littleblueclown

[littleblueclown]

Someone on AO3 asked me for writing tips since they want to start writing fics for the first time. I kinda wound up typing out a big ol' eleven paragraph essay of advice but my sister said I should post here so more people can read my tips. So uhh if you're interested in some of the tips and advice I've got, you can read my reply below the cut!

I will definitely say planning is important. I've noticed that if I don't have a decent outline that'll take me from start to finish it's harder to actually write the whole thing and it often winds up an abandoned project - having it even more fully planned is preferable but I often have a few gaps where I'll have to figure out how to get from plot point C to D or whatever, which can be annoying to figure out down the line, hence I recommend getting it as fleshed out as possible first.

Write what you love, that's another big one. Start small if it's intimidating - just like, a oneshot, a scene that you think would be fun to see between some characters you love or something. You could always look up writing prompts if you need inspiration. And, of course, reading is a huge help! I can't imagine being a writer without having read plenty of things myself - and read with the mindset of writing too. Like, reading for enjoyment is great (though since I've been writing since I was like, 12 I think I technically always read with the writer's brain somewhat active LOL) but taking note of things you like about how others write as you read can be really helpful. Like artists using other art styles as inspiration!

Also keep an eye on things like punctuation, spelling, grammar, etc - I'm certainly not perfect at it, but if you make a lot of big errors it can really distract a reader. I like to use Grammarly to help point out mistakes that I missed, but a word of warning, it's not always accurate, so definitely don't just accept everything it says as correct. It mostly helps me to see areas that *might* be wrong so I can see whether or not something actually needs changed. One mistake I tend to see newer writers do a lot is failing to make new paragraphs where they should. So be sure to follow the P rule - new Person, Place, Perspective, Plot point, Point of view, or Period of time are all moments when you should be making a new paragraph. So read up on basic grammar/punctuation/capitalization/etc rules and maybe even look up common mistakes people make so you can keep an eye out for it in your own work!

A trick I've found handy to help with writing characters if you're having trouble keeping them in character is to do a character study. Look at what's happened to them, their personality, and write about the whole thing. From their perspective, preferably. Try to get in their head. What makes them tick? What makes them who they are? What events have shaped them?

When it comes to dialogue, I encourage reading the scenes out loud after you write them. Does it sound natural? Does it sound like something they wouldn't actually say? Reading what you've written out loud in general can help you catch mistakes or areas that don't flow right, and if you've got someone you trust to read to, definitely do that - they might point out areas that don't make sense to a third party reader but only made sense to you because you already knew what you meant.

Don't be afraid to use a thesaurus, but don't get crazy with it unless super wordy purple prose with extravagant language is the style you're aiming for LOL use it where it really counts! Not all synonyms have the same feeling and vibe so keep that in mind when deciding what words to use. And do NOT listen to people who say said is dead. If you try to use a descriptive dialogue tag (aka stuff like mumbled, shouted, cried, sighed, etc) for every sentence it's gonna start sounding super weird. Our eyes and brains tend to skip over "said” because it's so basic. So if you need to make it clear who is talking (and you do want to make it clear so people don't get lost in ten lines of back and forth dialogue while forgetting who is saying what) without trying to figure out a special way that person can talk or some action they can do while speaking just so you're not saying "said", don't worry about it. Said is not bad, it's very useful. Save the dialogue tags for when someone is talking in a specific manner that's important to the tone of the story. If they're upset, make it clear in their voice or mannerisms. If they're extra excited or really angry. Use dialogue tags where you actually have something to get across.

I also advise trying to show not tell. Like yeah, some things need to be outright said sometimes, but there's plenty of ways to show things. Don't say "he was mad" if you can say "his fingers curled, anger blooming in his chest". "Thinking of her dead father made her sad" could be "her eyes started to burn with tears at the very thought of her late father's passing". I also recommend avoiding the extensive character physical description all crammed into one or two paragraphs the moment you meet them fjkfkgkgk you can sprinkle in their appearance over time. In one sentence, you can use something like "her blue eyes met his" and then a paragraph later, "shoving her black hair behind her ears with a huff, she (etc)". Unless it's really important to a character, it's not necessary to know what their entire outfit looks like, you know? Unless it helps show who they are or really stands out. It might be good to mention if it makes it clear what they do for work without having to outright say it, or if it helps paint the picture of their personality or life style. But it's not always needed or important. Learning to cut out stuff that's not actually important to forwarding plot or character growth and things can be really challenging (I try and put those in a different document in case I can use them another time or at least draw inspiration from them) but it is good to eventually learn.

What else... Oh, action scenes, if you ever want to write those, know that the more detailed and descriptive you get, the slower the scene will *feel*. This is something that's really fun actually, once you start to get the hang of it. You can have part of the fight feel like it's flying by so fast, wham bam kick just by keeping it within a few sentences. And then you can draw it out a bit more using more descriptive words and actions for another part of the scene. It's neat to play with the timing of things using that method - which can apply to more than just action scenes, but I feel like it tends to be easier to notice during those.

Also, write literally anything down that you come up with and think, oh that's kind of fun! You might find a place for it somewhere eventually. Don't be afraid to write scenes out of order - you can always tweak them to fit later! I've got a separate document for each story I write that's basically just future scenes or lines I'd like to fit somewhere if I can. Don't think there's no point in writing something down just because it's only one sentence. If it's a sentence you like the sound of, it might come in handy later!

Most importantly, practice a lot and don't be afraid to write badly. Like, it's all just steps towards getting better! Everyone starts somewhere! You might suck at first and that's okay - I can't even begin to express how horrible and cringey my writing was when I first started LOL it was like the kind of fanfic materials you see people making fun of and mocking. But I loved writing so I kept doing it and over time I got better! Just like any craft, unfortunately, it takes time and effort and doing it repeatedly (regularity can certainly help - sometimes I feel rusty if I go long periods without writing a single thing). Writing when inspiration strikes is always great, but sometimes you'll find yourself completely without inspiration, and when that happens, sometimes you just gotta force yourself to put pen to paper or fingers to keys and do it anyway. You can always go back and revise and improve later, or rewrite the entire thing if you don't like it, but something is better than nothing. If you hate what you wrote, ask yourself why and look for what it is you want to improve.

I mean heck, I've been writing for, what, over a decade? And I write stuff all the time that I look at and go hhh yeah,,, not the proudest of that, I could do better, I HAVE done better, etc, so even if it's been a long time you'll probably have those feelings plenty, but I think that just comes with creative hobbies because I certainly feel that plenty about my art too LOL don't get too discouraged though. When you read something that makes you go man, I wish I could write like that :/ my stuff sucks in comparison :/ try to think about what it is that's so good about what you read. What it is that you'd love to emulate into your own stuff. Is it the descriptive terminology? Is it the plot? Munch on it and try to figure out how you can use it to improve rather than just get discouraged about your stuff.

That's all I can really think of at the moment as far as the kind of general, all-encompassing sort of advice goes + some extras I just feel like I've picked up over time that I don't see talked about a ton in general writing advice... But if you have any questions, feel free to reach out! I love writing and I love to see people get into the craft <3

[littleblueclown]

Not related to Chains of Corruption but it is LoZ related, so I figured I'd post it here!

For any Linked Universe fans, I wrote a little one shot on ao3 about the gang discussing what Wolfie gets up to when he's not with the Chain, much to Twilight's humiliation.

Where Does Wolfie Go? (link here)

[littleblueclown]

*holds hands with the gloom hands* haha stop trying to kill me that's not very nice

[littleblueclown]

If you close your eyes and listen close you can hear me temporarily morph into a bowl of Rice Krispies when I stretch

[littleblueclown]

Metal Sonic Reflections is an IDW mini comic that lives in my head rent free. It says so much with hardly any words and I could write an essay about it and so I'm gonna babble my analysis of all the pages about it here because I simply cannot shut up about this

Analysis/babble under the cut!

First of all, the first and second page already say so much.

We know Metal hates losing. You can see here how his attention is drawn by seeing himself on screen. He watches his defeat and seems to continue on unbothered, but then his fists clench.

Notice that it doesn't happen right away - the walking panel has him quite a distance from that screen now, and even then it's one panel later that he clenches his fists. He's mulling over his failure. Ruminating on it and thinking about it and getting more and more frustrated and angry as he does so. His whole posture changes in that third panel with how he leans forward, almost like he's angrily storming off.

The vat of metal virus catches his eye - hard to say why for sure. Maybe because it turns people into something kind of robot-like, and as a robot, he's curious about it (I know I would be). Maybe he's already had on his mind what's been happening to Sonic, and he just spotted the opportunity to test what's been eating at him.

Either way, he approaches, stares at it for a moment, then looks to the screen, watching how it is affecting Sonic. Infecting him. Metal Sonic believes he's the true Sonic, or at least, a better Sonic. It's hard to say exactly what that means to Metal (surely he knows Sonic can't turn into a giant dragon creature, but that didn't stop him from doing that in Heroes as long as it meant beating him and proving he was better lol) but he has always seemed to be so obsessed with that concept. What's really interesting to me here is that he glances back to see if anyone else is watching. Like he knows he shouldn't be doing this, or maybe even like he's embarrassed or ashamed that he's going to do this in the first place. Like he knows he'd be judged for doing this, viewed as ridiculous for the whole thing, or maybe even scolded for it, and yet he wants to do it anyway. He needs to do it.

When he goes to touch the metal virus, he hesitates. Like he's afraid. Is he afraid that he actually will get infected? That he'll be harming himself just to prove a point? Is he afraid that he won't be infected and it'll do the opposite of prove a point, and if he just went on about his day he would never know and could pretend he'd have been just as infected as Sonic was?

Either way, he steels himself. He's resolved to whatever this leads to - he seems straight up ready to succumb to the virus if that's what it takes to find a similarity between himself and Sonic. He's so different in so many ways and losing over and over, among many things, must only drive that point home. How can someone better, or even identical, only ever lose? There's gotta be something similar about them. He can't be an inferior robot copy. He just can't be.

So here he is, being rash, impulsive, and doing something that could be self-destructive and dangerous (ironically a lot like Sonic HAHA) and he touches the virus.

In that last panel, to me it looks like he's leaning forward a little. He almost looks excited? Crazy to be excited about possibly turning into a zombot but you can see where his priorities lie for sure with that. He'd possibly rather become a zombot than find another difference between him and his so-called copy.

But of course he's a robot and nothing happens. He keeps staring at his hand. That close up on his eyes followed by the silhouette with a white background just feels like chef's kiss to me, because we don't know exactly what's going through his head, but it's got him so messed up that in the next page, it's shown that he's completely zoned out. Maybe he's shocked because he firmly believed it would affect him. Maybe he's grieved because it's just one more piece of evidence that he's not Sonic and never will be - never can be. Maybe he's struggling to comprehend it in general - his programming says he's the true/better Sonic, so how could this have not worked?

Maybe it's a combination of all three, but either way, he's so lost in his thoughts that he straight up does not notice the portal lighting up the room, does not hear Starline approach, doesn't even hear him tell Metal to leave until he snaps his fingers directly in his face. He's a fine-tuned, well-made robot that should have incredibly fantastic sensors to allow him to act quickly and efficiently to any stimuli. Yet he didn't. Starline get close enough to do that, and the fact that Metal only noticed once he was snapping in his face says so much about how much this whole thing affected Metal. How lost in thought and feelings he was about the whole matter. It's gotta eat him up inside, how much everything contradicts what his programming tells him. He can never be the one thing he's supposed to be, a truer, better version of Sonic, and he can never do the one thing he's supposed to do, which is to defeat Sonic. Man I love Metal Sonic, he's such a tragedy.

[littleblueclown]

Geniunely I think about the dent remover thing you drew here sometimes like

It lives in my head a little

More goofy things I thought of while reading imagination_junkyard's fic, More Than a Few Loose Screws (x). None of these things are actual scenes; just silliness inspired by the actual events. The bit between Metal and Tails is similar to what happened, but it was super adorable, sweet, and wholesome in the fic.

The "dent remover" thing is based off of some commercial from 2007 (?) where a self checkout kept repeating "wart remover, wart remover, wart wart wart" or some crap. xD

[littleblueclown]

I might've gone through your metal sonic tag to hunt these down once I realized they'd be here

I know it's been a long time BUT THANKS AGAIN FOR THESE!!

Some drawings inspired by imagination_junkyard's fic, More Than a Few Loose Screws (x). And when I say inspired by, I mean only the first one is something that actually happened in the story. The other two are just silly dramatizations my brain told me to draw based on it. xD

[littleblueclown]

Sometimes I think about my first time experiencing a blood moon in botw

Now, I knew they existed, I knew what they did, I'd even seen part of the cutscene before when my sister played

I did not, however, know the effects leading up to it

So you can imagine me innocently chasing a flower across a river, hoping to get the Korok at the end of it, only to notice red flecks coming up from the ground and the world in general looking a bit weird. I'd thought maybe I was imagining things? But it got more intense and I wound up sprinting frantically towards the tower close by (I don't know what I thought that was going to do tbh) while screeching, "WHAT'S GOING ON?! WHAT'S HAPPENING?!" repeatedly in an increasingly loud and frantic tone.

The amount of relief I felt when the blood moon rises once more cutscene hit. Like OHH, that's what that was???

Geniunely don't know how my sister didn't lose it laughing at me as she watched the whole thing go down.

[littleblueclown]

Honestly there are actually so many funny outfits in general to put the chain (but especially warriors) in

The more I think about it the funnier it gets

He's already got the atrocious postman uniform so why not put him in more awful and ridiculous things

I know jojo said tri force heroes isn't canon to her legend but like just pretend with me for a second that it is and so legend has all the fits

Imagine, somehow, wars ending up in the cursed tights

[littleblueclown]

I know jojo said tri force heroes isn't canon to her legend but like just pretend with me for a second that it is and so legend has all the fits

Imagine, somehow, wars ending up in the cursed tights

[littleblueclown]

HOLY COW??? THANK YOU SO MUCH????? My day has started off SO awful so thank you SO much for this I really needed it 😭🙏🩵 she's so cuuuuute AAAAAA !!!!!!

For imagination_junkyard on ao3!

>> Context! <<

More Than a Few Loose Screws has brought me a stupid amount of joy this past year! It's been a lot of fun chatting with you in the comments. You seem like such a fun person and I wanted to doodle you a silly thing.

I based this critter off of Mira the Arctic Fox, who I peeped on your insta. >:3 Her body is striped like Mira's shirt and has a cloth-like texture, kinda making her like a plush toy. Her tail turns splits into feet in leggy-form, giving her this floofy, kinda Dr. Seuss-ish feet. Suits the overall accidental plush theme, I guess! I gave her a little Metal plush to torment. >u>

[littleblueclown]

BotW experiences, fanfic form (series)

I've been writing a series of fics based on my experiences in botw so far! That is to say, I just wrote 4 fics in less than 24 hours like an absolute maniac because the loz brain rot is so real rn

Fics within at this moment (titles are all links):

Ruins

Link doesn't think too much about the ruins spread across the world around him. He's got too many other things to think about as he explores this world so new and foreign to him. No, the ruins are just a place where he can sometimes find useful things, and aside from that, he doesn't care about them much at all.

Until he finds something specific and reality sets in.

Hateno

When Link visits Hateno Village for the first time, something about the place strikes him as just a little bit familiar... And yet there are so many unfamiliar things that it aches.

The People of Hateno

A small collection of four short stories about interacting with the different people of Hateno. Link meeting Sayge for the first time, Link's dealings with Manny, hunting deer for Dantz, and the consequences of reading Purah’s diary.

Likes and Dislikes

Link doesn't remember much, so he decides to keep track of what he likes and dislikes as he makes his way through this journey. There are lots of things he likes, and, of course, several things he doesn't like.

Including remembering. That, he hates the most.

[littleblueclown]

I desperately urge everyone to listen to Home by Cavetown while thinking about this boy because I did and this is what resulted from it

He'll be okay he just took a hard tumble and also doesn't remember that much of anything or about anyone and also has the weight of the world on his shoulders and also all his weapons break after like 5 attacks which is really annoying for him to deal with and also-

[littleblueclown]

Sonic ao3 fanfic masterlist

Includes mid and post forces, metal sonic centric, shadow ARK incident angst, movie!verse, and post-frontiers

the war is over and we are beginning

(sonic forces series)

"Worry Too Much" and "Six Months" have an overlapping of events, the first being from Tails' perspective and the latter from Sonic's.

Worry Too Much

The guilt that ate away when Sonic died in front of Tails barely goes away when it turns out Sonic is alive. Even after the battle is done and everyone is saved, self-doubt suffocates the kit as he wonders if Sonic blames him for what happened.

A much needed conversation between the two is had.

AKA some events of Forces from Tails' perspective, plus some of the emotional aftermath.

Six Months

What happened during the six months Sonic was locked up by Eggman during Sonic Forces? They said 'torture' but what exactly does that mean? Here's my take on it. (Sort of a Forces fix-it fic tbh)

Avoidance

When Tails sees Shadow, all he sees is Infinite's illusion of him, all he feels is fear.

His avoidance of Shadow is obvious, and something has to be done about it.

More Than a Few Loose Screws

When Sonic destroys one of Eggman's bases, Metal's systems get wiped by a strong energy surge. He sets out on a path of self discovery based on the singular memory he has left.

Reset

The ARK is under attack and every time Shadow dies, it all starts over. If only it reset to a moment where they’d have time to get to the escape pods before the invasion. But no, every time it started anew, the alarms were blaring and G.U.N. soldiers were already pouring through the ship like a swarm of angry hornets.

Through Thick and Thin

(movie!verse series)

Starting after the events of the second live action movie. In the series:

Still Waters Run Deep

When Wade makes an unexpected trip to San Francisco, he gets a little more than he bargained for in the form of a pink hedgehog.

Swimming Against the Tide

New enemies rise against not just the town of Green Hills, but the entire world. Can Sonic and his friends stop them before it's too late? (AKA my version of Sonic 3 before Sonic 3 even came out LOL)

Taking Time Off

After the world is saved, Shadow finds himself feeling unsettled and out of place. Maria wanted to explore the world with Shadow, so even though she's not here, he decides he ought to honor her wish - and maybe he'll find where he belongs in the process.

There's also optional one shots:

No Good

Wade has Tails come by to help fix his bike, but the kid is obviously feeling downhearted about something. Wade decides to try and help him out.

Dad Issues

Wade Whipple can't imagine how he could ever be a good dad. But maybe he can be enough.

am I laid to waste, now that you're not around?

The sensation of wrongness continued to itch under his skin though he couldn’t figure out why. Sonic ran off on solo adventures all the time - where was the harm in his friends doing the same? (post-frontiers)

[littleblueclown]

HE WAS A SKATER BOY SHE SAID SEE YOU LATER BOY

Local robot puts masking tape on his shoes to look cooler on his skateboard so he can one up his organic nemesis or smth idk (inspired by a bootleg metal plush photo taken by @ luigilover.tm on Instagram)

[littleblueclown]

POV you just asked Metal if he's ever gonna beat that level so he can move on in the game

[littleblueclown]

oh no he got u :(