Bro Trust Me I Can Write. Like Actually.

Trust Me Bro I Swear

[brotrustmeicanwrite]

Once upon a time, there was a foolish god.

Part 1

He was a god of innocence and freedom, adventure and travel, but also a god of foolishness. He was an important god. Alongside his twenty one siblings, he was one of those who had created this world. Despite this, what he loved more than anything was to simply wander the world and watch it change within what seemed to be the blink of an eye compared to his immortal life, until...he met that soul. That soul was a mere human, an ant compared to the majesty of a heavenly being, but to the foolish god they were everything.

"Halt! Don't touch those flowers!" The foolish god was standing amidst a field of purple flowers, stretching as far as the eye could see, about to pick himself a few to braid into a flower crown as he often did back in those days.

"Good sir, you must not be from here. Those flowers are poisonous," exclaimed the youth as they came running across a small hill, "you really- you really shouldn't touch them." They had completely exhausted themselves sprinting across the field just to warn the foolish god and now stood hunched over with their hands on their knees panting right before him.

What a kind soul, to care so much for a stranger.

"Thank you," said the fool, his smile audible in his voice "I am merely a wanderer from afar. There are many things I don't know about this place. Your kindness has saved this fool from a terrible death!"

The youth laughed at the fool's dramatic exclamation. It was a wonderful sound.

"It's not quite as severe as death," explained the youth, still laughing "but it would've surely caused quite an uncomfortable-" as they finally lifted their head and their eyes met, the youth couldn't help but falter. That "mere wanderer", as the stranger had introduced themselves, was a beauty as they had never before laid their eyes upon. His skin was as bright and pure as the finest porcelain, his ebony black curls fluttered in the light breeze grazing the fields, and his deep dark eyes seemed to shine with an etherial glow as they reflected the setting sun. And yet, he was wearing clothes of a peasant, as simple as the youth's. A stark, almost jarring contrast, they thought.

"Yes? An uncomfortable...?"

"A-a rash. An uncomfortable rash, painful even."

"I see. Thank you."

The fool again smiled at the youth. It was a warm and gentle smile and the youth couldn't help but look away as they felt the heat rise to their ears and cheeks.

"Uhm, si- since you are a wanderer," stammered the youth before clearing their throat "I suppose you don't yet have a place to stay the night. Why don't you come with me? I was about to head back to the village, I can lead you the way. My house is small and modest but certainly enough to offer a roof over the head to a guest."

That night was the first of thousands the two of them would spend together.

[brotrustmeicanwrite]

Part 2

The youth was a stonemason, as it turned out.

As a god, the fool had no need to sleep. He had spent the night simply resting his eyes as he lay on the straw mattress the youth had laid down for him on the warmest, most comfortable tiles next to the fireplace, where usually their own bed was placed, attentively listening to the youth's soft breathing. Yet the youth had managed to jump up and leave the house for work the second the first rays of sunshine had touched the horizon, so fast the fool didn't even have a moment to react. He sat on the bed, alone in this stranger's house, dumbfounded. What a foolish young creature! Diligent and kind, but very foolish indeed. He couldn't help but laugh.

After carefully folding the sheets, cleaning out the fireplace, and sweeping the floors, the foolish god left the youth's home to go explore the village. They had shown him so much kindness last night, so naturally, he wanted to repay them. It was a gentle summer day. Fluffy clouds slowly wandered across the sky, and a light breeze made his hair flutter in the wind, just as it had the day before. The village had been built on the shore of a lake so large, only the lack of salt in the air gave away that it wasn't an ocean. As the god wandered down the hillside heading towards the water, the purple flowers came into view. The fields truly stretched as far as the eye could see, both left and right, on the grasslands surrounding the lake. At the very end of a withered pier sat an old couple. Their feet were dangling down, toes dipped into the gentle waves, as they held their fishing rods and patiently waited for a fish to take the bait. The wood creaked under each step, giving away the god's approach. At this, the old man glanced over his shoulder. 

"You must be the wanderer from afar," his voice was raspy. "We already heard all about you," joined the old woman, smiling. The old man pulled out his hook, it had already drifted too close to shore, and threw it back, far into the waters. "That kid was all excited, gushing about the kind wanderer when we ran into them this morning." "Gushing, you say?" chuckled the fool, "I'm honored. But they're the one who is kind." At this, the fool noticed a spare fishing rod lying on the pier beside the old man. "Senior, if you don't mind, would you be so kind as to lend me one of your fishing rods? I want to repay them for allowing me to stay the night." The man turned his head back to the lake as he stroked his coarse white beard. "Hm, yes, I could lend it to you," he pondered, "but how are you going to repay *me*?" "Darling!" the old woman gave him a light slap on the arm, "Don't be like that. Give him the fishing rod." As he watched the old couple bicker, the god couldn't help but laugh. "He's right, grandmother," said the god, "kindness must always be rewarded. I will have to share my fish with him." "Ha! See?" exclaimed the old man. "Darling!" she gave him another exasperated slap on the arm.

Hours went by as the foolish god sat between the couple, all three of them patiently waiting for a fish to bite. The old man caught one after the other, the woman a few less than him. And the fool, he caught none. After yet another fish escaped, he couldn't help but lie back on the pier, feet still in the water and one arm still holding the fishing rod, the other covering his face as he let out a deep, frustrated sigh.

"Grandmother, grandfather, how come I can't catch a single fish while your basket is about to overflow with them?" The old man let out a hearty laugh, "because your technique is the worst I've ever laid my eyes upon!" The fool lifted his head a little to glance at the old man, "... technique?" he asked bewildered. A long pause. "How did you think fishing works?" Another long pause. The fool laid his head back down on the pier, moving his hand from his head to his stomach. "You make it look so easy..." he mumbled as he stared blankly at the sky. Even the old woman couldn't contain a chuckle. She quickly turned away, hiding her face in her hands. Defeated, the old man gave the god a pat on the thigh. "Sit up," he said, "I'll show you how to do it right."

The old woman watched her husband tentatively explain each step to the young man between them, one hand supporting the fishing rod and the other stroking his back encouragingly out of habit. It reminded her of their youth, when they had taught their own children just the same. 

"Do you have family?" she asked as she rested her chin on one hand and the elbow on her knee. The old man's eyes widened in shock. How could she ask a lonely wanderer something like that, he probably thought, of course he didn't have family. But before the woman could apologize, the fool chimed in. "I do," he said happily, "many siblings. Twenty-one of them, actually." Another pause. "Your poor mother," commented the old woman. The old man shot her a look. Feeling the tension between them, the fool continued,  "All of us have our own paths to follow, paths that lead us very far apart. But we still make sure to see each other at least once every single year. I love them all dearly, each and every-" 

Splash! The old couple looked at each other, wider eyed. Suddenly the space between them was empty.

"A fish! He caught a big fish!" screamed the old man. "Forget the fish! Catch the boy first!" The fool emerged from the water gasping, shocked he had suddenly been pulled into the water, but he was still holding on tightly, scared to lose the old man's fishing rod. 

By the time they managed to pull the god back onto the pier and help him haul in the fish, all three of them were drenched from head to toe. "I think- I think that was enough fishing for today," panted the woman hunched over on all fours, water dripping from her nose. The fool, too, was panting as he lay flat on his back, hugging his magnificent catch like a child would a giant doll. "But I don't- I need a second fish... to share." "Tomorrow," the old man placed a hand on the fool's shoulder, "tomorrow..."

[just-an-evil-immortal]

As a native german speaker I sometimes need to remind myself, when writing in english, that I cant just keep going with a sentence and that, unlike german, where you can make a sentence go on for as long as you want if you're a true lover of Nebensätze, english sentences are usually shorter and aren't supposed to go on for multiple lines or god forbid a whole paragraph.

[writersisland]

Saying I love you without saying “I love you”

“Being around you makes every day just a little lighter.”

[fondly] “You're such an idiot.”

“Got you, always.”

“I can imagine growing old with you.”

“I could sit here and listen to you forever.”

“Let me take care of you.”

“Nothing makes me happier than being with you.”

“Of course I trust you.”

“Seeing you happy makes me happy.”

“Something about you makes me feel safe.”

“Stay for a bit?”

“Stop making me smile, dork.”

“Why didn't you tell me you were cold? Come here.”

“You mean everything to me.”

“You were in my dreams tonight.”

“You're my favorite person, just… ever.”

[theseventhcrow55]

i get so emotional every time i think about fanfic culture. it's just so beautiful that people are writing and anonymously posting these thousand-word stories about characters we all love and not even getting any money or public fame from it. it's literally just for the love of the game.

shout out to everyone who participates in fanfic culture, be it reading or writing fanfics. you are contributing to such a lovely thing <3

[thebookishkiwi]

HELP NEEDED

Does anyone perhaps know how to write an unreliable narrator or have tips? I want to write a piece with an unreliable narrator for a short story competition but I have no idea where to start.... help?

[pb-dot]

I haven't written anything major with unreliable narrators since I prefer a limited third person POV and that's not a natural fit for that kind of thing. I have read a fair few, though, and I have some thoughts.

First, and this, I think, needs to be foremost in your mind: What motivates the narrator to lie? Much like a D&D character, "because I feel like it" isn't very satisfying motivation. The easiest way to justify an unreliable narrator is, of course, to plop them down right in the middle of the plot. It could be they're the actual murderer at the heart of the whodunnit, but disguising their crime both to the reader and to people in the plot, such as persnickety Belgian detectives, up to and including themselves.

The second question is, arguably more important than the first one, but having the first one in place leads very naturally to the next important question. Ok, now we know why the narrator is lying. The next question is: How is the audience supposed to detect that they are dealing with an unreliable narrator. You could have the narrator reveal their grand deceit in the end, like if a mid-series Saw director had a go at Death Note, but while that may be very satisfying for the narrator, it's probably less so for the reader.

To this question above I do also feel it's relevant to ask a subquestion. How should the audience be made to want to start sifting through lies and half-truths? The easiest way is probably to make the story the lying narrator tells wrap up a little too cleanly, with a bit too little drama and complications. It is, admittedly, risky to make the story that the audience experiences first the "lesser" of the stories, see how every Fromsoft game's story is quite thin and basic if not informed by the games' often quite voluminous lore. Some stories with unreliable narrators, like Lolita, arguably doesn't even tip its hand as the protagonist, for his many flaws are charming and clever in how he shapes the story, enough so that one might only recognize the unreliability in hindsight. For a beginner I wouldn't really recommend that though, especially in a work as lean on information as a short story.

I don't know if this is my most solid piece of writing advice, but if I were to sum up my approach, I'd do it thusly. For Unreliable Narration to work, concentrate on the narrator and treat him as the protagonist of a superstory (that is to say a larger story containing the "main" story, the telling of which is the Narrator's action undertaken to reach some goal or other,) and lay out their efforts in such a way that in the closing of this superstory, a clever detective that may or may not actually appear in the main story, might unravel the (villain) protagonist's lies, with the detective being a stand in for the audience. Not saying this is the only way to do it, of course, but it's a decent model for how one would go about planning such a thing.

[brotrustmeicanwrite]

Lowkey don’t have the time to read the guy before me but first thing I’d do before anything else is to clearly define what kind of unreliable narrator you want. There’s guys who straight up lie with whatever motivation and there’s guys who actually believe the nonsense they’re spouting. Be it someone with a limited understanding of reality, a conspiracy theorist, or someone on delusional levels of denial. They all work a little differently but the interesting thing about those is that you don’t need to sell every bit of their words as truth to the reader.

They’re allowed to notice.

As a result however they won’t know what to believe and what to question from much earlier. Which can ruin the text if you don’t play your cards right but can also make your readers rip their hair out exactly the way you want them to if you’re successful.

Just keep in mind that their narration still needs to be logical, else the narrator just sounds insane. Logical does not mean accurate in accordance to the truth, just internally logical in relation to the character‘s world view. They can do mental gymnastics, not mental teleportation.

[my-cursed-prince]

I think the question is what type of unreliable narrator do you want to write? Is this person delusional? (I recently read a book where the main character was heavily implied to have undiagnosed schizophrenia). Is this person experiencing a heavy amount of trauma and has difficulty remembering details? Or perhaps they've processed the trauma a certain way to be able to properly move on, whether that is true or not. Is this person trying to survive and telling whatever lie they need to tell themselves to survive? Is this person lying habitually? Or perhaps they are trying to cover up something they did in the past or currently?

I would say the first step is to figure out what your character is an unreliable narrator about and then to go from there. In my opinion how you approach the unreliable narration is going to depend based on the situation and the why of the unreliable narration.

[thebookishkiwi]

HELP NEEDED

Does anyone perhaps know how to write an unreliable narrator or have tips? I want to write a piece with an unreliable narrator for a short story competition but I have no idea where to start.... help?

[pb-dot]

I haven't written anything major with unreliable narrators since I prefer a limited third person POV and that's not a natural fit for that kind of thing. I have read a fair few, though, and I have some thoughts.

First, and this, I think, needs to be foremost in your mind: What motivates the narrator to lie? Much like a D&D character, "because I feel like it" isn't very satisfying motivation. The easiest way to justify an unreliable narrator is, of course, to plop them down right in the middle of the plot. It could be they're the actual murderer at the heart of the whodunnit, but disguising their crime both to the reader and to people in the plot, such as persnickety Belgian detectives, up to and including themselves.

The second question is, arguably more important than the first one, but having the first one in place leads very naturally to the next important question. Ok, now we know why the narrator is lying. The next question is: How is the audience supposed to detect that they are dealing with an unreliable narrator. You could have the narrator reveal their grand deceit in the end, like if a mid-series Saw director had a go at Death Note, but while that may be very satisfying for the narrator, it's probably less so for the reader.

To this question above I do also feel it's relevant to ask a subquestion. How should the audience be made to want to start sifting through lies and half-truths? The easiest way is probably to make the story the lying narrator tells wrap up a little too cleanly, with a bit too little drama and complications. It is, admittedly, risky to make the story that the audience experiences first the "lesser" of the stories, see how every Fromsoft game's story is quite thin and basic if not informed by the games' often quite voluminous lore. Some stories with unreliable narrators, like Lolita, arguably doesn't even tip its hand as the protagonist, for his many flaws are charming and clever in how he shapes the story, enough so that one might only recognize the unreliability in hindsight. For a beginner I wouldn't really recommend that though, especially in a work as lean on information as a short story.

I don't know if this is my most solid piece of writing advice, but if I were to sum up my approach, I'd do it thusly. For Unreliable Narration to work, concentrate on the narrator and treat him as the protagonist of a superstory (that is to say a larger story containing the "main" story, the telling of which is the Narrator's action undertaken to reach some goal or other,) and lay out their efforts in such a way that in the closing of this superstory, a clever detective that may or may not actually appear in the main story, might unravel the (villain) protagonist's lies, with the detective being a stand in for the audience. Not saying this is the only way to do it, of course, but it's a decent model for how one would go about planning such a thing.

[brotrustmeicanwrite]

Lowkey don’t have the time to read the guy before me but first thing I’d do before anything else is to clearly define what kind of unreliable narrator you want. There’s guys who straight up lie with whatever motivation and there’s guys who actually believe the nonsense they’re spouting. Be it someone with a limited understanding of reality, a conspiracy theorist, or someone on delusional levels of denial. They all work a little differently but the interesting thing about those is that you don’t need to sell every bit of their words as truth to the reader.

They’re allowed to notice.

As a result however they won’t know what to believe and what to question from much earlier. Which can ruin the text if you don’t play your cards right but can also make your readers rip their hair out exactly the way you want them to if you’re successful.

Just keep in mind that their narration still needs to be logical, else the narrator just sounds insane. Logical does not mean accurate in accordance to the truth, just internally logical in relation to the character‘s world view. They can do mental gymnastics, not mental teleportation.

[abyssal-ilk]

i love hitting characters with the disability beam. we should all be hitting characters with the disability beam. my favorite activity

[abyssal-ilk]

annoyed that your favorite character canonically receives a grievous injury that they seem to walk off without issue? oh do i have a solution for you.

[thebookishkiwi]

HELP NEEDED

Does anyone perhaps know how to write an unreliable narrator or have tips? I want to write a piece with an unreliable narrator for a short story competition but I have no idea where to start.... help?

[pb-dot]

I haven't written anything major with unreliable narrators since I prefer a limited third person POV and that's not a natural fit for that kind of thing. I have read a fair few, though, and I have some thoughts.

First, and this, I think, needs to be foremost in your mind: What motivates the narrator to lie? Much like a D&D character, "because I feel like it" isn't very satisfying motivation. The easiest way to justify an unreliable narrator is, of course, to plop them down right in the middle of the plot. It could be they're the actual murderer at the heart of the whodunnit, but disguising their crime both to the reader and to people in the plot, such as persnickety Belgian detectives, up to and including themselves.

The second question is, arguably more important than the first one, but having the first one in place leads very naturally to the next important question. Ok, now we know why the narrator is lying. The next question is: How is the audience supposed to detect that they are dealing with an unreliable narrator. You could have the narrator reveal their grand deceit in the end, like if a mid-series Saw director had a go at Death Note, but while that may be very satisfying for the narrator, it's probably less so for the reader.

To this question above I do also feel it's relevant to ask a subquestion. How should the audience be made to want to start sifting through lies and half-truths? The easiest way is probably to make the story the lying narrator tells wrap up a little too cleanly, with a bit too little drama and complications. It is, admittedly, risky to make the story that the audience experiences first the "lesser" of the stories, see how every Fromsoft game's story is quite thin and basic if not informed by the games' often quite voluminous lore. Some stories with unreliable narrators, like Lolita, arguably doesn't even tip its hand as the protagonist, for his many flaws are charming and clever in how he shapes the story, enough so that one might only recognize the unreliability in hindsight. For a beginner I wouldn't really recommend that though, especially in a work as lean on information as a short story.

I don't know if this is my most solid piece of writing advice, but if I were to sum up my approach, I'd do it thusly. For Unreliable Narration to work, concentrate on the narrator and treat him as the protagonist of a superstory (that is to say a larger story containing the "main" story, the telling of which is the Narrator's action undertaken to reach some goal or other,) and lay out their efforts in such a way that in the closing of this superstory, a clever detective that may or may not actually appear in the main story, might unravel the (villain) protagonist's lies, with the detective being a stand in for the audience. Not saying this is the only way to do it, of course, but it's a decent model for how one would go about planning such a thing.

[brotrustmeicanwrite]

Lowkey don’t have the time to read the guy before me but first thing I’d do before anything else is to clearly define what kind of unreliable narrator you want. There’s guys who straight up lie with whatever motivation and there’s guys who actually believe the nonsense they’re spouting. Be it someone with a limited understanding of reality, a conspiracy theorist, or someone on delusional levels of denial. They all work a little differently but the interesting thing about those is that you don’t need to sell every bit of their words as truth to the reader.

They’re allowed to notice.

As a result however they won’t know what to believe and what to question from much earlier. Which can ruin the text if you don’t play your cards right but can also make your readers rip their hair out exactly the way you want them to if you’re successful.

Just keep in mind that their narration still needs to be logical, else the narrator just sounds insane. Logical does not mean accurate in accordance to the truth, just internally logical in relation to the character‘s world view. They can do mental gymnastics, not mental teleportation.

[lux-scriptum]

No, you see, I wish to be an author. Not in marketing. Or an influencer. I wish to tell my stories, be told I did a fantastic job, and then go back to my hovel to scribble some more. I am delicate of constitution and awkward in crowds.

[charlataninred]

Character duo where one *remembers I don’t like fitting characters into trope boxes* is a completely fleshed out and realised person *remembers treating characters as real people and not story devices written with intent is bad* who is written by the author and *remembers death of the author* uh. And *fumbles and drops my pile of queue cards* ah fuck wait no *the menacing horse* what was that.

[tokkibean]

nothing reveals typos better than the ao3 publish button. who needs spellcheck honestly

[animentality]

[apocraphelion]

[a-kind-of-merry-war]

you get a comment on tumblr. it's a bot trying to scam you. you get a DM. it's a bot trying to scam you. you get a message on instagram. its a bot trying to scam you. you're an author and you get an email telling you how much they loved your book and want to showcase it at their bookclub. it's a bot trying to scam you (and it uses bad AI to pretend it knows your story). you get a comment on ao3 saying how much they love your fic - and they made you fanart!! it's a bot trying to scam you. you get a hate comment on ao3 which insults your writing or calls you a monster for writing something "problematic". it's a bot. but at least that one isn't trying to scam you.

[hazeldomain]

You can fight AI in indie publishing by leaving reviews.

Seriously.

Ai-generated garbage is flooding the self-publishing market. It works as a numbers game- put out ENOUGH fake crap and eventually someone’s aunt will buy them the ebook as an unwanted gift, and you’ll have made two dollars. This tactic works at SCALE, which means real independent titles are now a needle amongst a haystack of slop.

If you have read a book this year that has less than 5 reviews, your rating is an algorithmic spotlight on that needle.

A one sentence review helps. Really. A star rating helps if you really can’t think of anything to say, but if you can muster up even “I laughed at the part about the tabby cat” you are doing indie authors a favor like you cannot believe.

(Also if you left a review on one of my books this year I am kissing you so softly on your forehead and I adore you)

[plague-of-insomnia]

as a former indie author i cannot express how much even one single sentence review can mean to sales.

so if you care about supporting authors take a sec to leave one!

[aristocrating]

its 2026 i cannot handle any more fucking "author A obviously ripped off author B" discourse by people Who Have Only Seen the work of author B and admit themselves that they have no further knowledge of the literary landscape they are moving in. like.

[insomaniackills]

Folks really need to reacquaint themselves with this concept

[mosslingg]

My liege im sorry to break it to you but your advisor that's actually evil and wants you dead turned out to be straight. I know you really wanted to have an enemies to lovers situation with him. Yeah I'm afraid the poisoning didn't hold any romantic intent behind it. The king of the enemy kingdom is bisexual though, I could send him a letter? Yes, I'll make sure to include multiple threats of homoerotic nature. You will have your toxic yaoi, my liege

[chimaerakitten]

idk if this is controversial or not, but I really like when non-professional writing like fic has hints of author bleedthrough when it comes to like, what different people assume is common knowledge. Like sometimes I’ll be reading a fic and it’ll just be obvious that the person writing it is either obsessed with medicine or has been to medical school, because they’ll use terms that are just a shade too technical without explaining them. It’s never the super specific stuff that they’d know other people are unaware of, it’s always the things that once you’ve known it for a while you forget it’s niche knowledge. It’s fun because as a fanfic reader it reminds me of how this is a fun hobby community, where everyone has their own thing going on outside of fandom. Everyone’s got their own specialties and they can’t help but write that into their work sometimes

[chimaerakitten]

…well this post sure took off

[bamsara]

new ask game; what do you think my hobby, skillset or knowledge or any other details of me based off my writing

[edgar-allan-possum]