❣ Chile in a Photography ❣
if i look back, i am lost
oozey mess
noise dept.
Xuebing Du
tannertan36
h
Keni
TVSTRANGERTHINGS
PUT YOUR BEARD IN MY MOUTH
blake kathryn
No title available
tumblr dot com
Not today Justin
Monterey Bay Aquarium
Jules of Nature
ellievsbear
izzy's playlists!
trying on a metaphor
hello vonnie
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Morocco
seen from Poland
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Venezuela
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
@alennamartin
A 👏 male 👏 character 👏 isn't 👏 a 👏feminist 👏 if 👏 he's 👏 nice 👏 only 👏 the👏 to 👏 the 👏 woman 👏 he 👏wants 👏 to 👏 have 👏 sex 👏 with
A 👏 male 👏 character 👏 isn't 👏 a 👏feminist 👏 if 👏 he's 👏 only 👏nice 👏to 👏his 👏 girlfriend/wife/mate/whatever the fuck else
A 👏 male 👏 character 👏 isn't 👏 a 👏feminist 👏 if 👏 he 👏 slutshames
A 👏 male 👏 character 👏 isn't 👏 a 👏 feminist 👏 if 👏 he 👏 says 👏 a 👏 woke 👏 line 👏 per 👏 book
tips for choosing a Chinese name for your OC when you don’t know Chinese
This is a meta for gifset trade with @purple-fury! Maybe you would like to trade something with me? You can PM me if so!
Choosing a Chinese name, if you don’t know a Chinese language, is difficult, but here’s a secret for you: choosing a Chinese name, when you do know a Chinese language, is also difficult. So, my tip #1 is: Relax. Did you know that Actual Chinese People choose shitty names all the dang time? It’s true!!! Just as you, doubtless, have come across people in your daily life in your native language that you think “God, your parents must have been on SOME SHIT when they named you”, the same is true about Chinese people, now and throughout history. If you choose a shitty name, it’s not the end of the world! Your character’s parents now canonically suck at choosing a name. There, we fixed it!
However. Just because you should not drive yourself to the brink of the grave fretting over choosing a Chinese name for a character, neither does that mean you shouldn’t care at all. Especially, tip #2, Never just pick some syllables that vaguely sound Chinese and call it a day. That shit is awful and tbh it’s as inaccurate and racist as saying “ching chong” to mimic the Chinese language. Examples: Cho Chang from Harry Potter, Tenten from Naruto, and most notorious of all, Fu Manchu and his daughter Fah lo Suee (how the F/UCK did he come up with that one).
So where do you begin then? Well, first you need to pick your character’s surname. This is actually not too difficult, because Chinese actually doesn’t have that many surnames in common use. One hundred surnames cover over eighty percent of China’s population, and in local areas especially, certain surnames within that one hundred are absurdly common, like one out of every ten people you meet is surnamed Wang, for example. Also, if you’re making an OC for an established media franchise, you may already have the surname based on who you want your character related to. Finally, if you’re writing an ethnically Chinese character who was born and raised outside of China, you might only want their surname to be Chinese, and give them a given name from the language/culture of their native country; that’s very very common.
If you don’t have a surname in mind, check out the Wikipedia page for the list of common Chinese surnames, roughly the top one hundred. If you’re not going to pick one of the top one hundred surnames, you should have a good reason why. Now you need to choose a romanization system. You’ll note that the Wikipedia list contains variant spellings. If your character is a Chinese-American (or other non-Chinese country) whose ancestors emigrated before the 1950s (or whose ancestors did not come from mainland China), their name will not be spelled according to pinyin. It might be spelled according to Wade-Giles romanization, or according to the name’s pronunciation in other Chinese languages, or according to what the name sounds like in the language of the country they immigrated to. (The latter is where you get spellings like Lee, Young, Woo, and Law.) A huge proportion of emigration especially came from southern China, where people spoke Cantonese, Min, Hakka, and other non-Mandarin languages.
So, for example, if you want to make a Chinese-Canadian character whose paternal source of their surname immigrated to Canada in the 20s, don’t give them the surname Xie, spelled that way, because #1 that spelling didn’t exist when their first generation ancestor left China and #2 their first generation ancestor was unlikely to have come from a part of China where Mandarin was spoken anyway (although still could have! that’s up to you). Instead, name them Tse, Tze, Sia, Chia, or Hsieh.
If you’re working with a character who lives in, or who left or is descended from people who left mainland China in the 1960s or later; or if you’re working with a historical or mythological setting, then you are going to want to use the pinyin romanization. The reason I say that you should use pinyin for historical or mythological settings is because pinyin is now the official or de facto romanization system for international standards in academia, the United Nations, etc. So if you’re writing a story with characters from ancient China, or medieval China, use pinyin, even though not only pinyin, but the Mandarin pronunciations themselves didn’t exist back then. Just… just accept this. This is one of those quirks of having a non-alphabetic language.
(Here’s an “exceptions” paragraph: there are various well known Chinese names that are typically, even now, transliterated in a non-standard way: Confucius, Mencius, the Yangtze River, Sun Yat-sen, etc. Go ahead and use these if you want. And if you really consciously want to make a Cantonese or Hakka or whatever setting, more power to you, but in that case you better be far beyond needing this tutorial and I don’t know why you’re here. Get. Scoot!)
One last point about names that use the ü with the umlaut over it. The umlaut ü is actually pretty critical for the meaning because wherever the ü appears, the consonant preceding it also can be used with u: lu/lü, nu/nü, etc. However, de facto, lots of individual people, media franchises, etc, simply drop the umlaut and write u instead when writing a name in English, such as “Lu Bu” in the Dynasty Warriors franchise in English (it should be written Lü Bu). And to be fair, since tones are also typically dropped in Latin script and are just as critical to the meaning and pronunciation of the original, dropping the umlaut probably doesn’t make much difference. This is kind of a choice you have to make for yourself. Maybe you even want to play with it! Maybe everybody thinks your character’s surname is pronounced “loo as in loo roll” but SURPRISE MOFO it’s actually lü! You could Do Something with that. Also, in contexts where people want to distinguish between u and ü when typing but don’t have easy access to a keyboard method of making the ü, the typical shorthand is the letter v.
Alright! So you have your surname and you know how you want it spelled using the Latin alphabet. Great! What next?
Alright, so, now we get to the hard part: choosing the given name. No, don’t cry, I know baby I know. We can do this. I believe in you.
Here are some premises we’re going to be operating on, and I’m not entirely sure why I made this a numbered list:
Chinese people, generally, love their kids. (Obviously, like in every culture, there are some awful exceptions, and I’ll give one specific example of this later on.)
As part of loving their kids, they want to give them a Good name.
So what makes a name a Good name??? Well, in Chinese culture, the cultural values (which have changed over time) have tended to prioritize things like: education; clan and family; health and beauty; religious devotions of various religions (Buddhism, Taoism, folk religions, Christianity, other); philosophical beliefs (Buddhism, Confucianism, etc) (see also education); refinement and culture (see also education); moral rectitude; and of course many other things as the individual personally finds important. You’ll notice that education is a big one. If you can’t decide on where to start, something related to education, intelligence, wisdom, knowledge, etc, is a bet that can’t go wrong.
Unlike in English speaking cultures (and I’m going to limit myself to English because we’re writing English and good God look at how long this post is already), there is no canon of “names” in Chinese like there has traditionally been in English. No John, Mary, Susan, Jacob, Maxine, William, and other words that are names and only names and which, historically at least, almost everyone was named. Instead, in Chinese culture, you can basically choose any character you want. You can choose one character, or two characters. (More than two characters? No one can live at that speed. Seriously, do not give your character a given name with more than two characters. If you need this tutorial, you don’t know enough to try it.) Congratulations, it is now a name!!
But what this means is that Chinese names aggressively Mean Something in a way that most English names don’t. You know nature names like Rose and Pearl, and Puritan names like Wrestling, Makepeace, Prudence, Silence, Zeal, and Unity? I mean, yeah, you can technically look up that the name Mary comes from a etymological root meaning bitter, but Mary doesn’t mean bitter in the way that Silence means, well, silence. Chinese names are much much more like the latter, because even though there are some characters that are more common as names than as words, the meaning of the name is still far more upfront than English names.
So the meaning of the name is generally a much more direct expression of those Good Values mentioned before. But it gets more complicated!
Being too direct has, across many eras of Chinese history, been considered crude; the very opposite of the education you’re valuing in the first place. Therefore, rather than the Puritan slap you in the face approach where you just name your kid VIRTUE!, Chinese have typically favoured instead more indirect, related words about these virtues and values, or poetic allusions to same. What might seem like a very blunt, concrete name, such as Guan Yu’s “yu” (which means feather), is actually a poetic, referential name to all the things that feathers evoke: flight, freedom, intellectual broadmindness, protection…
So when you’re choosing a name, you start from the value you want to express, then see where looking up related words in a dictionary gets you until you find something that sounds “like a name”; you can also try researching Chinese art symbolism to get more concrete names. Then, here’s my favourite trick, try combining your fake name with several of the most common surnames: 王，李，陈. And Google that shit. If you find Actual Human Beings with that name: congratulations, at least if you did f/uck up, somebody else out there f/ucked up first and stuck a Human Being with it, so you’re still doing better than they are. High five!
You’re going to stick with the same romanization system (or lack thereof) as you’ve used for the surname. In the interests of time, I’m going to focus on pinyin only.
First let’s take a look at some real and actual Chinese names and talk about what they mean, why they might have been chosen, and also some fictional OC names that I’ve come up with that riff off of these actual Chinese names. And then we’ll go over some resources and also some pitfalls. Hopefully you can learn by example! Fun!!!
Let’s start with two great historical strategists: Zhuge Liang and Zhou Yu, and the names I picked for some (fictional) sons of theirs. Then I will be talking about Sun Shangxiang and Guan Yinping, two historical-legendary women of the same era, and what I named their fictional daughters. And finally I’ll be talking about historical Chinese pirate Gan Ning and what I named his fictional wife and fictional daughter. Uh, this could be considered spoilers for my novel Clouds and Rain and associated one-shots in that universe, so you probably want to go and read that work… and its prequels… and leave lots of comments and kudos first and then come back. Don’t worry, I’ll wait.
(I’m just kidding you don’t need to know a thing about my work to find this useful.)
Keep reading
I had to remove the links from the main post in order for it to show up in tag search, so here are the links to dictionaries and resources as a reblog!
MDBG an open source dictionary - start here
Wiktionary don’t knock it til you try it
iCIBA (they recently changed their user interface and it’s much less English-speaker friendly now but it’s still a great dictionary)
Pleco (an iOS app, maybe also Android???) contains same open source dictionary as MDBG and also its own proprietary dictionary
Chinese Etymology
what's wrong with roshani chokshi? her books have great desi and hindu rep (even though im not desi i can still tell?)
hey! first of all i literally reblogged a post about her? that says tgw is anti semetic. and bc u bring up desi rep, as a desi hindu girl, i can tell u her desi and hindu rep is shit
i haven’t read her books bc i know to stay away from her after aru shah using hindu culture like it was nothing (ex: using gods like characters when they mean a lot to us and influence our everyday lives) even though roshani is desi. you can’t even call it myth because it’s so much more than that.
this post also points out that issue along with minor ones, like aru shah lying to fit in when lots of indians are stereotyped to that. and again, she’s lying about being rich? huh? doesn’t that seem a lil 🥴
tgw is praised so often for it’s amazing rep! when it’s anti semetic and laila is sexualized as a brown woman! so haha. people continue to ignore this because she’s an aoc when things shes done are very offensive to me and so many other people.
anyways theres so much more to say but thats the summary, and if you’re not desi/hindu i don’t think you should be commenting your opinion on this. and if you keep praising her just block me
same concept, three years apart!
watch the video here: https://youtu.be/tR5CheShrsA
Hey! I've had an asexual character for years that's part of a story I'm about to start putting into fruition. I'm not asexual but I want to represent the sexuality accurately. Any suggestions/ places I should look for ideas? Thank you.
If you’re not ace yourself, then your references should come straight from the minds and mouths of ace people. You’ll need to explore the minds of people who live that ace experience, and pay attention to what we want out of life, and also pay attention to the things we fear.
There already exists ace/aro writers, and it’d go a long way to study and explore how they went approaching writing asexuality. Or not even asexuality specifically, but sexuality in general. Asexuality doesn’t just influence your sex life, it also influences everything from your relationship with your body, to your interaction with strangers in public areas, to your comprehension of consent and the word ‘no’, and beyond.
I imagine that getting into the head of an ace character while not being ace yourself can run risks of things just … not adding up. You need to search for resources that aren’t just directed at allosexual people, but also for those dedicated amongst ourselves. Since there’s this huge dearth of accessible information out there, it’s common enough that your run-of-the-mill ace is well practiced at self reflection and the ability to articulate those thoughts.
Words and concepts used in asexual communities
Asexual POC Resources
The Aphobia Masterpost
What Does Love Mean When You’re Asexual? (Using a videogame as an analogy)
Dating While Asexual
Sex While Asexual: What’s Going On?Sex Tips For The Hypersexual Ace
There’s also some stuff written by writers, for writers, about asexuality;
Aces Are Not One Flavor: A Don’t-Do List of Lazy Characterization
Love and Sex in Literature
Issues when writing an ace character
Stereotypes to avoid when writing asexual characters
Why so many stories about asexuality hurt asexual people
Writing Asexual Characters: Character-Development Questions
How to show that a character is asexual
Writing sex scenes with asexual characters
Writing Demisexual Characters (Without Invalidating Asexuality)
MOVING BLOGS!
hi! so i recently moved blogs but didn’t really wanna make a post about it for reasons, but if you want the new url, please give this a like / reblog and i’ll send it to you via IMs!
tagging a few mutuals: @blisslai, @karachis, @wrenzhi, @jeansmoreau, @wingday, @hollerans, @venka, @laststop, @hideos, @rhsand, @rgcnsey, @iparises, @winnietech, @rhoxana, @amechanias, @liyathakkar.
Please tell me if any of the links aren’t working
Faces:
Face Tutorial
How to Draw the Human Face
Quick Face Tutorial
How to Sketch Faces
Profile Anatomy
Drawing Heads
Basic Head Layout
How to Draw Ears
Basic Ear Tutorial
Ears and Noses
Drawing Noses
How To Draw Mouths
Mouth Tutorial
Lips
Lips Ref
Semi-Realistic Eye Tutorial
Tips for Drawing Eyes
Manga Eye Tutorial
Pixel Eye
Eyes in Different Angles
Expressions
Step by Step Expressions
How to Avoid the Same Face
Head Angles
Beards
Neck Help
Skull Tutorial
How to Draw a Skull
Hair:
How To Draw Braids
Headband Braid Tutorial
How To Draw Hair
Hair Tutorial
Another Hair Tutorial
Also Another Hair Tutorial
Tutorial: Hair
Tutorial for Hair
Simple Hair Tutorial
Hairstyle Tutorial
50 Male Hairstyles Revamped
Let’s Do Hair!
Female Hair Tutorial
Curls
Pixel Hair Tutorial
Manga Boys Hair Tutorial
Bodies:
A Guide to Drawing the Human Body
How To Draw Hands
Hand Tutorial
Hand Gestures
More Hand Gestures
Arm Tutorial
Feet Drawing Guide
Foot Tutorial
Drawing Feet
Knees
Sitting Poses
Drawing Torsos
Abs Tutorial
Clothes and Accessories:
Clothing Tutorial (Notes)
How to Draw Flower Crowns
Helmets and Hats
Hoods
Fashion
How to Draw Tights
Jeans
Boot Tutorial
Plaid Tutorial
Lace Tutorial
Armour Tutorial
Creatures:
Wings
Folded Wings
Thoughts on Wings
Tutorial on Creature Design
Bat Wings on Humans
Pegasus Wings
Animal Legs on Humans
Dragon Tutorial
Dragon Wing Tutorial
Dragon Hands and Feet Tutorial
Dragon Mouth Tutorial
Dragon Head Tutorial
Dragon Scales
Clawed Hand Tutorial
Basic Horn Tutorial
Sauropod Tutorial
How to Draw Centaurs
Werewolf Anatomy
Animals/insects:
Animal Noses
Basic Animal Anatomy
Paw Tutorial
Fur Tutorial
Pixel Fur Tutorial
Painting Fur
Fur Painting Tutorial
Horse Tutorial
Horse Proportions
Horse Hooves
Horse Legs
Dog Anatomy
Simple Dog Tutorial
Wolf Paw Tutorial
Wolf Head Tutorial
Drawing a Wolf
Canine Leg Tutorial
Feline Comparison
Big Cat Paw Tutorial
Lion Head Tutorial
Cat Faces Tutorial
Snow Leopard Tutorial
Tiger Tutorial
Fox Tutorial
Rabbit Drawing Tips
Butterfly Tutorial
Rat Tutorial
Owl Anatomy
Feather Tutorial
Bear Anatomy
Objects:
Glowing Stuff
How to Draw 3D Rooms
Gun Ref
Slime Tutorial
Chain Tutorial
Gemstone Tutorial
Bullet Metal Tutorial
Lightsaber Tutorial
Gold Coin Tutorial
Jewel Tutorial
Nature/Food:
Tree Tutorial
How to Create Stars (With Photoshop)
Stars Tutorial
How to Draw Clouds
How to Draw a Rose
Simple Roses
Grass Tutorial
Another Grass Tutorial
Quick Grass Tutorial
Bush Tutorial
Rain Tutorial
Water Tutorial
Underwater Tutorial
Fire Tutorial
Snow Tutorial
Light Tutorial
Light Sparkle Tutorial
Mountain Tutorial
Another Mountain Tutorial
Moon Tutorial
How to Draw a Apple
Strawberry Tutorial
Colours:
The Psychology of Colour
Basic Colour Theory
Colour Theory 101
Quick Colour Reference Sheet for Designers
The Art of Colour Coordination
Colour Profiles and Printing Explained
The Colour Strata
The Art of Harmonious Colour Schemes
The Ten Commandments of Colour Theory
How to Use Colour in Your Design Scheme
Colour Theory: The ABC’s of RGB
RGB vs CMYK
The Business of Colour Psychology
The Psychology of Colour
The Psychology of Logo Colour and Font Style
What Colours Communicate
A Colour Guide for Designers
Colour Theory: What People Really Think
Colour ROI
The Colours of the Web
Colour Design
Colour Help
How To Colour
Colour Blender
Colour Scheme Designer
Colour Meanings For Roses
Colour Palette Generator
Upload an Image and Get a Colour Palette
Another Colour Palette Generator
Color Hex
Colour Harmony
Skin Colour Palette
Pastel Colours
Greyscale Tutorial
Colouring Cloth
Hair Colouring
Photoshop Colouring Tutorial
Other:
How to Draw Dimension
Pixel Art Tutorial
Another Pixel Art Tutorial
Photoshop Brushes
Photoshop Layers Tutorial
Glitch Effect (with Photoshop)
Gimp Soft Shading
Blending Tutorial
Free Digital Sculpting Tool
Skeleton Drawing Tool
Repeating Pattern Tutorial
Free Art Programs
Silk - Interactive Generative Art
Creativity Cards
Don’t Know What to Draw?
I really enjoy your more detailed looks at different elements of book covers. I don't have a book cover review request, but wanted to know if you have recommendations for good cover designers for someone wanting to self-publish. It would also be great to if you ever decided to write a comprehensive piece on how to go about deciding what type of book cover suits different books and what elements. Love your posts and wish I could do the patreon thing right now, but am back to the job hunt. Best!
Thank you! Unfortunately I don’t know any freelance cover designers to recommend; if any are reading this feel free to promo urself ;)
Here’s my comprehensive take on cover types best practices: No book should have a Knife Cover. society has progressed past the need for Knife Covers.
But ok, really, here’s the thing: there is no story -> cover set of guidelines that would come without massive, massive caveats. I talk a lot about covers accurately representing the contents of the book, but not only is that in and of itself not a straightforward task, that’s only part of the conversation (hence why marketing departments, rather than editorial, rule these negotiations for traditional publishers). Cover design is as varied and multi-dimensional as books themselves, and what’s important, I think, is less to examine the story and more to establish your goals. Which aspects of the book do you think are special and worth representing visually? How do you perceive your book vs how do you want potential readers to perceive your book; are those different, and which matters more to you? Which genres or comp titles are you trying to align your book with (or avoid aligning your book with)? Which parts of the tone and setting of the book are essential to code into the design to set appropriate expectations? What age group are you trying to appeal to?
I could sketch out some common basics for a number of genres, but it wouldn’t be anything you couldn’t observe yourself by browsing some goodreads lists, and I can’t anticipate the nuances a real book with a real person behind it adds to the equation. Which sounds complicated, but it doesn’t have to be; your goals may be as simple as “appeal to established contemporary romance fans”, meaning your cover needs only abide by those genre conventions and a baseline of accuracy, or you may have a dozen different goals, and your designer and design will hopefully negotiate between them to represent as many as possible. “What am I trying to do and why?” has to be answered before you can get to “okay, how can I do that?”
Even if you know very little about design technically speaking, having a clear goal to measure your reactions against (”I want it to feel X overall, and this font/ composition/ stock photo makes me feel Y”) is a more useful compass than me saying some bullshit like “a character-driven story should have character art!” or whatever. At the end of the day, I just want everyone to be purposeful about their covers, and more than using the “right” elements for that kind of story, that means approaching it intentionally and thoughtfully.
Probably not the answer you were expecting, lol, but hopefully of some interest? best of luck with the job search!
Mystère à la Tour Eiffel
I dont know what this is but I want to be on it.
Mystère à la Tour Eiffel: The French Lesbian Eiffel Tower Murder Mystery Period Costume Drama of Color in Which ZERO Lesbians Die that You’ve Been Waiting For
ZERO LESBIANS DIE??
The description for this show just ticked all the boxes for what I want in a show. Including a couple I didnt know existed.
important message for trans lesbians!!!!
💞💝🥰💖💌💝👩❤️💋👩💖💛💘💞💝👭💕💖🌼💞⭐️💝💞🌸👩❤️💋👩💐💕💘💛💖🌷💕💞💕💌💛💕💕🌷🌹🌻💕🌸🍯🌺💓💞💕💛💕💘💕🥰💕💘💛👩❤️💋👩💕👭💕💓💖💖💌💕💞💘🌷💓💕🌸💘💞💕🌹💞🌻💕👭🌺💕🌸💕
I am MAD
“Racists, lgbtqphobes, and exclusionists can get fucked” Another post brought to you by the “let people live their goddamn lives” gang
REBLOG IF YOU THINK IS OKAY FOR A BOY READ AND/OR WRITE FANFICTION
I’m trying to make a point to a friend
Writing x Characters When You Aren’t x, A Masterlist
x: a variable used to represent something unknown.
We’ve seen an influx of questions about how to write stories based around characters of color, disability, non-binary, etc. when the author does not fall into these categories. Rather than have these posts take over the site, we’ve decided to compile a list of resources to help our fellow writers become more educated about writing what they do not immediately know. However, this list is not the end-all-be-all of knowledge; one should always try to learn from someone with first hand experience in any topic. The world is constantly growing and changing, and because of that, there will always be more to learn. The admins at Plotline Hotline want to help writers form respectful, informed, and realistic characters that broaden the narrow range we see in literature today.
*Be wary that some of the topics listed below contain sensitive material. Reader discretion is advised.*
As always, the links I found to be especially apt will be in bold. Topics are listed alphabetically, excepting the “other” section.
Culture
Appropriate Cultural Appropriation
What is Cultural Appropriation? [1,2,3]
Cultural Appropriation Is, In Fact, Indefensible
Voice Appropriation & Writing About Other Cultures
Diversity, Appropriation, and Writing the Other [List]
Disability
Writing Disibilities [1,2,3,4,5]
Guides to Writing Deaf or Hard of Hearding People
National Association of the Deaf - Resources [List]
World Federation of the Deaf
Using a Prosthetic Device
Prostehtic Limbs (Character Guide)
How NOT to Write Disabled Characters
A Guide to Disibility Rights Law (United States)
Timeline of Disibility Rights in the United States
Social Security Disability: List of Impairments, Medical Conditions, and Problems [List] (United States)
How to Write Disabled Characters: An Opinion Piece
Artificial Eye Resources [List][Various]
Adapting to the Loss of an Eye
Misconceptions and Myths About Blindness
Blind Characters: A Process of Awareness
Writing Blind Characters [List]
Types of Learning Disabilities [List]
Diversity
A Guide to Spotting and Growing Past Stereotypes
How to Prepare to Write a Diverse Book
The Diversity of Writing
Why Diversity Matters for Everyone
Writing a Driverse Book [1,2,3,4,5]
Diversity, Political Correctness and The Power of Language
Diversity Book List [List][Books]
Basic Tips To Write Subcultures & Minority Religions Better
Basic Tips to Avoid Tokenism
Gender
GLAAD Media Reference Guide - Transgender
Creating Well-Written Trans Characters
A Few Things Writers Need To Know About Sexuality & Gender Expression
Trans (Character Guide & Bio Building)
A Non-Binary Person’s Guide to Invented Pronouns
Gender Neutral Writing [List]
Keeping a Trans* Person a Person
Suggestions for Reducing Gendered Terms in Language [Photo]
How to Review a Trans Book as a Cis Person
Writing Characters of Different Genders [List]
Understanding Gender
Gender Spectrum Resources [List]
Gender History
Illness
Writing Chronic Illness [1,2]
The Spoon Theory - Also pertains to disibility
About HIV/AIDS
Sexually Transmitted Diseases [List]
Sexually Transmitted Infections
Sex and Gender Differences in Health [Study]
All Chronic Illness Topics [List]
Coping with Chronic Illness
All Cancer Types
A Day in the Life of a Home Health Aide/Health Coach
Fiction Books With Chronically Ill Main Characters- Not Cancer [List][Books]
Neurotype (Including Mental Health)
Writing an Autistic Character When You Don’t Have Autism
Depression Resources [List]
What to Consider When Writing Mental Illness
Stanford Psychiatric Patient Care
Inpatient Psychiatric Questions and Tips
Don’t Call Me Crazy [Documentary]
(Avoid) Romanticizing Mental Illness [1,2]
A Day in the Life of a Mental Hospital Patient
State-run vs. Private Mental Hospitals
Mental Disorders
Mental Hospital Non-Fiction [List][Books]
National Institute of Mental Health - Mental Health Information [List]
Writing Autistic
What Causes PTSD?
Remember, Remember: The Basics of Writing Amnesia
ADHD Basic Information
What is a Learning Disability?
What is Neurotypical?
Race
Writing Race: A Checklist for Authors
Transracial Writing for the Sincere
Is my character “black enough”
White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack
Challenge, Counter, Controvert: Subverting Expectations
Writing With Color: Blogs - Recs - Resources [List]
Writing People of Color (If you happen to be a person of another color)
7 Offensive Mistakes Well-Intentioned Writers Make
Description Guide - Words for Skin Tone
Religion
Religion in Novels: Terrific or Taboo?
How to Write a Fantasy Novel that Sells: The Religion
Writing About Faith And Religion
From Aladdin to Homeland: How Hollywood Can Reinforce Racial and Religious Stereotypes
Sexuality
Understanding Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity [List]
Writing Gay Characters [1,2,3]
American Civil Liberties Union - LGBT+ Rights
LGBT+ Rights by Country or Territory
History of Gay Rights
Gay Rights Movement
LGBT+ Culture
Gay Myths and Stereotypes
LGBT+ Studies Web Sites [List]
LGBTQ Youth Issues
LGBTData.com
Overview of Gay and Lesbian Parenting, Adoption and Foster Care (United States)
Other
How Doctors’ Offices—and Queer Culture—Are Failing Autistic LGBTQ People
Five Traps and Tips for Character Development
Developing Realistic Characters
I hope that this list will provide topics a writer may not initially think to research when writing. If there are any resources that you think would be fitting for this list, please let us know! We want to have as many helpful sources as possible to maximize learning opportunities.
Stay educated,
xx Sarah
Even tho Cassie Clare was problematic at first, she got a whole lot better in her later books- Jem in TID, Cristina in TDA, etc. The Last Hours series is going to be released starting either 2018 or 2019, and it's going to have two biracial (British-Iranian) siblings. One of them will be a focal POV main character. Her name's Cordelia. Unfortunately the fandom thinks she is white because she has red hair. I wonder if they ignored the fact she has brown skin and speaks Farsi?
Cassandra Clare might have characters of color and LGBT+ characters in her books, and she might try to seem “inclusive” and “progressive” with “her” work. I think, however, that she utterly fails at that. Under the cut, a list of all the reasons why her diversity isn’t worth much, and why I don’t think anyone should be giving her any more money, as she will just keep on dissapointing. Call this…
The Cassandra Clare is inexcusable masterpost:
Keep reading
How to Write a Fight Scene (Rebloggable Version)
Admin Note: This post is a rebloggable copy of our page on fight scenes. The page is being phased out, so from now on all updates will be made on this post and not on the page.
Among the typically difficult scenes writers face in their stories, the fight scene definitely ranks high on the list. Below you will find several resources with tips for writing a good fight scene.
Action with a Side of Zombies: One of our articles focused specifically on writing action scenes. Bonus: the examples all include zombies.
ArchetypesAndAllusions: An article on the three main types of fighters and their various approaches to kickin’ ass (or not).
TheCreativePenn.com: Alan Baxter, speculative fiction author, gives some great advice on characterization, setting, martial style, and cliches.
StoryHack.com: A PDF that takes you through writing a fight scene step by step by Randy Ingermanson, compiled by Bryce Beattie.
MarilynnByerly.com: An extremely good guide to writing fight scenes. This guide includes tips on character viewpoint, mapping the fight, and tricks for writing each type of fight.
Shelfari.com: This site is an interview with famed fantasy author R.A. Salvatore on how to write great fight scenes.
TheBusinessOfWriting: C. Patrick Schulze gives some good, solid advice on identifying and writing your fight scene.
EzineArticles.com: Marq McAlister explains how to make a fight scene pack some serious punch. This article is good for fine-tuning.
Martin Turner: Focusing specifically on sword-fighting scenes, Martin Turner writes in great detail on every conceivable detail of this type of time-honored fight scene.
SeriousPixie.com: Susan tells you about the three types of fight scene writers and explains how to fix the problems that arise for each type.
David Alan Lucus: This multi-part guide gives advice in exhaustive detail on how to write an awesome fight scene.
NightFoot: This Tumblr post offers some great tips for writing fight scenes.
Film Crit Hulk: A shoe-in for screenwriters, the Hulk and special guest Tom Townend talk shop on how to write a great movie action scene.
Harry Edmundson-Cornell: Harry writes a series on the fight scene geared toward writers of Superhero comics.
How To Fight Write: The knowledgeable and thorough admins of this exceptional Tumblr blog will teach you everything you ever wanted to know about fight scenes and weaponry—even if they have to beat it into you.
Scholagladiatoria: A YouTuber with lots of weapons teaches you how they were/are properly used to their greatest advantage.
These links provide advice specifically for writing battle scenes:
Gerri Blanc: eHow’s article on battle scenes is a basic step-by-step list for you. It’s a good introduction to writing battle scenes.
StormTheCastle.com: This article takes you through an in-depth guide on how to write battle scenes for fantasy stories.
Rhonda Leigh Jones: Jones lists some dos and don’ts of writing battle scenes.
Other resources:
List of Martial Arts: Looking for a fighting style? Find it here!
List of Weapons: Every type of weapon you can think of is listed here.
List of Military Tactics: From troop movements to siege warfare, this list has got you covered.
Asylum.com: A few examples of awesome battle tactics from history.
BadassOfTheWeek.com: Get some inspiration for awesome fight scenes and fighting characters from this compendium of badassitude.
Thearmedgentleman: Austin has offered to share his knowledge on weaponry with any writers who have questions. Thanks, Austin!
Don’t see what you’re looking for here? You can find every post we’ve ever made or reblogged about fight scenes in our “fight” tag. You might also find our “action scene” tag useful.
We hope this helps! If you have another link or a tip for how to write fight/battle scenes, hit up our ask box and let us know!
Great tutorial!
okay i see posts appreciating brown and black eyes more often these days but i rarely see as many about dark hair. so anyway romanticize dark brown and black hair and specifically brown and black and curly hair. the way the sun lights up a reddish halo when it hits dark hair right. the way it contrasts with skin. the way it’s often thick and uniform in color. the way textured hair is unpredictable in that the curl pattern will be different every day. the way it doesn’t reflect as much light. the way it spirals up around your forehead and ears after a hot day. the way it can keep its form for days without any hair pieces or products. the way it scrunches up tightly if it’s short or gets wavy if it’s long. the way the same person could have one section of hair that grows in corkscrews and another section like ocean waves.
