#i'm so spoiled by scrivener....

[radiantcircle-if]

it's september 1! 😩

so i said that i planned to continue trying to write an average of 500 words a day for august, but then i spent the first half of the month feeling depressed because living alone is deceptively difficult 😭 so i gave up having a goal to focus on self-care. thankfully, i'm in a much better headspace 💕

so in august i think i added around 2,000 words story-wise (i didn't keep track in an attempt to not feel so bad about a tiny number 🫣), but i also decided to add a major choice into the first plot beat of chapter one and that set me back a little. i also did some coding and moved my draft from gdocs to scrivener for the corkboard and color coding. in the end, the rest of my writing has mostly been spent on exploring the shared backstory between mc and all the ROs.

definitely the most fun i had this month was answering all of the great asks sent to me. i have a few more asks half-answered in my drafts so uh i guess expect more essays, and once i have those finished, i'll answer the newer asks i've got. thank you for sending them in 🥰

(i'm saving the nsfw asks for after demo release, which i'm planning to be the full first chapter. plan is still fall! but probably late fall.)

for those curious about the change in the chapter, you still arrive home, reunite with your brother, and spend some time with one of your dads, and then that's where there's a shift. i moved the reminiscing for the next plot beat when you arrive at your family's solstice party. instead, i decided to throw in a really fun decision that i won't spoil 🥰

coding-wise, we've got a profile now. also made some more unnecessary design decisions like changing the font and adding more colors. i love vibrant colors, but i know they're annoying lmao i'll definitely include a black/white theme.

here's a preview of what i've got so far, though same caveat as before: any of this design could change between now and the demo. some of it already changed in the last month like twice. i am indecisive as hell when it comes to aesthetics...

(the name on the profile is from a french band called odezenne that i really like if you're looking for a random recommendation.)

plan for september is to go back to writing an average of 500 words a day at least for the first half of the month. unfortunately, i have to work on my dissertation as well and the academic year starts near the end of the month, which means i'll be busy with teaching/grad schooling again. that'll slow me down for sure, so i'm sorry in advance.

ok that's all. until next update 🙃

[gisellelx]

Every once in a while, I reread one of your stories and I can’t help but check your website for any updates for One Day 😇 Just curious: are you still working on it? No pressure whatsoever of course!! I love the way you portray Carlisle in that fic & am already super thankful for those first 8 or so chapters! Anyways, hope you are doing well & thanks for providing us with so many high-quality fics!

- Sannehale

Ah, this ask made my year. (Also now I realize your two blog names. Sneaky!)

Yes., yes I am. It was actually open on my laptop even as this ask came in. My prereader is asking about it too--I stopped giving her chapters because I was realizing that I got a lot of enjoyment out of sending them to her and that was filling enough void that it cut off my writing mojo. I'm thrilled though, that she can't see where it's going.

I'm stuck on chapter 16 (of likely 23-25) at the moment because a whole bunch of dominos have to fall in order to get to several reveals that are going to happen in very fast succession to move the story out of the second act. Also the second act/B story was hard because I am not a romance writer! 😆 It's not the genre I read and I'm not very good at writing it, but the middle of this story called for a romance and so there is one. Or so I hope.

I've also gone back and shored up some things that needed shoring--introduced a few of the characters who turned out to be important earlier on, and added another character in Bella's research mentor, Amy Jackson. I'm worried that I'm under-utilizing her at the moment.

This ask, though, prompted me to back out to the card view in the Scrivener project and I realize I actually did leave myself the breadcrumbs necessary to get myself out of here. Maybe I'll put my shoulder to the wheel and see what happens if I just follow the outline I laid out.

Anyway. I feel like I shouldn't end an ask without giving a little bit of some of the over 40,000 words that are written and not posted. So here's a tiny bit. This actually may not stay in, and in any event doesn't spoil anything--it's also the headcanon behind this chapter of Montage, though this scene was written years ago and my headcanon about Carlisle's name and his parents' names goes back over fifteen years now.

Of course, I knew a lot more than most people who were hunting down a relative from the 1600s. I clicked on the link for church records, and then delimited my search. If Carlisle was 367, that put him in 1644. That seemed reasonable. I filtered the results by the location, London, and then 1640 to 1650.

CULLEN, I typed. CARLISLE.

Zero hits. I frowned at my screen for a long moment and then practically slapped myself in the head. Of course there were no hits for Carlisle Cullen. Wasn’t this the very thing we’d been arguing about for months, now? I backspaced over the first name, and changed it to WILLIAM.

There were only three hits. Astonishing. I had assumed that Carlisle would have done his due diligence. He’d had hundreds of years to track this information down—why hadn’t he? William Cullen number one was in the baptismal records of St. Luke’s Catholic Church. He had been baptized in 1642. That would make him nearly the same age as Carlisle, no luck there. William Cullen number two, however, was on over seventy pages of documents—the records of St. James Aldgate, listed as parish pastor. And William Cullen number three almost caused my heart to stop.

Born 17 February 1644. Died 8 August 1667.

Twenty-three years old.

My heart, pounding, I clicked on the church register, enlarging it so that it filled my screen. The handwriting was old, faded and pixelated, but it was tidy and easy to read. Carlisle Cullen, it read, with William crammed onto the line before the first name, in the same handwriting but obviously a different pen—the lines were narrower, slanted slightly differently. Born and baptized on February 17, 1644. Father, William Cullen number 2. And mother…

My heart sped. There, in the same scrawly hand—his father’s hand, I realized, it must be—was written the words, Sarah Cullen (Crawforth).

A quick “Open in New Tab” allowed me to pull all the records from the 1600s from St. James Aldgate and in five minutes, I had a birth date of November 15, 1620. And a death date, which was of course expected, of February 17, 1644. But it was the annotation here which was breathtaking—in a different handwriting, written by the midwife? Some other member of the parish?

Died babe in arms.

Tears sprang to my eyes, and with blurry vision, on a hunch, I ran one last search. Then I printed the pages with the documents, shoved them in a folder, and headed for my car.

[porgthespacepenguin]

Hi!

It's the first time I decided to actually leave a comment on a authors work, still I was too anxious to leave it on ao3 so imagine my relief when I discovered you had a tumblr account!

As I said, I don't normally give any feedback after reading a story, not because I didn't enjoy it- I usually experience teh after fic emotional emotional swirl with no need to express it, and my language barrier is no help when it comes to actually trying to write how i felt about the story.

But "No Easy Way to the Stars" blew me away.

I was truly amazed by how one can create the story, I read it as often as I could for a few days straight, mostly giving up sleeping at all, just because you had me in suspense, you and the admirable Naegi world you created.

With that, I want to thank you wholeheartedly for taking me into Thier world, for letting me be among them with my spirit. And obviously, thank you for the happy end we received after everything we came through (yes I did cried a little, gasped horrified and screamed, who didn't?)

And with that, I have a question-

I know that the key to a good story is to know when to end it, but! Have you ever considered writing a little epilogue about Thier future? There are many possibilities that I would love to read about, and-

-Oh. I'm just so desperately not ready to let go of all of them :((

No matter what's your plan for the future, once again, thank you for everything. It was a pleasure to sink into this story without a single care in the world. I already read some of your other works, but, this one will always have a special place in my heart.

May the Mujur guide you!

PS: A big thank you for the author for letting me correct my ask, this time without any spoilers for the others. I didn't though ahead about it, mostly controlled by my emotions still wrapped around this amazing story, but that just confirms how deeply it can move you! If you didn't had a chance to read it yourself, I strongly recommend to go and try, and if you're reading it already, continue, it's a remarkable experience.

Remember to go spread some love and appreciation for the author!

Hi there friend!

Thank you so much for taking the time to amend your ask -- I sincerely appreciate it. Your kind words mean a great deal to me, so I'm super happy to be able to post them without spoiling future/current readers. 👏😁

To answer your question: I haven't ruled out writing an epilogue. That said, I haven't written anything yet (not even notes!), because I pretty much told the story I wanted to tell... and haven't really thought about what happens next.

I have, however, written a full outline and filled up a Scrivener file about my (maybe?) next story -- if I manage to climb out of my current writing slump, and get this new WIP written then... Perhaps it will be time to revisit the NEWTS universe again. :)

first I do need to beat the writer's block that's currently kicking my ass something fierce...

PS: thank you again, so much, for taking the time to read AND to send me this beautiful ask. ❤️

[bitbybitwrites]

🎶

xoxo MJ/kiwiana-writes

🎶 [Notes] Do you have any other WIP related things, like moodboards, character portraits, playlists or similar?

Yes! ( kind of long, so more info under the break)

IN GENERAL

I tend to write in Scrivener - which has this great notes section on the right hand side of where the body fo my text is kept. Lots of times when I go on "research rabbit holes" sometimes before I start writing or in the middle of writing (which is what happens more often 😂), I'll search out photos, music etc that make me think of the story or chapter. As I go I'll dump all these photos, links to inspirational items, etc there for easy access.

Scrivener also has a great sections specifically for places and character and template pages to fill out for locations/characters that I've used in the past. It makes it all easy to jot down/collect all that info in one place. I can copy and past pictures in there really easy - so its kind of like a mood board/inspiration board. And I don't have to go to a whole other document to look for the pictures etc if I need it - its all right there in easy reach

SPECIFIC WIP

For my Klaine fic - If I Can Make Your Heart My Home:

A fic which involves a cello player and a baker, I've got a playlist on youtube comprised of mood music for chapters and actual music included in the fic:

Also because this fic involves A LOT of food, I started a recipe wrap up for readers that I try to update every 3 chapters or so which includes quotes where I mention items, and then the recipies for them:

I LOVE moodboards on fics. I'm paired up with a lovely and talented fanartist (@datshitrandom ) for the fic who did this gorgeous moodboard for a chapter where the characters met up in Central Park in the Fall.

She also made the beautiful cover art for the fic which inspired the story in addition to a CD cover for my cello player and is creating a cookbook inspired by the fic - which I'm excited to see when its finished! ���💖

For my Klaine fic, Sanctuary :

(which is a fantasy!AU involving a medieval prince and an elf) I have this lovely artwork by @datshitrandom that serves as the inspiration for the characters. The art came first, along with the prompt by @justgleekout. The story is currently on hold till I finished the monster of the previous fic I mentioned above 😂.

And I have 2 RWRB fics brewing at the moment.

Notes, research, chapters outlined . . but very little written so far for them (not enough to post at the moment) . . but both are inspired by fan artwork.

Shaken, Not Stirred - inspired by this sketch by @noodles-and-tea

Curently Unnamed RWRB historical fic - inspired by these portraits by @stormtrooperjeff17004

Thanks @kiwiana-writes 💖💖

If you want to play: Random WIP Game

[asterhaze]

Writer Positivity Tag

As always, thank you @doublegoblin for the tag.

I am not good at being nice to myself so I appreciate the challenge.

What motivates you to write?

Well, I got tired of not being able to read the stories I wanted because they're stuck in my head. Then I found out that people think I have some sort of talent for it. So, I might as well write them myself and actually go through with it. Honestly, having the support system I have found is what motivates me to keep going.

A line/short snippet of your writing that you are most proud/happy of. If not maybe share a line of someone else's work you love (just please credit them)

Misery is a virus that soaks in through hidden places, laying a blanket of pain and suffering, until it spreads to others that try to fix it.

---

This was taken out of one of the drafts for my second book in my vampire series. I'm not sure if it will go back in since I have changed the direction for the book a little. I hope you enjoy it all the same.

Which OC makes you smile every time you think/talk about them and what are they like?

Glen. 100%.

In one of my drafts I wrote a conversation where Victoria, the vampire that turned Glen and his dearest friend, is explaining his tendencies to another vampire in their kindred. I think she says it best:

"Glen flirts with anyone he thinks will be embarrassed, angry, or interested. He flirts with me in one sentence and then calls me mom in the other. Flirting means nothing to him, it’s just how he talks. Glen is one of those guys you just have to walk up to and tell him what you’re thinking, what you want, why and how. Otherwise he assumes the stupidest things possible because lord knows what that boy thinks about. "

What process of writing do you enjoy the most?

Adding little details that seem irrelevant. Steering my audience in one direction, keeping them focused on something important, when equally important things have been standing in the doorway and watching them the whole time. I have a friend who reads every writing prompt answer I publish and when it all clicks in his head, I can see it. I can see that my genius and my talent have merged into writing that is as enjoyable for someone to read as it is for me to write.

What part of writing do you think you are the best at? (Yes stroke your own ego it's okay)

I want it to be the "dun dun dun" at the end of a short story but I'm pretty sure I'm actually the best at describing whimsical and fantastical things.

What is something in the writeblr community is most enjoyable?

That there is absolutely someone out there that desperately wants to read your genre. Do you write fanfiction? Tons of people on writeblr will love your stuff. Disgusting grotesque horror that makes stomachs churn or bowels evacuate? Heck, send me your way. I'd love to read it. I love that we all care about each other and understand the struggle and just want to be there for each other.

A writing tool/device you use that helps you with writing? (It could be speech to text, a writing program etc)

Scrivener is so amazing for world building. It is just built for my brain when it comes to doing complex things like the lineage of an alien race across 5 star systems or categorizing which race belongs to which galactic organization. But it costs money and I couldn't buy it outright. I also hated writing my actual manuscript on it.

Now I just use Google docs.

A piece of worldbuilding that you like in your own story? (It could be the magic system, a particular place in the story, a law etc)

That demons and fair folk (fairies) only call themselves that because humans and vampires do. It's a little frustrating that they're not called by their correct "titles" since names hold such importance for all of them but there is little point in arguing with those who are not truly immortal.

I also love the history of vampirism in my story but since it plays heavily into the plot of all three books, I can't say anything without spoiling it.

What piece of advice would you say to encourage others to write if they are having a rough patch?

Your first draft holds the heart and soul of your WIP. Even if all you get out of it is the ambience you're wanting to put in your final story. Your second draft holds the heart, soul, and bones of your WIP. After that you're just adding muscles, tissue, and the good-looking bits to make it easier for someone else to look at. If it takes 3 drafts then it takes 3. If it takes 5038402 drafts then it takes that many.

Remember that you have seen the process of building a story from the soul outwards and sometimes that process is disheartening. It isn't you. It's because things can be a little ugly without the good-looking bits and, unfortunately, the good-looking bits are the hardest to add.

Tag some people whose works you love/have been your biggest supporters

@doublegoblin - makes me happy you tag me in so many games and I love your writing.

@veetvoojagigthemagnificent - will kill me if I don't put them here.

[use-your-telescope]

So yesterday I was introduced to Scrivener after I mentioned how I needed to organize my google drive, so I bought it and I've spent the last two days plugging my current draft of the Trickster into the program, I have discovered I'm at over 225,000 words (over 125,000 of which need heavy editing), which, wow! I am farther along on this than I thought I was (I do not write things in order, can you tell?).

Also... FUCK. I HAVE TO MAKE THIS MAKE SENSE. And because this is all in my head, I can't bounce ideas off of anyone without spoiling things for them... the one person who knows the ins- and outs- of every little bit of this story is in the middle of moving -.- *commence feeling very overwhelmed*

[horizon-forbidden-sheesh]

Writing Process: Drafting

Sooooo, I started drafting Part 2 almost immediately after Part 1 concluded—and by now I've abandoned my Scrivener file entirely and am doing everything in Google Docs. (I talk about my switch from Scrivener to Google, here. ⚙️)

This time, I didn't have all the journal entries to work from, either. I was starting entirely from a blank slate. So at first, I just let myself WRITE. All the scenes I was most excited about, in no particular order, just to squeeze all the juice out.

I did that for like a month. And then, when I had about 15-20k words of random bits and bobs, I started to put them in order, and develop a through-line. That's where the draft docs & trackers came in.

✏️ Away from Scrivener, I needed some extra organizational tools to house my more general notes, research, & scraps. So, I built this li'l cutie with easy links to all my Google draft files, and included a brief summary that helped me greatly when plotting out the next set 10 chapters for Part 2:

*The chapter titles were updated as my outline changed, but the summaries did not! The descriptor for Chapter 20 is now, like, Chapter 23.

Keeping the descriptors short really helps me stay on task. If I have so much I need to cover in a chapter that it drops my formatting to the next line, I know I probably won't be able to cover everything in ~3,000-5,000 words.

✏️ Now, that's just the first page of the "Table of Contents." As of today, it's 13 pages long, and it also houses a TON of notes and working drafts and snippets of dialogue that I am saving for future, as-yet-unspecified chapters.

It's really messy—and sometimes when I'm out & about and my service is shit, I whip open my old Notes app, just to get a thought down. Here, have a taste of what's been rattling around in my brain...

Dialogue often starts as just the dialogue. I layer in tags & descriptors later, during the editing process. Most of the conversations I've written started with me talking to myself alone in the car, in the shower, or while washing dishes. (This works for copywriting too. My best ideas almost NEVER come to me while I'm sitting-down-looking-at-a-screen. Of course.)

For instance, that same conversation made it from the Notes app into a Google Doc and has since evolved to:

A li'l somethin-somethin from the upcoming Scorcher Season's Chapter 24 🔥

✏️ Once I've got all the major plot points written, I'll go back and write the "boring" stuff in chronological order. Okay, it's not really boring. It's just the filler information that helps a reader get from point A to point B, and I edit as I go. This ends up being like half of the total word count for the full 10 Chapters.

I'm currently hitting this point in Part 3—and you can see below that just writing my favorite parts here and there gets me pretty far on its own. Over the last 3 weeks, I've nearly exhausted my imagination developing the general story arc. Next up, I'll go back and start fleshing out each chapters one by one.

Wanna know something CRAZY?? Over the last ~year, I've noticed that I tend to write nonstop during Mercury Retrogrades. Like, I don't want to do anything else. I'm learning not to schedule any major projects for these ~3 week periods, so I don't blow my deadlines on account of being too obsessed with my fanfic to bother. 😅

After my decision to expand to 4 Parts total, my original ToC Doc got a bit... top heavy. (Also, I got really tired of manually calculating all the word counts.) So, instead of continuing in Docs, I added a tab to my spreadsheet:

*Hiding my chapter summaries so as not to spoil!! 😈

As you can see, I fill in the links as I create the draft docs... and I've already had to split a chapter in half due to scale, so the untitled <Scorcher 7> dropped to Part 4. I'm hopeful I won't have to split any more, so I can end strong on 'Ten Days.'

I don't usually start the finale until the very end, because I've learned that the wonderful comments I receive will sometimes give me extra ideas that I want to ensure make it into the fic!

✏️ Around the time I've fully completed the first 5 chapters, I'll give myself the green light to start posting. That leaves me just enough runway to finish out the rest of the season, and posting on a timeline helps keeps me motivated & accountable!

This is getting kinda long, so I'll write about Trackers & Timelines I've developed along the way in another post.

Thanks for being here! 🖤

xo, Sheesh.

[darling-archeron]

hello again I 🧑🏻‍🎄 have returned with a gift for youuu<3 (it’s another snippet hint hint😉)

I hope the past few weeks have been good for you, I had a wonderful trip hanging out with my friend but then proceeded to get very sick when I got home, missed work, wrote five essays for an online class in two days while unable to breathe and coughing nonstop, and am now staying with my family until sunday. eventful, to say the least.

I’m not able to work from my desktop while staying with my parents so while I don’t know exactly how far I am into your fic (I prefer scrivener to drive so I can’t check), I think it’s around 22k right now, and maybe a third of the way done? The beginning is done, and I’m into the meat of the story, which is always the most fun but also my biggest struggle. It’s easy to plot for me but harder to actually write, whereas endings are the opposite - harder to plot but they come like a breeze when I actually get there!

I also love making playlists for my writing projects - one random song off it is It Will Come Back by Hozier. The whole song is a Rhys mood, but the second verse in particular fits him so well. 

I know who I am when I’m alone/ I’m something else when I see you/ You don’t understand, you should never know/ How easy you are to need/ Don’t let me in with no intention to keep me Jesus Christ, don’t be kind to me/ Honey, don’t feed me, I will come back

Like that whole thing????? Literally him.

And for the snippet, some angst:

“It’s mine,” he whimpered, head turning back and forth again. Twigs tangled in his hair, scratching his cheek sharply enough that it left an immediate red line of irritation. “You can’t… you can’t take it. It’s mine.”

Anyway I hope you have a great next few days/weeks until I next message 😊

Hello again Santa! It's good to hear from you!! I'm so sorry you've been so sick, that sounds absolutely terrible. I hope you've taken time for yourself to recover. <333 Getting sick around the holidays/finals always adds to the stress.

My past few weeks have been pretty uneventful! Chipping away at some school projects mostly.

Also It Will Come Back is one of my favorite Hozier songs, and you're absolutely correct it is soooo Rhys. Actually, on the subject of Hozier, one of the highlights of the last few weeks for me was successfully getting Hozier tickets! I'm so incredibly hyped.

One song I've been associating with (angsty) Rhys lately is Meet Me in the Woods by Lord Huron!

I have seen what the darkness does Say goodbye to who I was I ain't never been away so long Don't look back, them days are gone Follow me into the endless night I can bring your fears to life Show me yours and I'll show you mine Meet me in the woods tonight

And 22k words so far?? Santa, you absolutely spoil me!! Just so you know, don't put too much pressure on yourself over word count! (I say this because I constantly put pressure on myself over word count haha) But I'm so excited for what this fic has in store.

I am absolutely screaming over this snippet!!! Is this Rhys? Who took something from him??? Why is he in the woods??? So many questions.

It's always good to hear from you! Take care of yourself, Santa! <33

[recurringwriter]

i hate google docs where's the word count where's the word count it should be at the bottom of the document at all times and it should reflect how many words i have selected i shouldn't have to go into a menu or click on a button it should be There at all times

[windandwater]

since at least 4 of you enjoy it when I show you these...here’s how it’s going

.... yeeeeeeeeeah

[here2bbtstrash]

4, 10, 17, 25, 32 and you know I have to do it because I am a poetry bitch: 40!!!!

AHHHHH so many~ ok here we goooooo 🫡

4. What’s a word that makes you go absolutely feral?

mmmm i feel like i never put this in anything bc it feels pretentious to just ~slip in~ somewhere but i'm quite a fan of the word halcyon 🥲

10. Has a piece of writing ever “haunted” you? Has your own writing haunted you? What does that mean to you?

i tend to purposefully try to read things that will "stick with me" in a good or fucked up way lmao so there are a lot of these. ocean vuong's on earth we're briefly gorgeous and kate elizabeth russell's my dark vanessa come to mind, as well as han kang's the vegetarian, mona awad's bunny, rufi thorpe's the knockout queen.... i have many!! sohn won-pyung's almond too, though i wouldn't exactly call it haunting? and i read it without any influence of bts tyvm... we just both have great taste 💅

the only thing that haunts me from my own writing are the grammatical errors that i miss despite my many proofreads 🤣

17. Talk to me about the minutiae of your current WIP. Tell me about the lore, the history, the detail, the things that won’t make it in the text.

MY CURRENT WIP IS LDOMLT SO LIKE...... i can't spoil things 😭 have i mentioned that i have a 48-card scrivener outline for the series that i have been meticulously building upon since april??? 🫠

oh! i have also done.... insanely stupid amounts of research on things that really don't matter because i'm a perfectionist, including but not limited to: restaurants/bars/clubs/food halls/parks in seoul, flights from seoul to LA and what economy/business/first class experiences are like, the grammys (obv) and the nomination process, IP/copyright law in korea, recording studio terminology, los angeles neighborhoods and travel time between them, hotel room layouts.....

basically, if something crops up even for a second in the story, there is a very good chance i obsessively researched on it for no reason 🤣

25. What is a weird, hyper-specific detail you know about one of your characters that is completely irrelevant to the story?

i decided not to put this in the story bc, tho it's not a big deal to me (or to jimin or yoongi lmfao) i thought some readers might overblow it and i just.... didn't want to deal with it but. in my mind LDOMLT yoongi was LDOMLT jimin's first kiss when he was like.... 15 lmao 🤭

32. What is a line from a poem/novel/fanfic etc that you return to from time and time again? How did you find it? What does it mean to you?

literally all of the poems in @gimmethatagustd 's paint me naked 😩 even tho she's a PMN anti now for some reason!!!!! we still love her 🫠

40. Please share a poem with me, I need it.

LOL does jai's poetry count 💀 the love song of j. alfred prufrock is always a fave let's just ignore eliot's antisemitism shall we ok thx

weird questions for writers ask game!!

[skiitter]

What wip are you most excited about? Which one is the hardest to write?

hmmmm. i'm very excited about "A Darker Blue" and "Violent Delights" just because i've put the most amount of work into them.

ADB is my dramione wartime seaside au fic. it's got lots of domestic angst, lasting injuries that have become (semi) permanent disabilities, and the cruel way that war can spoil the things you love. i love it a lot. i've been working on it for actual years and only in the last few months have i nailed down the bulk of it. it sits around 50k rn but it's only about half written? maybe less? they've barely hugged i think.

VD is just this insane shakarian serial killer/no reapers AU that i blitz wrote 60k for in less than two weeks. i left it alone for a very long time because i wasn't really feelin it but i'm back on my bullshit and i THINK i've got the plot worked out. its just SO MUCH mutual pining complete with Garrus and Shep being idiots and blaming cross-species miscommunication for everything. plus im a slut for detective procedurals and im employing 29 years of TV watching knowledge and its gr8.

in terms of hardest to write? probably the above two only because i hold myself to frankly insane standards that are impossible to reach and live the lie that the first draft must actually be the Most Perfect And Excellent Version of the work. i'm desperate to get these works finished, edited, and published but i'm holding myself back haha. somedays i just open the scrivener doc and glare at it for a while.

[plotlinehotline]

In the story I'm planning there is a decent sized group of main characters plus recurring characters who have smaller but important roles to play in moving the story forward. With such a large group, do you have any tips for how to organize and prioritize which characters get more scenes and development?

Developing and Organizing Character Arcs 

@suksi-vittuun

It’s as if you already knew what I was going to say! Yes, when you’re balancing a lot of characters, your first step is to make sure that each character is crucial to the plot and that their story arc is helping to move your plot forward. Since you included those key criteria in your ask, I’ll assume that you’ve already determined all this. 

When you’ve got a lot of characters, it’s assumed that each character (or set of characters) has their own story arc (and get ready; I use the word “arc” a million times in this post). The arc should be able to tell a complete story from beginning to end, but when combined with the other arcs in the novel will form a complete, complex narrative.

For example, if you’re familiar with Harry Potter, then you know his story arc in Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, but Draco Malfoy has his own story arc, that mostly happens “off-screen,” where he is plotting to murder Dumbledore. We see his story arc collide with Harry’s towards the end when Snape steps in to kill Dumbledore for Malfoy (and consequently, Snape has his own story arc too! He’s advising Dumbledore on what to do about his damaged hand, and he’s keeping an eye on Malfoy after making the Unbreakable Vow). 

Name any character that’s even briefly mentioned in a novel, and you could technically devise a story arc for that character that fills in the gaps of all the times they appear “on screen.”

1. So first things first - make a list of the characters you’re concerned about. If you’re unsure about any of them, go ahead and include them in this list. Then, for each character, write out as much of their story arc as you can. If there are uncertainties in any of the arcs, do your best to fill them in. 

There are lots of fun ways you can organize this, depending on the tools you have. If you’re more into free-hand, you can keep your arc notes in a journal, with tabs for each character (use post-it tabs, labeled/colored masking tape, or improvise ways of dividing the notebook). You might also use a binder and have actual dividers. Digitally, you could use separate Word documents, or if you have other writing software like Scrivener, you can use separate docs within your story file, and even have character profiles associated with each. 

Now earlier I threw out the terms “on-screen” and “off-screen” and it’s important to note the difference between them. Don’t limit your thinking to what’s actually on the page - think beyond what you intend to show scenically. Think of your novel as highlighting the key points of each arc; you still need to understand more than the key points. This knowledge helps you keep the narrative cohesive, and it helps you make additions and subtractions to the story as you need to (because chances are, during the editing process, you will make changes). 

So really elaborate when you write out your characters’ arcs. Throw in information that you think you may not even use, and be as detailed as you can. During this process, think about what each character wants, and what needs to happen in order to get what they want. If nothing else, determine what’s motivating each character as that will help drive the arc and you’ll be able to see it more vividly. 

Once you have this, then you can begin to think about actual “on-screen” content. 

2. Second, go through each arc and decide what you will actually write into the story. 

Now’s the time to decide between on-screen and off-screen content. Only you can decide what scenes to include in your story, but I would advise choosing scenes where something changes, whether this change is something literal (the character getting fired, let’s say) or whether the change is internal (the moment when the character decides to quit). Change may also be seen in relationships - when two characters fight or reconcile. Scenes that reveal some sort of backstory are also good, as are scenes where some important plot detail is discovered. 

Do your best to whittle down what you outlined in the character arc (the more characters you have, the harder you should try), but don’t be so selective that you lose the meat of the arc. A novel that only features a few scenes for each of twenty characters might work if the characters are compelling enough, but for a plot centric novel that’s trying to tell a complex narrative, you need more content with each character to get readers invested. Think about Stephen King’s books that feature large casts (It or The Stand), or Game of Thrones, or books by David Foster Wallace - they’re thick. If this is the kind of narrative you’re looking to tell, I’d recommend checking out any of those (a friend of mine also recommended Robert Jordan, especially if your novel is fantasy). 

Don’t forget the element of mystery as well. There are some details you’ll want to hide from the readers until the end, so allow yourself some room to exclude the parts of plot arcs that spoil your big reveals. In doing this, you’ll also be deciding what parts (if any) you do show - these will serve as hints, or foreshadowing of what ultimately happens.

Deciding what it is or isn’t important is one of those writer skills that you have to constantly work to master, but if you go into the process with a 50-100 word summary of your book, you can constantly go back to that summary and ask yourself if these things you’re considering including have anything to do with that summary. This will help you answer the question: Should this be in the novel?

Use your character arc docs to list these scenes that you want to include. You may end up with some “maybes” that you’re not sure about, so maybe highlight those in a different color, or put an asterisk or something beside them to remind yourself that you’re undecided. 

3. Put them all together.

Now, go to each arc document and copy all the scenes you selected and put them into one giant doc. Don’t worry about the order as you’re going - just get them all in one place first. Then, put the scenes in the order that you see them occurring. You can do this with paper/pen while referring to your screen, or perhaps a separate document, or you could even just copy and paste within the doc you’re already using to reorder them. 

Start with the obvious ones, and save any that could happen in multiple places until the very end. By the time you get to those scenes, you’ll have a better look at your story’s timeline and it might be easier to find potential places for these scenes. 

I also recommend choosing a unique color to either highlight or use as the text color for each character so you can visually see which characters have the most scenes. If you’re looking at your outline and you only see a couple of green spots, for instance, you can evaluate whether that character is getting enough screen time, or if they even need any. 

4. Consider the overlap (and how POV comes into play).

I’ve been avoiding this a little bit to avoid confusing everyone, but you also can’t forget that some arcs will overlap with one another, and you’ll have characters that will “pop up” in different arcs, or even be “missing” from their own arcs. The key is determining whose arc each scene is mostly contributing to. The scene may be advancing both arcs, but the idea is choosing whose arc it advances more. 

Going back to my earlier example, Harry and Malfoy each have their own arcs, but Harry often shows up in Malfoy’s and vice versa. Despite his “on-screen” absence, I would argue that the scenes where Malfoy fails to kill Dumbledore (the bewitchment of Katie Bell, and when Ron gets poisoned) do more to advance Malfoy’s arc than Harry’s, as Malfoy’s continued failures affect his mental state, as well as his position with the Death Eaters. So even though we don’t see Malfoy on-screen (since the perpetrator is meant to be a bit of a mystery, and because we’re from Harry’s POV), these scenes would be listed under Malfoy’s story arc.  

When it comes to prioritizing which characters you should develop more, that’s your choice. Once you’ve presented the bare minimum for each character, or the selected scenes that tell the story arc sufficiently, then you get to decide which ones we delve deeper into. There were enough scenes in Half Blood Prince to sufficiently tell Malfoy’s story arc, but if JKR had wanted to, she could have chosen to include scenes from Malfoy’s perspective to advance his development and garner more sympathy from readers. As a writer, she made the choice not to do this. As such, it’s your decision which characters you want in the spotlight and which you’d rather the reader be more distant from. 

So the bottom line here is that it’s not simple. Writing novels with big casts never is, so prepare yourself for the monumental task in front of you. Accept that you might be confused about what you’ve got going on quite frequently (and then reward yourself with candy anytime you feel like you actually have your shit together). Outlining is key, and hopefully this blog post helps you get closer to establishing an outline. 

5. Lastly, let your outline guide you, but don’t let it control you.

Once you’ve put all those scenes in a potential order, you’ll find that you may add new scenes from your arcs that you dismissed earlier (or ones you come up with later), and you also might delete ones that you used to think were super important. Allow yourself this freedom, because much of what you do in your draft is difficult to determine until you start writing it. 

Mia also just did a post on managing large casts of characters with a few tips that may be helpful to you when building your cast. We also have a few other posts on large casts if you want to check those out too. 

Good luck with your epic story!

-Rebekah

P.S. Thank you Megan for discussing this ask with me ;)

[sineala]

Hi Sine! I recently re-read your Star Trek AU--which is BRILLIANT--and I noticed that it's got a pretty complex plot. Then I thought about it, and a lot of your fics have multiple things going on in them at once. I think Living On Your Breath has something like four plots: Steve's personal, Tony's personal, the villains, and then Carol&Wanda's. Plot complexity is something I'm trying to get better at, so I thought I'd ask how you come up with and manage everything! Thanks for writing!

Thanks for asking! I had to think about this for a bit, but I came up with a few rough guidelines for how I handle plot. I’m putting this under a read more because (1) I am wordy, and (2) I don’t want to spoil either of those stories for anyone who hasn’t read them.

A disclaimer: I am entirely self-taught in that I have never had a writing class in my life and I don’t really do well with those writing help books. So basically what I have learned has been picked up by reading a lot of books, reading a lot of fanfic, and writing a lot.

This is not so much a plot tip as General Writing Advice, but there’s an Ira Glass quotation that circulates Tumblr every so often that I really like:

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”

I’ve certainly had this problem; I’ve spent years not writing because I’ve come up with ideas I knew I couldn’t execute to my own standards. And then I did it anyway, and eventually I got better and now I’m at a point where if I have an idea for a story it is probably something that I feel like I would enjoy if I wrote it (as opposed to “God, I can’t pull that one off, I hope someone else writes it”). It does make leaving exchange prompts kind of tricky because I think one up and then NO I WANT TO WRITE IT MYSELF. (The Jar is a Cap-IM Holiday Exchange prompt I nearly left before deciding I wanted to write it myself.)

Anyway. Plotting long stories. The big difference between a long story and a shorter story  is that you need to be conscious of the overall structure and where you are going. You know all those rising action/climax/falling action plot outlines? Take a novel you like and think about it like that. Break it down. If you want a long story that feels cohesive, you’re probably going to want to adhere to that basic structure. You don’t necessarily need to make an outline of that form – I don’t bother – but you should have in your mind the idea that three-quarters of the way through (or so) is the Big Important Scene that your story has been building towards, and then the rest is cleanup.

I am generally writing romance stories, and the tropes of the genre are such that there are often a lot of shortcuts I can take when I am trying to work out what’s going to happen, especially if these are first-time stories – the big moment is the characters declaring their love, finally getting together, and so on and so forth. So you ask yourself, okay, what are the obstacles to their love? Why didn’t they get together before? Maybe they have to learn to love each other. Maybe Steve doesn’t know Tony is Iron Man. Throw the obstacles in their path! Make them get over them!

But the reason these stories get so long on me is that that’s not usually the only plot. The other plot can be personal to the characters (say, Tony’s drinking problem) or involving the personal lives of the other characters, or, heck, maybe they even have to save the world. Basically I just… intersperse the development of both plots, and I try to make sure that every scene is furthering something: either plot or characterization. (When I am outlining the story itself, I try to keep tabs on this.)

Because these are generally romance stories, the A-plot, the one I give the most weight to, is probably going to be the romance plot, and the B-plot is going to be whatever else happens in the story. The absolute best way to join these plots together is to make them both build together and then hit their respective plot climaxes at as close to the same time as you can manage. If the B-plot is saving the world, Tony is tragically injured in the fight with supervillains, and that’s when Steve tells him he loves him. If the B-plot is personal discovery, Tony gets sober and decides he can be with Steve. Something like that.

How do I keep track of this? I used to do it in my head. I don’t recommend that part. I know some people can handle writing novels by the seat of their pants, but I work a lot better with outlines; I have a lot of abandoned novels where I basically didn’t remember what was going to happen next, and… whoops. I actually do all my outlining and writing (of long stories, anyway) in Scrivener (which is the best program I have ever spent money on). I like Scrivener because it’s set up to handle stories with a lot of ancillary research material, and furthermore it’s organized by scene, which makes a lot of sense to me.

First is the brainstorming. I like to bounce my ideas off other people when I am still in the thinking stage (like “hey, would you read a story about X?”) and then I spend a while mulling over The Scenes That It Makes My Brain Really Happy To Think About, which are usually (for me) probably the climax of the story. (This might be Steve And Tony Finally Get Together or Steve Finds Out Tony Is Iron Man or Steve Cradles Tony’s Broken Body In His Arms.) In my current WIP, it’s probably Steve Realizes He Loves Tony After All.

And then eventually I make an outline. The outline is basically a complete synopsis, scene by scene, of everything I want to happen in the story, with as much detail as I need. Sometimes there will be bits of dialogue, sometimes it will be OH FUCK SOMETHING PLOTTY HAS TO HAPPEN HERE, FIGURE OUT WHAT IT IS. Because generally I will know that the non-relationship plot must advance before I know exactly how. (I revise it as I go.) The outline for the Trek AU is about 1500 words. (The outline for its sequel is 3000 but it uses more complete sentences as it was intended for other people to read.) I stick this all in the Research pane of Scrivener along with my canon notes and whatever else I need to refer to while writing. This is a good time to stop and make sure that the outline feels like a story – all the emotional beats are in the right place, there’s a good mix of A-plot and B-plot. and so on and so forth. I just squint at it and wing it but I’m sure there are various exercises you can do if you like that sort of thing.

Then I do the actual scene breakdown. Because I’m using Scrivener, it has this very cool functionality whereby every scene has an associated “notecard.” You can give each card a title, organize them in folders by chapter, reorder them, and write up whatever you want on the notecard; I fill it with a description (expanded from the outline) of what’s going to be in each scene. Sometimes if I have multiple POVs I will color-code each scene.

As for specific complex plots, let me tell you about how I came with the stories you asked about.

Living On Your Breath was easier because it was for a RBB, and the artist (Phoenix) had a few suggestions about canon, and from there I let canon help guide me to filling out the plot. The art that went with it was Tony in leather and fishnets, choking Steve out. Which is, you know, evocative. Phoenix had suggested that the plot involve mind-control (which seemed reasonable as Tony looked pretty evil in the picture) and also she wanted to know if I could write a story set in Avengers v3, which I had never read, but I was game.

So, I thought, okay, this was going to be a story where a mind-controlled Tony had somehow captured Steve and decided to choke him. How could I get a plot out of that? Well, I thought, what if the drama of the story isn’t just about Tony being villainous? What if it’s a story about kink and consent? What if maybe Steve would have wanted Tony to choke him out when he wasn’t evil? What if Tony secretly wanted that too and Steve had no idea? Well, that seemed like a decent amount of angst to me.

And that right there suggested a basic plot structure. Steve and Tony would get together at the beginning, and we would establish that Steve had these unfulfilled kinky desires, and they would be happy together but not A+ perfect because they are not talking about all their unmet needs because, let’s face it, they have communications problems. Then Tony gets kidnapped and mind-controlled, and kidnaps and tortures Steve, and he does everything Steve wants except it’s fucking terrible because, well, Steve didn’t so much want Tony the supervillain to whip him. Just regular Tony. And so the rest of the story was going to be about them healing and putting themselves back together (although getting worse before they get better) and reclaiming everything they did and admitting their secret kinky desires and having Tony choke Steve out in a truly wholesome and loving way.

I knew that there was going to have to be some kind of plot involving villains – I mean, someone had to do the kidnapping and mind control – so I went looking for obscure villains (since I’d had enough of AIM and Hydra) with a grudge against Steve and ended up, unfortunately, with the Secret Empire. They were so obscure, I told myself! Surely Marvel wasn’t ever going to use the name for something big! Ahahaha. *sobs quietly to self*

I also decided that it might be nice to have the events of canon going on as a backdrop to the story, and as soon as I read v3 I knew exactly what I was going to do because, see, I fell in love with Carol’s drinking arc. Avengers v3 starts out so sweet and the team loves each other and then… it kind of starts to fall apart. Not that they don’t love each other, but it’s apparent that several of them have Problems, and Carol’s drinking is the definition of a Problem. So I wanted to have the team start to go along perfectly and then break apart as Carol does, with Steve and Tony’s post-mind-control relationship along for the ride at the same time. Suppose it all comes to a head with Steve and Tony on the same mission that gets Carol kicked off the team? And then, well, we know Tony goes up to Seattle in canon for recovery from a fight in canon – what if, in this version, he brings Steve with him? And later on, when Carol drop-kicks Tony through a jet and finally sobers up, what if Steve is there too? So that way both Tony and Carol get to get better at the same time. Recovery arc for EVERYBODY.

Honestly I added Wanda because I figured that Carol needed SOMEBODY to be there for her (it really irritated me that the team basically just kicked her out on her own, in canon) and she and Wanda clearly like each other a lot. Having said that, about 50% of Carol’s plot is straight out of canon, dialogue included, although I played with the timing, added Wanda, put Carol in the Blue Area mission, and gave Steve and Tony a massive breakup in the middle of the mission.

The structure of this one was pretty simple – before, during, and after Steve’s captivity. Every scene in the During section was one of Steve’s days. During the After scenes I was basically trading off Steve/Tony and Carol & Wanda plot development.

Straight on till Morning was trickier to plot. For most of its imaginary life, it didn’t have a plot; it was me sitting around and thinking, “Gosh, I like the Avengers and I like Star Trek and I want to imagine the Avengers in spaaaaace.” But that wasn’t a plot. That wasn’t even anything close to an idea for a story. So it just kind of sat there for a couple years rattling around my brain. And, really, the backstory all came first, and the plot kind of sprung out of everything there had to be in order to put the backstory in play.

One day I was sitting there thinking about what the Avengers would be in the Star Trek universe, and I thought, “Well, obviously Steve is a starship captain and OH MY GOD STEVE IS A GENETICALLY-ENGINEERED SUPERHUMAN FROM THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.” I had been thinking of the story as a complete fusion, where no one existed with their regular Marvel identities, but suddenly it occurred to me that if Steve existed in the Star Trek universe and had still been Captain America in World War II, things could get really interesting – because the Federation, bastion of diversity and tolerance, is fully prepared to hate the fuck out of you if you are genetically-engineered. Especially, and I am just guessing here, especially if you are from the twentieth century. Steve would predate Khan and the other supermen, but, well… maybe Steve was the first Augment. So that’s an interesting idea! The one universe where being Captain America would actually be reviled!

So that’s not a plot, either, really, but that’s part of a plot: Steve has a Terrible Secret. He is an Augment. What’s going to happen when Tony learns his terrible secret? Well, he’s probably going to take it pretty badly.

Steve’s backstory was pretty much a direct port of the Cap stuff plus making him frozen twice so that (1) he could have prior starship command experience and (2) I would throw off everyone who assumed that him being frozen once was the way I was translating his comics backstory. At least until the scene where Tony gets out his Cap poster, anyway.

Tony’s backstory was a little more complicated. Because the thing about an AU is, you have to ask yourself which elements of a character and their backstory are 100% essential. And the weird thing about Tony is that a lot of the things that are key components of his superhero life don’t really translate to Star Trek. Like, take Tony’s famous MCU line, “genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist.” Welcome to the post-scarcity economy, Tony; there’s NO MONEY. That knocks out “billionaire” and “philanthropist.” “Playboy” is, let’s face it, probably also linked to “billionaire,” and for 616 Tony it gets use as basically part of his intricate layers of personal masks where he doesn’t sleep with nearly as many people as he wants you to think he does. That leaves “genius.” And we’re gonna make him a Starfleet engineer! Everyone’s a genius there!

The Iron Man suit, likewise also out. Because, yes, it’s cool, but it’s not Star Trek cool. A flying suit? Try a starship. Maybe he designs starships, I said to myself.

So what are the key qualities of Tony? His genius, his engineering aptitude, his general personality, let’s throw in his former alcoholism, and of course his Vietghanistan trauma leading to heart injury. So something happened to him on Planet Vietghanistan, obviously, and whatever it was hurt him, but it didn’t lead him to make Iron Man. But he still needed to do something heroic, but it had to be Trek-style heroic. What if he saved a bunch of his shipmates? What if he saved a bunch of his shipmates and built a ship to rescue them and Captain Yinsen died tragically in his arms? And what if Tony was so fucked up by all of this that he decided to quit Starfleet? Until, of course, he meets Steve.

This suggests an arc for Tony’s character, the same way Steve’s backstory suggested an arc for him: Tony learns to love himself, Starfleet, and Steve. Maybe not in that exact order.

And remember, Steve has A Secret. Well, that’s going to interfere with Tony learning to love him. Obviously Tony will eventually come around. So from there you can see where the major obstacle to Steve and Tony’s happiness is going to be.

The first third-to-half of this story was therefore pretty easy to write, because it was just a matter of introductions and shoving in all the backstory. Meet Tony. Meet the ship. Meet Steve. Let’s go to Starfleet Academy and learn a bit about the Prime Directive and Tony’s tragic backstory. Meet the crew. Set off on a maiden voyage. Tell Steve about Augments, watch him freak out, and watch Tony have no clue why.

And then, of course, there had to be A Plot. Every scene basically advances the worldbuilding, Steve’s character, Tony’s character, or the plot. This was also pretty easy to come up with, because it’s Star Trek, and if you want to make your Star Trek story feel like Star Trek, steal a Trek plot. Of course they beam down to a planet and meet some aliens. Then something goes terribly wrong, something bad happens to the ship, but it is all fixed just in time and they sail on. You know how it goes. There is a pre-existing structure. I had actually been joking that if I couldn’t think of anything I’d just sex pollen Steve and Tony and well… I couldn’t think of anything else. Sex pollen it was!

I think sex pollen actually works well, because it is a very Star Trek trope (quick, count all the sex pollen episodes; you might need more than one hand) and also because the absolute worst time to find out that your captain is an Augment is after you’ve been forced to sleep with him to stay alive. I figured that scene was going to be one of the super important plot moments.

I debated using a Trek alien race or a made-up race but decided to go with Skrulls, on the grounds that evil shapeshifters are also very Star Trek and also I thought maybe I could fool people into thinking I made them up as long as I didn’t bring in Veranke until after the Skrull reveal.

And then, well, the ship is in danger, Tony nearly dies (you can tell that Star Trek II is one of my favorites) sacrificing himself to save the ship, gets his heart injured again, decides while he’s dying that he was being an idiot about Steve, and lets himself actually love Steve.

Basically, it is literally several actual Star Trek plots mashed together with Captain America’s backstory and a lot of infodumping. It is honestly way simpler than it looks; there were plenty of existing models for How To Tell A Star Trek Story and I pretty much just stole them.

I hope that helps.