#thumbprint challenge

[winterandwords]

Thumbprint challenge

Thanks to @willtheweaver and @kaylinalexanderbooks for the tags!

📝 Look back on your works, both past and present, finished and unfinished. What are five to ten narrative elements or tropes that continuously pop up in your work? Give a list of these things!

#ThatShouldNotBeHot

Altered states of consciousness

The scars they were given and the scars they chose

Committing murder together absolutely counts as a date

Liminal spaces

Hurt me, I need to feel alive

That is a gun in my pocket and no I'm not pleased to see you

If the system's fucked, fuck the system

Queernormativity

Non-linear narrative structure

Tagging @starscribes, @sunset-a-story and @tabswrites if you'd like to do it, with an open tag for anyone else who wants to join in 💜

Reblogs, replies etc on my tag posts are always welcome, but if you're doing this tag yourself, please make your own post instead of using mine to start a reblog chain.

[kaylinalexanderbooks]

Thumbprint Challenge

Thanks @oh-no-another-idea for the tag!

Rules: look back on your work, both past and present, finished and unfinished. What are five to ten narrative elements or tropes that continuously pop up in your work? Give a list of these things!

Back at my old work? Okay...not sure how much of these count but here are the commonalities:

Found family/importance of friendship. The focus on best friends from when I was a kid is very prominent in childhood writing and friendship is still a key part. Interpersonal relationships are a very important theme across everything.

Female main characters. Not sure if this counts, but almost all of my childhood works were about girls. My first male main OC was a character named Julian/Mikey (changed his name) in an old draft of TSP. Hell, my first male POV was my Warriors cats fanfic (they were OCs though) and the first time I wrote a male voice in first person was a character named Jesse in eighth grade.

Queer undertones. Looking back at my old work, a lot of my main characters were sapphic or ace/aro spec. Anahi and Marlis from what later evolved into SOTL were very gay for each other. Even Mossflower and Lemonfrost from my Warriors fanfic. The aforementioned Jesse was asexual-coded. Christy and Trish in TEOS. It was just always there as I hadn't figured myself out yet.

Dialogue-driven storytelling. Maybe not in early early writing, but like age 8 onward included a lot of dialogue. I've always been more character focused than environment focused, so I'd say this adds up.

Intelligent main characters. Most of my protagonists were emphasized to be very, very smart. It's interesting that I'm not a STEM person, but I am a former "gifted kid" so that may have something to do with it, but I usually emphasized this with a STEM field they were interested in. Christy from TEOS, math nerd. Hollyn from Perspectives, science geek. Twinkle in my bear cubs series as a kid, astronomer. Even in the Warriors fanfic the first POV is Mossflower the medicine cat. The only pre-high school time I can find where I emphasized intelligence that wasn't in a STEM field is Anahi, who was very literature based.

Multiple main characters. I liked a group of people, even if it was one POV. TSP D1 followed Alexia and Aurora, then they ran into four other people. 3+ was my usual. I guess it comes from the interpersonal relationships themes, like #1 talked about.

Fantasy elements. Man, I almost never write in realistic fiction. I mean, my earliest works were, but then I'd occasionally have an anthropomorphic animal pop up and now it's fantasy. Now, the only realistic fiction WIP I have on the shelf is Perspectives. Arguably IWAJAD because I guess someone can have a vivid dream where a character arc is forced upon them but idk.

Dramedies. I loved to incorporate humor among things I thought were high stakes. I like to be angsty but that doesn't stop me from being very silly. I mean, look at TSP D1. They are threatened to be killed and I still have humor in there. Good? No, but I still tried.

Communication I realize is a prominent theme. Oftentimes, things are not resolved due to not communicating, or I show communication allowing a character to experience comfort, or how not listening to someone leads to trouble, or how hiding a part of yourself isolated you, or acting like someone you're not pulls the wrong people in... So much, man.

I hope this is an okay list. I'll tag @gracehosborn @illarian-rambling @mk-writes-stuff @little-peril-stories @buffythevampirelover @dyrewrites @elsie-writes @sleepywriter00 @theelfauthor @theeccentricraven @thepeculiarbird @finxi-writes @writingsfromspace @winterandwords @revenantlore + anyone else

[winglesswriter]

Thumbprint challenge

I was tagged by the lovely @willtheweaver

Rules: look back on your works, both past and present, finished and unfinished. What are five to ten narrative elements or tropes that continuously pop up in your work? Give a list of these things!

OMG this one his hard, but I'll try.

Self-worth issues: most of my characters have to realize their own worth throughout the story

Love doesn't fix your problems but it gives you the strength to fix them yourself - that's it, that's what my stories are about and always will be

Supportive characters - I don't like my heroes to exist in a vacuum, they are always surrounded by people that support them and that they care about

Lovers coming from different backgrounds - I have yet to find true enemies to lovers but my MCs always come from the opposite end of a scale

Dreams and nightmares - meaningful (prophetic?) dreams or nightmares occur in all my works. I don't have a rational reason for that, maybe it's my own messy relationship with sleep 😄

Gentle tag for: @astorichan, @ramwritblr, @sunset-a-story, @satohqbanana, @sarandipitywrites

[dyrewrites]

Thumbprint Challenge

Thanks to @kaylinalexanderbooks for this one.

I am tagging @rowanmgrey-author and @starbuds-and-rosedust and @aziz-reads -- because I am not suffering through figuring this out alone and maybe you guys will find it fun ^.-

Rules: look back on your work, both past and present, finished and unfinished. What are five to ten narrative elements or tropes that continuously pop up in your work? Give a list of these things!

I am terrible at picking out tropes, so I'm not sure on tropes. However, narrative elements I know...kind of. So let's find out together what I have going on.

->under cut because long<-

Isolation -- Whether the story is told in isolation, with the character alone and detached, or they simply feel that way and it drives them through the plot. It seems my biggest element throughout. Someone is always lonely enough to do basically anything to not be.

Family -- Sometimes a natural relation, often it is escaping said relation, but largely it is a case of finding or forging one's own. It pops up a lot.

Love -- Not necessarily romance, or searching for it, but someone is always either in love, searching for it, mourning its loss, or staunchly fighting against it (in the case of one not yet written). This is all types of love, mind, but I've noticed the emotion itself does crop up frequently.

Loss -- Every single one of my characters appears to have lost someone important to them, if not before the story begins then during. I apparently enjoy giving them something to love, something they care more for than life, more than themselves, something they cannot live without...only to tear it from their fingers and force them to.

Shadow and Light -- I have a few that are expressly about shadows and light, wherein living shadows exist and light is a fearsome and dangerous thing. However, I mean this more metaphorically. There's a lot of darkness and light in my stories, and rarely in expected ways for what those words are typically associated with. I think it goes back to the isolation bit, but I can't be sure. Darkness is safety as much as danger, light danger as much as comfort. It's in a lot and I'm not entirely certain where it comes from...but it's there so it's here.

Color -- Everything, quite literally everything, that I've written is drowned in color. I can't help it. Might be the artist part of me, or being raised by one, I dunno. But if you come out of something I've written not knowing what color the sky is, or the light, or the eyes of at least one character...I probably didn't write it.

Power at a Cost/Under-Powered -- I'm mixing these together, as they relate. Even those billed as being big and scary and capable...aren't. They're the least skilled of whatever they're doing. I like strong, scary characters, but I also like to make sure they never think they are. So if they get too big, they get smacked down. I'm not entirely sure why, might just be something I like reading/watching so it's what I write? I dunno, but you won't find any 'pulled this out of thin air' chosen one super powers here. If you see something close, well, chances are they're going to regret using it immediately after. As that's the other thing I seem to have a lot of. All the magic, the innate power, even the vampire and werewolf stuff, has side-effects or a cost of some sort if abused. And they're rarely easy things to deal with, discouraging the easy-mode buttons.

Impossible Enemy -- The antagonists/villains of my stories are rarely obvious. They're forces or emotions or some other nebulous thing. Even when they are something tangible the characters can face and fight...they're rarely defeated.

Complicated Endings -- On the previous note; I don't write happy endings. I've not gone in with that intention, but I've noticed looking back. Bittersweet is best case scenario. Conflicts will be resolved, mostly, but not all of them and while the characters will most often live on the world will not exactly be 'saved' so much as 'altered'. For the better? Maybe, for most, probably worse for some but it wont be as bad as it started and there might be hope that it'll continue to improve because of what they did. So, complicated. Always a little complicated.

Abuse -- Now...now this one is uncomfortable, as it should be, but it is in everything. My main characters, or those they interact closely with, have been abused in some way. Usually it is a horrific way that is touched on but not expressly described, other times it is expressly described to illustrate how horrific. But it's there. It's always there. I can't seem to write anything without it. I know the reason. I will not share the reason. Writing is therapy, and it helps.

[tabswrites]

Thumbprint Challenge

Tagged by @winterandwords here!

Tagging: @sam-glade @mysticstarlightduck @theprissythumbelina @the-down-upside-finch @thatndginger

Look back on your works, both past and present, finished and unfinished. What are five to ten narrative elements or tropes that continuously pop up in your work? Give a list of these things!

I compared my three most recent works because I think my writing style is unrecognizable from my older stuff...

What do Batman and my OCs have in common? Dead parents.

Someone has to be emo

We all use sarcasm 'round these parts

Tragic backstories are a key ingredient

Grumpy/sunshine ships (they're just so good)

Moral ambiguity

At least one character is super dramatic for no reason

I pick One Person to be the punching bag

Dramatic monologues!

[rickie-the-storyteller]

Thumbprint Challenge

Thank you @all-write for tagging me for this.

RULES: Look back on your work, both past and present, finished and unfinished. What are five to ten narrative elements or tropes that continuously pop up in your work? Give a list of these things!

This is interesting to think about... let's see...

Coming-of-age stuff/life lessons (hopefully not done in a super preachy or overly on-the-nose way lol)

Close friendship groups (which often double as a found/chosen family dynamic, which technically counts as its own thing)

Romantic subplot (typically featuring the friends-to-lovers trope because I'm basic)

Problematic characters (or characters that frequently engage in or feel pressured/tempted to engage in problematic or dangerous or unhealthy/toxic behaviours)

A house party or big event that goes wrong somehow

There are probably others, but these are the ones that I can think of right now.

Tagging these people: @winterandwords, @hd-literature, @clairelsonao3, @mysticstarlightduck, @magpie24601, @the-stray-storyteller, @gummybugg, @writingalterras, @tea-and-mercury, @exquisitecrow

[forthesanityofstorytellers]

Thumbprint Challenge

Got tagged by @winterandwords here, thanks!

Quickly Tagging (no pressure): @kittensartswriting @mysticstarlightduck @mjjune and @vacantgodling

RULES: Look back on your work, both past and present, finished and unfinished. What are five to ten narrative elements or tropes that continuously pop up in your work? Give a list of these things!

Living outside of whatever is deemed 'appropriate' by whatever society is present

Finding your own way

"You can do this, but you don't have to do it alone"

Angry Is Soft For Sunshine

They're More Guidelines Than Actual Rules

Smarty ones and punchy ones

Otherworldly Wonders

Thanks for the tag!

[hannah-heartstrings]

Thumbprint Challenge

Thanks for the tag, @druidx!

Rules: look back on your work, both past and present, finished and unfinished. what are five to ten narrative elements or tropes that continuously pop up in your work?

I have so many things that crop up a lot, sometimes I think I’m just writing the same story over and over. XD

1. Found Family

2. Dealing with trauma and recovery

3. Best friends who are polar opposites

4. A small cast of characters that I either treat like they’re all the main character or it shifts who the main character is each story in the series

5. One character that’s always causing trouble and loving every minute of it

6. One character who’s perpetually done with the rest

7. One character with big dreams of changing/saving the world but has crippling self doubt (who isn’t based on anyone in particular I’m suuure)

8. Parallels, so many parallels, a lot of them on accident XD

9. A lot of my stories don’t actually have romance but if they do I basically have one ship dynamic and it’s girl with way too much to deal with and her emotional support best friend who’s had a crush on her practically since he met her

10. A flat arc character whose struggle is to not change, to hold on to their hope and to what makes them themselves when the world tells them to give it up

I love all of these tropes sooo much, which is probably why they show up so often.

I really love this one, so I'm going to tag a lot of people. XD @ff2-soda-pop @emeraldhazeart @inkysqueed @mareenavee @sylvienerevarine @nerevar-quote-and-star @daisywords @toboldlywrite

No pressure! And if anyone else wants to, consider yourself tagged.

[winterandwords]

Thumbprint Challenge

@rickie-the-storyteller tagged me in this one. Thanks, friend!

RULES: Look back on your work, both past and present, finished and unfinished. What are five to ten narrative elements or tropes that continuously pop up in your work? Give a list of these things!

🧠 Altered states of consciousness

🌈 Be gay, do crime

🔪 Hurt me, I need to feel alive

🔄 Non-linear narrative structure

🔥 If the system's fucked, fuck the system

🌊 Nature and weather symbolism

🖤 They deserve each other (derogatory)

🌃 Liminal spaces

⛓ Angsty kink (but no genitals, thanks)

Tagging @eyes-talks-ocs, @felixwriting, @forthesanityofstorytellers and @i-can-even-burn-salad if you'd like to do it, with an open tag for anyone else who wants to join in 💜

[felixwriting]

Thumbprint Challenge

@winterandwords tagged me in this and now that Art Fight is over I'm going to try and actually do these tag challenges lol ^.^

RULES: Look back on your work, both past and present, finished and unfinished. What are five to ten narrative elements or tropes that continuously pop up in your work? Give a list of these things!

💜 Monsters in love

👿 Made to feel monstrous

🩸Noncon body mods

💞 Mutual pining

⛪ Religious trauma

🌈 Outcasts, weirdos and queers

🌱 The cycle of life and death

🛸 Aliens

Tagging: Open tag <3

[druidx]

Thumbprint challenge

Thanks for the tags @strosmkai-rum​ & @chauceryfairytales

Tagging back: @aalinaaaaaa @thewriteflame @wildswrites @aquadestinyswriting @artdecosupernova-writing @autumnalwalker @blind-the-winds @eli-writes-sometimes @hannahcbrown @oh-no-another-idea @rhikasa @swordsoulwrites @winglesswriter @andromeda-grace @writingmaidenwarrior @wispstalk

Rules: look back on your work, both past and present, finished and unfinished. what are five to ten narrative elements or tropes that continuously pop up in your work?

Found family

Circular stories (where the last lines match back up with the first lines)

Characters whose names start with A (this doesn't quite fit as a 'narrative element or trope', but it is a weird tic of mine...)

Missing father/ daddy issues

Foils - all my main characters have a foil as the deuteragonist

Series - I like setting up connecting short & medium stories in the same settings. Not necessarily in an episodical sense, but certainly ones that make call-backs to events in previous stories.

Tight casts - not many of my stories have a sprawling cast, it's usually kept under 10 for supporting casts, and most of my works center around a core group of three characters.

Limited religion

Limited romance

Weather symbolism (though I've toned down on that in later years)

[sunset-a-story]

Thumbprint Challenge!

Thanks to @moondust-bard for the tag!

RULES: Look back on your work, both past and present, finished and unfinished. What are five to ten narrative elements or tropes that continuously pop up in your work? Give a list of these things!

Queer/mlm/ace-spec/queer-platonic stuff

Snark. So much snark

Action/fight sequences

Tension

Nature-writing-esque descriptions

Playful-to-biting banter

Things that come in threes

No pressure tagging @words-after-midnight @pandoras-comment-box @thatndginger @cljordan-imperium

[kaylinalexanderbooks]

Man these are good tropes!

Already did this here!

Thumbprint Challenge

thank u sm for the tag @corinneglass! this was so interesting to think about <3

Some things that are consistent in my writing are...

IDENTITY!! when do we become the masks we wear?

losing someone you love and doing everything, anything, to get them back somehow, even if as nothing more than a shadow on the wall

unnecessary tangents on philosophy

street smart, annoyed women who make their unrequited feelings everyone else's problem (i got obsessed with éponine thénardier when i was 17, can you tell)

gentle, soothing love

tagging (gently, no pressure): @leahnardo-da-veggie @elizaellwrites @kaylinalexanderbooks and anyone else who'd like to do this <3

[thana-topsy]

Writerly Thumbprint Challenge~

Rules: look back on your work, both past and present, finished and unfinished. what are five (or more!) narrative elements, themes, topics or tropes that continuously pop up in your work?

Tagged by @mongoose-bite ! Thank you, crunchy, for forcing me to think about my writing. I tag @kookaburra1701 @dirty-bosmer @turbo-toast @paraparadigm and @nientedenada Gimme the themes. Gimme the writerly self-awareness.

Choice - Whether it's the choice to do right, to do wrong, to heal, to hurt, to begin or to end a cycle, so many of my stories come down to destiny being shaped by the ability to choose. The inherent "neutrality" of human (or elven?) nature, and how the choices we make shape our lives more than fate or destiny.

You Are More Powerful Than You Think - I apparently love writing characters who have low self-worth, or even just characters who don't see themselves as particularly special or powerful, realizing (or being shown) that they are more important and more powerful than they previously thought. Everyone has the potential to be the "main character" of their own story.

Kindness Prevails - My writing is wish-fulfillment at its heart. And in my heart of hearts, I'm a fatal optimist. Kindness pays off. Wickedness isn't necessarily punished, but it isn't rewarded either. Kindness and generosity reap their own rewards just by their inherent nature. Satisfaction is cultivated, not earned through merit.

Inner Truth vs. External Actions - I find a lot of my characters will run (metaphorically or literally) from things that they know and understand to be true, fighting against the truth to their own detriment, and in turn prolonging their own suffering. A lot of character development comes from seeking balance with one's inner truth and the way one moves through the world, so that actions align with beliefs.

Barefoot - I think it was @mongoose-bite who first pointed it out way back when, but a lot of my characters tend to wander off barefoot a lot! I think, depending on the story, there are a lot of ways to maybe interpret the symbolism within the context, but I know for me (in my life), going somewhere barefoot has always felt very vulnerable. But, at the same time, it brings my attention to the moment with sharp focus. I have to be very careful of where I step. So maybe the shoelessness is a way that my mind is saying "Pay attention! This is very important! They are vulnerable!"

[turbo-toast]

Writerly Thumbprint Challenge!

Rules: look back on your work, both past and present, finished and unfinished. what are five (or more!) narrative elements, themes, topics or tropes that continuously pop up in your work?

@thana-topsy tagged me, and I'm happy to indulge in some self-reflection!

I tag @tafferling, @moriche and @expended-sleeper. Submit to the mortifying ordeal of being known. C'mon.

Monstrous Is Who Does Monstrous Things - I really like writing characters with some aspect that makes others afraid of them, or hate them because they pose an apparent danger. Be it vampirism or having been kidnapped and turned into a killing machine, I like writing characters who through choices and their own principles prove that just because they're capable of atrocities, it doesn't mean they have to conform to the prejudice leveled at them. Yeah, you're a monster, but you're not a monster monster.

You're Lovable - This goes hand in hand with my protagonists often having "monstrous" aspects: They just as often don't think they're capable of love or being loved. I like to make them see they're wrong by pairing them with someone who, either slowly or immediately, goes full-on heart eyes for them (and vice versa).

Power Couples - While we're on relationships - usually, both parties of my couples are highly competent in their fields. Sometimes I think that kneecaps my ability to write character development or throwing actual challenges at my characters, but I think even if a character is nigh unkillable, there's still a lot of anguish they can be put through that isn't mortal combat, for example. I just like the dynamic of a couple kicking ass and figuring stuff out together a lot.

Romance Isn't The End Goal - A famous idea about the Romance genre is that as the author, you have to answer the question "Why can't they be together right now?" until the very end when they finally get together. The story usually ends when the main couple (and it's usually a couple, not a polycule) finally admit their love for each other and get their happily ever after (or something along those lines). The journey to get there is the whole point. This usually leaves me a bit unsatisfied though: I want to know what they're like when they're comfortable with each other. I want to see domesticity and solving problems together. Show me how they work when they can fully rely on each other. So... I write that. The chase is fun, yes, but let me eat the cake I have too, please.

Found Family - Look, I just like this one a lot, okay? It's extremely common in narratives with queer protagonists, and I'm here for it. It crops up in my writing a lot not necessarily because my protagonists have a bad relationship with their blood relatives. As a matter of fact, most of them just don't have any of those anymore. But in any case, they make their own families. Because that's what you do, I guess.

[recareels]

warnings: 18+ minors do not interact, pseudocest

big brother ajax is the type to press a thumbprint into the obscenely massive blotch of navy staining your neck as he slinks by you in the kitchen—nonchalant, unobtrusive, but annoying—and ask ‘who gave ya that nasty mark, huh?’ in front of the entire family, knowing full well that he gave it to you after sneaking in through your bedroom window at three am last night. 

‘whoever it is, they really did a number on you,’ he’d continue, jabbing at the hickey again and asking, ‘why do you let ‘em do that to you?’, knowing full well that you can’t do anything but stutter out some incoherent response, tongue tripping over your lies, choking on half-formed excuses as your adoptive father glares at you. 

ajax’s mask of mock concern is good—sufficient enough to appear authentic from a distance: brow warped with worry, creased just a little too perfectly; tone composed with ideal amounts of fretful and distress, balancing the two in a way that’s a little too calculated—but you’re not fooled. because you can see that sharp shard of mischief glimmering in his eye; you can see the playful smirk incessantly yanking at a corner of his mouth. 

he’s offering a challenge.

and you’re going to get him back.