#these wips are just for one story each

[monochromatictoad]

Me: Maybe I should open prompts for my writing blog. Something to get my ass back into writing.

Also me: *has two WIPs for a Macul short and three for an Isaacul short, because I cannot get Mathias or Isaac's personalities right.*

[squirrelno2]

All right so I haven't been active in the Julie and the Phantoms fandom in a long time, and although I know there are definitely still people creating and reblogging in the fandom it tends to be a much smaller handful of people than it used to, which for me felt disheartening and was part of why I've backed off from it. I'd love to see new stuff more regularly and start recirculating older things just to remind myself and anyone else who needs it how much I love this silly little show.

All this to say, I am putting out feelers to see if anyone is interested in a blog that runs consistent, casual event-type things for the fandom to try and revitalize interest in jatp fanworks, like featured weeks for individual characters here, fic rec events, etc. I'm toying with ideas to inspire people to pick up their wips, spark new stories, and highlight older content that didn’t get much attention or would just be nice to see again. I’d like to create a community space to liven the fandom back up for people who miss the show or got into the fandom after the hype died down. Does that seem interesting to anyone?

[askyofexplodingstars]

my favourite polycule

[diazheartsbuckley]

📄 I love angst so I think this will be soo good

Hiya anon 🫶🏻

This is a tough one but it’s worth it 💗

📄📄📄📄

“This is our marriage, Buck. You don’t get to just make the decision when it ends, at least not without talking to me first” Eddie says, feeling his jaw clenching in frustration.

“You were the one who transacted to another station! What am I supposed to do with that?” Buck snaps, watching his husband’s eyes widening in surprise, like that wasn’t the answer that he was expecting.

Make me write ✍🏻

Tagging the wife @tizniz 😘

[delta-piscium]

blatantly making [DnD character’s] backstory a steddie fic for wip weekend please I am so intrigued!!

oh thank you!!! You have no idea how excited I am that you requested this, this fic is my (very neglected) baby !! (and based on my favorite PC who is a human bard called Max in a modern campaign setting, i just wanted to share that lmao)

“Steve? Eddie?” Someone calls from the other room and they spring apart. “Where did you go?” “Uhh,” Eddie says and Steve rolls his eyes. “Just getting water,” he calls back, “we’ll be out soon.” “Get me an ice cream too,” the someone, who Steve now realizes is definitely Dustin, shouts before he hears the back door sliding open and then shut again.  He waits a couple of seconds to be sure they're alone again and then raises an eyebrow at Eddie. “Uhh,” he parrots. “There’s not a lot of blood in my brain, kinda difficult to think” Eddie snipes back but he’s smiling. Steve tilts his head, “I make it hard for you to think straight?”  Eddie gives him an unimpressed look, “that’s the worst thing anyone has ever said to me Harrington, and I had an angry mob with pitchforks after me.” Steve shrugs, “what are you gonna do about it?” Then he lets a slow smile spread across his lips, and glances down at Eddies ‘no blood in his brain situation’ “big boy.” Eddie’s jaw audibly snaps shut and when Steve looks up he’s giving him a wide-eyed look. ‘Yeah, got him back for that one’ Steve thinks, satisfied to have some leverage back between them.  Eddie closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. “You are gonna have to stay so far away from me Harrington, or I will jump your bones and traumatize all our friends even more than they already are. Then when everyone has left I will deal with all,” he waves a hand between them, “this.” “You keep calling me Harrington,” Steve points out, “what, no more baby? Sweetheart? Princess?” Eddie turns on his heel.  “So far away,” he shouts over his shoulder.

(very late) WIP weekend (Wednesday)/make me write

[insane-weasel]

I think as writers we should hold funerals for our WIPs more often.

Dearly beloved, gather us here today where this fic of some middle-aged man getting rawdogged and this other fanfic about the importance of friendship are laid to rest, because the author got really distracted playing that new video game.

We celebrate what could have been, cut-and-recycle those really good lines or ideas, because I swear I'm going to use them, I swear! And drag this poor document not to the great recycling bin or trash, but to the "graveyard" folder because sometimes I like to commune with the dead.

[altruistic-meme]

pov: you're Abram when he's about to start writing something

[keeps-ache]

ggghhg i hate vehiclessssssss ghghghhghhhhh [dies dies dies forever]

[cream-and-tea]

was thinking about it and i firmly believe that the funniest possible thing to keep the exact same if i write anything in the lmd no-magic-no-apocalypse-au is pallas and calliope routinely just beating the absolute shit out of each other. t4t violence that transcends genre or whatever.

[themyscirah]

Started thinking about the Amanda Waller + Ben Turner relationship again.... fuck, I'm gonna need a minute

[exalok]

might post all the tiny self-imposed prompt stuff from a few years back that i for some reason never did. this is your automated warning

[eorzeashan]

still having brainrot over Eight and Lana's own commander-and-outlander relationship bc i can't fucking sleep and have to make flop posts, but the day before he leaves is the day they sit down with one another atop his ship, watching the sunrise. (I guess this counts as a WIP whenever but I've slacked so hard this month I don't even remember how or what i've been tagged in...OTL)

they've both been made aware of one another. Lana's incomparably guilty. Eight looks at her and sighs.

"Be proud, Lana Beniko. Yours is the shield that our enemies dashed themselves on, that guaranteed a new future for all those you held dear. If you're at a loss for what to say to me: don't. No other would go so far. That is why we won."

For once in her life, Lana finds no speeches at the tip of her tongue, no ready-made phrasing that does just enough; she merely stares at her friend, (her hand), and stammers.

"I... don't know what to say. Eight, I..."

"I just told you not to." The spy feigns irritation with a roll of his eyes, then cracks a smile at her, faint and fleeting as the breaking dawn. "Neither of us were very good at listening to each other, were we."

An awkward silence descends on them. Lana is visibly discomforted, now made aware of the exact implications of such a statement. Eight had bent over backwards to follow her sense of right and wrong. Eight had devoted everything to heeding her call. She hadn't even known his reasons for doing so until the very end, blinded by her own eagerness to be saved. Her gloved hands grip the edge of their perch, white-knuckling them beneath the leather.

And she'd been none the wiser until she awoke one day to a slightly panicked holocall from base saying Eight was gone.

He'd fled. Deserted. In the traitor Theron's words, as he put it with uncharacteristic gravity to his features, "was it any surprise that he ran away? you used him-- and now he wants nothing to do with you or the Alliance. It's over."

The betrayal had stung almost as much as the revelation. They'd made up by now, but...

"Lana." Eight's voice pulls her out of her morose reverie, clear and lucid as day. His eyes lock with hers, piercing right into her soul. Lana's breath hitches, and his next words punch the air right out of her chest, like a battered hole in a damaged dreadnaught in the vacuum of space.

"Stop it. I know that look. Stop punishing yourself."

He grips her by the shoulders, shockingly earnest for a spy who concealed all emotion. Lana opens her mouth to speak, but instead of words coming forth- something unfathomable flows into her across the bridge of physical and mental contact, whisking her away on the tides of fate.

[nostalgia-tblr]

Today I wrote about 900 words \o/ But only 100 of those were in the thing I wanted to add words to :( And most of them are in the wrong chapter. :( :(

[atomic-insomnia]

theme in my writing i only just now realized: using a unique nickname to indicate closeness/affection between two characters that others don't have

[batri-jopa]

WIP ASK MEME

Thank you @notasapleasure for tagging me!

Who should I tag now? Maybe @zorilleerrant and @figuringthengsout ... And whoever else wants to join! It's two month old tag game so every writer probably have been tagged already😅

Now I don't believe anyone would be really interested in my WIPs (though you're all invited to surprise me!) I just hope that maybe writing about my unfinished writings would feel like actually doing something about it? And listing your problems could be the first step to solve them so...

Let's do this:

AND THEN WE DANCED:

"DAFT"* - fix-it-fic: I decided that Irakli definitely MUST see Merab sleeping in front of his granny's block. The rest of the movie plot I try to leave as untouched as I could so it is still far from easy happy ending. But at least I gave them time to think and chance to work on it. And whenever they feel relaxed they start to behave silly for that's the part of their relationship dynamics that I adore❤️ *Note: fic was inspired with Maurice by E.M. Forster where "a happy ending was imperative". I even made few scenes or characters' thoughts as homage to either scenes from a Maurice book or from its movie adaptation. But I doubt ATWD fans know Maurice and even less that Maurice fans care for ATWD. That is I'm not sure if there more than two persons like this, including me😅

WIP with working title: "DEFY THE WORLD"* - could be treated as sequel of DAFT (I decided to put here all the ideas that did't fit to main narration of "Daft". It's a bit like "Mary Poppins in the park" for that matter). All in all - Merab and Irakli are still together in Georgia somehow! I try to give very little details about place and time as possible (I was never good in world building, analysing interactions is what I prefer - so I trust your brains to fill up the gaps💪). I simply just enjoy writing short scenes and some cute aspects of their relationship in my free time. Some are quite good I think. And some are NSFW. *my first idea of working title was "Cud, miód i orzeszki" - it is Polish untranslable phrase indicating a very pleasant situation, and I love it because "orzeszki" means nuts (very important ingredient in georgian cuisine!) but also because you can't say the word "orzeszki" without ending up with broad sweet silly smile on your face - and that's exactly the mood that I wish for our boys!❤️

SOME JUST STAY UNSEEN (aka NIGHT NATION) explaination: that's my vampire story initially inspired with anime series Black Blood Brothers - especially with its minor character Kelly Wong and her people. The moment she told Mimiko sth like: "You don't need to worry, I just had a snack" in the most casual way and gave her that grin - she stole my heart and possesed my mind. Ever since then I've been wondering and analysing, and theorising, and inevitably world-building: were do young, poor, not-noble vampires like her hunt? Were do they live? How do they survive? How do they support each other as a community? My story takes place in "alternative universe central Europe", does not include any of BBB characters and also I changed some rules of vampirism - so I actually don't treat it as fanfic anymore.

Presence (1990s) - story of Robbie, the teenager who was just recently changed into vampire and is struggling to learn the rules of that weird new world, with help of his vampire older brother, Jerr.

Past life of other vampires around (gradually revealed in the main narration but Robbie often stays unaware of those): young widow Jen, jewish girl Arue (turned during WWII by The Oldest), her sister Pam (who Arue turned in 1950s), Apter (The Oldest vampire in this part of the area, changed in medieval times [the name is fucking stupid but initially I named him Sayo which turned out to be a female name]). Jerr's past remains unknown for longest

Human perspective of Alex, a teenage girl who became Robbie's friend

I was writing this story for so many years already (it's spinning in my brain since... 2009? Or longer?) that I feel like I grew up with it. I witnessed my brain gradually turning from empathysing with young Rob - to finally choosing POV of his older brother, Jerr. There's almost no romantic interactions, because I honestly never felt any need for them (I discovered that I am aromantic just 2 years ago - and now I'm fascinated to see how obviously aromantic all my vampire-OCs always were without me even knowing). The story is fucking long (about 500 pages in Word document) and needs huge edition (many important scenes I was describing 4 or even 5 times, always with a bit different details). And the whole thing is written in Polish - if I ever plan to share it I'd need to translate to English with Google Translator or sth.

Should I also list things that I most probably won't even write down? You may notice an obvious pattern of my interest through this... Have some drawings for entertainment:

STORIES NEVER TOLD

OBSESSION OF BLUE - story of winged people. Main character, Nomin, grows up in the country with other winged people only (I had a lot of fun with their world building) but then once is send on another continent to the country of wingless people and stucks there. So he tries to survive among them, hiding his wings and learning different language and culture. His greatest friend back home is a talking cat, Meton, he once got for his birthday. Very sarcastic one. Actually the most interesting character I suppose. Though I like all the moments Nomin behaves so weird in the eyes of the wingless.

KOSA - a winged girl from the same universe as Nomin only she was raised among wingless people in some postapocaliptic fantasy environment. Not knowing anyone like her she is trying hard to be a "normal" girl as is expected from her, though she has passion for long travels and climbing trees. Once she notices her wings start to turn black and she is terrified that she'd turn into a demon (could not know it is a normal sign of a adolescence). So she hides her wings and supress everything her heart desire and still feels like a failure. But when one day her father-figure gets imprisoned, she decides to safe him and that's when she starts to learn how to live and act on her own. That's the girl with sword

CAT RIDER - a young girl (Millie) takes care of an injured tiny guy (Drannen) who fell from the sky. Overcoming the initial prejudice the guy starts to like his young giant caretaker but one day have to return home (he leaves few jewels as gift for her and takes a kitten with him). Another part of the story is few years later: the girl who were turned into a liliput by a bad witch. She meets her old friend who is now a cat rider (she has no idea that he is also a prince). I had a lot of fun with world-building. Nuff said Drannen's compannions call her "the girl who is afraid of her meal" after seeing her reaction to earthworm on her plate

WEIRD TWO FOOTED CREATURE (aka Feet Fetishist) - young centaur meets a human girl on his walk, takes her home and treats as a fascinating exotic pet. Then he gradually learns that she is a person. And that's when their problem appears because centaurs' society is very conservative. (here's Ain and Ida)

WHEELS - very stupid story of boy meets a girl. Or rather get caught? Boy is on wheelchair and girl is... umm, weird? (well, not neurotypical, that's for sure). Anyway the story contains drinking for courage, memory loss, condensed silliness and stupid sexual puns/NSFW. And how was all this inspired with Wheels by Billy Vaughn I can not quite explain (there's also Sail along silvry moon I love it!) I actually always wanted to share this story (anonymously because of how stupid it is) though I never had the courage (what if it's only funny for me? Or if someone would feel offended? I'd burn from shame). On the other hand I guess there's no better place for it than tumblr🤔 But be aware that my most favorite relationship dynamics is "being idiotic together".

I even made few illustrations inventing my new drawing style just for these guys: (the girl here is drunk AF and I love her)

WOLFALIKES - Faith, Love and Hope are three brothers in fantastic world of wolf-alike creatures. Faith is strong (often called Truth for how much knowledge he have and how honest he is), Love is tender and wise and Hope is easy forgiving joy bringer. There's quite sad part because Love and Hope get killed by Hate, Despair and Lie... but they can't be gone just like that, could they? In the other part of the story there's interesting relationship between Faith and Temptation. More about three brothers on my deviantart

NO-WOLF'S TAIL - few stories within a story. All containing wolf-alikes along with demons, spirits, death and trauma. One angry wolf-character with dissociative fugue (after a traumatic quest with his compannion freezing to death and himself halucinating and almost freezing too) becomes a wandering demon-fighting spiritualist (but after another trauma he comes back to his old personality and remembers nothing of what he achieved). Other curious and adventurous young wolf is given the magical power to turn into a human to protect some very important girl - but once a girl gets aware of who he is it becomes complicated (while he's fine with eventually sacrifying his life for her but she's definitely not alright with it). And then there's also a grumpy outcast wolf living in an old castle with bunch of dogs (who despise and avoid him) and his only friend becomes a mouse. Both are disrespected by dogs's society and only have each other. Wolf gets somebody who cares about him despite being scared and the mouse (naive and good heart, easily abused by dogs) gets protection and self-esteem from the wolf.

SARIANS - talking cats on a quest to find a promised land. What's more to say about it? I was a teen and needed an excuse to draw bows and arrows, cats, dragons, foxes and goats... More about sarian cats on my deviantart

[physalian]

How To Make Your Writing Less Stiff 5

Movement

Dredging this back up from way back.

Make sure your characters move, but not too much during heavy dialogue scenes. E.g. two characters sitting and talking—do humans just stare at each other with their arms lifeless and bodies utterly motionless during conversation? No? Then neither should your characters. Make them…

Gesture

Wave

Frown

Laugh

Cross their legs/their arms

Shift around to get comfortable

Pound the table

Roll their eyes

Point

Shrug

Touch their face/their hair

Wring their hands

Pick at their nails

Yawn

Stretch

Sniff/sniffle

Tap their fingers/drum

Bounce their feet

Doodle

Fiddle with buttons or jewelry

Scratch an itch

Touch their weapons/gadgets/phones

Check the time

Get up and sit back down

Move from chair to tabletop

The list goes on.

Bonus points if these are tics that serve to develop your character, like a nervous fiddler, or if one moves a lot and the other doesn’t—what does that say about the both of them? This is where “show don’t tell” really comes into play.

As in, you could say “he’s nervous” or you could show, “He fidgets, constantly glancing at the clock as sweat beads at his temples.”

This site is full of discourse on telling vs showing so I’ll leave it at that.

Epithets

In the Sci-fi WIP that shall never see the light of day, I had a flashback arc for one male character and his relationship with another male character. On top of that, the flashback character was a nameless narrator for Reasons.

Enter the problem: How would you keep track of two male characters, one who you can't name, and the other who does have a name, but you can’t oversaturate the narrative with it? I did a few things.

Nameless Narrator (written in 3rd person limited POV) was the only narrator for the flashback arc. I never switched to the boyfriend’s POV.

Boyfriend had only a couple epithets that could only apply to him, and halfway through their relationship, NN went from describing him as “the other prisoner” to “his cellmate” to “his partner” (which was also a double entendre). NN also switched from using BF’s full name to a nickname both in narration and dialogue.

BF had a title for NN that he used exclusively in dialogue, since BF couldn’t use his given name and NN hadn’t picked a new one for himself.

Every time the subject of the narrative switched, I started a new paragraph so “he” never described either character ambiguously mid-paragraph.

Is this an extreme example? Absolutely, but I pulled it off according to my betas.

The point of all this is this: Epithets shouldn’t just exist to substitute an overused name. Epithets de-personalize the subject if you use them incorrectly. If your narrator is thinking of their lover and describing that person without their name, then the trait they pick to focus on should be something equally important to them. In contrast, if you want to drive home how little a narrator thinks of somebody, using depersonalizing epithets helps sell that disrespect.

Fanfic tends to be the most egregious with soulless epithets like "the black-haired boy" that tell the reader absolutely nothing about how the narrator feels about that black-haired boy, espeically if they're doing so during a highly-emotional moment.

As in, NN and BF had one implied sex scene. Had I said “the other prisoner” that would have completely ruined the mood. He’s so much more than “the other prisoner” at that point in the story. “His partner,” since they were both a combat team and romantically involved, encompassed their entire relationship.

The epithet also changed depending on what mood or how hopeless NN saw their situation. He’d wax and wane over how close he believed them to be for Reasons. NN was a very reserved character who kept BF at a distance, afraid to go “all in” because he knew there was a high chance of BF not surviving this campaign. So NN never used “his lover”.

All to say, epithets carried the subtext of that flashback arc, when I had a character who would not talk about his feelings. I could show you the progression of their relationship through how the epithets changed.

I could show you whenever NN was being a big fat liar about his feelings when he said he's not in love, but his narration gave him away. I could show you the exact moment their relationship shifted from comrades to something more when NN switched mid-paragraph from "his cellmate" to "his partner" and when he took up BF's nickame exclusively in the same scene.

I do the same thing in Eternal Night when Elias, my protagonist, stops referring to Dorian as "it" and "the vampire" instead of his name the moment they collide with a much more dangerous vampire, so jarringly that Elias notices in his own narration—the point of it being so explicit is that this degredation isn't automatic, it's something he has to conciously do, when everyone else in his clan wouldn't think twice about dehumanizing them.

—

Any literary device should be used with intent if you want those layers in your work. The curtains are rarely just blue. Whether it’s a simile with a deliberate comparison or an epithet with deliberate connotations, your readers will pick up on the subtext, I promise.