Me: *Considers how reading releases emotional plugs, calms me down, makes me laugh, feel at home, the number of favourite stories I have, my plan to live in a personal library, my infinite TBR list, my TBRR list* ...Yeah... I love reading
One day, I’m going to write a full-on love letter to reading. And maybe to some of the different books I’ve fallen in love with as well.
@dissectingdragons has just had 2 episodes on parent-child relationships in speculative fiction and I have some recommendations! (No Spoilers)
Castle Swimmer by Wendy Lian Martin (WEBTOON, fantasy, LGBTQ+)
Prince Siren has a generally great relationship with his mother, Queen Susca. However, she and everyone else in their castle has put a lot of pressure on Siren. He’s well-loved and everyone is extremely protective of him. He’s their Chosen One, after all, destined to save them from the curse that has been killing them off for years. It’s a shame he has to murder an innocent person to break the curse.
Castle Swimmer | Episode 1 - Introducing one of the other main characters. Siren shows up in Episode 2.
The Demon Cycle by Peter V Brett (fantasy novels, clashing cultures, demon war)
One of the main characters watches his mother get killed by demons while his father just stands there.
Another hates her mother, who has been having affairs her whole life. It doesn’t help that she looks exactly like said mother.
And another is grudgingly adopted by the man who is responsible for his mother’s death.
There are a lot of fraught parent-child dynamics in this series.
Wonderland by Juno Dawson (contemporary, mental health, LGBTQ+)
Alice has okay relationships with her mother and step-father. She comes from ‘made money’ but remembers when they were poor. She has met her biological father exactly once and it went badly. Alice’s parents don’t talk about her father, preferring to pretend he doesn’t exist. But there are some health problems that it’s helpful to know if a parent had it.
Snowbaz is wonderful, obviously, but I also love their friendships with Penelope. Penelope fully stole my heart. Wanting to take Simon away from all the danger and keep him safe. Her parents knowing that she’d walk to Simon if they tried to keep her from going back to Watford. Baz hugging her while she cried in ‘Wayward Son’. Baz using ‘kiss it better’ to heal her, even though it’s only meant to work on family members.
Penelope Bunce making lists of ‘What we know & What we don’t’. Penelope Bunce making the effort to stay in contact with Agatha. Penelope Bunce pushing through a confidence crisis.
Penny confidently breaking the law. Penny paying for a road trip in America without informing her compatriots first. Penny yelling ‘We’re literally fleeing a crime scene’ while Snowbaz snog. Penny singing ‘Don’t stop believing’. Penny aspiring to a relaxed life after their chaotic school years.
Castle Swimmer is an LGBTQ+ comic on WEBTOON. It’s entirely underwater with many many different kinds of merfolk. Every castle has its own prophecy. The Beacon, Kappa exists to fulfil those prophecies, which is about as much fun for him as you’d probably expect. In Season 1, he meets Siren, the prince of the Sharks. Siren’s prophecy turns out to be...inconvenient. Shenanigans ensue.
This comic is one of my favourite things on the internet. It’s funny and adorable and occasionally quite dark. Do not let the cuteness fool you.
Siren, Pim & Pagoon
‘Into the Unknown’ - Panic! at the Disco
‘On My Way’ - Phil Collins
‘Home’ - Josef Salvat
‘757′ - Salem Ilese
‘Just One Yesterday’ - Fall Out Boy
Kappa & the Witches
‘Birds’ - sung by Terrence Williams jr
‘Two Minutes’ - The Amazing Devil
‘Radiosity’ - Retro is the Future
‘Take Care of Yourself’ - Maisie Peters
‘Magic’ - Saint PHNX
Siren x Kappa (Karen/Fish Idiots)
‘Would You Be So Kind’ - dodie
‘Shut Up’ - Grayson Chance
(‘757′ - Salem Ilese) (shh)
‘Change Is Gonna Know My Name’ - Alex Varga
‘Monster’ - Adventure Time ft Olivia Olson & Half Shy
All
‘When Can I See You Again’ - Owl City
‘Ready Now’ - dodie
‘Talk to Me’ - Cavetown
‘Oh My Love’ - The Score
‘All I Know So Far’ - P!nk
‘Waving Through a Window’ (from Dear Evan Hansen) - cover by Thomas Sanders, dodie & Ben J Pierce
If you haven’t seen Guillermo del Toro’s Tales of Acardia on Netflix yet, I strongly advise you to do so. I haven’t seen the finale film Rise of the Titans but the shows are really good and this post contains a lot of SPOILERS.
Merlin’s apprentice, Douxie is one of my favourite characters in Tales of Acradia: Wizards because he’s optimistic and values everyone around him - “You believed that every life was precious (Episode 10: Our Final Act’). He’s confident and hopeful, skilled and rash. It’s interesting to me that these traits are associated with the Tarot card, The Fool. Throughout his arc, however, Douxie becomes more like The Magician. What makes this fascinating to me is that he doesn’t complete his transition into The Magician but evolves into a combination of the two cards. This transition is influenced by Douxie’s love of Merlin, his father figure, because Merlin is very much The Magician. While Merlin making him a Master Wizard is a crucial point in Douxie’s arc, the completion comes later.
In the first episode, Douxie meets Nari of the Eternal Forest, a demigod and former member of the Arcane Order, a pantheon of magic titans who want to return the world to magic. Nari has left the Arcane Order because she finds the other titans’ approach to their goal abhorrent. The other titans don’t care about loss of mortal life, whereas Nari realises that “[trying to restore magic] was not worth [the cost]” (Ep 7: Killahead Part One). She is now under the protection of Master Wizard Merlin. The Order want her back because they’re not at full power without her and are thus unable to achieve their goal. Through shenanigans, Douxie and company travel back in time to Camelot, when Nari is still part of the Order. They have many issues to deal with - a vengeful king, a morally questionable sorceress, and evil trolls - before returning to subdue the Arcane Order in the present day.
Douxie throughout the series is a lot like The Fool of the Tarot Major Arcana. He’s enthusiastic, optimistic and kind. In scenes such as freeing the Lady of the Lake (Ep 4: Lady of the Lake), he displays the “innocent wisdom” (Easy Tarot, Ellershaw 2018, p.109) that The Fool represents. The Fool is one of the most positive cards in Tarot; it indicates “innocence, imagination, and wonder” (Ellershaw p.110). It often encourages a leap of faith, or indicates that someone is open-minded. For example, “a youth setting out on a path of discovery” (The Art of Tarot, Dean 2001, p.12), which accurately describes Douxie when we meet him at the start of Wizards -- “I wanna be a wizard like [Merlin]” (Ep 1: Spellbound). He fully commits to that journey. Like The Fool, Douxie is “trusting, positive...independent and courageous, but sometimes reckless” (Tarot, McCormack 2013, p.13). These are characteristics are equally as likely to get him into trouble -- such as when he tries to change the future to save everyone and ends up making things worse (Ep 3: Witch Hunt) -- as they are to help him win -- Douxie successfully keeps the Order distracted by giving them something they need (Ep 10).
As the series goes on, Douxie exhibits aspects of The Magician, such as learning, self-reliance and founded confidence -- as opposed to blind confidence that things will work out. By the end, Douxie possesses “all the skills and ability require to handle a task well and bring it to a successful conclusion” (Ellershaw p.111). In Douxie’s case, this task is becoming Nari’s protector. In order to do that, he must make a “difficult but honest decision” (McCormack p.15). He needs to let go of Merlin. To access the seals the Arcane Order are after (and protect them), Douxie has to destroy Merlin’s staff, the only thing left of him after he’s killed by King Arthur -- “A wizard’s staff is everything to them” (Ep 9: Dragon’s Den). Even as circumstances become bleak, Douxie considers “every opportunity in a positive light” (Dean p.13), including the opportunity to get everyone home, to save everyone by altering time, and to save Nari by giving the seals to the Arcane Order. By doing this, Douxie combines self-reliance and founded confidence with The Fool’s innocent wisdom.
Douxie must let Merlin go to complete his character arc because it means taking his place as Nari’s protector. Douxie has craved approval from Merlin since becoming the ancient wizard’s apprentice. As Douxie’s journey, both in-world and narratively, began with Merlin, it fits that the series ends with him taking up Merlin’s mantle. Merlin was already The Magician but significantly less adaptable and more pessimistic. He may once have been The Fool but any recklessness and optimism are gone. Where Douxie sees an opportunity to save everyone, Merlin sees only potential for disaster. Douxie works well in a team, while Merlin believes he’s always right. By the end of the series, Merlin validates Douxie’s decisions and shows faith in him by giving him his own staff and the title of ‘Master Wizard’. Douxie being The Fool as well as The Magician is what makes him such an amazing character.
You could argue that Douxie isn’t a combination of The Fool and The Magician at all. There are other Tarot cards that symbolise optimism and wisdom. There’s The Sun, which represents “positivity, fun, warmth, success, vitality [the] inner child...[feeling] overly optimistic” (biddytarot.com); The Star, which indicates “hope for the future, inspiration, contentment, calm & stability” (thetarotguide.com); Strength, which shows “courage, bravery, confidence, compassion, inner power” (labyrinthos.co); and The Wheel of Fortune, which is “often associated with ideas of transition, renewal and evolution” (7tarot.com). While Douxie is certainly warm as well as positive, he lacks the playful energy of the ‘inner child’. ‘Calm’ and ‘content’ aren’t words I would use to describe him at any point in the story, even considering the 900 years he was working to become a Master Wizard. There is more space for the Strength card because Douxie is definitely brave and compassionate. He takes control of his fate -- and effects those of many others -- as The Wheel of Fortune often indicates. However, neither Strength nor The Wheel hold any symbolism for optimism or recklessness. Therefore, I believe it is most accurate to say that Douxie is The Fool and The Magician united.
Douxie’s optimism, recklessness and ‘innocent wisdom’ are what most mark him out as The Fool, but his developed skills, founded confidence and self-reliance are more reminiscent of The Magician. It’s through this development and merging of two cards that stand for confidence and wisdom that Douxie becomes what he has always wanted to be - a Master Wizard.
I’ve become moderately obsessed with the webcomic, Aurora. It’s being made by Red from Overly Sarcastic Productions and is very pretty, brightly coloured epic fantasy. So far we’ve got:
- a sort-of-demigod with very little sense of his own personhood
- an elf mage who may or may not have a supposedly deadly plague
- a human mage with a super-powered evil side
- a fiercely loyal, emotionally constipated cat-boy
And they’re all on a mission to stop a primordial threat and save a (so far) rather lovely god from a thoroughly single-minded and destructive mage. It’s emotional and hilarious. The story’s good, the worldbuilding is awesome and all the main characters are wonderful. If you haven’t read it and that sounds interesting to you, the link is above.
SPOILERS
One of the main characters is called Alinua. She’s a cloud elf and a Life mage. For about 20 years, she believed she had the chimeric plague, a magical illness that would have made her magic extremely dangerous. If you’ve got this far, I assume you know how that went down.
The thing is, I think Alinua did have the chimeric plague. Everything known about it is focussed on mutation and madness, very much like the beasts Doctor Jolon created. We don’t know how long the chimeric plague has been around but the first known case was 300 years ago. The first time anyone became aware of The Collector was about 100 years ago. It’s not unreasonable to suppose that she’s been around a lot longer than that, given that the results of her actions were rumours at the time. It’s taken her a long time to go after a god like Vash. It probably took her a long time to start experimenting on spirits. If we assume that The Collector started her experiments because she wanted to free Life, then Life has been awake for at least a hundred years. I’m extrapolating from fairly limited data that they’ve both been around for 300 years or more but I think it makes sense.
If you’d like to humour me and believe, temporarily, that Life has been awake for at least 300 years, then her causing the chimeric plague seems very likely. The Void Dragon made his own rune so he could infect the Elemental Mage (Erin, in this case). He tried that infection on other humans several times and failed. He needed a rune to succeed. (And for Erin to come into contact with it). Life already had her own rune, which appears on the skin of mortals who have the chimeric plague, just like the Void Dragon’s appeared on Erin’s skin.
Aside from the incomplete timeline, the biggest flaw I can think of in this theory is that Alinua is the only person to survive the chimeric plague and become Life’s Vessel. I have no idea why other than pure chance. After inventing his own rune, the Void Dragon only wanted to infect/possess the Elemental Mage. It’s unclear what would have happened if he’d tried to possess someone else but I bet it would have gone poorly. Erin’s mind, body and soul are accustomed to having access to 6 elements. Adding the Void Dragon might not be much of a stretch. Alinua, on the other hand, has only ever had Life magic.
The possibility that Alinua is Life’s Vessel through chance is interesting to me. Life’s motivations are vague. She rarely interferes with Alinua. The one occasion that she has, she retreated as soon as the situation was resolved. She was angry about Jolon using her to corrupt innocent creatures. But she’s also the reason The Collector is around. If Life created the chimeric plague, she’s killed thousands of innocent creatures herself.
I’m sure I’m not the first person to consider this theory. Any contributions, including constructive criticism, are welcome.
Please be kind, and I hope you’re as okay as you can be right now.
The Harmatia Cycle is inspired by the Arthurian legends based in an awesome epic-fantasy world with deeply unpleasant Celtic faeries. There’s a wonderful balance of serious and hilarious, sweeping epic and small-scale human. So much LGBTQ+ rep (one of my favourite characters is a chaotic bisexual) that you should really assume everyone is queer unless told otherwise. The intricate plot gets more interesting with every reread.
Book 1: Sons of Thestian - 2 idiots get lost in a faerie wood, chaos ensues
Book 2: Blood of the Delphi - Charming idiot tries very hard not to go on a murder spree
Before I talk about how I’m developing this idea, here’s the drawing from Part 1
I liked how Blue’s face and the wave spikes turned out but the horns and the ears don’t look right to me. I decided to move the ears down a bit and change the horns so that they’re at more of a slope. You’ll see that ‘Work with the fur’ became ‘Turn the fur into a mane’. The markings are up for debate.
To start with, I worked with those basic ideas. My favourite part of the top and bottom left drawings is the mane, that works to me. The bottom left has my favourite ears so far. You can see that I was struggling with the face-on perspective. Blue is loosely modelled on a cat. She’s a predator, so her eyes are on the front of her face but I want to make it clear that she still has a muzzle. The pencil sketch is just a quick idea of what Blue’s head might look like from above. That’s something I’ll come back to at some point.
Mixed results on this page. The inside of Blue’s mouth is currently based on a lion’s but I don’t think she has enough teeth. I like the idea that she has quite a soft face and then she yawns and it’s like looking down a tunnel to Hades. Or she grins and you’re slightly terrified. Her jaw is the other issue on this page. Basically, one of the things on my to-do list is working out how her mouth moves. At some point on this page, I forgot to add the markings underneath Blue’s eyes but it doesn’t seem to matter much.
This drawing is my favourite version of Blue so far. I like the angle of her face and I got to see how she looks with yellow or red eyes. I preferred yellow because it’s brighter and I like the contrast between the two primary colours. I was expecting to prefer the red because red eyes + soft friendly face is a combination I enjoy but I decided there wasn’t enough contrast. In this drawing, you can still tell that Blue has a muzzle, which is a plus. I like the mane and the spikes as well. The ears and horns gave me problems again so that’s clearly something I need to practice. I wasn’t giving a lot of time to the colouring, since I’m mostly working on Blue’s shapes at the moment but doing this highlighted that I don’t yet know what combination of blues to use or what I want the majority of her markings to look like. I also don’t know if I want her to have neck armour as well as a mane or if she has a soft underside like a cat.
I’m pleased with my progress so far. I like the direction the design of this dragon is going in. One thing I want to be careful of is not getting too caught up in ‘perfecting’ her head. Otherwise, I might end up thinking ‘Cool, I like this...and now I have to design the rest of her body’ and give up because I’m not enjoying myself anymore. The wings and how Blue moves will hopefully be the next thing I try to tackle.
As mentioned in Part 1, I’m designing these dragons as fan-art for the speculative fiction podcast @dissectingdragons (available on Apple Podcasts, iTunes and PodBean.com). It’s a podcast for writers and readers that covers a broad range of subjects from morally grey characters to the various swords that turn up in fiction to the questions writers often get asked. It’s very nerdy and I love it. Here are some episodes I recommend:
263: The Blade Itself - the Genesis of the Sword in History, Mythology and Speculative Fiction
261: Reading the Classics - Hidden Meaning and Censorship in Stoker, Bronte and Shelley
242: Chairs, Dolls and Diamonds - Cursed Objects in Fact and Fiction
236: News from the Word Mines - What No-one Tells Newbies about Writing and Publishing
213: That’s Just Not Literature - the Myths of Fantasy Writing
ShI’ve been teaching myself to draw for about a year at this point. One of the big reasons I decided it was time I learn (having wanted to for years) was that there’s a podcast I listen to that I really want to see fan-art for - @dissectingdragons (available on Apple Podcasts, iTunes and PodBean) and the tagline is ‘The speculative fiction podcast for writers and readers by writers and readers’ (the dragons do the dissecting, they don’t get dissected). Hosts Madeleine Vaughan and J A Ironside discuss a super broad range of topics related to speculative fiction, writing and reading. They’ve had episodes on the language of flowers, films that traumatised them as children, and some of their favourite tropes like ‘found family’ and ‘secret stab wound’. I always find it fascinating but plenty of episodes make me laugh. I love it so much, I keep going back to re-listen to episodes. There will be links to a few recommended episodes at the end of this post for anyone who’s interested.
Also, I love dragons. Dragons are amazing and I’ve seen so many awesome variations of them. And I thought that it would be cool to do some ‘Dissecting Dragons’ fan-art that involved designing some literal dragons. And who knows? Maybe some people will be interested in seeing the development from ‘a mess by an obvious amateur’ to ‘hopefully pretty good drawing of dragons by an obvious amateur’.
I’ve started with a blue dragon. This isn’t the literal first sketch but it was the first drawing of this particular dragon I was happy with. One of the dragons was definitely going to be red and I wanted them to be distinct from each other without clashing. Making the other dragon blue seemed like a good idea. I also want to be able to draw them in greyscale or ink and have them still be clearly different. Blue is loosely modelled on a cat. I have ideas for Red but I’ll worry about her when I get to her.
Thank you for reading :)
Recommended episodes of Dissecting Dragons:
256: Assembling the Skeleton - Showing, Telling and Cutting Out Scenes in Speculative Fiction
235: The Alchemy of Forever - Immortality in Speculative Fiction
234: The Power Behind the Throne - The Hidden Voices of Political Change in Speculative Fiction - with guest Somaiya Daud, author of Mirage and Court of Lions
222: Getting the Band Back Together - Subverting Tropes in Fantasy Teams
219: Children of the Prophecy - Subverting the Chosen One Trope in Speculative Fiction - with guest Veronica Roth, author of Chosen Ones
There are loads more amazing episodes that I’ll probably recommended as I continue posting about my progress on designing these dragons but these will give you an idea of what the podcast is like.
Let’s be honest, this season was chaos. In the best way possible. I think most of the chaos was in the ‘Intruder’ - ‘Prince Whitney’ episodes just because there was so much going on. But I want to talk about the last episode specifically.
SPOILERS
The Season 3 finale, Ep.106 ‘Jamie’s Art Show’ takes place during an art show that Leopold has done surrounding Jamie’s work as a food critic. Gwen and Frederick end up going together and the episode ends in what would normally be a romantic setting, which is essentially a hall of crystals but it represents how much sugar Jamie consumes.
Let’s back up.
Pretty much the central conflict of this comic is that Gwen overheard Frederick call her ugly on the day they met. Up until that chaotic episode arc where Frederick meets the CPC, only the readers know that Frederick has no idea Gwen heard him, let alone that Gwen thinks she told him. Personally, I loved this use of suspense. Readers get to know that there’s been a miscommunication while (hopefully) enjoying Gwen’s developing relationship with Frederick. They both believe that they’re on the same page and they are both, in their own ways, being as honest as they can manage. But only Gwen actually has all the information...besides that detail that Frederick doesn’t know she heard him insult her. An important thing to note here is that Frederick learns very quickly that he was being horrible and shallow. He genuinely has feelings for Gwen. He tells her, in this finale, that she’s beautiful. I thought that was a neat way of *almost* closing that arc.
When I read the part where Frederick asks Gwen what he did, my stomach dropped. But *of course* Frederick was going to bring this up. He cares very much about Gwen and I think he knows that they shouldn’t start a romantic relationship until this is cleared up. If Gwen had told him the truth, he would have been mortified *and* they would start on the same page.
But she doesn’t tell him. And, at least in my opinion, this decision was exactly where Gwen’s arc was taking her. When Frederick asks, she wants it not to matter. She likes him too, she wants this moment. And, as the episode shows, she’s been told to be more selfish. Selfishness isn’t a bad thing. Doing things you want, just because you want to do them, is okay. But only as long as you’re not hurting yourself or anyone else. Unfortunately, that’s where Gwen has gone with this decision. Deciding to push her feelings about being called ugly by someone she cares about, in exchange for what will ultimately be an illusion, is the worst thing she could have done in this situation. To her, Frederick having called her ugly is more important than the potential for a healthy relationship. Her belief that it’s the other way around, that she’s putting her positive feelings for Frederick first and ignoring the negative, is one of the most harmful aspects of this decision. It’s why her reflection goes back to being shattered. And it’s totally in character.
‘Cursed Princess Club’ is an amazing WEBTOON. The writer, @iamlambcat (on Twitter) is an excellent storyteller. This careful control of suspension, the structure of the plot, and Gwen’s (currently incomplete) character arc is masterful. That last panel at the end of the finale is a punch to the gut and excellently sets up the next season. Gwen has come so far and yet this stumble could cost her all her progress. It won’t, obviously, because this isn’t that kind of comic. But there’s only one season left and I’m excited to find out how @iamlambcat is going to bring this central arc, as well as all the sub-plots, to a (probably unexpected and surprising) end.
Castle Swimmer - Huge HUGE Ocean and Small Small Mer
I love that there is no canon information (at present) about the surface in Castle Swimmer (WEBTOON) or how big the mer are. This way, I get to imagine that the ocean almost meets the atmosphere and the mer are human-hand-sized. For some reason, it brings me a great amount of joy :D
I like that Jamie and Leopold’s initial interactions reflect Gwen and Frederick’s - Frederick was put off by Gwen’s appearance, which is almost exactly how Leopold felt about Jamie. Frederick, like everybody else in the comic, could see Jamie’s beauty straight away, whereas Leopold is disdainful of Jamie to start with. Leopold saw Gwen’s beauty as soon as he saw her because he’s taught himself to see unconventional beauty but he and Frederick are both kind of shallow to start with. Leopold feeling as if he’s being haunted by the Pink Demon also mirrors Frederick worrying that Gwen was going to haunt him :D
(I love that Leopold is kind of annoyed about realising that Jamie is actually a lovely, kind, brave person who isn’t only superficially beautiful :D)
After all that, my expectation is that Jamie and Leopold will get together :D :D :D ...eventually. Thinking that Leopold will be equally as frustrated about being attracted to Jamie as he is about accidentally drawing him makes me smile :) They’re both invested in their chosen professions and I like that they have opposing tastes in food. I can imagine Leopold continuing trying to get Jamie to eat more healthily, and Jamie trying to get Leopold to eat more sweets like in the last panel of Ep 93. Learning more about Jamie will be awesome too :D As always, I’m very excited to see where this story goes.
From the age of about 12, I wanted to be a professional author and I got super attached to that idea of myself. As far as I was concerned, it was the only thing I was good at. I have an A level (UK) and a Bachelor’s Degree in Creative Writing. I’m 23 now and I’ve only just realised that I have no idea what I’m doing.
Correction: I have an idea of what I’m doing. I know that the best approach to any story is to be invested in it. I know the importance of the opening scene; of relatable characters; of clear description, etc. Here’s the thing: until university I wrote for fun. Sure, I wanted to be professional author but it turns out I didn’t know what ‘professional’ meant. I did okay at university. I got a 1:1 (First/A) on a travel piece and on one of my essays. For a while after university, I wrote a series of short stories called ‘The Shapeshifter Thing’. They were about a teenager who turned into random animals at inconvenient moments, like while sunbathing. I had a lot of fun writing that and I posted it online. Part of the reason I was brave enough to do that was because I didn’t really care what people thought of it. I hadn’t tried my hardest. I’d only written some short stories that I hoped people would like. (You can read those stories on my website: https://taylorkdenwood.wordpress.com/shapeshifter-thing/)
Whenever I think ‘I have no idea what I’m doing’ (specifically writing-wise but I don’t know what I’m doing in general - yay adulthood), I mean that I haven’t found a process that works for me...yet. I wanted to write full-length novels, so it’s strange to try changing my story-mindset to work with a shorter form. This is how I ended up with a series of stories about the same set of characters. While at university, I wanted so badly to be writing again that I dove into a story that wasn’t ready to be written yet. That went as well as you might expect, which is sad to me because it was a good idea. I’d like to go back to it someday.
Post-university, story-writing is more complicated than pre-university. There’s structure and tropes and research involved. For whatever reason, I didn’t give that stuff a lot of thought when I was writing as a teenager. I was (and am) super stubborn. You could have shouted in my face that I needed to structure my stories and I’d have refused to do it because you shouted at me. Then I’d insist that the story structure would sort itself out. I read a lot and I thought I’d absorb the technical stuff without having to think about it. I don’t know if I was right about that or not.
However, it turns out that structure and research make writing more fun. Thinking about tropes you want to see more of or subvert is wonderful. Annoyed that Arwen does a lot waiting and worrying in ‘Lord of the Rings’ while the band of male heroes have adventures? Write a story where the stay-home love interest is super-important to the heroes success, or they can be the Kitchen Hero trope, making sure the action heroes take care of themselves. (Kitchen Heroes are amazing - I’m convinced the action heroes would be doomed without them).
Most of my current story ideas will require a lot of research. That in itself isn’t a problem because I love doing research. But finding a good starting point when you know there’s a lot to get through can be tricky. Knowing there’s a lot to do can put you off even trying. I’m currently learning to draw and I wish I was perfect at it from the start. Research is the same principle - I wish I could know everything on one topic from one book. Even encyclopædias don’t work like that, and one book covering an entire subject is going to be highly suspect anyway.
When I say ‘I don’t know what I’m doing’, I also mean that, after about 10+ years, I’m still a very young writer. A lot of my convictions about writing disintegrated into flames while at university (my fault, not the university’s). I feel like I’ve had to start over. Instead of only writing fantasy novels, I want to try everything. Fantasy owns a piece of my heart that no other genre can touch, but I don’t want to fall back into the ‘everything I learn is in service of writing fantasy novels’ trap. It turns out that I enjoy writing creative essays and opinion pieces. For the first time in my life, I’ve written a short fan-fic (Rise of the Guardians - JackxTooth) that I want other people to read and like. There’s an idea in my head that has nothing to do with fantasy at all. Instead of learning stuff for the ultimate goal of fantasy-novel-writing, I want to write different stuff for the pleasure of the stuff - for the learning, for the possibility of unexpectedly falling in love. It’s like I’ve been looking through a window my whole life and just realised that there’s a whole glass wall next to it.
If you’re super attached to one genre, or there’s a genre you’ve decided you don’t like, try to broaden your horizons a bit. Write fan-fiction, write essays, research things you want to write about. Writing is a lot more fun when you’re open-minded, I assure you.
Hallo. I am a hermit-dragon. I wish to become a shapeshifter who can transform into a dragon and fly away to forested mountains without entirely rejecting human civilisation. Besides that, I want to be a writer of interesting stories, thought pieces and creative essays. I love love love fanart and learning what people think of my favourite stories. I also don’t know how to use Tumblr, so this should be an adventure.
andulkaphoto
dailybridgerton
theartofmadeline
stormborns
pixelskylines
germansingergirl
