#I've already started planning out the skeleton of things basically lol

[pigeonstab]

Me showing up in your inbox every other day to ask about the vampire and werewolf au lol

Are there people who know about vampires and werewolves and shifters? Like is it a known and normal thing or are they trying to keep it secret? If it is/was known would it be dangerous for them? Like people hunting them?

Also you said they know Killer’s been hurt before, what happened to him? :o

Also also do you have any ideas about what Killer and Cross are studying at college?

AND— how are you?? I hope you’re having a nice day \(^-^)/

Thank u!!! Very nice getting these hehe

1) This is like THE world building element I wasn't really sure about. I've thought about it and I think like, people know about vampires and werewolves and there are still some modern day hunters but they're a minority? (In a drawing I made you can see Killer has a AHAB (all hunters are bastards) sticker lol). I really don't know yet. I think society accepting them is like out of the question lol, you lose a lot of adversity and interest doing that I think. It's also just sort of weird to me? Idk that's just not a story I'd like to read.

Maybe it's more of a 'we saw a werewolf attack in this little village outback' and people are worried and stuff but it's always out in the middle of nowhere and it's not happening to them so they don't really give it that much thought. It's the news you see horrors all the time right? Mostly they just... Don't think anyone in their college classes would even be a vampire/werewolf. Maybe there aren't that many creatures out in the city at all. Like a hiding in plain sight thing. i think that's something I like more already. It's probably not going to be a huge part of the story at all. Maybe a few mentions that can leave the characters feeling like outsiders or a little anxious but not a major plot point y'know?

2) I Imagine someone who's like twenty something and already a vampire hasn't had the best circumstances lol. He definitely was not turned with his consent, I haven't really thought of specifics yet but when Nightmare found him he was not laughing and being cute. He was closed off and depressed. Didn't talk much at all. (He's better now y'all

3) wahhh I haven't thought about that! That's a good question. I don't... Actually know how American colleges work but I think Killer would probably be in like history or english? Cross maybe in computer science? Maybe audio-visual stuff. Is that cinematography? Idk what it's called. Maybe they can be like. History of arts+cinematography so they have classes together maybe. Again this is without knowledge of how any of it works. I'll get back to you on that.

I'm good! Pretty tired. College maybe isn't.......... As cool.... As I first thought....... But it's chill! some of my classes are still super interesting and I love learning. And anyway I have plans and ideas and stuff on the side that make me happy! And my Kitty is drooling on me so really what more can I ask for?

And how are youuuu?

[time-to-write-and-suffer]

Hi Eff! I've been following your blog for a while and I love hearing about your writing process and your characters; they all seem great. I am really curious as to your process on outlining your wips and how you turn your ideas into a plot, because I love writing, but I get so many ideas that I want to write about that I end up losing focus of the actual point of the story if that makes sense. Keep up the great work! You're doing great and I can't wait to see more of your wips! <33

Oh man, I relate do this so hard!

Most of my ideas die on the initial brainstorming stage, it's very rare that one gets through to outlining or writing, and I finish things only once in a blue moon, so I can't say I'm the right person to give advice on this, lol, though I'm flattered you still asked me.

To me it sounds like you're having issues with losing focus when you're already in the middle of writing something? So that's what I'll try to respond to, sorry if you meant something else!

I used to have a lot of problems finishing WIPs because I'd start hot and strong and then it fizzled out when I'd realize that I'm just writing shit without knowing where it's going. I wrote like 80k of the first draft of Princess Machine (it was so cursed), and I still thought I'd only written maybe half of it at that point? This basically taught me that I'm not a pantser and work better as a planner/plotter, at least in some aspects. I think figuring out where you exist on the pantser/planner spectrum could help a lot, because what gets me writing is usually knowing a beginning and an end, and pantsing only results in sadness and lots of first chapters being abandoned forever, so maybe you're similar?

Once you have a beginning and an end, outlining becomes a process of filling that time between those two points. Your genre can help decide how it gets filled and what sort of scenes and catalysts you have.

For me, I ask myself things like "what am I trying to say?" or "what would I want to read?" If I have a specific genre I'm working on, like romance, then it's easier to know where I'm going. I write out the most basic plot structure and then slap on the details, the fun concepts, the neat worldbuilding ideas in a later draft. For a planner, that's basically like building a skeleton, a frame for your house, and then putting the rest of it that frame. When I'm only starting out a WIP, I try to keep the plan as simple and mechanical as I can, literally just concerned with the plot progression and movement. Character arcs and symbolism and themes will come after, or maybe while you're writing, and will usually only solidify in your second draft at the earliest, so there's no point in wasting time on them now, you'll just get overwhelmed and distracted by details. Keep them in mind or write them down if you come up with something you think is neat, but don't try to get everything right or put every concept in from the start, because you'll just end up losing focus on getting to the end. (I sometimes do a thing where, if I come up with something good while writing but it requires rewrites, I just pretend that I've already done the rewrites from that point on and include the new concept as if it was always there. That's more of a pantser thing, but everyone has their own approach to their writing method, so this is me saying you don't need to adhere strictly to either one and it's ok to do things sloppily, since you can fix stuff later on once you have something to fix.)

So basically if you have an idea or a protag and you have some inciting incident that you're eager to start writing, you could try taking a step back and thinking "but where does this go? how do I want to end this?" and once you have an answer, you can slap that ending down and start trying to connect the two together into what some might call a plot, without the distractions of nebulous shiny things.

It will inevitably change and morph and become different and that's fine, nothing is set in stone with art, but having an end goal in mind might help you keep your focus and also help you figure out how you want to get there. It's like, uh, being adrift at sea and you're paddling in a random direction hoping for solid ground versus paddling toward a distant island. Like you're still struggling, but in one of them you're at least sure you'll get to shore. Ya know?

Hope any of this made sense and helps you figure it out! Good luck and thank you for the nice ask! <3