cygna scrimbling

posting my daily word count (sometimes)

[cygnadailywordcount]

Cygna's WIPs as Tags

ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cygana

wips below the cut:

TGEOI: dnd campaign turned fantasy novel when the campaign fell apart. i am most determined to finish this one someday; most of the words will probably be towards this wip. i probably won't post excerpts? but that's a soft won't. i've shared last sentences once or twice for that post that goes around every now and then. it's very easy to convince me to rant about this one but most of the exciting things are spoilers. themes include the nature and value of truth, existentialism, the relationship between language and reality, etc.

Rasya/BKHK: dnd character turned solo dnd campaign (which is effectively a fantasy story). Rasya Sidorova, Bramble Knight of the Honeydawn King, goes out into the world to bring the light of her goddess of hope to all. probably will post excerpts, just to practice editing, because i'm determined not to edit TGEOI until i've got a finished first draft. i have no idea where this one's going, so got much less to rant about, but don't let that stop you from asking questions. or speculating! themes include hope, naivete encountering the world, etc.

Squirrel: untitled story that i thought i read as a child, but can't find proof of its existence anywhere and many factors point to it being hallucinated by me (ex: the mc names were stolen from pippi longstocking, which i also read at the time i thought i read this). the cover (i imagine remembering) was black and had a stamp-sized picture of a squirrel on the front. since i can't find it, i'm going to write it, and either 1) find that it was a real book all along or 2) have made it a real book. either way, win. themes include children getting cool magic personalized rooms, wizard friend, kidnapped alien prince, etc.

MATWD: "Megan All The Way Down", my unfinished inklings story from last year. i do want to finish it, and have some ideas for where to go, but right now am in a place where i've lost the thread. themes include depression, escapism, healthy/unhealthy relationships to fantasy, beauty in the mundane, this is water, etc.

The Weald: this one's kinda in storage; i haven't worked on it in a while but definitely want to finish it someday. i will sometimes tag things with this because they have the Vibe. the faerie, bird, frog, and mushroom nations of a forest world encounter humans, who threaten to upset life as they know it. themes include conflicting cultures, the role of truth, and other stuff that's not very fleshed out yet.

The Siderian Isles: another storage one; haven't done anything with this in years. more a collection of vibes than a plot or themes. we'll see where this one goes maybe. the core idea is a sailing society whose religion/culture is based around stars (I started writing/planning this while bored in my college astronomy class).

Alaiya and the Collector: also in storage, this is a mysterious benedict society-esque story based on a dream my husband had when he was a kid. certain books will give powers to the last worthy person to have read them, the collector is trying to get all the powers from all the books, you get the idea.

Knights/Questing Knights: i want to do a modern-ish/portal fantasy retelling of Spenser's Faerie Queene someday. that's it that's the concept

and that's what I've got going on! thanks for reading! any questions are welcome; even if I don't have answers, i love hearing people's reactions, seeing what an outside viewpoint focuses on, and getting new things to think about for these stories. someday i will finish something!

love, cygna

[writersisland]

“dad and the dog he didn’t want” but it’s a grumpy, mentally & physically scarred warrior and the cheerful apprentice he didn’t want

[pillowspace]

Sometimes having an OC is like "this character is an outlet for my insecurity and trauma" and sometimes it's like "this character is an outlet for my love of vampires :)". Sometimes it's both

[pillowspace]

Sometimes you think it's "this character is an outlet for my love and nothing more :)" and then you look it over later like "shit. product of the deepest depths of my soul again"

[unyieldingsilence]

‎

[luna-azzurra]

Something neuroscience-y that helps with prose: attention is selective. A character will not notice everything in a room. They will notice what matters to their goal, fear, desire, training, wound, or obsession. A jealous character notices hands. a hungry character notices food. A soldier notices exits. A lonely character notices pairs. Description becomes character when attention has a bias.

[ashen-crest]

I can do it. I can write a chapter. I am capable of putting sentences together. I know what a comma is. I am Aware of the Character.

[actualized-animal]

as much as i poke fun at “tumblr prose,” i will acknowledge that sometimes when you’re writing and you’re really in the groove, you’re really feeling yourself, you’re on your capital-a Author shit, and you write a line that makes you go, “oh yeah, this is the Good Shit. this is so Subtle and Says So Much. this is Characterization. this is Themes and Motifs. you could write a whole essay about this one line. the master of the craft strikes again!” and then a month or whatever later when you’re editing you read over it again with post-write clarity and you realize you wrote some real “people die when they’re killed” bullshit

[bookshelf-in-progress]

Once again, I've been reminded of the creative power of walking away from the document. There are so many times that I've been struggling through a story, painstakingly writing sentence after sentence that just doesn't work, but as soon as I step away from the computer, the creative juices start flowing, and I find the perfect way to solve my problem. Even when I write something that I like, stepping away from the project usually means that within a few minutes, I've found a bunch of problems I hadn't noticed, which helps me improve the story. Like, obviously there are limits to this, but it's shocking how often it works.

[mossbawn]

people on here are always saying “we NEED a story where the art of storytelling is abandoned” like ugh literary devices are soo annoying like that wouldn’t happen in real life that only happened to further the story (why is there story in my story) why would orpheus turn around when he was explicitly told not to why would icarus fly so close to the sun romeo&juliet catcher in the rye why are they so earnest why pour your heart and soul into anything why bother why cant all art be quippy logical monotony like my marvel movies there’s a void in my heart bc i refused to fill it and the curtains were blue

[mossbawn]

“i hate poetry its so pretentious” but then you reblog a quote or a throwaway line and say “why does this go so hard” you are desperate for poetry you are starved for it and u dont even realise you’re hungry

[pgwodewose]

My stance is that before you embark upon writing your own mythology retelling, you should actually read the source literature you're basing your retelling on as opposed to simply relying on other retellings.

[queer-ragnelle]

And this is NOT gatekeeping. Not when I’ve got all the material at @arthurianpreservationproject at least for Arthurian Legend. Many translations of Greek myth are available on the Internet Archive as well.

Everyone has bias so basing your stuff on retellings is not only taking someone else’s interpretation at face value, it’s in poor taste. Read the myths and form your own opinions and ideas. Wikipedia and blog posts are not sufficient if you intend to adapt for yourself.

[pgwodewose]

To add to this, not only is this not gatekeeping, this is pushing the gate wide open. This is telling artists to go explore and frolic in the pastures and ancient woods beyond the fences.

As ever, I'd like to direct people to this quote by Michael Moorcock:

To this day I advise people who want to write fantastic fiction for a living to stop reading generic fantasy and to go back to the roots of the genre as deeply as possible, the way anyone might who takes his craft seriously. One avoids becoming a Tolkien clone precisely by returning to the same roots that inspired The Lord of the Rings.

The same applies to retellings (and adaptations, for that matter, since one user brought it up in the tags). For example, you are less likely to write a TH White clone if you go and read Malory for yourself, or for that matter go further back to Malory's own sources such as the Vulgate Cycle. Another example, you are less likely to become a Madeline Miller clone by reading Homer's Iliad and Odyssey for yourself.

And for heaven's sake, don't do what I did as well for years which was rely on summaries and articles. Try and go as in depth as you can, and face the work on its own terms (but don't be intimidated by its age, either).

Because as Ragnelle said above, by approaching these works by yourself, you will likely come to your own conclusions and not just parrot someone else's. Ideally as well, you will be less likely to end up parroting tired and terrible tropes (particularly racist and misogynist tropes) that have their origins in other people's retellings, as well as flanderisations of the characters and misinterpretations and generalisations of the stories themselves brought about by pop culture.

[mylordshesacactus]

I read etiquette and homemaking guides from the 1800s mostly because they're a FASCINATING insight into cultural norms that we often don't think about. I honestly really recommend people crack one of these open at least once--it goes way beyond, like, "what to wear to a ball!!!"

The best ones have advice on decor, how to select high-quality furniture, childrearing, fashion, etc--from a contemporary perspective, and the things the authors feel the need to clarify vs the wild shit that will just casually mention like it's something everyone knows and agrees on is REALLY revealing of the culture and how it's shifted.

And while a lot of the advice is WILDLY bigoted or just outright funny, you'd be surprised how much of it is...just genuinely timeless, and shockingly compassionate.

They ALSO, as a writer, have INVALUABLE resources--because, again, they're talking about things that are so MUNDANE that a lot of the time nobody really sat down to formally document what normal, everyday people thought or cared about--because that's boring! But a book written to provide advice and information to, say, a young woman who's never run her own home before? You can fully expect an entire chapter dedicated to The Types Of Oven, and which features are useful and worth spending money on, and which features are a huge hassle to clean and a waste of space, and what to spend that money on instead.

And like. As a writer who frequently works in the 1800s? Fuck inflation calculators, this is the kind of thing I need. This is absolutely priceless.

Now that being said.

My current favorite 'etiquette guide' in the world is actually like....70% purely practical advice, written by a gentleman the groupchat has affectionately dubbed History's Most Autistic Man In The World, and thank god they didn't have Aderall back then

Because the AuDHD is strong in this one and as a result, in addition to the deeply practical and useful everyday reference points, we also have:

[mylordshesacactus]

[mylordshesacactus]

[delsicle]

I’m not sure if this will be helpful to anyone, but you literally do not have to be a good writer to write and post fan fiction. Yes you will naturally get better at writing and finding your voice the more you do it but you do not have to be or become a professional level writer to enjoy writing and sharing fics. It’s common to hear people praise fic writers by saying their work is better than published books, and while I think this comes from a good place, that’s not the norm or expectation. There is also a sentiment that fic writing is “good practice” for becoming a better writer or doing something else later, but if fic is the only creative writing you ever do that is literally okay. Your technical skill does not mean you cannot have fun and build community with your writing, or that other people cannot love and find meaning in your work.

[ancientforgcd]

[idolkilling]

I saw an “OC Red Flag Bingo” floating around but it was not toxic enough for my needs so I decided to make my own LMFAO Feel free to use, but please credit me and link back to the original! :D (And @ me if you’d like—I’d love to see how bad your OCs can be!)

Answers for my main six below:

[pillowspace]

Sometimes having an OC is like "this character is an outlet for my insecurity and trauma" and sometimes it's like "this character is an outlet for my love of vampires :)". Sometimes it's both

[pillowspace]

Sometimes you think it's "this character is an outlet for my love and nothing more :)" and then you look it over later like "shit. product of the deepest depths of my soul again"

[fictionadventurer]

Magic system where magic is treated like work in 19th-century England. Magic is something that everyone is naturally able to do, and you can learn different skills and do certain tasks with it, but it's tiring and wears out the body.

Lower class people use magic all the time--it's necessary for survival--and they're hired to do magic for the upper classes, whether they're working the fields, hiring out their magic for factory work, or, working as a maid in an upper class home. Gentlemen are allowed to use magic in a few specific "refined" occupations.

Upper-class ladies are allowed to do almost no magic, except for tiny decorative uses--magic is "low", and using it too much destroys your status in society. Upper-class ladies also regularly go insane from "magic hysteria". Some women are starting to notice this and are arguing for women to be allowed to do healthy amounts of magic. Other people find this idea coarse and unfeminine.

The world and story would be shaped by what the magic actually does (so there's a reason to write this as fantasy rather than pure historical fiction). I'm sure there have to be plenty of stories like this already, but it's still an interesting framework.

[nondelphic]

writing tip: put words on page. hope this helps. i will not be taking questions because i have not done this

[wizardarchetypes]

it is SO frustrating to read a bestseller debut novel that’s sooo good and the author has such a strong voice and amazing skill but every chapter there’s a sentence or a phrase or a small plot mistake that doesn’t by any means ruin anything but which is distracting enough that it has you asking where the editor was!!! i know editors have gargantuan jobs to do but i can’t help but feel in the current industry that a lot of new authors are just having their work inhaled and spit out by publishing houses as fast as possible with no true attention given to making the work as strong as it can truly be, and it’s disappointing!!