#okay hold on while i was typing that a comma somehow found its way in there and i deleted it bc i didn’t want a comma there but now im

[pallases]

my prof giving us an exam on content he can’t even do himself <3

[theticklishpear]

WriteblrConnects December Festive Fun

@writeblrconnections did a month-long palooza of daily questions to get to know each other. They wanted us to blog the original posts to add on, but I didn’t want to spam you all with the posts every day, so instead, here are my responses under the cut, all at once, in case anyone was interested. (Sorry for breaking the rules, M3....)

Day One: Why did you pick your current Tumblr handle? Is there a story behind the handle? How did you come up with the idea for it?

I wanted to do something related to literature, but I also knew I didn’t want to be a blog solely dedicated to whatever it was I referenced. I didn’t have a reason for choosing Harry Potter aside from it being a series I grew up with and one of the reasons I started reading on a regular basis. I wanted something that wouldn’t seem too overt, but if you knew the books well enough, you’d get it. Add the original illustration for the moment in the books as my avatar to help pass the hint along, and there I was: theticklishpear.

Day Two: Where is your favorite writing spot?

The floor! Laying on the floor with a notebook and pen is the best way I’ve found to get myself unstuck and to ease myself back into writing after a long break. It puts me in stronger touch with the words themselves somehow.

Day Three: What is your favorite kind of music to listen to while writing?

Movie and game soundtracks! It’s got to be lyric-less. I don’t have specific playlists for different stories or types of scenes, though.

Day Four: Awful AU Ideas: Name one (or more if you’re so inclined!) AU idea(s) that would either have your readers crying (because it’s good but incredibly sad) or cringing (because it’s truly terrible).

I... don’t really get AU ideas?

Day Five: Post a GIF to describe your current attitude/state with writing (please keep it PG-13 or below!)

Day Six: Name your top three “bad” habits when it comes to writing. This can be anything that the “rules” (or any other common writing advice) say are “bad.” Think of this as flouting the rules!

1. “Just” and “very.” 2. Long, sometimes-too-complex sentences. 3. Ignore the idea of flaws. Not that they don’t have what some would consider “flaws,” just that I don’t put any stock in the idea of calling them flaws. They’re just another facet.

Day Seven: What do you find the easiest–first drafts, rewrites or edits? Which is the hardest?

Easiest is edits. There’s nothing subjective about those. Either it’s spelled correctly or not; either the comma belongs there or it doesn’t; either the sentence is convoluted or it’s not; either the sentence achieves something and belongs, or it doesn’t and it gets cut. Drafts and rewrites are more fun, but they’re also more work and more imagination and more effort. Edits are just factual.

Day Eight: Take a look at this amusing explanation of plot bunnies. Which one(s) do you struggle with the most?

Lethargic, easily startled, and dying bunnies are common for me. I often get an idea I love that I’m very enthusiastic about until I’ve written a portion of it, at which point it loses steam, and I have a hard time getting back into it, particularly if the bunny doesn’t come with an end-point for the story to move toward. After that initial steam, it takes a while for me to sit down and puzzle out what the story really is.

Day Nine: What’s your favorite way to break writer’s block?

Breaking writer’s block is never fun for me, so “favorite” is a bit of a misnomer. I hate dealing with it and I hate having to break it and none of the techniques are my favorite because I’d rather I didn’t have to do them at all. It hurts. Mostly I have to figure out what’s caused it to begin with, whether that’s overworking or a need to reorganize my priorities or mental health. I have to fix what’s keeping me from doing that, and it may mean continuing not to write until I am better. So, often times, it’s a process of healing, which involves waiting until my mind feels bright enough to write again. And then I stretch out on the floor with clipboard and pen in hand, and I give myself permission to start something new, to ease into what I want to write, not what’s been waiting for me or what I need to write. It’s as simple as that. Heal first, write what I want, get back to the other projects when I’m able.

Day Ten: What is your preferred beverage when writing? Coffee? Tea? Hot chocolate? Or something else entirely? BONUS: If your favorite drink is hot, how often does it end up going cold because your writing made you forget about it?

Tea, and it isn’t really fair to say that it gets cold every time I write, because it gets cold every time I make tea, regardless of whether I’m writing or not. I take forever to drink anything.

Day Eleven: What is your editing process like?

Forget about it! Do several read-throughs and make lists of things that are missing, loose, unnecessary, not well-articulated, repeated themes, and more. Rewrite or actually write those inadequate or missing scenes. Read through it again for continuity errors with the new segments, style problems, and other medium-sized things; and then read through it again, looking for small things like spelling and whether each line is holding its own weight.

Day Twelve: Share a snippet of one of your earliest pieces of writing (cringe-worthy or not!). If you’re not comfortable sharing an excerpt, share one of your earliest ideas!

My earliest writing was all done on disposable things--most notably napkins in restaurants--so I don’t have any of my earliest stuff, but I have a couple of early story starts, probably from twelve years ago or so. It’s a single page in an otherwise blank notebook, and I think it’s the origin of the first ideas for the Moonwater Series....

Jumping up, she took a small glass vial from a pouch, raced to the window, and threw it open. The sounds of the bustling market came in along with the dying afternoon light. It was just that time between afternoon and evening when the crowds of the day began to look up at the horizon, mothers snatch children to their sides, and men lead their families back to their homes. Leaning out into the cooling air, she uncorked the vial, waved it around a bit, brought it in, sniffed it, shook her head, waved it around again, then corked it quickly and with the air of one who has just made a fantastic catch. Tipping the vial upside down, she flicked the bottom, grinned, and flung the shutters closed for the evening. “You can never have enough good, quality twilight around. I think I just got the right aging, even. It’s either too early or too late, but I think this is just right.”

Day Thirteen: Do you write lots of stories at once or only one at a time?

I usually actively write just one, kind of dabble in writing a second or third, and then think intensively about three or four additional ideas.

Day Fourteen: The Muse of Writing comes to you and offers to grant you one wish in regards to your writing ability or style. What do you wish for? Do you want to write like a specific author? Improve one area of your writing?

I don’t want anything to change all on its own in regards to my ability or style. I’m pretty fond of my style, and I would prefer for my ability to grow through my own learning. What I do need is more time and energy throughout the year so that I can write. That, and the wider appeal of my writing/stories, would be most helpful.

Day Fifteen: Do you prefer writing by hand or on a computer? Why?

Both, in different situations. By hand when I’m having trouble focusing, have been in a long slump, or am puzzling through something. By computer when I need quantity over quality, like NaNoWriMo. I also have a bluetooth keyboard for my Kindle Fire tablet, which I use for write-ins and whatnot.

Day Sixteen: Describe your inner editor. What do they look like? Sound like? How do you usually shut them up (and yes, duct-taping them to a chair is fair game)?

A copy of me, but dressed in slacks, button-up, and an excellently-fitting suit vest. They usually have a pen hanging lazily from one hand and drawl a bit as though I’m slow to understand obvious things. “Unnecessary, nobody needs that, nobody even cares, extraneous, so many things you could do better, you know.” I’m fueled by spite, so my response is usually gritted teeth, a wave of the hand, and a, “Yes, I know, but it will be necessary, it is important, and I’ll show you!”

Day Seventeen: Secret Santa Event

Day Eighteen: Confession time: where do you get your best ideas? In the shower? At work? In the middle of the night while you sneak Oreos out of your roommates stash? What are you usually doing when you’re hit with inspiration?

I’m usually in the shower or staring at a blank page. Part of my writing process is just thinking, putting words together in sentences until one has a strangeness to it. I’m listening for double meanings or ambiguous phrasing that could be twisted into something unexpected. When I’ve decided to write on something new as a break from my normal WIPs, I just stare and think and listen to the way my brain puts words in order. There always has to be a moment of, “Okay, but why?” As soon as that happens, I’m off!

Day Nineteen: Who is your favorite character from each of your WIPs?

Moonwater Series: Cyrian is a lot of fun; equal parts cryptic and cheeky. Sheytana is easy and smooth to write, so she’s probably a close second because I don’t have to think much when it comes to her. She’s very natural.

Gran and Gwyn: Oh, Gran, for sure. Crotchety 83-year-old detective who is exasperated by everybody.

The City Docks: Quill is great because of his down-to-earth, practical perspective, but Fell is great, too, for all her wonder and excitement.

Day Twenty: Describe your dream writing environment. Castle in Ireland? By the beach? A trendy cafe? Don’t be afraid to have fun with this one!

Somewhere quiet, rain pattering off the roof, a window letting in the grey light, and beyond the glass, nothing but dripping woods and a distant, fogged lake. No other houses, no one to look through the window and see me laying on the floor dreaming, nothing to break the peace, quiet, and illusion of loneliness.

Day Twenty-One: If you could meet one author, living or dead, who would it be and why?

I’m a terrible conversationalist, so I’d want to meet him with low contact stakes, like, if I was part of a panel audience or something, but C.S. Lewis would be my guy. I grew up with Narnia--my dad was deployed overseas when I was five or six in the 90s, pre-digital, and he had more or less nothing to do over there, so my mother recorded herself reading the books, with voices and the whole bit, on cassette tapes to mail over to him to listen to on a walkman. My sister and I would lay on the hallway floor after we were supposed to be in bed, with our ears pressed up against the crack at the bottom of the door to listen to her do these, and then when he came home, he brought them back and I got them--still do!--and I used to listen to them as I went to bed. I’ve read and listened to Narnia so many times that I had them memorized for a long time, and my first email address--which I also still have...--was Narnia-related. So yes, I’d like to listen to C.S. Lewis talk about constructing story.

Day Twenty-Two: You’re hosting a dinner party and can invite any of your characters. Who do you invite?

Sheytana Roper, Baron Sinister of Thieves, and Cyrian Greystoke, former Baron Sinister of Thieves from the Moonwater Series, Pixel Constant and Cairn Shipstealer from The A Team world stories, the narrator from Singers of Sand and Sea, and probably a couple of minor characters from the Moonwater series like Keetan who runs the orphanage, Captain Adedayo from the pirate conglomerate of Anderlene, and matron Rada Kaye.

Day Twenty-Three: Have you ever participated in an activity or gone to an event JUST to make your writing more realistic? Share what you did if you’d like! If you haven’t share something that you’d LIKE to do as writing-related research!

Geez, half the courses I took in college were to make my writing better. Dad always wanted a justification for why I was taking classes not specifically for something, or why one class over another for the general requirements--not that he preferred one over the other, he just wanted to know if I was thinking about why I wanted to take courses, what I was hoping to get out of them.

“Why geology?” “For worldbuilding--to build better, more realistic worlds.”

Heck, my entire Anthropology minor was for the betterment of my culture-building, and that was 40-some-odd credits.

Day Twenty-Four: How old were you when you started writing?

I was an oral story-teller first, because reading and writing was hard, but I liked stories and I liked to tell them. Writing didn’t come into the picture until I worked harder at reading and started to actually like it, so some time after Harry Potter when I was 8. Writing in earnest as a Thing(TM) was 13 or so.

Day Twenty-Five: What’s the biggest compliment you’ve gotten on your writing? Who did it come from? Any fun stories behind how you got the compliment?

I don’t really get compliments on my writing, but I do get compliments on characters. The biggest indirect compliment was that both my fiction and creative nonfiction capstone classes in college had reading periods, and we were only supposed to read for about 10 minutes each before workshopping a piece. My creative nonfiction class always asked very excitedly for me to read and had literally visceral reactions to the stories; and my fiction class just unanimously decided once very early in the course that I could read up to 20 minutes. I’d read my 10 minutes, said, “And that’s my time. Thanks,” went to sit down for the critique, and the professor looked scandelized, the whole class groaned and he waved me back up, saying, “You have to finish the scene!” And from then on, I always got to read at least 15 minutes.

In that same fiction class, I did have several people say one of my characters reminded them of Han Solo, which, in retrospect, fits his character really well, so that was nice?

Day Twenty-Six: What’s the best writing advice you’ve gotten? What’s the worst?

I still stand firmly by the time a professor serenaded me with “Don’t Stop Believing” in his office as some pretty damn good advice. For real advice, that same professor taught me to think about whose story I’m telling to help center and focus the on-screen events.

I don’t think I’ve gotten bad advice, though. Bad critiques, yes; bad advice, no. Advice can’t be bad--they wouldn’t tell it to you if they didn’t think it had merit. Some techniques work for some and not for others, so the advice isn’t bad, just not right for you.

Day Twenty-Seven: SECRET SANTA REVEAL! Reblog this post with the writeblrs you are a Secret Santa for OR send a direct ask to the writeblr and reblog this post once you have!

Day Twenty-Eight: Do you ever set long term goals (think New Year’s Resolutions) for your writing? Would you ever consider setting those kinds of goals? Why or why not?

Rarely for writing aside from the vague “write more” kinds of resolutions. I have the Moonwater Series at a current “goal,” but it’s not a firm timeline or anything. I just want to keep moving. That’s the key.

Day Twenty-Nine: Name your top three “most loved” tropes and your top three “most hated” tropes.

Most Loved: Found family || close sibling friendship || snarky magical companions (usually creatures)

Most Hated: Friends of different genders can’t just be platonic friends!! They must be lovers!!! || incest or even might-be-incest-but-not-really-I-promise-haha!!! || protagonist is the most [adjective] in all the land, but they sure don’t act like it! Isn’t is cute and funny??

Day Thirty: The Muse of Writing pops back by again and gives you the ability to rewrite the plot of one book. Which one do you choose?

I have too many books of my own to care. The write wrote it that way for a reason that made sense and was satisfactory to them. I’m going to strive to do the same. I don’t need to rewrite somebody’s book. (But if I did, The Mermaid’s Sister would get a yank in the right direction.)

Day Thirty-One: What are your writing goals for 2018? If you don’t set writing goals, what project are you particularly excited about writing or finishing in 2018?

Annual call-out.... Finish Gran and Gwyn, finish Spirit Shores, plot out Book Five and start writing it (hopefully), work on City Docks, consider The Book Well and the Alchemy Engine. Maybe shop The Evening Road around again.