner called Molly Mauler= beccas mom ruth who died(oh, evil side was where mom working, got it got it)(but why did she die?)

Right now its Dees pov, where apparantly the people are mad cuz these survivors are the reason they LOST A STUPID APP? OF THE POSTMAN? DO THEY HEAR THEMSELVES??!!! And the postmanic fandom wants the survivors dead

WHO THE HELL IS MONICA??!!! THE STEPMOM OR THE STEPMOMS DAUGHTER?? Aah i see monica is dees stepsis that she indirectly got killed that her stepmom blames her for, got it got it (nah wrongly convicted kiddo)

Oh nyles and dee are dating,(see hunger games post 74th game era)(nyles 1 yr older than dee and in clg) Plus dee had no time to process monicas death and now she has so much time

So the Painiacs(original) were the people who killed contestants in Alcatraz 2.0(at this point i think this is a game show) Ah so the Postman and his successor were dead, at Dees hand.

Ok, why did the Breakfast club kill the postman in the first place? Nvm that, why do this stupid tv reality show at all? Who sanctioned this, how did they manage to sell it to so many people? Good taste they say. I say cow poop.

Ok but why do the postman(fangroup) want to hunt and place a bounty on these survivors? Who the hell is #cinderellasurvivor ? Hey, is cinderellasurvivor Dee? Cuz ya know, stepmom and stepsis??!!! (Yes, she was)

Painiac= a govt approved santioned contestant killer , beccas mom ruth was one of them

What the hell why did that idiot burglar threaten to kill rafa ? When all he did was break into beccas house?

Facebook. They are using facebook.

Becca go call 911!!! Or something, there was a burglary(oh wait, certain deTh) Ruth's ashes??? The survivors themselves think that because becca joining painiacs, its connected[postman responsible for it)

Kimmi= kidnapped Dee(formerly dolores), then she n her dad moved+ changed names, (Who da hell is kimmi now?)kimmi is Postmans daughter

Dees dad knows who the Postman is(yes the postmans dead) (Implied via flashbacks)

So bits i liked= uhhhh

Becca and stef prob need more fleshing out, i feel like they were still in the friend zone(just got forced into it cuz circumstance and plot)

Rita made it i think, but we lost stef

Yeah no, i spent a better part of a year reading malory towers and being able to sniff the conclusion before it appeared on my face

I did not like the blatant anti-Russian propaganda. Like seriously, all the bad things? Russia is behind it. The mafia? They're from Russia. The corrupt President? Also controlled by Russia. It would have been better if they had fleshed out why Russia was behind this and what they could gain, but oh well we got anti russian propaganda

kudos for making it ig?

#noescape

This. Now this is the book i liked.

We have a character to root for(finally), who meets another person(we r never told hes her brother until the end, which weird and funny)

And the friendship between neela and persey i liked

And the clues scattered across the room

I was right!! I guessed right that kevin was the killer! Ha! (The statues that represented each of the players gave it away...)

Was it necessary to kill off everyone in book 2?

And it turns out kimmi=persey which kinda doesnt make much sense unless we are supposed to conclude that Dee was harassed by a 37 yr old??? Not to forget the entire psychological degeneration perce would have to undergo, from someone who doesnt want people dead and desperately wanted to leave her family cuz of them being useless , i highly doubt she ended up as a spoilt manipulative dependent prone to angry mood swings kind of adult

Kimmi from book 1 seems immature, plus she was 19 there, later 24

Kimmi book 3 must at best be an aunt, whose niece is a crazed hedgehog

Which means kimmi the elder got away! Good for her, i hope shes living a happy life

Summary:

If you've been reading this all along and wondering if you should read this series, I suggest reading only book 3 (all of them are standalones, book 1 and 2 are connected , is all)

Otherwise, if you're like me and prefer to read complex and challenging books that make you scratch and wonder at the richness of stories, maybe read something else.

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How To Scare Your Readers (Mature Horror)

tw: mentions of murder and other horror media, its not specific or gorey but I just wanted to mention it

Today is one my hardest asks as it is a highly individual process to freaking out your audience with @differentnighttale asking: "How do you write horror, and how do you write it good nail biting and very unsettling type of horror."

Specifically, we are focusing on supernatural horror and dark fantasy. Due to the fact that there are numerous ways of scaring an audience, I'm going to focus on more diverse and interesting ways to freak out the readers. There are obvious tricks like "focus on the tactile senses" and stuff like that but let's cover something not as cliche!

Again, there are many ways to instill horror.

One: Combine Beauty And The Macabre

While this is a common trick seen in visual horror such as the works of Junji Ito or Midsommar, it's also an important and useful element in other beloved horror media.

This can be useful for a myriad of reasons.

The ability to combine the fantastical beauty of the scenery with death or the lovingly detailed imagery of a victimized body might be just the thing to elevate the scenery and visuals.

It also works to surprise your readers. If you are reading horror, you expect the murder and terror to appear in dark hospitals and obviously disgusting places. But what if the horror was in a cherry blossom field? In the church? In the character's childhood bedroom during the sunset?

It follows the perversion of the familiar. Most people internalize certain environments are seperated from society which might assist you if you are going for that specific type of horror. BUT! If you have horror in the supermarket, in the coziest little cottage, in the beauty.

TWO: Focus On A Specific Brand Of Horror

This is especially important for horror that is based off of pop culture spooks such as ghosts, ghouls, witches, zombies, and werewolfs.

Doing some research into why these monsters have survived in the public mind and what exactly is frightening abou them can influence your settings, characters, and horror.

There is horror about isolation.

There is horror about losing yourself.

There is horror about the female body.

There is horror about puberty.

There is horror about gender dysphoria.

There is horror about everything.

Decide what is the core fear you are proding at.

THREE: Be Ambiguous

Readers are comforted by linear stories with a beginning, clearly laid out morality, and a clear cut ending which provides either a happy ending or a sad ending.

Messing up any one of these things can lead to your story haunting the minds of your audience for a long time.

Midsommar is constantly debated about over if the ending is happy or sad.

Joker(2019), a thriller but not a horror, is infamous for it's amazing usage of hallucination and delusion to tell a non-linear story with a confusing ending.

Leaving the ending, villain, characters, or plot ambiguous and not clearly detailed might elevate your horror :)

FOUR: Use Your Own Fears

When you write about what scares you, that natural fear tends to radiate into your writing more naturally :)

This fear can be a lot of things from the specific phobia of bugs to the fear of being mistreated by a loved one.

Conclusion:

I hope I gave you some interesting advice that you haven't heard before @differentnighttale

p.s: at what point does something become "Mature"? I did mention "murder" throughout my post somewhat frequently but I never went into specific detail so I can't tell if it's "Mature" or not?

If it is mature and I mislabeled it then I can edit it to be "Mature"

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I think i need advice on this so i'll just post it here

Writers of tumblr,

Do you find yourself writing on the first piece of paper you see as soon as a story idea strikes you?

What about scenes that come later , that would easily fit in the story ideas you've got?

I've learnt that im the type to use flashcards for writing my fics, except that i tend to write in whatever notebook/paper i have on hand and refuse to use the computer to keep track of it all.

And i tend to write whenever inspiration strikes on loose sheets of paper or a notebook.(which is often followed by an unrelated scene from an unrelated story)

So how do i keep all of my notes organized?

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“I forgive you” parallels

Ok. Listen up, my little sweet potatoes. I figured something out.

I previously posted about how I thought the Final Fifteen “I forgive you” might be code.

And then today I went for like a 6 hour aimless drive to clear my head, and, yeah, I have audio recordings of a few of my favourite GO scenes, which I listen to on repeat sometimes as an auditory stim. And I noticed a few interesting parallels, and I think I’ve cracked it.

We, as the audience, have seen a few things only once before.

Season 1, after the Bandstand Breakup, outside the bookshop, Crowley is back and saying ‘let’s run away together’. In this conversation, we see the only on-screen instance (before the Final Fifteen) of Crowley calling Aziraphale stupid, and the only previous time Aziraphale has used the specific phrase “I forgive you”. If we take this and the bandstand together, we also have very likely the only previous time Crowley has been bold enough to say ‘let’s go off together’.

So what happens in Season 1?

1. Armageddon Part I is imminent.

2. Crowley suggests they run away together.

3. Aziraphale says ‘no, I’m going to stay and work with heaven to fix things’.

4. Crowley calls Aziraphale “stupid” for taking sides and believing heaven cares about good.

5. Aziraphale says ‘I forgive you’.

6. Crowley leaves.

7. Aziraphale talks to the Metatron and gets transported to heaven against his will, and is expected to fight for their cause.

8. Crowley waits for him.

9. Aziraphale comes back to Crowley.

10. They work together and things turn out okay.

Does any of that sound familiar?!?

Let’s look at how the Final Fifteen plays out:

1. Armageddon Part II is imminent

2. Crowley suggests they run away together.

3. Aziraphale says ‘no, I’m going to stay and work with heaven to fix things’.

4. Crowley calls Aziraphale an “idiot” for taking sides and believing heaven cares about good. (Also: you’re an idiot for choosing heaven over me).

5. Aziraphale says ‘I forgive you’.

6. Crowley leaves.

7. Aziraphale talks to the Metatron and gets transported to heaven (against his will?), and is expected to fight for their cause.

8. Crowley waits for him.

I mean….

Is there any chance at all that either of them doesn’t remember the first time they had this conversation? That they’re not also seeing the parallels?

That Aziraphale isn’t getting flashbacks to Armageddon, that he isn’t aware that something could go terribly wrong here, but that he has to try and, please, Crowley, be here when I get back?

Listen, when I say “I forgive you” I know we’re only halfway through this dance? Wait for me. I’ll come back to you.

(I wasn’t going to add this, but the only time Aziraphale has used to the word ‘idiot’ is when he said “I’m not an idiot, Crowley” when he thought Crowley was going to use the holy water on himself and that’s some foreshadowing I don’t really want to explore).

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September media wishlist:

Murdertrending trilogy

Lotr

The telugu magazines by using google translate

Epic the musical

The gondoliers

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Do you think in the omegaverse there’s a new, awful layer to “the talk” that teens get

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OK I REALLY LIKE HOW IT TURNED OUT-

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Hot take: Actual literary analysis requires at least as much skill as writing itself, with less obvious measures of whether or not you’re shit at it, and nobody is allowed to do any more god damn litcrit until they learn what the terms “show, don’t tell” and “pacing” mean.

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is that piece of media actually bad, or is it just not following the blueprint you projected onto it? is that work actually not good, or are you just demanding something from it that is absolutely antithetical to its themes, genre, tone, and narrative goal? is that story actually poorly written, or do you just dislike that it is not the specific things you wanted from it that it never set out to be, never was, and never is going to become? is it actually bad, or is it actually well-executed and you just dislike the story it chose to be because it isn't catering to your specific desires and expectations?

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American Gods thoughts

DNFing for good, like The Graveyard book

Criteria for Dnfing is if the book fails to interest me even after reading 58 pages/3 chapters

The book has a grim tone, and reminded me of Sandman with its grim and depressing philosophy

Felt like consuming grey clouds, i guess i like books with more plot and substance??

Bits i liked

The uhh coin trick imagery?

Free media recs!!

I like the idea of the new gods, and yeah them being young makes sense

Bits i didnt like:

Graphic descriptions of breasts(multiply by 3)

Bottomline:

Yeah this book failed to grab my attention because i really couldnt care less about what happens to shadow and wednesday and i dont really see the point in them going to wisconsin and do what? There?? Whats the point? Why did the book make me feel numb? I dont see the point in reading this so into the metaphorical dump it goes

(Im sure its a good book, just not something id ever pick up)

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thinking again about TvTropes and how it’s genuinely such an amazing resource for learning the mechanics of storytelling, honestly more so than a lot of formally taught literature classes

reasons for this:

basically TvTropes breaks down stories mechanically, using a perspective that’s not…ABOUT mechanics. Another way I like to put it, is that it’s an inductive, instead of deductive, approach to analyzing storytelling.

like in a literature or writing class you’re learning the elements that are part of the basic functioning of a story, so, character, plot, setting, et cetera. You’re learning the things that make a story a story, and why. Like, you learn what setting is, what defines it, and work from there to what makes it effective, and the range of ways it can be effective.

here’s the thing, though: everyone has some intuitive understanding of how stories work. if we didn’t, we couldn’t…understand stories.

TvTropes’s approach is bottom-up instead of top-down: instead of trying to exhaustively explore the broad, general elements of story, it identifies very small, specific elements, and explores the absolute shit out of how they fit, what they do, where they go, how they work.

Every TvTropes article is basically, “Here is a piece of a story that is part of many different stories. You have probably seen it before, but if not, here is a list of stories that use it, where it is, and what it’s doing in those stories. Here are some things it does. Here is why it is functionally different than other, similar story pieces. Here is some background on its origins and how audiences respond to it.”

all of this is BRILLIANT for a lot of reasons. one of the major ones is that the site has long lists of media that utilizes any given trope, ranging from classic literature to cartoons to video games to advertisements. the Iliad and Adventure Time ARE different things, but they are MADE OF the same stuff. And being able to study dozens of examples of a trope in action teaches you to see the common thread in what the trope does and why its specific characteristics let it do that

I love TvTropes because a great, renowned work of literature and a shitty, derivative YA novel will appear on the same list, because they’re Made Of The Same Stuff. And breaking down that mental barrier between them is good on its own for developing a mechanical understanding of storytelling.

But also? I think one of the biggest blessings of TvTropes’s commitment to cataloguing examples of tropes regardless of their “merit” or literary value or whatever…is that we get to see the full range of effectiveness or ineffectiveness of storytelling tools. Like, this is how you see what makes one book good and another book crappy. Tropes are Tools, and when you observe how a master craftsman uses a tool vs. a novice, you can break down not only what the tool is most effective for but how it is best used.

In fact? There are trope pages devoted to what happens when storytelling tools just unilaterally fail. e.g. Narm is when creators intend something to be frightening, but audiences find it hilarious instead.

On that note, TvTropes is also great in that its analysis of stories is very grounded in authors, audiences, and culture; it’s not solely focused on in-story elements. A lot of the trope pages are categories for audience responses to tropes, or for real-world occurrences that affected the storytelling, or just the human failings that creep into storytelling and affect it, like Early Installment Weirdness. There are categories for censorship-driven storytelling decisions. There are “lineages” of tropes that show how storytelling has changed over time, and how audience responses change as culture changes. Tropes like Draco in Leather Pants or Narm are catalogued because the audience reaction to a story is as much a part of that story—the story of that story?—as the “canon.”

like, storytelling is inextricable from context. it’s inextricable from how big the writers’ budget was, and how accepting of homophobia the audience was, and what was acceptable to be shown on film at the time. Tropes beget other tropes, one trope is exchanged for another, they are all linked. A Dead Horse Trope becomes an Undead Horse Trope, and sometimes it was a Dead Unicorn Trope all along. What was this work responding to? And all works are responding to something, whether they know it or not

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Felt like crowley was more fleshed out than A

imps reminded me of terry pratchett

tv script thoughts

Read the tv script the first time

Some things need to be worked out, like whether the movie actually captures the main message of good omens or not(that humans are neither good nor bad)

Madame tracy and adam-> i can accept a circumstance where adam is the caretaker, but the whole "only adam is responsible for choosing who lodges cuz of the Fish Lady incident" is a bit iffy. Maybe tell us what the fish incident was in the first place?(does not work as a good excuse to leave adam in charge of lodgings)

Aziracrow relationship= maybe make the relationship more playful bickering instead of one sided mockery of A?

Never knew id get adam x pepper, with anathema as older sis(is a good different)

I think i need to dissect this, and start writing every single gomens idea i ever had(wtac, hishe, and this ig)

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the office thoughts

the workplace seems toxic, can they get rid of the boss? He seems full of himself, thinks that hes funny when hes not, (yeah hes a jerk), called out and rebuffed pam's suggestions, doesnt listen to other people

is that an autism/adhd character??with the stereotypes??(at least he likes working there, even tho he got stuck in the jello prank)

Love triangle between fiance, pam and third straight brown hair? Or workplace friends??

YES PAM IS OUT!(except its for a stupid reason to fire someone!)(yes tell him pam)edit= no shes stll there cuz plot

I hope pam leaves and finds a better place to be a receptionist

Im only giving this 5 episodes chance because i had the urge to dnf it as soon as i put it on for the first time

Races are not the same as religion!

PLEASE FIRE THE BOSS!!!

Glasses guy whis on boss side also needs correction on his beliefs

Everyones just tolerating the boss , hes not even taking it seriously

The guy who cracked a joke of sitting in a circle got kicked out! Poor thing

GET RID OF THE BOSS!!!!! Honestly trying to start an intercultural war??!!

Yes! Slap the harassing boss!

Love triangle confirmed??!! Oh Come on i was giving them the benefit

Hold on healthcare episode? This i have to watch, see if i get insulted :D

Pfft the boss thinks hes a specialist hah!

Oh wow delegating to other people

Hes called dwight

leprosy being fake? Hah 😆

Jim and pam are awesome

See absolutely NO ONE CARES and are DONE with the boss

Anyway if there are people reading this theres tw "pfft that disease doesnt exist", "tw racism", "tw intentionally inciting fights"

Skipping to s2 to see if it gets better(source=reddit)

Maybe it gets better from s2 onwards???

Nope not for me

Not at all, didnt work for me cuz i tend to like plot and humor, or slice of life and humor, and i guess maybe some other office story is for me?

Dnf? Yes

An entire bunch of disk space cleared for good

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The Causal Chain And Why Your Story Needs It

The most obnoxious thing my writing teacher taught me every story needed, that I absolutely loathed studying in the moment and that only later, after months of resisting and fighting realized she was right, was something called the causal chain.

Simply put, the causal chain is the linked cause-and-effect that must logically connect every event, reaction, and beat that takes place in your story to the ones before and after.

The Causal Chain is exhausting to go through. It is infuriating when someone points out that an event or a character beat comes out of nowhere, unmoored from events around it.

It is profoundly necessary to learn and include because a cause-and-effect chain is what allows readers to follow your story logically which means they can start anticipating what happens next, which is what is required for a writer to be able to build suspense and cognitively engage the audience, to surprise them, and to not infuriate them with random coincidences that hurt or help the characters in order to clumsily advance the author's goals.

By all means, write your story as you want to write it in the first draft, and don't worry about this principle too much. This is an editing tool, not a first draft tool. But one of the first things you should do when retroactively begin preparing your story to be read by others is going step by step through each event and confirming that a previous event leads to it and that subsequent events are impacted by it on the page.

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descendants 4 thoughts

bits i liked

Hook(the part where he hides his face behind a tree branch prop)

Sword in the stone refs! Like the owl, the round table, merlins disorganization

The hatters kid, and the wonderland castle

The blonde captain of the soldiers, i wanna know more about him, hes just doing his job

Merlins office

Some of the songs

Cinderella family was the best

Bits i was uhh not a fan of

As i was typing this, how did Queen of hearts do a complete 360 personality?

Like, there was NO NEED for the time travelling to occur, if uliana gets frozen in the timeline cuz of touching the book, then there was no need of the time travelling arc , which means something ELSE occurred in the castlecoming dance which made Brigit go evil, gahhhh big plot hole here wth

Could have made uma more mentor like instead of college kid volunteer like

This story was in Reds pov, which is unreliable at best, because she kept complaining about how restrictive her mother is, but she has never gotten into trouble?? She wants to wear what she wants, but didnt undergo a costume change as soon as she was away from her moms influence? Seems to me that shes alright, minus the mom forcing her to order beheading(plus shes already doing what she likes, which is running around on roofrops playing spy)(thematic dissonance with the intro song and the reality behind her heritage)(gotta eat to stay alive? Shes a princess, hello?)

I liked the cinderella visit scene, it did a better job of showing her situation

Bottomline, its a good movie to watch, if you dont want to use your head. It was not meant for me, because i could not gnaw on it.

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Writing Notes: Point of View

Point of view (POV) - the position from which the events of a story are observed.

The author establishes point of view through the use of characters, dialogue, actions, setting, and events.

Authors rarely speak in their own voices. Instead, they assume a particular persona and adopt a "voice" that enables them to narrate their stories and novels. This voice is called point of view.

4 Common Points of View

1. Omniscient 2. Limited Omniscient:

Major character

Minor character

3. Objective 4. First Person:

Major character

Minor character

OMNISCIENT

The story is told in the third person ("he," "she," "it") by a narrator who knows everything about the characters, actions, and events.

The narrator is able to move in time and place, to shift from character to character, and to reveal or conceal as little or as much as he or she pleases.

This type of narrator is "all knowing."

Example from "Godfather Death:"

"He ought to have remembered his godfather's warning."

The narrator has unlimited knowledge, even knowing the mind of Death, and he comments on and evaluates the doctor as he is dying.

LIMITED OMNISCIENT

The story is also told in the third person, but only from the viewpoint of a single character, whether a major or minor one.

The author selects which character to see through, and the narrator is confined to knowing only the thoughts and actions of that character.

Such a character is the "lens" through which events pass in the story.

Example from Gustave Flaubert's Madame Bovary:

"Charles went upstairs to see the patient. He found him in bed, seating under blankets, his nightcap lying where he had flung it....The fracture was a simple one, without complications of any kind. Charles couldn't have wished for anything easier. Then he recalled his teachers' bedside manner in accident cases, and proceeded to cheer up his patient...."

It is only through Charlie's eyes that readers "see" and learn about the patient.

OBJECTIVE

The story is told in third person, but the narrator does not enter the mind of any character.

The narrator objectively describes events from the outside.

The reader is left to infer the character's inner thoughts and feelings.

The narrator knows which details to use to communicate deep meaning.

Example from Dashiell Hammett's the Maltese Falcon:

"Spade's thick fingers made a cigarette with deliberate care, sifting a measured quantity of tan flakes down into curved paper, spreading the flakes so that they lay equal at the ends with a slight depression in the middle...."

Readers must infer that Spade is deliberate, cool, efficient, and painstaking during a crisis; the author never uses those adjectives to describe Spade.

FIRST PERSON

The story is told in first person ("I"), through the thoughts and feelings of the narrator, not anyone else's.

What reaches the reader is subjective.

So, more important than whether the narrator is a major or minor character is the narrator's reliability.

An unreliable narrator can present a distorted picture of events; a reliable one can render events with accuracy.

Example from Aesop's Ant and the Grasshopper:

"Cold and hungry, I watched the ant tugging over the snow a piece of corn he had stored up last summer. My feelers twitched, and I was conscious of a tic in my left hind leg. Finally I could bear it no longer. 'Please, friend ant,' I asked, 'may I have a bit of your corn?"

Readers only know the thoughts and feelings of the grasshopper. They know nothing about what the ant thinks or how the ant feels.

Determining Point of View

The attitudes and opinions of a narrator aren't necessarily those of the author.

Don't confuse a character with the author.

To determine point of view, ask who the narrator is and what pronoun the author attaches to the narrator.

Also ask yourself what role, if any, the narrator plays.

By using a particular point of view, an author determines how much the narrator reveals about the characters.

If these writing notes help with your poem/story, do tag me. Or send me a link. I'd love to read them!