Afterwards

she/any . demi/queer . over 18 . my ao3:LakeWitch

[eroscestlavie]

I need to stop replying to “how do you make friends in your 30s?” threads because all my answers boil down to “you have to want to know people instead of have friends” and I don’t think people wanna hear that

[gr8writingtips]

writing tip #4235:

never reuse any words ever. once you write a word it's BANNED from being written again for the rest of your book

[writingdose]

protect em dashes.

protect “not x, not y, but z” format.

protect short sentence stacking as a stylistic choice.

protect fanfic writers—who are kind enough to share their works with people to read for free—from ai witch hunts, speculations and accusations.

“don’t like don’t read” also applies to any fic that is ai-generated and any fic you think is ai-generated by the way. if you don’t like what you’re reading for any reason, you can always stop reading and exit the fic at any point. but harassment is never ever justified. no matter if you think you’ve found a noble excuse to do it. and also…

witch hunts, speculations and accusations harm the writing community as much as ai does. if not more. I don’t want to see another innocent writer get driven away from the community because someone decides to harass and accuse them for using ai just because their fic happens to have “ai telltales” — the same telltales ai got from having been trained on millions of human-made works to mimic how real humans actually write.

[drchucktingle]

WHAT A GREAT DAY. it is astonishing how cool existence is. endless gratitude. what a blessing

[light-camera-bitch-smile]

Can we just talk about how the entirety of the pool scene (post-baptism) Gideon is fucking cradling harrow in her arms and the moment Gideon realizes ‘She can’t love me even if I wanted her to. I can’t even try.’ She LITERALLY LETS GO OF HER FACE. SHE LETS GO. SHE RELEASES HER I—

[catskullery]

Hey Griddle. It's been a while.

[light-camera-bitch-smile]

ianthe: harry can't POSSIBLY love you, nav; she lobotomized herself to forget about you! to love is to remember!

not five pages earlier: gideon waxing poetic about how harrow tenderly wrapped gideon's sunglasses (that harrow allegedly hated btw) and sealed them tightly in an envelope for eight months on the OFF CHANCE gideon came back in some way shape or form

gideon: yeah seems legit. i mean she didn't even seem happy when i died for her so like.

[vividciggy]

They're smudging each others clown makeup

[novelconcepts]

Hey, man, c'mere. Listen. Get in real close, this is important.

You're gonna make stuff again. You're gonna make stuff you're proud of. You're gonna make stuff you're excited to share. You're going to feel that overwhelming drive to create, not just the frantic I want to want to you're stuck in now. You're going to have awesome ideas, and you're going to make them into reality. You're going to create again. You're still an artist. You're still a writer. You're still home to the same passion you had before. You'll find it again. It's not gone. It's just resting. Let it rest. You're going to make stuff again. I promise.

[drchucktingle]

the game is a blessing

ive seen some folks lately talkin on NEGATIVE REVIEWS and how to deal with them as authors or artists. personally i have not cared about reviews for several decades. negative reviews do not bother me in the slightest and buds often ask me HOW. ill explain a bit here and why this applies to everyone

first, the reason this matters to more than just authors and artists is because GUESS WHAT WE ARE ALL CREATORS. a book can get one star but so can a walk in the park or a sandwich we made. we are all in a state of critique from the world in some way because we are all creators

to narrow it in on AUTHORS however, ill start with something everyone already knows: ART IS SUBJECTIVE. in the most ZOOMED OUT sense, there is no good nor bad art. there are certainly methods of quantifying like 'is it effective?' 'did it move me?' and these are important but not some COSMIC truth

i think a lot of buds realize this and thats great. they say 'i think my book is FIVE STARS and this buckaroo thinks its ONE STAR but its subjective so it really is neither.' this is a great first step but personally its not ENTIRELY how i look at it (and probably where i will lose some thats fine)

i do not see a one star review of my art and think 'art is subjective so that is wrong'. i think 'art is subjective so that is the truth.' because it is. the subjective nature of art does not just mean everyone is wrong, it also means everyone is right. every takedown of my work is correct

i think there is a power in truly accepting this, not in some 'well let me TURN IT AROUND and use these mean quotes as promo' kind of thing (although that is fun too, trot your trot) but in an almost spiritual way, for lack of a better word. to ACCEPT these many truths is a blessing

theres nothing to be bothered by when you recognize that your creation, whether a painting or song or book, is ALL THINGS. it is not about your art being NEITHER good or bad, it is BOTH good and bad. it is BEYOND quantifying and when you start trying to do that you are simply playing a game

and HEY playin games is fun. reviews and critique are important (they are ALSO art). its a dang treat to be reviewed. BUT in the grand cosmic sense it is still a game of trying to put something ethereal into a coherent shape. there is absolutely no reason to get upset over a game

so this is why reviews never bother me. a glowing write up is a blessing. an insulting screed is a blessing. they are both true and i am honored to play the game. if this makes sense to you THATS GREAT hope it helps, and if you are like 'what the heck chuck?' thats okay too buckaroo. LOVE IS REAL

[bodyintheriver]

She was forced to eat 200 souls of the ninth house when she was conceived 💔 Griddlehark as kids

[thasmin-vibes]

I fucking can't breathe

[cellsdividing]

[eroscestlavie]

This just pissed me off so baaaad 😂

[drchucktingle]

how incredible that we get to get to put our stamp on existence for these brief moments. what an honor

[wafflewarrior111]

So... I found this and now it keeps coming to mind. You hear about "life-changing writing advice" all the time and usually its really not—but honestly this is it man.

I'm going to try it.

[missroserose]

I love the lawyer metaphor, because whenever I see “John knew that...” in prose writing I immediately think “how?  How does he know it?”  Interrogate your witnesses.  Cross-examine them.  Make them explain their reasoning.  It pays dividends.

[heck-in-a-handbasket]

All of this, but also feels/felt. My editor has forbidden me from using those and it’s forced me to stretch my skills.

[ineedthesons]

This is your "show not tell" advice explained!

[tarysande]

Editor here.

First, let me preface this with something very important: you can treat all of this advice as SECOND-DRAFT ADVICE. It is so much easier to rewrite this kind of stuff once you have words on the page. Telling yourself the first draft is totally appropriate and acceptable.

What we’re talking about here are FILTER WORDS (and to some degree verbs of being). Yes, “thought” words are included. But so are “heard, saw, looked, tasted, smelled” etc.—most words having to do with the senses.

This isn’t black and white advice; sometimes you’ll use these words and that’s okay. They’re not WRONG. They’re just weaker. And they’re weaker because they create distance between the reader and the experience of the character.*

If you want your reader to feel like they’re experiencing the story right alongside the character, you want to cut down on filter words.

*This is particularly important with first person and close third POVs. The reader always knows whose eyes they’re seeing through and thoughts they’re privy to. So you don’t need to tell them “I saw X.” Or “I heard X.” Or “I thought Y.” You can just jump into the action/observation as it’s happening.

This is also where you want to pay attention to verbs of being.

“It was rainy.” Versus: “The rain pounded against the roof.” Or “The rain howled like an injured animal.” Or “The rain tapped against the window like an anxious lover.” All of these are inviting the reader deeper into the experience of the story by using stronger verbs and similes. And, at the same time, they stir feelings (instead of TELLING feelings). And feelings keep your reader engaged. Engaged readers keep turning pages; engaged readers become FANS.

[the-haiku-bot]

This is also where

you want to pay attention

to verbs of being.

Beep boop! I look for accidental haiku posts. Sometimes I mess up.

[defilerwyrm]

The most valuable advice that Author Ex gave me through the years that we wrote together was this: the problem with all these filter words is that they create distance in the POV.

That means that when you read a line like

John saw that the curtains were open.

It immediately takes you OUT of the character's perspective and instead tells you what they experience as a secondhand observation.

You don't have to get fancy or purple with how you rephrase things like this. Not everything needs a ton of breathing room.

You wanna know what's perfectly impactful while keeping a tight POV?

The curtains were open.

Simple as that.

[harrirats]

her ass is not listening