#idk why this was so hard to modivate myself to write

[deadwriter16]

so im also a minor and i love ur fics but i have to ask how do u have the modivation to update. im writing smth rn and its so hard to have modivation to update so do u have any tips?

hi! tysm im glad u like my fics!!

and regarding motivation honestly a lot of the time i simply don't have the motivation to write, but I've found some ways to fix that (kind of) that personally work for me.

when i first started writing fic a couple years ago i had way more free time so a lot more writing time, and i was motivated by all the fresh ideas i had and my excitement to write. however i do tend to get bored by longer stories the more i write them which is why i mostly stick to oneshots or shorter works because an idea that used to excite me starts getting boring after a few chapters.

with my current busy ass schedule ive been slowly but steadily working on this chatfic, because it's easy, stress free, and short. i can write one chapter in 30 minutes to an hour and post it right after, so it makes for an easy way to keep writing fic even while im busy. i just find chatfics overall very low effort so that helps me w motivation

my biggest tip for motivation would be: if something you used to actually want to sit down and write starts feeling like a chore because you feel like you have to update regularly or soon, stop writing it. fic is supposed to fun and an escape from stress, not a cause of it. so if writing something isn't really fun anymore, stop writing it. your readers may be disappointed but they'll understand because we all have our own important lives and feelings. and if someone doesn't understand then they don't deserve to read ur fics anyway

when you do enjoy writing but you just have a hard time finding the motivation to update, something did with my longfics was always have a backlog of chapters. for my long 70ishK fic i used to be about two chapters ahead, so i would post chapter 10 right after finishing chapter 12. doing that makes it easier to update knowing that you have a safety cushion if life gets busy or you get tired.

sometimes when i havent updated in a while i just have to kinda sit myself down and force myself to do it honestly. not in a bad way though, just in more of a i want to do this but i keep Not Doing It but i have some free time now and im going to use it to write. and i just clear up that free time and make it writing time and just do it. motivation is really hard sometimes so idk how helpful my tips will be at all because i certainly haven't mastered motivation so

anyway i hope this was at least like a little bit helpful, pls lmk if it was and sorry if it wasn't lol. anyway thanks again for reading my fics :)

[writingblock101]

Roof Tops (Duke Thomas x Reader)

Request for Anon: “If we get caught, you can’t speak English, and I’m deaf!” with Duke

Based off actually rooftops I’ve gone on. Trespass carefully kiddos. 

Word count: 1,600

Tags: @idkmanicantenglish @mayahoelland2013 @incrediblysadstudent (hello discord friend, welcome to my account)

“Come on, babe,” Duke begs. “It’ll be fun!” 

“I don’t know, Duke…” You trail off. “What if we get caught?” 

“If we get caught, you can’t speak English and I’m deaf,” Duke insists, very sold on his foolproof plan. 

You can’t help but chuckle at his plan. 

“What if we get caught by someone more dangerous than the cops?” You propose. 

“Good thing you’ll have Signal there to protect you,” He grins, puffing his chest. “I’ve done this a lot before, I know all the good spots.” 

You frown again, skimming through all the possibilities. Roofing sounds really cool and you would love to see Gotham at night from some rooftops, but you’re afraid of getting caught. It would constitute as trespassing and your parents would kill you if you got arrested. 

“Please,” He begs, looking eager. “I promise I’ll keep you safe.” 

You sigh, barely able to say no to his excitement. 

“Okay, fine. Let’s go roofing.” 

“Yes!” Duke cheers, giving you a quick kiss. “Trust me, you’re going to love it. We’ll leave at 11. Wear something dark.” 

“11?” You question, looking down at your phone. “It’s not even 6 o’clock yet!” 

“We’ve gotta wait until everything closes,” Duke points out. “Also, I may or may not be luring you into a dinner at the Manor,” He ends with a hopeful grin. 

You sigh, rolling your eyes. While you like your boyfriend’s dysfunctional family, sometimes dinners get a little out of hand. 

“Come on, I need someone to back me up in mediating arguments between Damian and Tim,” Duke pouts. “I don’t have Dick or Cass there to help and Jason just adds fuel to the fire.” 

“Alright, fine,” You chuckle. “Is Bruce going to care about us trespassing?” 

Duke snorts. 

“That would be very hypocritical of him, but no. He’ll have much more pressing matters to deal with than my hobbies than don’t include actively picking fights with criminals.” 

You chuckle and kiss Duke’s cheek. 

“Look at you, the new golden child.” 

“No!” He protests. “Do not curse me with that! I do not need this family’s daddy issues!” 

You toss your head back, laughing. 

“Oh, come on, they’re not that bad.” 

“Jason came back from the dead and started killing criminals to spite Bruce. Are you serious?” 

“Well, at least that means you’re probably not going to do anything worse.” 

“Worse?” Duke laughs sputteringly. “What do you think I’m going to do?!” 

You grin, leaning back against his chest. 

“Dunno, babe. You’re the genius. I’m sure you’ll figure out something to wow me.” 

“Or just go on to become the lamest super villain ever,” Duke rolls his eyes. “How did I end up here? My tragic backstory? No, I was challenged into one uping my brother’s rebellion.”

“Well, you’re not going to sell shit with that attitude!” You protest. 

Duke laughs wrapping his arms around you. 

“You’re right, how could I be so pessimistic?” He remarks dryly then stands up, pulling you to your feet. “Come on, let’s go see what Alfred is making.” 

. . . 

“This feels so sketchy,” You admit, sitting in Duke’s car now dressed in all black. 

He chuckles, pulling around the back of an empty shopping center. 

“This is honestly kind of how I feel when I go on patrol,” He admits. “Just chilling on a rooftop, waiting for trouble to happen.” 

Duke parks next to a dumpster then you both climb out of the car, you eyeing the tall building. 

“Are you sure we won’t be seen?” You ask hesitantly. 

“There aren’t any security cameras back here,” Duke reassures you. “Also, the shopping center has been closed for two hours now, they leave the main ladder to the roof unlocked, and the restaurant across the street is closed for renovations,” He walks over to where the ladder is guarded by a cage, easily unlatches it, and swings it open. “You coming?” 

You grin, and start climbing up the ladder, Duke following close behind. Once reaching the top, you swing your leg over the ledge, looking out across the various air conditioning units. 

“Come on,” Duke takes your hand. “We’ve got a little more climbing to do.” 

He leads you over to where another building starts and gives you a boost up. He easily pulls himself over the ledge then takes you to a steeply slanted concrete wall. 

“This is where the sign is,” Duke explains. “I’ve found if you run up the wall and grab the ledge, you can pull yourself up.” 

He demonstrates, making it look way too easy. 

“You got this!” He cheers from his spot on top of the sign. 

You take a breath, wiping your hands on your pants then scramble up the wall, managing to catch the ledge. Using your feet to push you up, you pull yourself up on top of the sigh and sit next to Duke, your feet dangling off the edge of the building. 

There’s something peaceful about looking into the empty parking lot at night. It’s lightly misting out, giving everything a slight haze. You admire the city lights and enjoy the peace of the nighttime. Duke pulls an arm over your shoulder as you both sit quietly. 

“You know,” You say after a while. “From up here, you’d never think this city was crazy enough to need a small army of vigilantes to keep it functioning.” 

Duke laughs then stands up, holding his hand out to you. 

“I’ve got one more spot I want to take you.”

He guides you back down to the car and drives to another area you haven’t been before. 

“Electric Cowboy?” You read off an old sign. 

“It was a club,” Duke explains. “It closed a while ago and now it’s abandoned. I want to try to get on the roof.” 

“Is it open?” You ask, noticing the padlocked front doors. 

“It is around back,” Duke slowly drives behind the old building, pointing to multiple open doors. 

“Then doesn’t that mean someone has been in there?” You raise an eyebrow. “Someone might be living in there.” 

“I’ve walked around inside a little bit. No one is living there, but it looks like some people got drunk and threw around some bar stools and stuff,” Duke explains, unclipping his seat belt. “Don’t worry,” He tells you. “I’ll keep you safe.” 

Even though it sounds a little sketchy, you can’t help but be excited as the prospect of what could be inside the abandoned building. 

“Alright,” You agree, hopping out of the car. 

You and Duke turn on the flashlights on your phones and slowly approach an iron staircase. You glance in a nearby trashcan, noticing fast-food wrappers, but they seem to have been there for a few days, hopefully, a promising sign that nobody has taken shelter in the abandoned club. The staircase seems mostly steady, just a bit rusted. 

Duke pushes the door open more with his foot and shines his flashlight inside. 

“Why do I feel like the first person that dies in a horror movie?” You ask. 

Duke shoots a grin over his shoulder. 

“We’re going to be fine. Besides, I have more than enough experience to survive a horror movie.” 

He walks inside, you following slowly behind him, shining your flashlight into every possible nook and cranny. Inside, the carpeted floors are covered in a thick layer of dust. All the tables, chairs, and bar stools are gone, perhaps already sold. The club clearly followed the western theme with a large mirror on one side, salon-style doors, and curved frames on the walls. 

It’s strange to see a club completely empty, but you will admit, it’s pretty cool. 

“I think I see an office over there,” Duke nudges your shoulder. 

You follow Duke to the side room. Duke is right-- it looks like it may have once been an office with an old desk settled in the middle of the room. There’s a bar stool deeply embedded in the sheet rock. 

“I’m guessing this is what you meant by people throwing stuff around?” You ask, pointing at the bar stool. 

“Yeah,” Duke nods. “There’s another door over here, but it’s closed.” 

You two slowly approach the door and frown at the lack of a doorknob. Duke shines his light through the hole where the doorknob is and peers into the room. 

“It looks empty,” He shrugs then carefully pushes the door open, insuring you’re positioned behind him in case someone is waiting on the other side. 

The door opens to a long, dark hallway, but on the right, is another open door leading to a small porch. You step onto the porch with Duke then look on the side of the building to spot a ladder than goes up to the roof. 

“Jackpot,” He grins at you then gestures for you to start climbing. 

Once you reach the top, Duke is quick to join you. He grins, taking your hand, and you two walk to where the sign is on the building, sitting on the ledge and dangling your feet off the side. Across the street, there is a bar where you can see groups of stumbling patrons being piled into cars with much more sober friends. 

The club is closer to the city than the shopping center is so you can see more of the Gotham skyline. Bright boxes of light pouring out from business buildings and apartment buildings shine brightly against the dark sky. Ribbons of colors from building decorations and billboards decorate the black skyline and a steady flow of cars zip by in the distance on high ways and interstates. 

“Okay,” You admit, resting your head on Duke’s shoulder. “This is pretty cool.” 

Duke kisses the top of your head then pulls an arm around your shoulder. 

“Told you that you would like it.” 

Yes, Electric Cowboy was a real place. No, I never went in it when it was open, only when it was abandon. 

I want to replace my profile picture and background on this account. Anyone have any suggestions?

[zewrites]

25 Questions

I was tagged by @jaimistoryteller. thank you as always!

1. Is there a story you’re holding off on writing for some reason?

mmm sort of. I’m holding off continuing to flesh out that character Astra, I brought up a few weeks back. I’m holding off because I don’t want to lose interest in my current WIP when I’ve worked so hard on it, and do genuinely like the characters I made for it. 

2. What work of yours, if any, are you embarrassed about existing?

hmmm, to be honest, most of the original stuff I wrote before my WIP. The stuff I wrote at 10 was quite obviously not very good and the stuff I wrote at 14-16 were blatant rip-offs of books I’d read at the time. Apparently I didn’t learn creativity until after high school -_-’ 

BUT I still like rereading them to myself because they highlight my progress. 

3. What order do you write in? Front of book to back? Chronological? Favorite scenes first? Something else?

Chronological, front to back. At least, for the first draft. 

4. Favorite character you’ve written?

hmmm... tbh Silas and Jinx are tons of fun to write. I know it’s uncreative to just choose the two leads for my WIP but... they’re my leads for a reason, right?

5. Character you were most surprised to end up writing?

I haven’t spoken about her at all in this blog, nor does she have a character page because she’s actually very minor, but I have a character named Vera. She was originally a pretty nothing background character, but I came up with some characterization for her on the fly and ended up loving writing her. I imagine a future WIP will feature someone based closely on her, since she’s so fun. 

6. Something you would go back and change in your writing that it’s too late/complicated to change now

tbh, I’m still on first draft, so there’s a LOT of things I can still change. However, there is a plot twist regarding one of my characters I randomly thought up one day and thought it would have been awesome...! Except that it works against everything else that makes up that character, so I ended up not doing anything with it. I might reuse it later for a new WIP too, we’ll see. 

7. When asked, are you embarrassed or enthusiastic to tell people that you write?

I don’t mind telling people that I write, I just don’t like when people want to read my writing because it’s so unpolished right now and not ready for anyone’s eyes!

8. Favorite genre to write

Fantasy and romance.

9. What, if anything, do you do for inspiration?

Weirdly enough, reading through/watching writing advice never fails to inspire and modivate me to create. 

10. Write in silence or with background music? Alone or with others?

Silence, or music without lyrics. Voices tend to distract me. I write alone. 

11. What aspect of your writing do you think has most improved since you started writing?

Pacing and characterization. My old stuff had neither lol.

12. Your weaknesses as an author?

Though I’ve improved a lot, I feel like my pacing isn’t amazing still. Also, I’m bad with story structure because I’m such a disorganized writer lol

13. Your strengths as an author?

I hope characterization; it’s certainly the part I like writing most. 

14. Do you make playlists for your work?

mmm no, actually. Certainly not for listening to while I write. 

15. Why did you start writing?

Idk I guess because I had all these ideas and was inspired by authors I’d read.

16. Are there any characters who haunt you?

Not yet...

17. If you could give your fledgling author self any advice, what would it be?

Your writing is flawed and that’s okay! You’ll get better with time and practice and patience! Stick with your work and it will pay off. 

18. Were there any works you read that affected you so much that it influenced your writing style? What were they?

I’d have to choose Howl’s Moving Castle (a surprise to absolutely no one). 

19. When it comes to more complicated narratives, how do you keep track of outlines, characters, development, timeline, ect.?

Can’t say, since Spellsong is my first full WIP that I didn’t give up on, and it has a pretty simple, straight forward narrative. 

20. Do you write in long sit-down sessions or in little spurts?

Little spurts with occasional long sit down sessions. 

21. What do you think when you read over your older work?

Yikes. But also that there’s small nuggets of talent buried under the yikes.

22. Are there subjects that make you uncomfortable to write?

Sure, most of the usual unpleasant or terrible subjects that I won’t name for obvious reasons.

23. Any obscure life experiences that you feel have helped your writing?

Sort of, but it’s a spoiler so I can’t say! 

24. Have you ever become an expert on something you previously knew nothing about, in order to better a scene or a story?

Um, I guess I know a lot more about late 1800′s fashion now. 

25. Copy/paste a few sentences or a short paragraph that you’re particularly proud of.

Sorry, draft’s too unpolished for me to really answer this. Plus I’d have to type it out lol. 

I tag, off the writer’s peeps list: @lady-redshield-writes @ladyliliana @lend-your-lungs-to-me