#i enjoyed this fantasy so much i wrote a blurb about it somewhere at some point even

[13beachesxx]

wanna go back to 2011 when i was lusting after cillian murphy and maybe 1 or 2 minor english indie alt band singers. life was simpler then

[ginnyzero]

Being Comfy in Your Writer Skin

I recently used the phrase “comfy in your writer skin” in response to a post by @the960writers. Being comfy in your writing skin is extremely important in your career as a writer and it’s something that you learn over time. In a nutshell, I was trying to convey being comfy in your writing skin is an author who is secure about themselves and their writing. Someone who is confident and willing to work on their writing, learn, and improve rather than someone who is arrogant.

If you’re comfy in your writer skin you know your craft and know that your craft is in a constant state of improvement. Each book/story is a new learning experience with new problems and new techniques to tackle. If you know your craft, you know the general guidelines, and which ones you can break, and which ones that you need to stick to because no one likes that holy batman where is the back button. (Passive voice, I’m looking at you. Grammar, I’m looking at you. Decent formatting, I’m looking at you.)

And if you know your guidelines and rules, you most likely know your audience. You know what the readers of your type of books like to read. And you know that not every reader is going to be down with what you’ve written and that’s okay. You might not know how to find the readers you need and want, but you know they’re out there somewhere. (Marketing is a different skill.)

I know that I’m looking most likely for a female reader who loves science fiction and fantasy, is into fan fiction, enjoys comic books and action movies that revolve around the characters rather than aliens invading or being attacked by zombies. (This is by the way called upmarket book club style fiction.)

This means, you don’t talk down about readers in general. You don’t whine and moan about ‘where are they’ and concurrently do no marketing. If your books aren’t selling, you don’t moan about ‘maybe this isn’t for me.’ You, as an author, realize there are things that are simply out of your control. You can’t make readers read your story, click the AO3 link, buy your book. You can’t force them to write a review or leave likes and kudos. All you can do is put it out there, do as much marketing as you can afford, and pray it find the right person at the right time. It’s a lot of luck.

And yeah, there will be down days where you feel like you’re a hack and you want what you think every other author is getting. You don’t know what the other authors are actually getting in sales. You only see what you perceive what they’re getting as sales unless they’re broadcasting each one. (Some do. Most don’t.) So, your perception might be wrong!

It’s okay to feel down. As long as you don’t wallow and keep on writing. Because the only way to gain an audience is to keep going.

Because not everyone is going to like your work, you’re going to receive criticism. If you’re comfy in your writer skin, you’ll be able to parse out the good criticism from the bad. It may sting. But you aren’t going to throw a tantrum over it. There might be reader biases at play. Or, you may need to improve.

Writing is difficult work juggling a lot of different pieces like dialog, characterization, world building, tenses, description, plot structure, and giving people valid grievances (aka conflict and stakes.) And you’re trying to put these together to make the Eiffel Tower and sometimes you end up with the leaning tower of Jenga and that happens. That’s what editing is for! And if you publish your book too soon, there are people who are going to tell other readers “if you don’t like passive voice, this book isn’t for you.”  Etc. So on. So forth.

As a reader, passive voice and no compelling characters with conflicts within the first chapter are the most common issues I see when reading indie books. (Indie books aren’t fanfic. I’m not invested in these characters. I need to be invested quickly. I give five chapters. Many readers give less.)

If you’re comfy in your writer skin and you keep getting rejections or bad reviews of your books, you’re willing to google or go to youtube and do the research on why you might be getting rejections and bad reviews! It may not actually be your writing or writing style. It might be that your genre is dead on arrival to the publishing world. It might be that your story concept is overdone and the agent is tired of it. It might be that your book is simply not marketable as written. Agents are readers too. And the reasons agents stop reading your books are the same reasons why readers stop reading your books.

(Having written a dead on arrival genre and queried it, this is frustrating beyond all reason because they just won’t tell you that. No. It’s “This isn’t for me.” I’d rather have like 3 form letters. “This genre is dead on arrival.” “This book is too long.” And “this book is not for me.”)

I get ‘bad’ reviews. (I try not to read them really. That’s why I have a best friend writer bestie to read them for me and tell me the highlights.) I get criticism in ‘good’ reviews. (I also try not to read them.) These reviews aren’t for me, the author. They’re for other readers. I can’t/won’t change the book that is published when I can and am writing the next book! (It is very easy to get stuck in a perfectionist writer loop.)

If you’re comfy in your writer skin, you will sit down with traditionally published books and figure out their voice (always active,) and how they write blurbs, look at the composition of book covers, and analyze the plot structure, and why are these characters relatable. (There is a certain alchemy to this that takes practice.) While there’s no shame in asking questions if you can’t find the information on your own, being comfy in your writing skin means you go looking for it on your own first.

Because you want to know, you’re driving yourself to improve and are willing to put in the work without prompting. It is no one else’s job to teach you, unless you’re at Uni and they’re being paid to do so. Don’t expect anyone to teach you for free.

Read the first chapters/openings of your favorite books. Look for what they have in common. Emulate!

There are plenty of kind people out there that are willing to help and have written (often contradictory) guidelines. Find the guidelines that work for you. Those are your readers/agents. If you sit down with books you love and book covers you love and really look at them and analyze why you love them, you’re going to be two steps ahead of everyone else.

The same can be said of books you don’t like or genres you’re tired of. Why are you tired of it? What can be done to make you less tired of it? What do you want to see in that genre? Are you capable of writing it? And so on and so forth. (I wrote my werewolf urban fantasy style books as a response to everything I didn’t like about werewolves and what I was tired of seeing in published urban fantasy books. Petty, maybe. Fun. Yes.)

Things outside your control are going to constantly give you reasons to feel insecure about your writing. And the only way to beat those things out of your control internally is to learn your craft, know your audience, and continue to write. As well as having low expectations, there are thousands of stories I can read for free on AO3, so your book better be the most polished and stellar thing if you want me to read and more importantly to review it.

People simply do not have time/emotional energy to waste.

Being comfy in your writing skin, being secure as a writer takes time and exposure to the writing community at large (fanfiction or original, doesn’t really matter.) While you need to know what other people are doing, you can’t let it affect what you’re doing in the long run. (You read other people‘s fanfics to know the trends. Same in for books. How can you follow/buck/subvert the trends/tropes of your genre if you don’t know it to begin with?) And if you’re thinking, “This sounds a lot like self-awareness and psychoanalysis” then, you’re not entirely wrong.

Outside validation is nice and often very needed. However, it’s never going to be enough to make you feel secure. The only way you’ll feel secure and comfy is if have a solid foundation on the inside of knowing your craft and being willing to listen and learn.

Once you’re comfy in your writing skin, lots of things will become easier and open up for you. You’ll be able to work with editors and other writers. You won’t worry about credit or having control of every detail. You know what you do well and you’ll be able to focus on doing that rather than having to micromanage the entire process. Criticism, or other people with similar ideas won’t call for emotional investment because there’s enough room for everyone!

Okay, this has gotten long. I hope it helps someone. Happy writing!

[overthinkingfeathers]

@hollyand-writes tagged me in the writer process meme (thanks!), so let’s get to it. Even though Hellbeast 2 managed to briefly break my keyboard partway through this, so presumably he’s trying to prevent some kind of terrible, meme related catastrophe. 

Short stories, novels, or poems?

Short stories, short stories, short stories. I have no patience to write anything longer than a brief one shot these days. I occasionally dabble in poetry, and I’ve written longer form things in the distant past. 

What genre do you prefer reading?

At this point, I’m pretty sure I read fanfic the most. Outside of that, I find it’s difficult for me to enjoy any one genre; I want to like fantasy and mystery and horror, but picking books up randomly within genres doesn’t tend to work out for me. I’ll be like this looks interesting! based on the cover and blurb, and then two chapters in it’s all boob plate sexy bathing, and I’m done. 

What genre do you prefer writing?

Does fanfic count? Look, I’m a lazy writer. I don’t want to world build. I enjoy some parts of it, but the overall scale is more than I want to deal with. I want to make a cool looking map, not actually think about how rivers work. Also, I enjoy writing one shots, and that really works best with characters and settings people are already familiar with. 

If I have to pick a different genre, unreality. You can’t argue the rules of reality when reality isn’t the same. 

Are you a planner or a write-as-I-go kind of person?

Write as I go, mostly. I usually have a rough idea of what I want - usually a few specific sentences, an overall plot - but I don’t make outlines or anything like that. My most well received fics have always been the ones where I do 0 planning and haven’t even considered writing them until that day. 

What music do you listen to while writing?

I don’t have any specific playlists or even a consistent stance on music while writing. Sometimes I just keep whatever I’m looping in the background going, sometimes I turn it off entirely. Once I tried using one of those ambient setting playlists but got distracted by it instead. 

Fave books/movies?

Books-wise, I love The Hogfather and Good Omens. Movies is a little harder, because I legitimately forget most movies within two weeks, but Constantine is my go-to (possibly mainly for the angel and demon depictions, but that’s not the point). 

Any current WIPs?

My endlessly in limbo Merribela one, Sten directly after becoming Arishok, Mahariel visiting Merrill post DA2, Mahariel and the one time she tried blood magic (without being a mage)... My WIPs are numerous and doomed to never be released. 

If someone were to make a cartoon out of you, what would your standard outfit be? 

A cute dress and black flats outside of work, scrubs and sneakers inside. 

Create a character description for yourself:

Moving on, I considered the position of my breasts. Women would never die of jealousy, but the men didn’t seem to dislike them. 

CURED? Social anxiety claimant wears THIS in public! [12 Photos]  (The photos are all me, in floral, paint spattered jeggings, dragging improbably large weeds and rogue tree branches around the yard. Half of my hair is in a ponytail so off center that it’s basically a pigtail, but rather than commit, the other half is nominally held back by a bobby pin. Mosquitos loom. A sapling conks me on the shoulder.) 

In seriousness, a wash. Dress that suggests going somewhere nice but with untamed hair and no makeup that suggests staying home. Soft spoken and polite but prone to swearing and absolutely confrontational when pushed. Comes across hyper competent and intelligent but actually only remembers things to keep out of trouble and is completely forgetful about everything else. 

Do you like incorporating people you actually know into your writing?

Nooooo. I am super no about that. I generally try to not even know who voices the characters in games I play, because that means there is a real person attached to them (in a way, even though I mean obviously there always is - even without a voice, someone(s) wrote them), and I cannot do anything that even remotely veers into real person fic. And that’s for people that I know only as a concept, a theory of personality based on public appearances. A person I actually know? Jesus fuck no. 

Are you kill-happy with characters? 

Nope. I want them all to be happy. If a character dies in canon, they’ll probably stay dead in my writing, but I usually don’t write much about that. 

Coffee or tea while writing?

Neither. Soda all the way. 

Slow or fast writer?

Fast typer who occasionally gets caught up on a specific line and will stop for a while to rework it. I also works in spurts; I’ll go months at a time without publishing anything, then abruptly write and share three things within two weeks. 

Where/who/what do you find inspiration from?

For actual inspiration, recent personal experiences, mostly. It’s not necessarily always obvious what did it though (the Mahariel talking to Zevran about why he lived fic, for instance, came from a night I spent at a campfire in the mountains, because the embers and the smoke were things I hadn’t experienced in a long time, but you wouldn’t know that).

Otherwise, prompts mostly. Lazy lazy, prefer to have a premade idea (or sentence or feeling or whatever) to spark an actual idea.  

If you were put into a fantasy world, what would you be? 

I mean, probably dead. Confrontational dumbfuck with extremely poor eyesight walks directly into dragon attacking town while shouting profanities, promptly gets incinerated. 

Most fave book cliche? Least fave book cliche?

Yay equally competent characters caring for each other and falling in love. Boo heavy sexualization. 

Fave scenes to write?

I actually prefer writing dialogue. I usually end up writing it first, because it flows much more naturally for me, and then going back and filling in around it. 

Most productive time of day for writing?

I would love to say night, because that’s when I’m awake 95% of the time, but I feel like most of my fics are written between like 8AM to 12PM, bleary eyed and exhausted. 

Reason for writing:

Words fun. Explore new concepts. Flesh out scenes that can’t make it into a necessarily shortened game. Create art without having to draw, which I personally suck at. 

I have no idea how many people I’m actually supposed to tag, nor do I remember exactly who hollyand tagged, so a random sampling of people who can do this if they want: @carabas, @mikkeneko, @thejourneymaninn, @emberkeelty, and @deviantdragons. 

[gettinziggywithit]

God, I think I finally got this little blurb written after initially having the idea in like May? >_< This is based on @thebananafrappe and @azulandrojo‘s horrifyingly beautiful creation, Axetale along with @mercy-monster‘s fantastic drawings crossed over with Repo! the Genetic Opera’s song, Legal Assassin.

I shared the idea with Banana and she wrote her take on it, which is fantastic btw, go read it. She beat me to the punch with some details, so if you see similarties, creative minds think alike sometimes? I tried to keep to the lore the creators made for this world, so if there’s something that doesn’t jive, write it off as creative liberties. 

Enjoy part 1! 

Assassin….                     Butcher….

                      Murderer....

      Monster….

             sans…                 Demon….

Assassin….       Monster….                Butcher...

                  Murderer….      sans….

Monster….                                        Demon….

MURDERERASSASSINDEMONBUTCHERKILLER….sans….

sans. sans. DAD!

The snow blew in from the open door haphazardly, the wind fierce enough to chill someone, even a skeleton, down to the bone.

Sans hadn’t moved from in front of the entryway since Aliza ran out the door. He hadn’t meant to lash out at her, his own daughter. She didn’t know the simple locket she held in her hand was so precious to him. No one, not even Papyrus was allowed to hold it. It was his and his alone.

He slowly walked over to where she dropped it and cradled it in his cracked and worn fingers. He clicked it open and the fractured image of his beloved filled his two toned vision. The ever present smile he wore on his face stretched a little wider, comforted by her loving gaze. In a moment of clarity he looked towards the open door to see the bones he sent shooting wildly still embedded in it and the surrounding wall. A splash of blood covered one of them and silently dripped to the floor.

“Aliza…”

Where did our daughter go? It's me she must escape. My burdens I can't erase. The mother I might have saved.

He stared at the dark, snowy landscape just beyond the door for some time more before snapping the locket shut. His Frisk was gone...and now Aliza had fled. He couldn’t lose her, not when she was the only thing that kept him tethered to the real world. What was real anyway now? The Hunger had taken everyone and there was very little hope that the Underground would ever recover from such a disease.

Assassin...Murderer...Monster...

The whispers never left him be. Always in the back of his mind, they tormented him relentlessly.

Sans turned back and crept to the fireplace and moved one of the items on the mantelpiece to the side and an audible click sounded. Slowly, the fireplace moved to the side, the rusty gears grinding loudly. He placed the locket around his neck where it belonged and began a slow descent into the darkness.

At the bottom, he palmed an orb shaped indention on the wall and one by one, sickly lights began to manifest. What was once a place of knowledge and science and the odd ketchup bottle littering the floor, was now a dusty crypt of distant memories. Little knick knacks and photographs lined the countertops in mad disarray along with a single portrait of his beloved Frisk on the wall at the end.

A small striped sweater dress was carefully folded at its base and sans delicately ran his fingertips over the soft material. He gripped the material gently and brought it to his face, her faint scent filling his nasal cavity. He placed the dress back in its spot and smoothed it out, keeping it like it was never touched to begin with.

His gaze slowly moved over to a dust covered floor length mirror. It was cracked from when he slammed his fist in a bout of anger and sadness when Frisk first left. Glass shards were permanently embedded into his hand because of it. He looked at his fractured self and for a split second he saw the ghostly image of Frisk behind him and he placed a hand on its cold exterior in sullen silence.

Frisk, I need you now. Look what I've become. The nightmare that she should fear Is the father you left alo~ne!

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Meanwhile, out in the forest...

Aliza’s lungs burned with exhaustion, but she couldn’t stop running. She had no idea the locket she found out by the dilapidated sentry station was her father’s, but was even more surprised to find her own mother and father from obviously better times staring at her as she clicked it open. Her fingers ran across the photo, tears stinging her eyes.

It was obvious this was her mother, and to see her father, whole and happy in her embrace was comforting. When she went to ask sans about it, he was adding logs to the small fire. She mentioned the locket and he stiffened and turned, his hand going to his chest, frantically grabbing for something.

His gaze landed on her hand that held the locket and his calm demeanor suddenly twisted into  unbridled rage. The right eye extinguished as his golden pupil crackled with energy as jagged bones manifested out of thin air and shot towards her. In a panic, she dropped the locket to shield herself as a bone grazed her cheek and she instantly felt pain. She saw no recognition in his glare as he stalked towards her and her fight or flight instinct was triggered. She wasn't about to fight the only kin she had left and chose to tear open the door and fled into the snowy forest.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The years roll by without you, Frisk. 15 years have come and gone. I’m raising our Aliza with the best intentions. But there is something I can't tell her. I am lost without you here! I am only living out a lie!

His hand slid from the mirror and he turned and paced the room, staring down at all of the trinkets and photos that held so much memory in them. A lone, dusty box was on the end of the tables and he brushed the dust gently away and lifted the lid. Inside were homemade gifts from some of the Underground residents to him and Frisk. Many of the items were baby themed as Frisk’s pregnancy was much anticipated before she was forced above ground.

There were tiny cooking gloves from Papyrus, a small recipe book from Queen Toriel, a small toy spear from Undyne who was more than ready to train a small baby right out the womb much to his and Frisk’s uneasiness. Alphys had chipped in one of her fantasy mangas, Napstablook quietly left a pair of headphones, and Mettaton had so graciously given the two of them TONS of baby clothing, with his brand name all over them, of course. And lastly, from his dearest friend, Grillby, a beautiful glass baby bottle handcrafted from his own fire with a faded sticky note that still read, “free of charge”

Tears formed in his one good eye as he rummaged through to the bottom where he found his own gift to Frisk, the tiny pink slippers that matched his own set he once wore. He held them close as the tears flowed and dripped silently onto them as he mourned the birth of his child he was unable to see.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. He was so close to finally having his happy ending, free from the turmoils of the resets, the countless deaths, and was relieved to finally be starting a family. Then it all went to Hell when that damned flower tore his entire world apart. He placed the slippers back into the box and replaced the lid, once again taking careful note to set it exactly where it had been before. He crept back to the portrait of his beloved and collapsed to the ground, grasping his head in his clawed hands, crying loudly.

After a few minutes of letting out the grief that had been steadily building, he whispered to himself, “it’s so hard, Frisk. It’s so hard not to just give up and waste away like the others. You’ve gone, Papyrus is…” He smiled weakly, “Papyrus is so good to Aliza. You’d be so happy to see how they get along. He treats her just like his own baby sister...but now I’ve frightened her away. What will happen to her? To us? ….I’m the monster I always knew myself to be…” He gazed back up to the portrait and his eyes went wide as a familiar voice whispered back to him.

“I love you, sans, but sometimes you are the biggest bonehead”

Sans smiled a little as he sniffed and wiped away some of his tears. Somewhere in what was left of his rational mind, he knew these whispers were not real, but just an evil aspect of the Hunger that ravaged his magic. But, still he continued to talk to it, as it gave him the only comfort he could find. “Yeah, yeah Frisk, I know you must find this humerus, but…” His smile fell again, 

“...you’re not real.”

He needed to get a grip and start coming to terms with Frisk’s death, no matter how big the hurt it put him through. The air was silent before a tiny whisper echoed through his skull, “I may not be anymore, but our daughter is real and she loves you very much.”

He got to his feet, eyes blazing as he angrily pointed a finger at the portrait, “she doesn’t even know what happened! What I’ve done, the blood I’ve shed! I just...I just want what’s best for her. I don’t want her to suffer the same fate as us..as you did!” The portrait remained unmoved and he started to cry again, his eyes dimming till nothing remained the but the deep, dark sockets and he clutched his locket. “I can’t do it, Frisk. It hurts too much to see you in her face, her voice, hell, she’s even got your same stubborn streak.” He sniffed and rubbed the dirty tears from his face.

Aliza can never leave. She is my everything. Nothing can bring you back Aliza is all I have!

“Heh, tibia honest, maybe it’s my stubborness that she has. She doesn’t take to the puns like you did and tells me to stop with all the dad jokes. I can’t help it, she’s my last line holding me together...without her, I’m nothing”

A cold, comforting veil wrapped around him almost like a hug. He swore he could feel Frisk’s arms around him once more, her warmth seeking the chill of his bones. He returned the ghostly hug as best as he could as he heard her faint whispers disappearing into the thin air. “She will not hate you, sans. She is your daughter as you are her father. Tell her everything and guide her as she grows with magic. When you see her, know that I’ll always be with you. That means forever, bonehead.”

He felt a phantom kiss press against his teeth and then the voice faded away, “Go now, Aliza needs you…”

Aliza’s screams pierced the silence and sans slowly came to his feet. His left hand outstretched as both pupils blazed to life to bring a weathered, but razor sharp axe into being. He flew up the stairs and as he dimmed the lights, he gave the portrait of his smiling Frisk one last look.

“See ya around, kid.”