#if you can rewrite the scenes for One character and think it won’t effect the rest of the characters. maybe you’re not doing ensemble well

[shorthaltsjester]

people talking about how it’s because they didn’t know if they’d get a s4 that they pulled punches in the s3 finale of tlovm…. you get that that’s still shitty right. you get that that’s them openly stating they chose a weaker narrative beat in the story they’d like to create in case it ends up being a story that’s cut short. like. it Is incredibly rough out there for shows on streaming rn don’t get me wrong i know that but. i don’t know that the answer is “let’s write something narratively weaker but more satisfying if we get cancelled”

[drakorn]

Rewriting Veilguard Part 1 - The World State

Disclaimer: I don't hate the game, I actually think it's quite great given the development hell Bioware went through in those 10 years. This is more of a hypothetical universe where there was less of that behind the scenes drama. Just a fun writing exercise.

Expanding Veilguard's World State Editor

Like many of us, I was disappointed with the total amount of choices carrying over from past games being only three, one of which dealt with romance, two with decisions made in the Trespasser DLC, and all of them being from Inquisition. This already set the precedent that we shouldn’t really be expecting the game to be as connected to our unique Thedas as we have come to be used to from previous titles—no more uniquely flavoured codex entries, no more small but sweet cameos here and there that make the world itself feel like a larger place that we had helped shape.

Given The Veilguard’s very troubled production history of multiple delays, staff layoffs, and all-around restarts of the entire project, it is honestly a surprise that we even got three choices, so credit where credit is due. They made with what they had. But what if The Veilguard had this vision from the start? What if there wasn’t any of this meddling? What if Bioware simply had more time and control? What if they could truly let us import the World State this game deserved?

Now, for this hypothetical rewritten playthrough, I’m going off from the fact that the Dragon Age Keep will not be used; I actually found it a neat idea to tick my three choices in the character creator, and it would have probably been better had Inquisition done something similar. Why do I think that? Because it means we are not running into any dangers of servers potentially shutting down, leaving us trapped in the canon we happened to have imported last. Converting the Keep into an offline editor was a good idea, but unfortunately not executed nearly enough as, let’s face it, we all expected. So we’re gonna have some fun for Veilguard.

Disclaimer: I’m going to refer to the game’s title as Veilguard from now on, not “the” Veilguard. I really don’t like the change of having a “the” in a series of otherwise one-word, or one-number, titles.

Of course, we have to be realistic about this. It is virtually impossible to implement every single decision from across all three games, and those that can be implanted can’t alter the main plot too much. Certainly, we like to imagine and picture things, but let’s approach this from an actually doable point of view.

Right, so imagine you just finalised your Rook, and then get a screen titled “Past Adventures”. Not just “The Inquisition”. And it would take up the entire screen instead of being shoved somewhere in the corner of the final CC page, which many people missed. I could have missed it too, had I not known beforehand that it was going to be there!

It would say something akin to “You can customise the protagonists and several events from the games Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age II, and Dragon Age: Inquisition. These choices will have both major and minor effects on the plot of Veilguard. If this is your first Dragon Age title, you would be advised to skip this section for now, as you may otherwise risk getting overwhelmed. A default World State has been pre-generated for the game.”

Why did I add this disclaimer? Because it would show us, right from the get-go, that we respect both new and old players. If you’re a new player, feel free to skip this part as it won’t matter to you anyway and, quite frankly, you wouldn’t want to spend an eternity in the character creator doing things you might not even be familiar with. But if you’re a returning player or someone who has read up on recaps and watched countless lore videos, come on right in, we’ve got you covered, don’t worry! We know how much time you spent meticulously crafting your World State for Inquisition, so join us and customise to your heart’s content.

If you choose to not skip ahead (honestly the only time I would click “skip” on that shit is if I was a new player), you will be presented with three tarot cards, one shows the griffon, the Grey Warden symbol, one shows Kirkwall’s heraldry, and one shows the Inquisition’s banner. Here’s your previous three games. And now we get to customise them a little. The little gremlin in me would be quite gleefully rubbing his hands at this prospect.

Past Adventures: The Blight

We open the first slide and are immediately hit with a crimson screen and an ambient reprise of several of Inon Zur’s themes from DAO. I loved this part in the game, when you click to customise your Inquisitor and are immediately hit with “Calling the Inquisition”. Really great stuff for early emotions. Now let’s actually customise things.

The Hero of Ferelden

I do not expect us to actually be able to recreate the Warden in the flesh, but I believe they should be at least brought up in conversation or mentioned in codex entries and letters. Here are the things we get to customise about them specifically:

The Hero: Here, we get to tick the race, gender, class, and background for our Warden. Again, no character creator, just fancy tarot cards. But guess what? That would already be more than enough for what we can do. At least we know the game acknowledges their continued existence.

The Warden’s fate: Did the Hero of Ferelden perform the ultimate sacrifice?

Romance: Who did your Warden romance, if at all?

The Companions

Now that our Warden is set, we jump over to DAO’s companions. Each companion has their own little mini-section. The first few questions will always be “Did you even recruit them? And if so, did they survive? If so, were you on good terms or not?” These questions, depending on the answers, will immediately lock or open the more specific ones. Which are, as follows:

Did the Warden have Morrigan perform the Dark Ritual?

What is Alistair’s ultimate fate?

Was Sten reunited with his sword?

What happened to Loghain?

What happened to Marjorlaine?

The Battle of Ostagar

What happened to the prisoner at Ostagar?

The Arl of Redcliffe

What is Connor’s fate?

Is Isolde alive?

Did you help Bevin and return his sword?

The Urn of Sacred Ashes

What happened to the Urn?

The Nature of the Beast

How was the situation between the Dalish and the werewolves resolved?

A Paragon of Her Kind

What happened to the Anvil of the Void?

Who rules Orzammar?

Did the Warden help Brother Burkel create a Chantry in Orzammar?

Did the Warden prove the Legion of the Dead was connected to a noble house?

Did Orta join the Assembly?

Warden’s Keep

What happened to Sophia and Avernus?

Denerim

Did the Warden complete Slim Couldry’s crime wave?

Who rules Ferelden?

Who killed Urthemiel?

Awakening

What happened to Nathaniel?

What happened to the Architect?

What happened to Vigil’s Keep and Amaranthine?

As you can see, I have not included all the choices, just the ones I think can be carried over in both realistic and interesting manners. Not all of them will heavily feature in the game; in fact, many of them are for flavour and codex entries only, but there is still merit in those. We know there is a whole lot of stuff happening in the South thanks to the letters the Inquisitor regales us with. So let’s put some world-state uniqueness to those letters. But in this rewrite, some of these choices will, in fact, feature in a more substantial manner.

And that’s Dragon Age: Origins done! Moving on to the next one!

Past Adventures: The Tale of the Champion

When we enter this screen, the CC assumes Kirkwall’s orangey-yellow tone and we get a reprisal of the key DA2 themes by Inon Zur, the most prominent one being, of course, Hawke’s family theme. This one is not going to be as big as DAO, but there are a few important factors nevertheless, especially concerning possible deaths and survivals.

The Champion of Kirkwall

Unlike the Hero of Ferelden, Hawke will actually be customisable in this one. Because no matter whether or not they were sent to the Fade or Weisshaupt, there is always the potential for them to still be alive. So, here are the choices regarding Hawke:

The Champion: Here you can customise Hawke’s gender, class, and personality.

Who did Hawke romance, if at all?

The Party

Pretty much every companion’s card, aside from a few, will have the questions “Did you recruit them?”, “Are they still alive?”, and “Were they friend or rival to Hawke?” at the forefront. Most of it is gonna be flavour, but it’s still my flavour, dammit!

What happened to Bethany or Carver?

What happened to Isabela and the Tome of Koslun?

What happened to Fenris and Danarius?

What happened to Merrill, her eluvian, and Clan Sabrae?

What happened to Bartrand?

What happened to Anders when the Chantry exploded?

Did Hawke approve of Anders' actions?

Did Aveline marry Donnic?

The Tale of the Champion

Did Hawke protect the Bone Pit from all its dangers?

What happened to Feynriel?

Did Hawke let Zevran go?

Did Nathaniel survive?

Did Hawke side with the mages or the templars?

Fewer choices are carrying over here compared to DAO, but many of the events that occurred in DA2 are only relevant to Kirkwall’s immediate fate, which is already resolved by the time of DAI. Many of these will be flavour again, but some of them, I’m not going to say which, will definitely have a bigger impact.

Right, we’re done with DA2, let’s move on to the last one!

Past Adventures: The Inquisition

And here we get to the big one, the game that most directly impacts much of DAV’s story. We click on the last page and get the green shades and DAI’s ambience themes, a beautiful reprisal of Trevor Morris’ great hits. I would like to once again reiterate how emotional the CC music made me feel here when I was playing the game. Let us now customise our choices.

The Inquisitor

While the Hero of Ferelden will be a background figure in letters and codex entries, and Hawke more of a minor character with a significant role, the Inquisitor will have a much larger presence. Just how large, you’ll find out soon. But for now, let’s customise them:

The Inquisitor: Here you can customise your Inquisitor’s race, gender, class, and specialisation. Their personality as well, for while it wasn’t as apparent as with Hawke, the Inquisitor does still have a distinct range of dialogue choices. You can still be diplomatic, lighthearted, or even rough.

Who did the Inquisitor romance, if at all?

The Inner Circle

As with the other companion sections, pretty much all slides here will feature the “Did you actually recruit them?”, “Are they still around?”, and “Are you friends or not?” questions. Alongside a few specific ones that will definitely have more of an impact here.

Did Dorian resolve the issue with his father?

What happened to Blackwall?

Did the Iron Bull remain loyal to the Qun?

Did Cassandra rebuild the Seekers of Truth?

Did Cassandra discover the book of secrets and what did she do with it?

What happened to Harmond?

Which path did Cole choose?

What happened to Solas’ friend?

Did Varric track down the red lyrium source?

Did the Inquisitor give Vivienne the heart of a snow wyvern?

How was Cullen’s lyrium dilemma resolved?

How did the Inquisitor help Josephine resolve her family’s fortunes?

Was Leliana hardened or softened?

The Path of the Inquisitor

Did the Inquisitor embrace or denounce their title of Herald of Andraste?

Did the Inquisition side with the mages or the templars?

What was the general principle upon which the Inquisition was founded?

Who rules Orlais?

Who stayed behind in the Fade?

What happened to the Grey Wardens after Adamant Fortress?

What happened to Samson or Calpernia?

Who drank from the Well of Sorrows?

Did the Inquisitor respect the rituals at the Temple of Mythal?

Who became Divine Victoria?

The Inquisition’s Influence

Did the Inquisitor ally with the Hinterland cultists?

Was the rift in Crestwood closed?

Was Caer Bronach captured?

Did the Inquisitor make a deal with Imshael?

Was Suledin Keep captured?

Was Griffon Wing Keep captured?

Was Sutherland’s company formed?

What tone did the Inquisitor’s judgments take?

Jaws of Hakkon

Did the Inquisitor learn Ameridan’s fate?

Was Hakkon slain?

Did the Inquisitor share the truth about Ameridan?

The Descent

Did the Inquisitor stop the earthquakes from destroying the Deep Roads?

Trespasser

What is the ultimate fate of the Inquisition?

What is the Inquisitor’s final goal regarding Solas?

Again, this looks like a lot, and it is, but bear in mind that a lot of these will only have minor impacts on the story in the form of cameos and codex entries. However, there are several major DAI choices that will have significant impact.

For our hypothetical rewrite, I shall not list every single choice I made for my imaginary playthrough. Instead, I shall reveal them as we go along so as not to clutter the space too much. And it’s a bit more fun this way.

And that’s the World State editor finally done! I believe all of these choices are able to feature in some capacity, be it big or small. But no matter if it’s a big world-changing consequence or simple flavour texts and cameos, it will still be our Thedas, our own unique version of it that we helped shape.

Now that the past is dealt with, let’s look at the present. Next time we’ll talk about Rook, the six factions, and why a DAO-style origin story selection would have not only been beneficial but very doable.

Rewriting Veilguard Part 2 - The Shadow Dragons

[nonsensefromtheabyss]

W.I.P Wednesday 1: The List

I don’t really know how big of a deal WIP Wednesday is on here, but it’s when my writing club used to be so I’ve decided I might as well start again! Maybe not every Wednesday, but I think it might be nice to share my thoughts instead of cannibalising them quietly. This week, I am doing that project list I mentioned before: Behold! Here are all the works I have on the schedule/drawing board at the moment. 

HAZBIN HOTEL. 

A Broken Record On Repeat In A Crowded Bar: a story about a brutally injured Alastor refusing to rely on his friends and toying with the boundaries of his deal. It also looks at everyone else’s perspectives post-extermination and features a lot of Charlie struggling with where she and her dreams stand in the new status quo. Quite dark, mostly character driven, will be 13 chapters long when done.

Still working on Chapter 5. Have been working on Chapter 5 for longer than I ever thought possible. Unfortunately my hours at work have increased which, along with a few changes in my personal life, means I’ve had less project time recently. It is hovering somewhere around 2/3s completed and I’m still hopeful to get it out this month. Overall, the whole project is sitting at around 60,000 words if I tally up all the chapter documents—not bad for an idea that started as a fucking oneshot!

I’ve also finally got a table that I can paint at, so I’m doing a painting of the Final Confrontation. No idea why; I sneezed and the sketch appeared. I have absolutely no faith that it’ll be finished by the time I upload that chapter, but sometimes we do these things for the journey. And the joy of painting. I’ve not had anywhere to paint for a year.

PROFESSOR LAYTON. 

When The Dust Settles and Professor Layton And The Master’s Last Painting: post Unwound Future Sycamore and Layton team up to solve a case where the people have vanished from a bunch of paintings. At the same time, Layton is trying to uncover what his estranged brother has been doing for the past three years. Mystery elements, psychological elements, a complete disregard for reality; slightly darker than the game series, but only in the sense that I describe the violence. The prologue and first part of what’s planned to be a trilogy. 

I actually don’t know if anyone here knows about these works; I wasn’t on tumblr when I started them. And I’ve been gone for… quite some time…

Basically, I got halfway through Chapter 15 and got really, really stuck—partly due to other things happening in my life at the time, and partly because it… wasn’t feeling right. To try and refresh myself with how we’d gotten to that point in the story, I read back through all my published Layton work and… was not inspired. I actually realised how much I disliked my early writing; I wasn’t using scenes or characters effectively, the threads for the mystery as a whole were either too obscure or flat out not there—I was displeased. Particularly because this is a project I get really excited about when I think about my plans for the series; all my work deserves my best effort, but this one in particular has a lot of potential to me that I don’t feel like I captured in my initial writings. Time to start fresh! Take another swing at it! I have a different method of working now, and I feel certain that this time I can capture my vision.

So, I finished my dissertation and cleared my first ever Big Project, and I had already started on the big rewrite… and then I fell down a hole into Hazbin Hotel. I cannot stress enough that Broken Record was supposed to be a oneshot. Finishing these two works is next on my list, this time I swear it. I already have the story divided up into chapter documents, and some have been fully reworked, It Is Happening. You still probably won’t see anything for a while yet, but if you’re one of my readers from before or on the off chance you’re curious now, feel free to pop up to chat about it!

RIDDLE SCHOOL. 

Unnamed Project. I’m so fucking back. Some very lovely people said they’d be interested in seeing more from me in my Riddle V.I.Z.ion universe, and I accidentally fell in love with these characters all over again while completing that project. Yall convinced me and I am so very happy about that!

The work will be a collection of moments from the aliens’ lives, jumping around in time between past and present within the timeline and history I’ve given them. More detail into how they work together, what their home planet is like, what they actually got up to as V.I.Z.ion members, stuff like that! Basically an excuse for me to write more for them. At the minute, I have their timelines (collective and individual) plotted out in a document, and have selected sections of history I think would be interesting to explore, so I would say a rough plot is hesitantly in place! 

Because it’s not going to be precisely linear (given that we already know where they end up, I don’t think there’s anything to be gained from sticking to the laws of time!) I’m thinking I can be a bit more flexible with myself in how I work on it. Which means I might try and fit it in around other projects as a little treat to refresh myself. If I think of it like Short Stories In A Shared Universe instead of Another Book, it feels manageable that I might add to it without disrupting my workflow, which means it hopefully won’t take another seven years (always a good thing!)

I’m also doing more art for Riddle V.I.Z.ion as well, fuck it. I had a vision (hah!) I saw the shipyard and the miserable campfire. I’ve never painted space before, but this seems a good enough reason to try. (I’ve painted the woods many, Many times.)

So, if you’re interested in this project while it’s still in the early stages, or you’ve read Riddle V.I.Z.ion and were interested in more, feel free to drop by and chat! Currently I’m stuck on a name; Puzzle Pieces has a certain appeal, but I think that would also be nice as a series title, and I think I’d like to keep the ‘Riddle’ naming theme for the main instalments. Riddle Classified? Riddle Planet? Riddle Logbook? Unauthorised Access feels nice in my head, but again with the lack of ‘Riddle’ continuity. Hm. I’ll keep at it. It’s the annoying moment where I realise that ‘Riddle V.I.Z.ion’ itself would have been the perfect title for this too!

DON’T HUG ME I’M SCARED. 

Three Friends, Three Foes, Three Names They’ll Never Know: a series of drabbles about terrible things happening to the Three Guys. Very graphic and violent. Horror elements with a lot of gore.

Believe it or not, I actually have three more chapters I always meant to add to that story that just got pushed around in favour of other things. Always meant to get back around and finish them; as you can see, they’re on The List!

So, in short order, we have ‘The Yellow Guy Chapter (a nightmare about stairs)’, ‘The Bigger Boys Chapter (bestie you forgot about The Cycle)’, and the ‘Lore Chapter (contains nothing of use to anyone, is Not A Theory.)’ They’re all about 1/3 done; i dip into them whenever I feel like rewatching the series or writing psychological and physical horror without any embellishments. Not much to declare on this front but they will be done at some point.

RESIDENT EVIL: VILLAGE. 

The Monsters You Told Your Children About: all the characters except for Mother Miranda are brought back to life by The Duke. Rose is declared a bio weapon by the BSAA and is taken into their custody. Thus begins a road trip where Ethan, with encouragement from The Duke, convinces the four most dangerous monsters he knows to help him rescue his baby.  This story is basically fucked up found family with the mold acting as a Get Along shirt for everyone involved and The Duke eating popcorn.

Contrary to popular belief, this story isn’t dead! Much like Ethan himself, it is merely in a perpetual state of rotting, and that hasn’t kept it from coming back to kick me in the ass whenever I feel inspired to look at it again. Original projection length was stupidly optimistic—this thing needs to be more than 8 chapters long or it’s just going to be nonsense. It needs some structural revision in its planning department, which is why it went cold in the first place; few things more demoralising than realising you’ve lost inspiration and your basic building-blocks suck.

So! I’m keeping the same concept and ideas and just… reworking the elements to flow better as a narrative instead of just being a collection of things I immediately wanted coming out of the game. Of course, this should have been step one all those years ago, but I rather got ahead of myself.

CUPHEAD. 

Untitled project. This was a curve ball to me. Divine inspiration to work out the perfect plot… for something I had wanted to write about in 2017. The devil works in mysterious ways and apparently She wants me to write more fic.

Following the Devil’s retreat, all the souls on the Inkwell Isles are released, and the Casino collapses into dust and rubble. The Casino, which I remind you, belongs once again to its original owner, the newly freed and magicless King Dice, who is not able to counter that degree of property damage. Mostly because even lawyers hate him.

Left with nothing to his name but his soul, King Dice, followed by his loyal court, embarks on a solemn quest: to punch his old boss in the fucking face.

(Featuring: bullying Saltbaker into opening a portal to Hell, Cagney running the woodland mafia, Spirited Away soul trains, and potion brewing with Elder Kettle (he’s being held at gun point.) Not show compliant, I have never watched it.)

I’m not thinking about this one too hard. I’m hoping if I stop looking at it, it’ll go away (it won’t.)

[sparkymalone]

Weenus Review~

First, Happy Birthday Hiko. I’m late, but so were you :P.

Second, I liked this chapter! I think the idea of Fuyuhiko having a fav dessert cafe. It’s adorable and very in character lol. Idk what a parfait is though so I’m uninformed.

My analysis:

The characters were obviously amazing. The only ones you really had to write to any great degree were, of course, the boys. There’s likely never going to be a complaint about them. I have read a lot of fanfic, and have never seen anyone come close to writing Kuzuhina even half as well as you do. I’ll give Natsupeko an honourable mention. They’re not a couple but you write them well. I like Peko’s focus on the romantic side while Nat focused on the sexual side. Also in character.

Now, I’ve split the content into four parts. The Cafe, the Movies, House and the Ring.

Cafe: I loved this!!! It’s so cute to imagine lil Hiko finding candy stores and sweet cafes. His blond little dumbass sat in a hat and sunglasses to avoid suspicion. I want Hajime and Fuyuhiko to be out at a cafe, and for the waitress to come over, nod at Fuyuhiko’s freckled face and coo “Ohh! Your son’s adorable!” I wonder if Fuyuhiko will ever realise he doesn’t need to be so defensive around Hajime. One day it’d be cute to see him just be all soft, sweet and sappy. It’d also be unlikely :3

Movies: I loved this too! I’ve always loved seeing Hajime be the one to struggle resisting his boyfriend. I hold out hope one day for a Dom Hiko chapter. He’d still bottom of course. I would genuinely love them to fuck in a movie theatre lmao. I want the lights to come back on mid-sex. I like the bathroom scene :3. I always love it when Hajime blows Fuyuhiko. It’s cute seeing Baby Gangsta get his little dom moment.

House: My least favourite part, I won’t lie. I think this part just seemed mechanical. You said yourself you were tired and, unfortunately, I do think there’s an effect here. I would say I loved the top!Fuyuhiko fake out, but it was my idea and I don’t wanna be a narcissist. The sex seemed pretty vanilla for a birthday post. I know they tried a new position, but I kinda thought they could do more. The cafe scene made me want Hajime to put the yoghurt on his fingers and let Fuyuhiko clean them off.

Ring: LOVED this!!! I’m so glad they’re engaged! I know this is but one of the many AU’s, but it’s still adorable! I love that Fuyuhiko basically said “Bitch please. Ring or else.” Such a petty bitch lmao. He’s defo gonna be a groomzilla. Btw when they get married, I want him in a golden wedding dress. You can say “it’s not white” but all I’ll say is those assholes have had a LOT of premarital sex. I want it to be some grand gesture or something to show Fuyuhiko’s trust in him.

Overall Thoughts: I liked this chapter! I do think the second half betrayed slight rush, but other than that it was good! I hope to see more chapters that explore Fuyuhiko’s sweet tooth. Can’t wait to see the next chapter for Hajime’s birthday.

6/10.

Thank youuuu 😭

I'm glad the characterization was good, at least lol. I also love the idea of Fuyuhiko having a favorite cafe, especially when he literally just wants the desserts there. 😆 And I'd love to do a theater scene sometime!

OOF, I appreciate your honesty, but having you call my smut scene "mechanical" HURT 😭 You're obviously not wrong, it just sucks to have my fears confirmed, I guess. I'm seriously considering going back and rewriting it, ngl.

I think it's funny that you liked the whole engagement bit because THAT was the part I was most worried about lmao

Thank you for your analysis, darling 💖

[brzatto]

Hello! I'm the person who wrote the dissertation-length comment on chapter 2 of BCM. My essay of a comment probably speaks for itself but I really love your writing. I'm still thinking about your fic over a week later and reread your reply to my comment over and over. It took me a full evening to read chapter 2 because I would read a part, sit and think about it, then move to the next part. Even though the chapter was so long I was scared with each paragraph that it was going to end, I didn't want to stop reading. The ending was really satisfying, if the fic ended there it would be a lovely ending, but like I said in my original comment I'm so happy there's more to come. The ominous reply from you saying you might scrap what you've written and rewrite the ending nudged me to message you. I really hope you don't scrap what you've written so far! Even if it's not the direction you want the fic to go now, I think everyone would love to see the alternate ending if you're happy to share it in the event you don't use it for the fic. Kind of a "BCM 0.5" if you will. Everyone is begging for the porny carmrich writing so thought I'd throw my hat in the ring and beg for the alt. ending of BCM. xD

Also thank you for leaving such a long reply to my comment! I really liked hearing your thoughts about Carmy and Richie and would love to hear more about your writing process. Your fic was the first The Bear fic I ever read and it hasn't left my mind since I first read it back in December last year.

Sorry for another really long message I can't seem to stop typing once I start. xD

(p.s. you should post the carmrich pwp huhuhuhuhu)

of course i remember you! i always remember repeat commenters and i distinctly remember being at work when i got the email for the first comment you left me on bcm, it was a really lovely comment and it made my entire night.

i say this often to a lot of commenters but it really does mean so much to me that you enjoy my writing and it has that sort of effect on you!!! like more than you’ll ever know. i can count the number of times i’ve actually published works on ao3 on two hands and i’ve always gravitated towards rarepairs with nicher audiences in almost every fandom i’ve been in so the type of enthusiasm i’ve received so far with bcm is really genuinely touching. i always try my best to reciprocate the energy given to me in the comments i get but longer ones make me especially happy because i loooove discussing character analysis and dynamics with people and i’m always eager to know how other people interpret my characters and my writing! thanks for how much thought you put into all of your comments, i always look forward to reading what you have to say <3

as for the ending of bcm i don’t actually think i’ll fully be scrapping it, it’ll still end the same general way that i had in mind but i’ll probably end up rewriting/reworking it because a big chunk of the fic leading up to it is still unwritten and by the time i actually get close to the ending it probably won’t make much sense as it is currently word for word. i don’t normally write in chronological order, i write scenes out as they come to me (i usually envision climactic scenes very visually in my head and then write them out first lol) and then fill in the gaps/flesh out the storyline as i go. but since i got the idea for this fic and planned it out back before s2 came out and now s2 is out and canon’s been vastly expanded i’ll probably end up also borrowing some elements from s2 for my own storyline purposes just because if i’m being fully honest… i actually can’t tell you what ch3 of bcm and onwards is going to be like. i have vague notions of major plot points and the direction i want the story to take and fragments of later scenes in my docs but even as it stands now uncompleted bcm is the longest thing i’ve ever written (it’s 49k on ao3 and 60k in my docs) like… ever. i’m not used to finishing fics at all much less writing long fics (if bcm would count as one) so this is all very much new territory for me but everyone’s support and encouraging really helps keep me engaged and on track! including yours 🤍 in the event that the ending does drastically depart from what i’ve originally envisioned for it i probably will upload the alt ending separately. i’ve also sort of toyed with the idea of writing some scenes out from richie’s pov but if anything that’ll be something that comes much much later.

[thegreatobsesso]

Hi hi hi hi hi, I just binged a ton of chapters and I didn't make it quite to this one yet because I have to leave, but please have my livestreamed reactions to the parts I just flew through:

<<“Maybe when you’re off duty?” What am I doing? Why am I like this? And other questions I’m never going to look deeply enough into the chaos in my head to answer. “Unless you have to drive home.”>>

I’m obsessed with this moment of Brett just watching himself and having no clue what his own motivations are and barreling forward anyway in this 100% self-aware way. This is one of the things I love most about your writing - your characters think so deeply and share those reflections with us and that makes them so. Intensely. Fascinating. 

<<in the back of my mind, there’s an unfolding kaleidoscopic memory of bodies falling>>

Ugh just this

<<“Everything’s my kind of thing.”>>

<3 Brett

<<It’s so good I almost don’t want it to go any further. But also, I know it will. Because I am never anyone other than myself.>>

This is where I totally get Brett. This sort of, I should stop, but I won’t :) 

<<“We’re clearly not working through any impulsivity issues here,” she says.

“Exposure therapy.”>>

Witty, delightful, brilliant

<<“Engage with that energy? Fuck, Noah, what have you been reading?”>>

lol

<<I lie down next to you and rain whips against the window. Lightning flashes through the crack in the curtains, followed a few seconds later by a roll of thunder. “I’m here.”>>

So cozy, so wonderful. So atmospheric. 

<<I’m never sure if it really hits straight away or if there’s just a very strong placebo effect inherent in the ritual of it. >>

Omg I can be so Brett it’s crazy. I have this thought all the time about coffee. Like, there is NO way the first sip of coffee can chemically do the things it does to me. And yet, it happens. One sip and I remember why I want to be awake, what potential joy life has to offer, and how I have the potential energy in my limbs to engage with it. There’s no way one sip of coffee can do that. And yet!

<<something good-natured but argument-shaped>>

Ugh the way you describe things.

<<Last night’s storm has swallowed itself whole and now watery sunlight filters through clouds that look like a painting on a cathedral ceiling.>>

UGH THE WAY YOU DESCRIBE THINGS

<<High-end residential properties and elaborate tombs have too much in common.>>

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I’m running low on words about how I feel about the way you write. Only punctuation will suffice.

<<Our belongings are here, our furniture, our clothes upstairs and our choice of decor throughout, but the absence of us has permeated the walls and turned them hollow. Our habits and routines, our voices and touches, have melted and sunk through the floors and foundations to somewhere deeper out of sight and it took less than a week to happen.>>

Noah is going through it and I feel frightened.

<<Somehow you are more here than I am, real in a way I never learned to be. I would resent that if I didn’t adore you so much. Perhaps on some level I resent it anyway. I envy you. I worship you. I can’t live without you.>>

<3 

<<“I mean where are you? Because you’re not here.”

“I am.” I want to be. I’m trying.>>

This is literally so ominous tho O.o

<<“Nothing to do with anything,” you start, in that way you do when it’s going to have something to do with everything,>>

I love this bit so much.

<<Part of me feels like I should say some of this out loud>>

This is like 100% perfect for the character and for the scene, but I love how it also invokes the writerly feeling of, should this be internal monologue or dialogue? One of the most interesting things about rewriting script scenes as prose is how much dialogue turns into internal narration. And then that instantly starts to deepen the tension because they’re saying LESS to each other, so they KNOW LESS about each other, and it makes everything sweeter. Yeah. I’m digging this so hard.

<<I hit the zone sooner than usual and I can’t stop thinking about you at the hotel, then you yesterday. Days of being unshakeable and calm followed by a night of distance and uncertainty. Contrast or conflict. A gathering storm. Untethered, you said. What could you do in that state? How far could you be pushed? How far could I push you?>>

Ohhhhhhhhh goodness goodness goodness

<<The image of your face clouded with remorse and your eyes darkened by the weight of guilt that you didn’t believe yourself capable of moves my feet faster.>>

Oh I am FREAKING OUT NOW

<<Gone to Alchemy. I’ll bring home lunch.>>

OH MY GOD THIS WAS PERFECT THO. Like, you leaving me in ABSOLUTE SUSPENSE over what Brett was just about to do. The drama the tension in this bit is just sheer perfection, I’m dead.

<<And since when would something so insignificant bother me? Since when would I care about anything beyond having the house to myself to do nothing for a few hours until you came back and we did nothing together? Chances are I wouldn’t have wanted to go with you anyway. A new and unwelcome voice in my head says, “Since he did it on purpose. Since he tried so hard to leave without you.”>>

Oh CHRIST

<<I miss the dog.>>

Oh my god oh my god after he’s said he doesn’t actually miss things ever, holy shit, this is hitting so hard, Winter I don’t even know what to say !!!!!!

<<All you did was go out.>>

Sweet lord god alright I have to go now even though I have more chapters to read, but ending it on this note feels so…. Empty, and perfect. The way that …. That ….. oh my god, this chapter ends with such resounding silence. And there’s this sense of helplessness about Brett in this final line that is unfamiliar, devastating, beautiful and ominous. I know I keep coming back to that word but it’s the best word I can find for the storm cloud of dread building in my mind as I read this. It’s so palpable because you have done it SO well. And I know you’ve said these boys will not have a tragic ending but you are REALLY making me wonder if you were lying, or if I am remembering your words incorrectly, because DAMN GURL. 

And don’t tell me. Do not tell me. I so here for however this ends. SO HERE !!!!!!!

💀 Spin Cylinder / Episode Four / Chapter 04 is now live at winterandwords.com

If control is your weapon, temptation is mine.

📖 Read it on winterandwords.com HERE

💻 Book summary and tag list on Tumblr HERE

🏷️ TAG LIST @indecentpause @pertinax--loculos @revenantlore @talesfromaurea @thegreatobsesso

(new line to appease the Tumblr link gods) @thespacelizard

[duckprintspress]

How to Edit an Over-Length Story Down to a Specific Word Count

One of the most wonderful things about writing as a hobby is that you never have to worry about the length of your story. You can be as self-indulgent as you want, make your prose the royalist of purples, include every single side story and extra thought that strikes your fancy. It’s your story, with no limits, and you can proceed with it as you wish.

When transitioning from casual writing to a more professional writing milieu, this changes. If you want to publish, odds are, you’ll need to write to a word count. If a flash fiction serial says, “1,000 words or less,” your story can’t be 1,025 and still qualify. If a website says, “we accept novellas ranging from 20,000 to 40,000 words,” your story will need to fall into that window. Even when you consider novel-length works, stories are expected to be a certain word count to fit neatly into specific genres - romance is usually around 80,000 words, young adult usually 50,000 to 80,000, debut novels usually have to be 100,000 words or less regardless of genre, etc. If you self-publish or work with a small press, you may be able to get away with breaking these “rules,” but it’s still worthwhile to learn to read your own writing critically with length in mind and learn to recognize what you do and do not need to make your story work - and then, if length isn’t an issue in your publishing setting, you can always decide after figuring out what’s non-essential to just keep everything anyway.

If you’re writing for fun? You literally never have to worry about your word count (well, except for sometimes in specific challenges that have minimum and/or maximum word counts), and as such, this post is probably not for you.

But, if you’re used to writing in the “throw in everything and the kitchen sink” way that’s common in fandom fanfiction circles, and you’re trying to transition only to be suddenly confronted with the reality that you’ve written 6,000 words for a short story project with a maximum word count of 5,000...well, we at Duck Prints Press have been there, we are in fact there right now, as we finish our stories for our upcoming anthology Add Magic to Taste and many of us wrote first drafts that were well over the maximum word count.

So, based on our experiences, here are our suggestions on approaches to help your story shorter...without losing the story you wanted to tell!

Cut weasel words (we wrote a whole post to help you learn how to do that!) such as unnecessary adverbs and adjectives, the “was ~ing” sentence structure, redundant time words such as “a moment later,” and many others.

When reviewing dialog, keep an eye out for “uh,” “er,” “I mean,” “well,” and other casual extra words. A small amount of that kind of language usage can make dialog more realistic, but a little goes a long way, and often a fair number of words can be removed by cutting these words, without negatively impacting your story at all.

Active voice almost always uses fewer words than passive voice, so try to use active voice more (but don’t forget that passive voice is important for varying up your sentence structures and keeping your story interesting, so don’t only write in active voice!).

Look for places where you can replace phrases with single words that mean the same thing. You can often save a lot of words by switching out phrases like “come back” for “return” and seeking out other places where one word can do the work of many.

Cut sentences that add atmosphere but don't forward the plot or grow your characters. (Obviously, use your judgement. Don't cut ALL the flavor, but start by going - I’ve got two sentences that are mostly flavor text - which adds more? And then delete the other, or combine them into one shorter sentence.)

Remove superfluous dialog tags. If it’s clear who’s talking, especially if it’s a conversation between only two people, you can cut all the he saids, she saids.

Look for places where you've written repetitively - at the most basic level, “ ‘hahaha,’ he laughed,” is an example, but repetition is often more subtle, like instances where you give information in once sentence, and then rephrase part or all of that sentence in the next one - it’s better to poke at the two sentences until you think of an effective, and more concise, way to make them into only one sentence. This also goes for scenes - if you’ve got two scenes that tend towards accomplishing the same plot-related goal, consider combining them into one scene.

Have a reason for every sentence, and even every sentence clause (as in, every comma insertion, every part of the sentence, every em dashed inclusion, that kind of thing). Ask yourself - what function does this serve? Have I met that function somewhere else? If it serves no function, or if it’s duplicative, consider cutting it. Or, the answer may be “none,” and you may choose to save it anyway - because it adds flavor, or is very in character for your PoV person, or any of a number of reasons. But if you’re saving it, make sure you’ve done so intentionally. It's important to be aware of what you're trying to do with your words, or else how can you recognize what to cut, and what not to cut?

Likewise, have a reason for every scene. They should all move the story along - whatever the story is, it doesn’t have to be “the end of the world,” your story can be simple and straightforward and sequential...but if you’re working to a word count, your scenes should still forward the story toward that end point. If the scene doesn’t contribute...you may not need them, or you may be able to fold it in with another scene, as suggested in item 6.

Review the worldbuilding you’ve included, and consider what you’re trying to accomplish with your story. A bit of worldbuilding outside of the bare essentials makes a story feel fleshed out, but again, a little can go a long way. If you’ve got lots of “fun” worldbuilding bits that don’t actually forward your plot and aren’t relevant to your characters, cut them. You can always put them as extras in your blog later, but they’ll just make your story clunky if you have a lot of them.

Beware of info-dumps. Often finding a more natural way to integrate that information - showing instead of telling in bits throughout the story - can help reduce word count.

Alternatively - if you over-show, and never tell, this will vastly increase your word count, so consider if there are any places in your story where you can gloss over the details in favor of a shorter more “tell-y” description. You don’t need to go into a minute description of every smile and laugh - sometimes it’s fine to just say, “she was happy” or “she frowned” without going into a long description of their reaction that makes the reader infer that they were happy. (Anyone who unconditionally says “show, don’t tell,” is giving you bad writing advice. It’s much more important to learn to recognize when showing is more appropriate, and when telling is more appropriate, because no story will function as a cohesive whole if it’s all one or all the other.)

If you’ve got long paragraphs, they’re often prime places to look for entire sentences to cut. Read them critically and consider what’s actually helping your story instead of just adding word count chonk.

Try reading some or all of the dialog out loud; if it gets boring, repetitive, or unnecessary, end your scene wherever you start to lose interest, and cut the dialog that came after. If necessary, add a sentence or two of description at the end to make sure the transition is abrupt, but honestly, you often won’t even need to do so - scenes that end at the final punchy point in a discussion often work very well.

Create a specific goal for a scene or chapter. Maybe it’s revealing a specific piece of information, or having a character discover a specific thing, or having a specific unexpected event occur, but, whatever it is, make sure you can say, “this scene/chapter is supposed to accomplish this.” Once you know what you’re trying to do, check if the scene met that goal, make any necessary changes to ensure it does, and cut things that don’t help the scene meet that goal.

Building on the previous one, you can do the same thing, but for your entire story. Starting from the beginning, re-outline the story scene-by-scene and/or chapter-by-chapter, picking out what the main “beats” and most important themes are, and then re-read your draft and make sure you’re hitting those clearly. Consider cutting out the pieces of your story that don’t contribute to those, and definitely cut the pieces that distract from those key moments (unless, of course, the distraction is the point.)

Re-read a section you think could be cut and see if any sentences snag your attention. Poke at that bit until you figure out why - often, it’s because the sentence is unnecessary, poorly worded, unclear, or otherwise superfluous. You can often rewrite the sentence to be clearer, or cut the sentence completely without negatively impacting your work.

Be prepared to cut your darlings; even if you love a sentence or dialog exchange or paragraph, if you are working to a strict word count and it doesn't add anything, it may have to go, and that's okay...even though yes, it will hurt, always, no matter how experienced a writer you are. (Tip? Save your original draft, and/or make a new word doc where you safely tuck your darlings in for the future. Second tip? If you really, really love it...find a way to save it, but understand that to do so, you’ll have to cut something else. It’s often wise to pick one or two favorites and sacrifice the rest to save the best ones. We are not saying “always cut your darlings.” That is terrible writing advice. Don’t always cut your darlings. Writing, and reading your own writing, should bring you joy, even when you’re doing it professionally.)

If you’re having trouble recognizing what in your own work CAN be cut, try implementing the above strategies in different places - cut things, and then re-read, and see how it works, and if it works at all. Sometimes, you’ll realize...you didn’t need any of what you cut. Other times, you’ll realize...it no longer feels like the story you were trying to tell. Fiddle with it until you figure out what you need for it to still feel like your story, and practice that kind of cutting until you get better at recognizing what can and can’t go without having to do as much tweaking.

Lastly...along the lines of the previous...understand that sometimes, cutting your story down to a certain word count will just be impossible. Some stories simply can’t be made very short, and others simply can’t be told at length. If you’re really struggling, it’s important to consider that your story just...isn’t going to work at that word count. And that’s okay. Go back to the drawing board, and try again - you’ll also get better at learning what stories you can tell, in your style, using your own writing voice, at different word counts. It’s not something you’ll just know how to do - that kind of estimating is a skill, just like all other writing abilities.

As with all our writing advice - there’s no one way to tackle cutting stories for length, and also, which of these strategies is most appropriate will depend on what kind of story you’re writing, how much over-length it is, what your target market is, your characters, and your personal writing style. Try different ones, and see which work for you - the most important aspect is to learn to read your own writing critically enough that you are able to recognize what you can cut, and then from that standpoint, use your expertise to decide what you should cut, which is definitely not always the same thing. Lots of details can be cut - but a story with all of the flavor and individuality removed should never be your goal.

Contributions to this post were made by @unforth, @jhoomwrites, @alecjmarsh, @shealynn88, @foxymoley, @willablythe, and @owlishintergalactic, and their input has been used with their knowledge and explicit permission. Thanks, everyone, for helping us consider different ways to shorten stories!

[gentrychild]

Do you have any advice for writing a fight scene that was also present in canon?

I really love your take on the Midoriya vs. Todoroki fight in Anyone and how you managed to use the expectations set by canon and twist and use them to your advantage!

I have trouble writing the fight from the first hero training inside my fic (I swapped Ochako with Shinsou to spice it up a bit more and for changed friendship dynamics). I know the direction I want it to go and I know how I want it to end but for the life of me I don't know how to make it interesting... every time I sit down and write it I think it's boring writing it. And if I think it's boring while I am writing it I don't even want to imagine how boring it is to read.

🙏

Okay, first rule about rewriting a fight that was already in canon: if you're not changing anything and if you're not interesting in writing it just for writing it, just skip them.

Instead of writing ten pages you're simply not vibing with, a "X was still thinking about Y and Z fight. The way X had just hit Z with that fire extinguisher had been a sight to behold. [Insert how he feels for one or the two participants". He breathed in, then out. It was now time to focus." will be much simpler for everyone involved.

Only writing the consequences is also a valid approach.

That way, you and your readers directly get to the juicy part.

But that's if you're not interested in writing the fight in itself. If you really want to write a fight scene, think about two things: 1. What changed in your AU and how does that affect the characters? What's the differences? 2. Who needs to win?

Once you know that, you can focus on the fight. Do you want a character to almost lose but to win because they simply refuse to stay down? Do you want them to win because they are smarter? Do you want they to win because they are an enraged gremlin that has no chill?

I have four tricks when it comes to writing fight scenes.

1. Focus on emotions.

People are made of different motivations. Why do they need to win? Do they respect their opponent? Do they hate them? Do they look for their respect? Are they friends?

For example: Bakugou and Iida vs Midoriya and Uraraka

Bakugou doesn't respect anyone and is focused on Deku. He wants to prove that he doesn't belong in UA and he wants to know what Deku really thinks of him (since he thought he had lied about not having a quirk and he is completely unhinged at the time because nothing makes sense.)

Izuku wants to prove that he belongs in UA, wants to stop being afraid of Kacchan, and wants him to know that he isn't his punching ball anymore.

Ochako wants to win with Midoriya but she doesn't have an emotional stake in this.

Tenya wants to win but also shows that he understands all the rules of the exercise (since he failed to notice that there were rescue points in the entrance exam), hence why he is completely in character as a villain. He also has to win despite Bakugou.

2. Remember that the reader doesn't live in your head

I won't ask you to keep things simple when you write a fight scene but please, always keep in mind that your reader has to understand what is going on. They have to follow what you're saying, and preferably, they don't have to hurt their brains while doing so.

So, if you reread an action and have to pause to remember what it was about, rewrite it.

3. POV switches, my beloved

That's a me thing. Maybe it won't agree with you. But oh boy, I do love my POV switches. That way, you can surprise the reader since A doesn't know what B is about to do. You can also explore the psyche of both characters in the same fight.

Another thing that is fun to do is the Outsider POV. You're writing about the Sport Festival, an event that is on TV and that your readers are already familiar with. Introducing some novelty by having outsiders react to the fight will bring some spice and is good for your story.

For example: Bakugou vs Uraraka in the Sport Festival.

Tomura noticing that Bakugou has a powerful quirk, real instinct when it comes to fighting, and how the public is quick to turn on him because he isn't winning like a hero should, even though winning is the whole point of the fight. Society is hypocritical! He is ostracized because of his quirk! It might be fun to recruit him!

Other example in the first Hero lesson this time: All Might, a new teacher, noticing what the students lacks and what their strengths are.

4. Write what you would have wanted to see in the fight

We're fanfic writers! Being self indulgent is the whole point!

For the First Hero Lesson, I always have Izuku dominating the fight by being OP.

I could also have him winning by booby trapping the entire building and playing Katsuki like a fiddle.

For the Sport Festival, Todoroki vs Midoriya, I focus more on Todoroki actually harming himself (not to Izuku's extent but he flirts with hypothermia to prove a point) and I researched the side effects of hypothermia to show how he kept weakening himself, and I focus on Izuku being angry because he, a boy defined by his past powerlessness, is fighting someone extremely powerful who is limiting himself, which is simply disrespectful.

For the Sport Festival again, if I ever write Bakugou vs Uraraka, I would love to use Uraraka trash talking Bakugou to get inside his head.

So, to conclude this, things about what interests you in a Shinsou and Midoriya team up, then work from that.

Good luck.

[dgcatanisiri]

So, I’m really only at the point of effectively looking at the 2077 fandom through a pair of binoculars, rather than even dipping my toes into that, but... I feel like I’m alone in just... not liking Johnny Silverhand.

Like, I don’t think he’s a bad character - he is well written, and, even if I think that Keanu Reeves wasn’t entirely comfortable with the character, he’s still doing a decent job of it - but I don’t find him a LIKEABLE one. Which is... NOT the majority opinion. Like I’ll acknowledge that the game at least offers SOME admittance of the idea that Johnny is not someone who V particularly cares for (the grave scene, telling him he had his second chance and he blew it), but... Overall, it seems like the fandom can’t accept that someone wouldn’t.

Y’know, why WOULDN’T you find the mental simulacron of an egotistical rocker turned would-be martyr who is forced into your head and is, admittedly not by choice, rewriting your brain so that he can take it over and is basically making your entire consciousness into an intruder to your own body to be someone you particularly care for?

I mean... Is this just me? I know I’ve been over how “bodily autonomy” is one of those trigger issues for me, particularly on the mental level - I won’t replay the Imperial Agent storyline in TOR (which people also seem to claim as “the best” of the class stories in that game...), I hate that Liara forcing the meld on Shepard is a repeated plot point, particularly with the writing dismissing not wanting to have her do that with just “I’m sick of dealing with these visions” instead of “people keep shoving things into my brain in this game, and it’s kinda fucked up that no one sees why I might have an issue with that,” all of that...

Still... It feels to me like people respond to Johnny more like he’s Keanu, and not the character he’s playing.

[myhoneststudyblr]

i received an ask from @sunset-study asking me how to annotate texts so i thought i would do a post giving some of my tips! as an English literature student, i spend a lot of my time doing annotations on loads of different types of texts so i think i have some good advice that i can give. i hope that you will find this helpful and if you have any other questions, please feel free to send me an ask!

disclaimer: these are my personal tips and experiences and i’m sure that there are many more that are relevant. i have tried to do a little bit of research to get some other ideas which hopefully will make this a useful post but as always i appreciate others adding their opinions and advice in the comments!

[Estimated Reading Time: 7 minutes]

What is covered:

General Tips

Things to look for

Specific Tips for Annotating Novels

Specific Tips for Annotating Plays

Specific Tips for Annotating Poetry

Other resources

General Tips

don't just highlight. this is very passive and often you will not really be taking in what is important. 

pencils are great for annotating. if you are anything like me, when you are annotating, you often are doing it as the thoughts come into your mind so a pencil allows you some leeway to erase and refine ideas. also when you are writing in a book, i personally do not have enough confidence to write in pen.

don’t annotate extensively the first time you read. often on a first read, you don't see the recurring imagery or features because you don't have the whole context so don't annotate deeply the first time you read something. that said, it can often be good to jot some questions in the margins that you have because these can be useful to remind you of your thoughts when you reread. 

think of some symbols to indicate important or interesting parts. for example, if it is a dramatic section, i will box it off and put a big exclamation mark. or if something is confusing or unclear, use a question mark. i tend to put a star for a section that is important. you could think of symbols for humour, foreshadowing, particular themes or characters etc.

actually respond to the text. this seems like an obvious one but a lot of the time, because we are taught in schools all these fancy techniques, when we see one of them in a text we just highlight them and note that its a metaphor or simile or foreshadowing. what you should try to do is explain - briefly - why that is important and its effect. also if you have any personal reaction to it, note that down as well because this can be really helpful when writing essays because it shows that you’ve actually engaged with the text. 

practice, practice, practice. annotation is a skill and honestly it can be quite difficult because you need to often read between the lines and summarise, while also analysing. so take some time to focus on this skill and create your own method and shorthand.

Things to look for:

structure. are the paragraphs long? is sentence varied or does it remain quite consistent? are there any repeated words or phrases? what is the overall shape of the text? where does the narrative start? does the focus shift anywhere? 

language. what are the literary devices used in the text? if so, what is their effect? has the author used a particular semantic field? are there any usual words? are there repeated words? are there any individual words that stand out to you? what are the connotations of these words? are there any words that you don’t know? if so, what do they mean? is there any unusual syntax? 

characterisation and voice. who is speaking in the text? if it is third person, how ‘close’ or ‘distant’ are we to the character? can we trust the character? are they an unreliable narrator? what are their key features? do any of these features link to key themes? if so, where is that shown in the text? is the author using a particular voice in order to get a specific reaction?

themes. what themes is the author exploring? where does the author explore these themes? are particular opinions (either by a character or perhaps the implied opinion of the author) expressed on the themes? are there any words or phrases that link closely to this theme?

Specific Tips for Annotating Novels

SUMMARISE REGULARLY

a novel is often long and there is a lot of stuff to cover throughout it so it is really important to keep making sure that you understand what is going on. summarising will also help you when revising.

for example, after each chapter quickly summarise the key points in a few sentences - which characters were important, did the plot move forward in any important ways, what themes were explored.

you could either do this on a post it note or if you have space on the last page of the chapter. make sure that it is not too long. a few sentences is absolutely fine.

KEEP A LIST OF CHARACTERS 

characters are obviously very important in a novel so make sure you know who’s who and where they come into the book. you could write the list of characters or a little character map on the inside cover of the book, which you can refer to if necessary.

COLOUR CODE

i personally don't colour code that often when annotating. i usually only do it in important scenes and moments where there is a lot going on and things can get very confusing. that said, colour coding can be particularly useful to keep track of themes in the novel.

there are many different ways that you can do this. for example you could have a particular highlighter colour for each theme. you could also put coloured sticky tabs on the page so you can quickly find the themes throughout the novel. 

Specific Tips for Annotating Plays

This is mostly the same for novels so take all of the tips above and apply them to the play you are studying with two main - VERY IMPORTANT - additions:

NOTE THE DRAMATIC FUNCTION

a play is written to be performed and this has a huge impact on the text, because it can affect how we interpret a particular character, theme or scene. 

so it is SO SO important that you remember that it is being performed and think about the different ways that it could be acted and how the audience could respond to it. 

on that note, remember that every performance, actor and audience is different so try to think of ALL the ways it could be played and how our interpretation could differ

PAY ATTENTION TO STAGE DIRECTIONS

this is a related point to the one above. my GCSE English teacher used to go on about this all. the. time. because it is so easy to overlook them and not consider them a real part of the text. BUT they are such a key part because they can give hints to performance as well as the atmosphere which might otherwise be difficult to discern just by reading the dialogue. they can also be good ways to demonstrate character traits

Specific Tips for Annotating Poetry

NOTE GENERAL FEATURES (STRUCTURE, RHYMING, METER, CONTEXT, THEMES, ETC.) SOMEWHERE SEPARATE 

poems are obviously much shorter than plays and novels so they are often packed full of interesting language points to annotate. therefore if you try to add in all of this other stuff in your annotations using arrows, it is likely that it is going to get very full and confusing. 

therefore, i would suggest only directly annotating language features for the poem and writing your notes on the more general features of the poem elsewhere - for example on a post-it note, or if there is a bunch of white-space under the poem. then it is easy to find and refer to but won't mix with your annotations and make it confusing so that you feel that you need to rewrite more notes on the whole poem 

if there is a particular word or phrase that is important for the above features (for example, links significantly with the context or has unusual - and therefore probably significant - meter) you can notes this on the text using arrows but keep it specific and short. you can expand on it in more depth in your general notes

IDENTIFY THE TONE AND MOOD OF THE POEM

this is good to identify because it can help you focus on the language that is important and helps you to interpret the meaning. 

THINK ABOUT THE SOUND OF THE POEM

poems are usually meant to be lyrical and rhythmic in some way and read aloud. so think about how these words sound when you read it (are they harsh or soft) and consider the rhythm that the poet creates through punctuation. it could be helpful to consider a poem like the lyrics of a song and imagine what it would sound like if it were set to music 

rhyming is an important part of this and you could note - just for your own reference - the rhyme scheme (if there is one) using letters at the end of the line. but again, referring back to tip one of this section, talk about the rhyme scheme in greater depth elsewhere so as not to clutter your notes 

Other Resources

there are so many resources that you can find on the internet about annotation but here are just a couple that i thought were useful:

Annotation Guide Produced for AP Language Students

BBC Bitesize GCSE Revision Page on Annotating Texts

General How to Annotate Guide (Note: this is not just for literature but also for textbooks but has some great tips)

Annotating Poetry Guide

[astrolocherry]

Mercury retrograde June 2020 - The Cancer Cycle

Mercury Retrograde  Cancer Cycle 2020 - Think and Feel Twice about It

The Mercury retrograde cycle in Cancer turns the mind into a time capsule. As Mercury stops still and falls asleep, we wake up inside a repetitive dream. The sensations that arise from this can be erratic and strange, though seem so eerily familiar. You’ve felt and thought this before and nothing turned out like you believed it would. Your journal is open to rewrite your history.  Transiting Mercury rx in Cancer can change the way that some people experience chronicle time. There may be events such as ‘losing time’ or forgetting whole sequels of events, time may seem to accelerate or slow, one night may last lifetime, yesterday may seem like it happened years ago. Chronicle time is not passing in seconds and minutes, it’s being recorded in moments, images, and inner growth. We are now under the spell of kairos and spirit’s time.  

Transiting Mercury is in Cancer turns the intellect into a visual cinema of concepts, imaginative facilities, and characters of our dreams, stories, and retained memories. Mercury is frozen in the sky and freezes our mind on certain scenes, dreams, and recollections from our life’s discography. Some memories  are messengers, and some are imprints and energies created and sustained purely by our own thoughts. It’s deciphering what to take with you into the next phase and what you will be leaving behind. In astrology, Mercury is the archetype of our thinking and Cancer embodies our feelings. This retrograde is a dose of space sedative to discourage avoidance tactics such intellectualisation, compulsive activity, interaction, and the like to evade finally stopping and being still. Stillness means finding out how you really feel, and letting all of the emotions you’ve been running from catch up and be felt by you

Side-effects of the Mercury rx in Cancer cycle 

Sleepy head, losing everything

Sudden episodes of sadness or longing and old memories returning to the conscious shoreline are not helping very much most of these are not of importance. These are energetic imprints from the past without a purpose in the present, and that’s where they need to return and stay

A long meditation. A good energy for practicing mindfulness or the state of being mindful with a mind that keeps emptying out. Now thoughts have slowed down enough for us to hear what we really think

You can finally take that deep breath and shut your eyes. You won’t miss out on anything - no-one is talking sense anyway.

People may seem difficult to follow in conversation and keep missing or misinterpreting your point

Mercury rx is retracing back over territory already crossed, so it may create the vivid deja vu experiences. Because we are in the sign of Cancer, these often relate back to our childhood

The inner experiences, intuitive leaps, and realisations may be too profound for words and seem too intricate to be shared, our mystic experiences can literally stun us into silence.

This is a good phase to start a moon mood journal and transcribe the thoughts and feelings that you experience in alignment with the lunar cycles. We are crossing the bridge from dream to consciousness without it vanishing before it can be turned into words, we can use this special resource to start practicing and getting the rhythm of it

It also means that we may have some inner experiences that literally stun is into silence because they are too profound and have no language to be shared with

We have adapted to working or thinking twice as hard and fast to recover what is lost...and yet the retrograding planet is peaceful and sleeping in the sky, serene and silent. Cancer energy is inviting us to dream awake with it and let ourselves take this pre booked horoscope holiday and see what happens. As Cancer is the residence of our ancestors and spirit guides, and Mercury is the conduit of spirit to mind, we can say a silent prayer inside and call for their guidance and loving support

Cherry 

[silverloreley]

What a delusion...

I was cautiously optimistic about Wandavision before it came out. I thought it could lead me to reconnect a bit with the MCU (I intentionally skipped a lot of movies and disliked every one I saw after AoU, with a small exception for Black Panther and Dr Strange, not to mention I never finished Endgame, so...).

Dear, I was wrong.

I started watching it with some interest after seeing the trailer on tv, I have been a long-time fan of Bewitched and I hoped for something on that line, a lighthearted fantasy Wanda concocted to deal with the loss, only for someone to get in and help her get out of it and cope in a more reasonable way because they needed her or something, or maybe because she was an Avenger who went missing and people wondered what happened to her and if what she was doing could be dangerous (a reasonable belief, I may add, given her precedents...), a thing like that. And it sort of was like that, except it wasn’t?

And, okay, I was biased from my own high expectations, I wished for things that weren’t there and Marvel would have never given me (full and well-thought plot, emotions, exploration of magic in the MCU and so forth), but I didn’t think they could mess up so bad. The finale in particular was a train wreck.

Why introduce new characters (and bring back Darcy) if they are of no consequence in the final showdown? I guess they needed to introduce White Vision (even though I can’t fathom why...) plus make an origin story for the powers of Monica (to whom I had no prior attachment since I didn’t see Captain Marvel but I grew quickly fond of her here), but what else? We didn’t get to see her abilities or her coming to terms with them (which would have been great and possible if she had been introduced to the plot earlier) or anything. Nor it made me hope to see her again because I am back to be uninterested in anything Marvel after this mess. The fact they gave us the twins only to take them away like that and in the after credits make them call for mom made me irrationally angry on top of the rest. I won’t even mention the whole Quicksilver matter because it was plain stupid to cause all that hype for nothing.

I don’t really understand how could they ruin it so badly, especially after how good ep8 had been in comparison to the rest. Meh.

To cite @lucianalight, how can we consider Wanda a hero after that? Even leaving out what she did before (she was pardoned for her AoU actions by joining the Avengers and fixing what she’s done as much as she could and we don’t know how many lives she saved before CW happened, so I give her the benefit of doubt that she redeemed herself a bit there), but now we saw she kept the town trapped even after she realized what she did! Agatha may have wanted to take her powers but she had a point in saying “heroes don’t torture”, and then what did Wanda do afterwards? Condamned Agatha, who could have been a great teacher to her, maybe a good friend in due time, to live a shallow life as a brainwashed dimwit?! WHY? Agatha had a point. Multiple points, if we take the hints the Scarlet Witch would be the one who destroys the Multiverse. In a way, Agatha was trying to prevent that by taking the power she saw, a win-win situation at the expenses of Wanda, I’ll give you that, but ultimately not that villainous.

I guess that what I’m trying to say is: why couldn’t the plot be more coherent with the idea Wanda was a hero AND with the MCU in general?

But, hey, Marvel sucks at anything but special effects and I don’t know why I had hopes for this show. Just like I don’t have any more hopes for the Loki series (which is a pity because I wished so bad for Tom Hiddleston to reprise the role on his own terms with some creativity freedom that could take Loki back to the Shakesperean anti-hero from his early days I love so much, but clearly Marvel doesn’t know what a precious resource they have, blame on them).

(And here I realize I elaborated a rewriting of WandaVision so I’ll put it under a read more because it wasn’t the original point of this post, lol)

Would it have been too hard to make the first episode and half as they were, then introduce Monica as they did but without a whole town hostage and more like, I don’t know, a magic red coocoon the size of the house in the middle of a simple town that alarmed a lot of people? Maybe with people being sucked in for a few hours from time to time and with no memories of it, except for the transmission of the “episodes” on a magically appeared channel in the town’s tv.

And then Monica, who tried to get in and was sent out, would recognize Agatha as someone from “outside” too and try to figure out what was going on. Cue Monica and Agatha both trying to “wake” Wanda each in their own way but Monica, who understands Wanda’s grief a little better than Agatha, would be the one to breach out Wanda’s on a feelings-level while Agatha, being more interested in Wanda’s powers would try to see the full extent of them.

Here I had two ideas: Agatha is a gray-character who just wants to study another witch, maybe to figure her out or to have a student after centuries alone. Or Villain Agatha who wants to unleash chaos magic to the greatest extend possible to get her own gain, maybe to exploit the twins who were spawned from pure magic, or, as it was speculated, she’s allied with Mephisto who wants the kids for his own nefarious scheme.

Either way, Wanda has to face Agatha. First scenario: Agatha realizes Wanda is the Scarlet Witch and offers to teach her a proper way of magic, perhaps to avoid the destruction of the Universe the Darkholme (I hope I got the name right) predicts, with Monica, who is finding her own powers and dealt with her grief along with Wanda, convinces Wanda it’s a good idea. Second case: Agatha kidnaps the boys and sends them to Mephisto, Wanda and Monica fight her but the boys are lost in the Multiverse and Wanda has to teach herself magic to find them again.

About Vision, the fact he was an illusion and Wanda didn’t steal the corpse to revive it was the only good point of the plot, their goodbye was very emotional and I liked it enough to think it could have stayed the same, but the boys were born through Chaos magic so they woulndn’t disappear. In the grey!Agatha scenario, they would stay with Wanda in the cottage while she learns magic (we could have had a cool scene with her playing with the kids while her astral projection studies magic, like in the post-credit scene), only to be kidnapped mysteriously when she turns for a second.

And maybe my take shows I would have liked more friendship between Wanda and Monica, and maybe I think Agnes’ potential and all the implication of her very existence were wasted, maybe I would have given people the cameo we were expecting with Strange showing up at the cottage with a “you need to learn things properly if you want to save your kids and not destroy the multiverse by accident”, and so on.

[lizhly-writes]

my in progress orv fics as of 12/15/2020

that is: the ones that i believe will be long enough to actually be posted on ao3 and what i expect from them.  

1. knw and kdj have been related this entire time (cousin au)

do i know where this is going?  no.  but this one is projected to be a full rewrite of canon, because i hate myself, so i am going to reread orv while taking notes and you are going to get a fully plotted out rewrite of canon.  this is going to take literal years to complete.

2. kdj is a 14 year old magical girl and bihyung is his 15 year old lore master (miraculous ladybug)

literally the only reason why i wrote this was because i wanted to write the sequel story to this, so yeah.  this one is going to be another fully plotted out fic because i need to finish it to post the sequel.  probably going to be long, though not as long as cousin fic.  is it going to have a fully plotted out sequel? maybe!  depends on my will to live!  at the very least, you’ll get a sequel oneshot, so i can post the scene that started this madness.

3. the uncle baby kdj is pretty sure doesn’t exist helps his mom get a divorce (time travel)

actually going to be plotted out, but is meant just to be a reallllly long oneshot.  may receive a sequel because i imagine the domino effect would be pretty interesting to watch play out, but probably not.

4. hsy and kdj meet 10 years before canon (here)

started out as an attempt to make hsy x kdj work and got wildly out of hand and now has an actual plot.  is this actually going to be hsy x kdj?  who knows!  not me!  i have a beginning, middle, and end in mind, so: full fic on this one, too.  this will be so much shorter than the miraculous and cousin fic.

5. 28 yr old lgy is the responsible one because now he has to cart around three whole children (ageswap au, oldest to youngest swap)

i have no idea where this is going to go, but i’ve already written 950 words, so it’s most likely going to end up long enough to post on ao3.  so you’ll probably get at least one out-of-context oneshot.  while some part of me would like to take this seriously, you are hella not getting another canon rewrite out of me.

6. kdj accidentally sets an avatar loose in round 0

has a plot, but not a particularly long or complex one, so i’m thinking, like, either three chapters or one long one.   

7. the webnovel that becomes real is SSSSS-grade Infinite Regressor, not WOS

this one highly depends how seriously i decide to treat it.  because i definitely meant for this to be crack but now i’m kind of.  side-eying it.  is this going to be a shitpost oneshot or will this have 12 chapters?  unclear!

8. pre-scenario OC fic in which i subtly explore the idea that ysa has definitely murdered someone before

gonna be a oneshot. the beginning and end is set, i just need the middle part.  which i could actually just skip all together if i’m feeling lazy.  might end up as a twoshot if i decide that yes, i do, in fact, like this OC to the point of inspiration.

9. roleswap au (real people <-> characters, sort of)

same as 5 -- no idea where this is going to go but i’ve already written too much to say that i won’t have at least one oneshot in this universe.  again: while i would like to take this seriously, canon rewrites scare me.

10. knw and hdh went to the same high school before the scenarios and are actually kind of good friends

honestly i just wanted to see 1) hdh show up more often and 2) if i could make knw x hdh work despite the fact that hdh doesn’t show up enough for me to remember what his personality is like.  will it actually be knw x hdh? no fucking clue.  have ideas that are even in chronological order, but they’re mostly pre-scenario.

[forthegothicheroine]

Opinions on Into the Dark Movies

I’ve seen a lot, though not all, of the Blumhouse series of Into the Dark, direct to Hulu horror movies themed around various holidays.  Some of them suck.  Some of them are surprisingly good!  Most are mediocre.  Still, I keep watching.  Rather than try to rank these movies, I’m just going to give a few of them awards.

Favorite Movie: Pooka Lives

If you were there for the height of Slenderman blogging, this will hit you hard!  The first Pooka movie was a psychological thriller and definitely interesting, but the horror-comedy sequel was the thing that touched my heart.  It’s all about how the internet creates memes that completely change from where they start by the whims of each new viral art piece.  While watching it, I said “according to Twin Peaks, this would be a a tulpa” at one point, and then Felicia Day said “I’ve got it, it’s a tulpa!”  She heard me!  Rachel Bloom kills Whil Weaton in the opening!  All you really need to know going in is that Pooka is a stuffed animal bear-rabbit-monster who repeats words in a “naughty” or “nice” voice.

Most Effective Horror Movie: I’m Just Fucking With You

Somebody on the Bloody Disgusting website said the stuff in this movie is worse torture than Saw or Hostel- but the kicker is, the torment is mostly mental and emotional.  An unlikeable internet troll checks into a sleazy motel, only to discover that the guy in charge of the place is a nastier troll than he’ll ever be.  This bespectacled, southern-accented slacker just keeps pulling pranks, each one more mean-spirited than the last, until they escalate to murder and the total destruction of our hero’s remaining humanity.  The constant neon-lit look of the motel is super intense, but the most important thing about this is that it shows you how really fucking annoying the Joker would be if you actually met him.

Sexiest Villain: Pilgrim

Look, I dunno.  Brother Ethan is just the sexiest evil Puritan you’ll ever find, as small as that pool may be.  He’s totally invested in what he’s doing, he fully believes in the lessons he’s teaching, he’s maybe a ghost or a trickster spirit or something, he has a great accent, he has a great laugh, and he has great piercing eyes.  Also he has this ongoing dynamic with the final girl that’s maybe sexually charged or maybe isn’t, but the whole thing is definitely a battle of wills and beliefs between them and that is hot.  Honorable mention goes to the hitman in The Body, but he only looked hot, he didn’t actually act hot, and there’s a difference.

Most Believeable Villain: New Year New You

Maybe the murders aren’t all believeable, but “Get Well” Danielle is!  Once a loathesome high school bully, she has now found fame and fortune as a loathesome social media influencer, and a culture that supports vapid self-promotion is one she thrives in.  Are the others in the movie any better, though?  They hate her, but isn’t it partly because they want to be her?  Don’t we all kind of want what she has, even while disdaining every part of her that got her where she is?

Movie I Could Have Written Better: Uncanny Annie

This movie about an evil board game sucked, but it didn’t have to!  There’s so much a horror comedy could parody about the modern board game scene.  It could have been an incredibly complex game with mutliple expansions where you’re two hours in and still haven’t gotten to using all the mechanics.  It could have been a super artsy Euro game with stunning evil art but instructions that are very poorly translated into English.  I work for a book and game store!  Give me a chance, I could script a greatdark parody of the the Arkham Horror franchise!

Movie That Might Have Been Scarier Without the Supernatural: Pure

I actually really respect the whole setup of this movie.  The notion of a “purity camp” father-daughter celebration is stunning and sickening, the fathers are holding their daughters to impossible standards and threatening to remove their love if they ever fair, the girls can’t trust that anyone they meet won’t reveal their secrets to the Reverend, and the camp itself looks like if that Midsommar farm was just No Fun Allowed.  Anyway, I don’t think they needed a weird rewriting of Lilith.  It’s a psychological cult horror, so let it stay that.  The girls can kill their dads at the end without any supernatural power.

Best Cheese: School Spirit

As soon as I saw the trailer and realized this was a Breakfast Club pastiche, I was in, baby.  You’ve got the prep, the class clown, the stoner, the nerd, and the delinquent all in for detention.  They resist the mean disciplinary teacher, they bond, they share secrets, they get high, they see beyond their cliques, and a masked slasher murders them one by one.  The villain reveal is ridiculous but kind of charming, a fun riff on the Norman Bates archetype, and the final girl’s speech to the killer at the end should be on all those “Good for her!” female character gif compilations.

Best Villain Outfit: Midnight Kiss

I love that giallo-killer-meets-gimp-suit look!  So creepy, yet so believeable for a club scene!  (Or at least, it would fit in with my memories of Folsom Street Fair.)  The movie itself isn’t super interesting as murder mysteries go, but it’s not bad, the whole thing is super stylish, and it is neat that almost the whole cast of characters, from heroes to villains, are gay.  But yeah, great costume, great party scenes, great beach house, shame about all the murders.

Movie I Wish I Hadn’t Sought Out Spoilers For: Culture Shock

I was trying to decide if I should see these movies and looked at lists of which ones were the best and then I looked into this one and...I spoiled the entire reveal.  It’s a great reveal!  I’ll try to avoid spoilering it here, but in this Spanish and English language movie, our heroine goes from dodging cartel men while trying to cross the border to existing in a beautiful, multicultural suburban town...where they dress like it’s the Tranquility Lane part of Fallout 3, and nobody will let her hold her infant son.  One of the more serious attempts at making a good movie, and I think it succeeds.

Movie That Does a Plotline Better Than Hannibal Did: Flesh & Blood

This movie, while following a pretty typical “Lifetime Movie” style plot (she says, never having seen a Lifetime movie), it understands one important thing: a story about a girl struggling to escape the influence of a pseudo-incestuous serial killer father figure is her goddamn story.  This will have to be my Abigail Hobbes fix fic.

Worst Movie: Tree House

Man, of all the horror movie characters not to get killed...

[ferusaurelius]

Day Two

For @the-wip-project #100DaysOfWriting challenge.

Prompt:  

For your current WIP: (do you have many WIPs? I have so many WIPs. So I mean current as of right this moment, the project you’re thinking about right now.) What motivates you to write this specific story? What makes this story special for you? Is there a special twist/trope/setting you want to explore? What got you started on this particular story?

I answered a bit of this in Day One but have some more meta for how and why I picked no-Reapers (and other tidbits and world details) for my “Air Needing Light” Mass Effect-based universe.

Ferus, why no-Reapers?

I immediately loved the world of Mass Effect and the whole visual phrasing of going off to retrieve an artifact where humanity was the galaxy’s quintessential new kid on the block. I thought that was great! And then Nihlus Kryik ended up dying in the prologue and we ended up with deep space eldritch horror monsters. Not sure if I should admit this, but that’s about the moment I went: oh, so it’s that kind of story.

I knew from that moment, early in my first playthrough of the first game, that I was going to just have to grin and bear it through the eldritch abominations being the big bad behind the scenes, whatever the game implied up front about Saren, the geth, and whatever else was going on in this universe.

It ended up feeling very flavor-of-the-week episodic with whatever villainous obstacle du jour we were going to encounter on each mission. In retrospect, I’m surprised I caught as much of the story as I did? I loved ME1 for the atmosphere and the background world, but I knew it wasn’t going to tell the stories I was most interested in.

The Reapers, in that sense, are just the primary plot element of ME1 that never worked for me.

While I can appreciate some excellent takes and rewrites in the fandom that have done great things with the Reapers, I wanted to go in a different direction.

Okay, so no-Reapers. What’s the central thesis of your plot?

I want to write something about the political tensions between the human Systems Alliance and the batarian Hegemony in the Skyllian Verge. That’s it, that’s the reason!

Batarians were criminally underutilized and ignored. Historically, they made contact with Citadel space 1000 years before the turians and 2000 years before humanity, and if you didn’t read the codex entries you’d never know it.

Wait, I thought Air Needing Light was about the First Contact War?

I’ve got roughly a trilogy planned. Every fic is designed to be standalone with some easter eggs present for anyone who reads all three.

There’s just enough background changes that I need to rewrite from the First Contact War, which gave me an opportunity to do something a little different with Saren’s character and throw him into a great political game. Nihlus also becomes a more central figure, as does his backstory. 

The first fic is setting up Saren’s military background. While there are allusions to later plot points which will crop up in this fic, you won’t have to read it if you just want to skip to the other two.

The second fic is setting up a very different galactic situation and environment before Eden Prime. The focus is on a few critical events in the Skyllian Verge and the motivations for Saren recruiting Nihlus to the Spectres. Batarians and Nihlus’s mercenary background play more of a role. This is going to be the ‘turian mercenary / batarian culture’ fic.

All of this setup then serves as the backdrop for the third fic, covering a very different Eden Prime and Normandy SR-1 crew. Assuming I get there? I’ll be happy if I just finish the first two. The third fic would be the icing on the cake. 

The third fic and outline breaks far enough from canon that I’d have to decide where to go after I finished it? So it’s just a different take on what I’d have liked to build into during ME1.

So what about all those one-shots? Got any more?

Funny story. I’ve got four one-shots in WIP. I think? Maybe more.

YOU WHAT.

Yeah, sorry, I’ve got a lot of ideas, I swear!

When are you posting next and what will it be?

Your guess is as good as mine. I’d like to think the next chapter(s) of Air Needing Light will finish up first, but if I have a really good day on a one-shot, that’ll get posted, instead. 

I have to roll with what I feel like working on, or the drafting and revising would never end.

I’ve been working on chapter (2+) of Air Needing Light for months at this point, but the bright side is that the rest of it shouldn’t be as complicated as I get over this hurdle. I’m also introducing the last primary member of the cast of characters! 

There’s a chance my next update for this story will be two or three chapters long...

[serendipitous-magic]

You might've talked about this already, but any tips for writer's block???

(Disclaimer: many of these are paraphrased from writing advice I've seen and liked myself, but can't for the life of me remember where I saw it or who said it.)

1) For existing stories: have a plan. Even if you’re someone who doesn’t like planning stories, have the most basic of skeleton plans. You don’t have to come up with the whole plan at once, and you don’t have to plan every little detail. But when you think of a plot point or scene or detail or whatever that you want to use later in the story, jot it down. Don’t count on yourself to remember it. You won’t.

And if you’re a person that hates planning stories, don’t think of it as a plan. Just think of it as saving the ideas you want to use later.

-_-

2) Write down your daydreams.

No, seriously. One of my biggest challenges in writing is that when I’m trying too hard, nothing happens. My best ideas happen when my brain is just playing, not even writing, just like... Going off on intangible adventures while I wash the dishes and listen to music. I’ll surface from some complicated daydream about a band of cowboys staging a horseback rescue mission for a friend being held prisoner on a moving locomotive, ending with the horse leaping over a narrow canyon Spirit style, and suddenly I’m like “wait, shit, this is good.” This applies for individual scenes, but also plot - the same thing often happens (to me at least) for larger plot points. I’ll be happily daydreaming a scene and suddenly one of the characters tearfully says, “I expected this from the others. I did. But from you? My own brother?” And I’m like WHOA WAIT, THEY’RE SIBLINGS? PLOT TWIST! And like... sometimes that shit makes it into the actual story I’m writing (or I write it down and save it for a future story) and becomes a major part of the plot, lol.

Point being, the things you come up with when you’re not even trying - when you’re just having fun, fucking around in the fandom or in whatever various universes you’ve created in your brain (anyone else? No? Just me?) - those effortless ideas are often some of the best ones. Because of how human brains work, it can be really, really hard to force yourself to make something good.

So if you’re just happily daydreaming, and you find yourself thinking, “Damn, this is actually pretty good,” write it down. You might be able to use it later.

-_-

3) If you’re in the middle of a story / scene and you get hit with writers’ block, or you find yourself rewriting the same sentence or paragraph or page over and over, or simply feel unable to continue forward - your problem is not that sentence / paragraph / page, it’s several sentences / paragraphs / pages back.

For example: if you can’t seem to figure out what a character should say next, first try the usual thing and plan ahead. Where does this conversation need to go? What needs to be revealed? What emotional beats need to occur? What information needs to pass from character to character? Does it need to continue? Maybe you just need to cut the scene or have the next plot point happen there.

But if none of that (the “usual stuff”) is working, don’t look ahead, look back. Your problem is probably actually a few lines ago. The conversation meandered too far from what it was supposed to be, or the conversation could have been three lines and it just kept going on for two pages after the plot point ended, or you’re not sure what the emotional beats of the scene are supposed to be so you’re floundering.

When trying to move forward isn’t working, look back instead. Mid-story writers’ block is often a sign that something went awry a little while ago, and you’re seeing the symptoms now. The stubborn paragraph is the check-engine light, not the engine itself. Go back and read over the last page (or more, depending on how big the issue is) and see if you can feel out what the issue is. Did the plot point end two or three pages ago and you just never stopped the scene? Are you relying too much on action and dialogue but forgot to describe the scene as it goes on, so it’s all happening in kind of a vague gray void? Did you get into a rut of repetitive sentence structure because you lost the flow a while ago, and now you’re just cranking out words mechanically?

-_-

4) Don’t be afraid to write “stupid version:” at the top of the page and just go for it, in the most cheesy, over-the-top, bad, obvious, flat, boring, illogical, improbable, unbelievable way. Or whatever way ends up coming out of you. You can go back and fix it once you’ve found the ideas you want to hold onto. Remember, “the first draft (whether that’s for the entire story, or just a draft of a single scene, or a single page, or a single paragraph) is for making it exist. The second draft is for making it functional. The third draft is for making it effective.” (I’m paraphrasing and I don’t remember where that quote came from, I’m sorry.)

-_-

5) If you’re having writers’ block on in coming up with new ideas, here are some things that work for me:

-Write down your daydreams (see above)

-Listen to music. Soundtracks and video game music are great because they’re designed to support a narrative, and to almost tell a story of their own. But, like, any music. I often end up making little “trailers” in my head when I listen to songs I’m currently taken with, and sometimes I’m like “Hey those could be some good elements for an actual story.”

-Look back at old notes for story ideas, if you keep any

-Or, look through any medium you use to save ideas - playlists, pinterest boards, art, whatever.

-Consume other content. I know that’s old advice that literally everyone gives, but hey, it works. You’re great and your brain is great, but you are not a closed ecosystem. You can’t just keep creating, growing, thriving all on your own without taking in and integrating other people’s ideas. Read something. Watch something. Read fanfic, see what the fandom’s up to. Reintroduce yourself to an old favorite with new eyes, or seek out something you’ve never seen before. Watch one of those old classic black and white movies that you never got around to watching. Read a book in a genre you don’t usually read. Find a terrible, I mean truly awful show and watch it with someone you can laugh with. Look at art. Ask the people in your life about their passions and their weird little cornerstones of knowledge.

-Give yourself time. Let yourself percolate. Let yourself think.

-Write yourself into an idea. Open up that dreaded blank page, switch to red ink, and just start typing like “Okay so it’s a werewolf story I think but not one of those pulp romances with the Alpha Wolf or whatever shit, I think I like the idea that it’s about the pack dynamic, so like a family story? But maybe the main character is a human. Do they get adopted by the pack for some reason? Why? Maybe they like... saved one of the pups or something. How did the pup end up in danger?” Etc.

6) It’s hard to force your brain to be interested in something it’s not currently interested in. If you’ve been super into sci fi and are all about Star Wars and Firefly right now, but you’ve been meaning to write a gritty crime mystery for like ever... you’re probably gonna have a hard time writing a gritty crime fiction if all your brain wants to think about is spaceships. (Unless you set the gritty crime mystery in a sci-fi setting 👀)

Trying to control your muse is like trying to leash a cat. You’re probably gonna have way greater success (and way more fun) if you just write whatever the hell you wanna write, whether that’s a 300K spy drama or another fake dating AU for your OTP even though you’ve already written two. (I promise you, nobody’s ever gonna get tired of it.)