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The very random things that make the day bearable.  Demi | INTJ | Free As A Bird Join me on AO3

[wordsnstuff]

Tips On Writing Time Skips

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Sneaky Summarizing

Summarizing is an important part of skipping several events along a timeline, but you don’t need to introduce the new part of the narrative with a 10 page long info-dump on everything that happened. If nothing is omitted, then there’s no point in skipping it at all. If you’ve chosen to skip a long period of time, then cherry pick the important information for the scene you’re introducing and make it clear that time has passed. Don’t share a lot, because you don’t want to reveal too much and certainly not too soon. 

Be Clear About The Timeline

Unless the aspect of not knowing where in the timeline these events are happening is a purposeful tool you’re utilizing, you need to make sure the reader is aware of how much time has passed and where they stand now within the conflict. What has changed, what has persisted, what has worsened or resolved, and how has this affected the characters? 

Utilize Flashbacks

Sometimes it’s a good idea to leave the reader a bit disoriented by the shift in time, and in this case I think using flashbacks can be a creative way to turn up the suspense and give them information while also showing them the space which is occupied by what they aren’t allowed to know yet. Instead of explaining something, you could show them a part of the period you’ve skipped and let them infer its significance or glean the important information. 

Take Advantage of Formatting

Referring to the flashback point a bit, let your readers know very clearly that they’ve revisited the past. An easy and pretty universal way to do so is through formatting, like creating a divider between the present and past narrative pieces, or italicizing the flashback portion of the chapter. This also makes it easier to pop tiny flashbacks in as they become relevant or imperative to the reader continuing to connect the dots.

Recognizable Triggers

When you move forward in time a considerable distance, you need to create some consistency in what triggers this decision, like a common occurrence, resolution to a smaller conflict, etc. This build up will be noted subconsciously in the reader’s mind and as soon as those things return later on, the tension will build naturally. 

Transitions Within The Text

Don’t end a chapter abruptly on a cliffhanger and then skip 10 years. I mean, do what you want, but in most cases this is a bad idea. The pace and timeline of your story should have good ebbs and flows, and the flow of your story will be noticeably jolted if there are no transitions leading up to and out of time skips. 

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MY CURRENT WORK IN PROGRESS (Check it out, it’s pretty cool. At least I think it is.)

[percyhoneybee]

THERE MUST BE A PARAGRAPH BREAK EVERY TIME A NEW CHARACTER SPEAKS

THIS IS NOT OPTIONAL

NO ONE WANTS TO READ ONE BIG BLOCK OF TEXT JESUS CHRIST

[bloated-butch]

REMEMBER TIP TOP OK:

Make a paragraph every time that any of these things change!

Ti me

P lace

To pic

P erson

[writeworld-blog]

[smallbookthings]

reblogging again because this is IMPORTANT

[khaleesiofthewolves]

THIS IS SO IMPORTANT, PEOPLE! REBLOG TO SAVE A WRITER’S LIFE!

[grifalinas]

There is nothing that will make me backspace on a fic faster than a lack of paragraph breaks

[weirdlandtv]

Know your horns!

(From Keith and Clothilde Sutton’s Pictorial Dictionary.)

[lazysmirk]

Just in case you forget this exists.

It exists.

[dragonofdarknesschaos]

With those “when you want to design a character but you don’t know color theory” posts flying around I thought this would be relevant again.

[secretsivekept]

SLAMs THE REBLOG BUTTON

[niyarest]

there’s also Coolors website that gives you randomized palettes!

[tf2humbug]

Don’t forget ColourLovers, either! It’s a social media-esque site where you can browse tons of palettes and share your own.

You can browse the most popular ones or search for certain colors, themes, and even specific hex codes!

When you find one you like, you can download a wallpaper swatch of it and also select the specific colors it uses to look at more palettes that use those same ones.

ColourLovers is my go-to for when I’m having trouble coming up with a color scheme! It’s also been around for over a decade, so there’s plenty to browse through.

[sevdrag]

MY FAVORITE POST AND FAVORITE WEBSITES ARE BACK

[rederiswrites]

Okay guys, for writing/general reference, a bit about what a ‘blacksmith’ is and isn’t:

A blacksmith is a generalist, a person who uses tools and fire to work iron.  Some blacksmiths work more specifically, so you get, say, an architectural blacksmith, who focuses more or less exclusively on things like gates, rails, fences, or an artist blacksmith, who makes wacky sculptures or what have you.  These days, though, that’s a pretty blurry line.  ‘Blacksmith’ is a pretty damn broad term, but it’s nowhere near broad enough to cover everything encompassed in ‘metalworker’, which is how I often see it used.  There are a LOT of different skills for working metal, and no one knows them all.  Some other terms:

A farrier shoes horses.  They may make the shoes, or they may buy them and then size them, but they actually do the shoeing.  Unless the blacksmith is also a farrier, they don’t know shit about horses’ hooves and are not qualified to deal with them and probably don’t want to.

A blacksmith works IRON, usually almost exclusively.  They might work with bronze or do a bit of brazing, but those are really separate skillsets.  If you work, say, tin and/or pewter, you are in fact a whitesmith.  You could also be a silversmith or a coppersmith, and so on.

Knifemakers and swordsmiths have their own highly specialized and fairly complex specialties, and usually a blacksmith wouldn’t mess with that unless they want to pick up a new skillset or if they’re really the only game going for a long way around.  By the same token, a swordsmith might never have learned the more general blacksmithing skills.  They’re not the same thing is what I’m trying to say here.  Likewise armorers.  There’s overlap but it’s not the same thing.

If you make metal items via molds and casting, you work at a foundry and are a foundryman.

Look, when metalworkers and individual shops and masters were the height of industry, this shit got REALLY specific.  There were people who spent their whole lives making pins.  Just pins.  Foundries specialized and made only bells, only cannon, only cauldrons, etc.  This is scratching the surface, I just wanted to make the point that ‘blacksmith’ is not the same thing as ‘magical muscly person who knows how to do everything related to metal’.

[cycas]

This sort of thing really illustrates the huge difference between writing fantasy and writing historical fiction, I think.   In real European medieval history, a smith might live, perhaps to the age of 50* - if he’s very lucky 60 or so.  And he (sometimes she, but mostly he) has to be earning money throughout his life,  so probably doesn’t have time to develop a whole set of skillsets, so if you write him being able to do loads of different things and having the right tools for all of them, it looks odd.  And if you write a woman, you probably do feel you need to give a bit of explanation about why she’s doing the job, since it’s a pretty sexist society on the whole, so she’s a little unusual. 

In fantasy, though, it’s all different.  Tolkien’s dwarves have an average lifespan of 250, so they have much longer to pick up skills (and live in an environment where probably it’s much easier and encouraged for them to do so: they live in cities that are concentrated on providing made items and skills to other species: they aren’t a generalist society, very unlike any human institution I can think of.)  They also ‘make mighty spells’ so very unlike real medieval blacksmiths, they are probably working metal with enchantment as well as tongs. 

We don’t know about their gender role situation, but I don’t think there’s anything in canon to say that the women aren’t making things (and even if there was, there are loads of dwarf cities that last for thousands of years, so no doubt there’s variation between them). 

Tolkien’s Elves of course live forever and also have more-or-less perfect memory, so there’s no reason for an Elven smith not to have all these skills and others, particularly if they are nobility (I don’t think in real-world history you get many noble smiths) and have other people helping to make sure they eat and have clothes and so on.  And it seems less of an issue being female, too: Galadriel and Arwen are notable makers of magical items.   *I’m assuming that if he’s a smith, he survived the terrifying childhood mortality rates, and we only have to think of adult lifespans. 

[ilsa-fireswan]

I love to talk about historic blacksmithing!  My husband and I run a blacksmithing shop (specialized in blade making) and we’ve done a LOT of educational demonstrations where we forge while lecturing on history, culture, techniques, etc.  (So feel free to ask me things!  I get all excited about it!)

Let’s talk first about the name!  Historically Smith would mean metal worker and the color would tell you what type of metal. Black is the designation for iron (because of the color it takes after being heated and cooled several times.)  Today Smith more generally means maker, but is still most commonly applied to metal workers.

And, as the OP said, if you need a tinker (tinsmith, also works pewter), silversmith (whitesmith), goldsmith (white- or yellow- smith), or coppersmith (red-, brown-, or green- smith), that’s a different discipline.  Not that a blacksmith has no idea how to work those metals, but his knowledge will likely be limited to how it applies to his general discipline.  For example, weapons and armor made for nobility might have precious metals used to decorate them.  (Aside: The techniques for iron vs copper are complete opposites and one of my favorite modern blacksmithing proverbs is about brass, an alloy made with copper and zinc.  It runs, “Brass, brass, what a pain in the… brain.” )

One of my choice historical bits is talking about medieval blacksmithing in England. This is something we actually have records of because of the guild structure. There were so many blacksmiths in urbanized areas that your permit to open a shop would permit you to make only a specific set of items. Pin drawers, chain makers, armorers, swordsmiths, farm tools, nails, wainwright (hoops for wagon wheels or barrels), farriers (horse shoeing)… all of those might be different shops.  And that isn’t even a complete list!  (Naturally there was a lot of overlap on high-demand items.) 

But even better, Yorkshire records that show us that women were regularly involved in the trade!  It was still male-dominated BUT several of the disciplines (nails, pins, chains) were almost exclusively women!  Women owned blacksmith shops, took apprentices, worked the forge - all of the things that mark them as “real” blacksmiths.  One of my favorite anecdotes is from William Hutton’s History of Birmingham; he encountered a nailer’s shop in which he noted “one or more females, stripped of their upper garments, and not overcharged with the lower, wielding the hammer with all the grace of the sex.”

Come yell at me about blacksmithing!  I want to learn what you know and I’d love to answer any of your questions!  I have a lot of prepared lecture snippets on a variety of smithing details:

Technological setbacks due to loss of historic metallurgical discoveries.

Why “damascus” swords are supposed to be the best.

Cultural and historical reasons for large, slow, strokes with a heavy hammer (like you see in video games) vs. small, quick strokes with a smaller hammer (like you see on YouTube).

Blacksmithing terms in modern English.  (”Keep your temper” being the most common.)

How settling America changed the Western picture to males-only generalized blacksmithing

Economic comparisons of the cost to hire a blacksmith

Apprentice vs. Journeyman vs. Master

More about female blacksmiths

What to wear in the forge (modern or historical reenactment)

How-to on a variety of subjects

Blacksmithing in movies

Why Forged in Fire doesn’t give you an accurate picture of blacksmithing or the skills of the contestants

Metallurgy (the science of metals)

Eastern vs. Western blacksmithing (Surprise!  Japan and Europe are wildly different!)

What kitchen knives do you need?  And how do you keep them sharp?

Did I mention I love to talk about it and get real excited?

[emarislaughsmaniacally]

Finders Keepers

Warning for blood, gore, dismemberment, references to torture, electrocution, disassociation, and murder. 

Helmet tilts his head and stands very still, observing him from a reasonably safe distance away.  Derek ignores him and stays sitting on the floor, back pressed tight to the wall as his ribs slowly start to shift and snap.  

The most unpleasant part of healing misplaced bones is definitely how his skin rolls and shifts with them. 

 Plus the pain.  

Yeah, that's crap too.

"You gonna be alright?"  The voice is mechanical enough that he's tempted to sniff the air again but his eyes catch on the puddle Derek's sitting in.  

It's admittedly a lot of blood so he just jerks his head in a sharp nod, barely feeling the fresh gush of blood from his chopped up larynx.

"You got anyone you can call?  Friends?  Work?"  

Derek shakes his head.

“Want me to call the cops?”

He gurgles angrily and shakes his head hard enough to spit up more blood.

“Right.”  Helmet relaxes, shifts his torso like he's stretching and then starts checking the bodies scattered about the dingy apartment. 

Derek flexes his jaw, eyes glued to where Helmet is systematically rifling through wallets, taking photos of everything inside and pressing phones to a thick tablet-looking thing.  It's fast and efficient as hell.

His jaw creaks when it fuses in place, face no longer looking like a dented can.  Nerves along the cheekbone start reminding him to press the hanging flap of skin back up to knit together faster.

Finished with the bodies and quickly sticking a few more holes into someone playing possum, Helmet straightens and stares at him again.  

He absently thinks it would be unsettling if he bothered to give a shit anymore.

"Change before you leave, you look like a murder victim." 

Derek's eyebrows climb up as he pointedly sweeps a glare over the destruction.

"Huh.  Yeah okay, maybe don't take clothes from an actual murder victim."  The man makes a buzzing noise that Derek interprets as a hum and then there's a sudden crackle of victory.

"This jacket's good, yeah? Uh. Yeah, just snapped his neck.  Hope it's dark enough outside no one'll notice your pants."  Helmet says conversationally as he strips it off the guy and stuffs an enormous wad of stolen cash into the pockets.  

This is probably one of the best rescues Derek's ever had and not just because of the considerate donation of money.  Hemet waves, presents the jacket and drapes it near the door, not even trying to approach him.  Minutes later, there's a collection of household cleaners that Helmet is liberally mixing and splashing around, concentrating on areas where Derek's been.  It's reassuring that the guy doesn't gas them out with the chemicals.

It's all so professional and solicitous that Derek lets himself relax a bit, focuses on his repairing body to make sure it heals properly.

Then again, -he flexes freshly grown fingers- he's got to find the box.  

He tries to be discreet, surreptitiously eyeing the chaos for it before he gives up.  Helmet probably wouldn't want to leave the box behind either.

Derek makes to speak but the sound is harsh, choked and painful, gristle barely stitched together.   

Helmet pauses where he's kicking liquid over cracked linoleum.  "Christ, you're a regular Judy Garland."

"Box."  Derek shakily mimes out the size of it and swallows down a clump of blood.  "Can't leave it." 

"Ooh, a box." Helmet shifts debris about, eventually digs out a duffel and crams three laptops inside.  "Missing anything else?"

Derek checks to find his wallet is still there before he remembers what happened to his phone and keys.

"Sewer." 

"Shitty."  There's a loud buzz like maybe he coughed or snorted.  “What’d you do to get them this pissed?”

He points to his healing face.  “Existed.”

"Riiight.  This Wolverine shit is kinda creepy.”  His speaker crackles a little more, like it’s having a hard time picking up his voice.  “You got anyone who can pick you up?"

Derek closes his eyes at a tangle of crushing emotions and shakes his head.  

"Okay."  The man's body language seems less aggressive, a little more careful to move.  "You got anyone who's lookin for you?  Anywhere you can go?"

Derek opens his eyes and stares at his dirty feet and clean toes, thinking about the little town in California and the arguments before he left.  

"Not anymore."

Helmet sighs expansively as he wanders deeper into the apartment.  "Right.  I'll find a place.  Just, ah, keep on with that healing thing.  You're doin great."

The man is still searching for the box when Derek's spine pops back into place.  He can't stop a yelp from the shock of it or the agonized groan when the nerves to his legs link up.  

He almost forgot they drilled screws into that bone.

Shit.

Shitshitshitshitshitshit

He pushes against the wall like it's the only thing holding him together, blinding pain burning through like acid until his nerves finish healing.

"Hey."  His rescuer is suddenly there and looms a little closer than before.  "You gonna be alright?”  

Derek takes a ragged breath, eyes him warily, and… decides getting the metal out with help is more productive than not.  

He tilts his leg a little to let the heads of the screws in a neat row down his shin catch the light against the dark of his jeans.

"Gotta get ‘em out."

The helmet is silent but Derek can still hear the faintest murmur inside. "Jumpin Jehoshaphat…"

Derek silently agrees and motions to the duffel bag now resting by the door.

"The drill there?"  

Hemet's hands start clenching and relaxing at his sides, mechanical voice buzzing with a jerky negative exhale.

"I'll find it too."  His fists shake.  "We'll have to take em out somewhere else though."

There's a protest building in his chest but it slowly dies, pressed down by the pains in his body as the smaller hurts start closing up.

Derek grunts in acceptance, the bone would be weak and take a little longer to fill in anyway.

They're silent for a moment before the man starts his search again.

"So.  What's in the box?"  He probably means to distract him with a chat but the box is… 

Derek looks at his hand and the clean pink skin on the new growths.  

The room wobbles a bit.

"Me."

A stretch of silence.

"Well, okay then."  The man flicks a switch on the helmet and Derek realizes the microphone is shut off, which would only make sense if the guy didn't know about Derek’s enhanced senses.  He hardly has to strain to hear that there's a series of clicks before another mechanized voice rasps out a greeting.

"O, imma need a room.  I've got a witness I need to stick to and I don't wanna spook him."  The man's actual voice is raspy, almost gruff, and seems surprisingly young.  “So I’d appreciate it if everyone would leave me the hell alone for a while.”

Whatever the response is, the mechanical tone is so strange Derek can't understand it so he just sags against the wall and rests.  

Helmet guy is going to let him stick around and he's warning others away.  

That's pretty great.

A small part of himself is soothed, comforted even, that this man who ripped through eight men like wet paper, has taken an interest in Derek’s wellbeing.

He slips down the wall a little and just… zones out for a while. 

The big hurts have righted themselves so there's just a mild ache in a few spots.  If he weren't so tired, Derek would be standing, anxious to leave, but Helmet doesn't seem rushed in the least and that confidence bleeds into him too.

He’s still worried though.  "Cops don't investigate shootouts around here?"

"Wow, that's an entire sentence.  You must be feeling better." Helmet is somewhere in one of the bedrooms still tossing things around.  "People would have to call the cops first but, this is Crime Alley so, you know, they don't."

He feels a burble of puzzlement rise through the haze of fading pain.

"I've never heard of Crime Alley in New York."  That's a ridiculous name for a place, but New York was filled with them. 

"Yeah?  Well, that's because you're in New Jersey.  Welcome to Gotham, man.”  More creepy laughter.  “I'd say this is an unusual way to end up here but I'd be lying.  You're lucky they came into my turf, anywhere else in the city and no one might've noticed."

"Your turf?”  Derek echoes the term curiously.  It gives the impression of a gangster or the mob.  It seems reasonable because the guy has pistols strapped to his legs and another pair under his jacket.  Also the professionalism reinforces the theory. 

There's a pause in the sounds then a heavy scrape over carpet. 

"It's just a little slice of this shit hole, but it's mine."  There's more rustling, then a familiar clatter, like beads. 

Derek registers the sound and waits. Hears the scrape of the lid.

"You."  More sounds, louder and faster than before.  "Hoo boy, can you take some damage."

Derek doesn't respond until Helmet stomps back into the kitchen, stained orange shoe box tucked under one arm, drill clenched in the other.

"Still hurts."

"I bet it does."  He shakes the box enough to rattle.  "There's more teeth in here than can fit in one mouth."

The atmosphere is tense now and Derek wishes the room didn't smell like death so he could better gauge Hemet's mood.

“I’ve been here a few days.”  He shrugs minutely.  “Electricity doesn’t really stop the healing, just makes it really slow.”

“So all of this... is from you.”

"Probably."  He says, hoping that's the end of it, doesn’t feel like he’s calm enough to talk about the various bits of him in the box.

The man taps with the drill, a muffled beat against his leg like he's thinking it over.

“Police won’t like any of this.” 

Derek shakes his head.  

“You don’t have a place to crash here.”  

Another shake.  

“You got money though.  You could get a hotel room, get a ticket out tomorrow.”  

Derek lowers his eyes to Helmet’s shoes. 

“I can do that.”  He agrees quietly.

“You don’t want to though.  Why?”

He lets his eyes flick back to the batteries.  “Doesn’t matter where I go.  They always find me.”  He stares at a red terminal, almost feeling the current again.  “Them or something like them.”

"Right.  You're staying with me until you got somewhere to go and we know these fucks won’t come for you again.  In the meantime, I need to replace my accountant.  Thanks for volunteering."

"Am I being kidnapped again?" It comes out sardonically enough that the guy laughs.

“This sort of thing happen a…”  Derek’s already nodding in response.  Looks over at the car batteries before his eyes skitter away.

"Okay.  Sure.  No one lookin out for you means you're mine for now."  He pauses at Derek's shudder.  "Just for now, understand?”  He waits for Derek to nod before he goes on.  “My territory reaches down to the docks North East of here.  Don't go outside of it.  Anyone gives you shit, tell ‘em Red Hood's watching you.  Not watching out, just ‘watching’.  You see any more’a this crew and you let me know, they ain’t leaving this city with a heartbeat.”

Derek barely stops himself from looking away, from tilting his head to expose his throat.

He nods instead.  A little more secure that this beast of a human has offered protection. 

"Do I call you Boss now?"  He means it as a joke but says it quieter than intended.

"You workin for me?  Got a head for numbers?"

Derek nods again.  “Bachelor’s degree says so.”  Even the mob appreciates degrees, right?

"Oh yeah?  Bonus.  Then sure.  Now get the jacket and find some shoes. We gotta go, someone's gonna come looking for these guys eventually."  Red Hood snags a few more bags and goes to drop them at the door.

It takes him a minute to get his bearings, he’s pretty sure he’s got some sort of repressed emotional response that Derek’s just gonna… yeah, he’s just going to leave it alone and maybe never think about it again.

The puddle he’s sitting in is dark and tacky enough now that he isn’t afraid of slipping but it’s still unpleasantly damp along his back and the seat of his pants.  Makes a sticky slurp as he stands and he tunes his hearing to Red Hood’s heartbeat instead.  

“Ready?”  The speaker suddenly sounds like the intro to some techno song and he inanely wonders if the guy sings in the helmet.  Derek smiles a bit at the thought because the guy is taller than he expected and stacked like a tank.  He probably would sing.

“Yeah.  Found my own boots too.”  He says for absolutely no reason.  It feels momentous though that he didn’t lose all of his belongings.  

“That’s great man. Never know what kinda fungus strangers got.”  Red Hood hefts a few bags and hands over another.  “I’m gonna drop you off first and bring back some Chinese.  You like egg rolls?”

Derek gives another barely-there smile and very firmly doesn’t think of his blood soaked clothes or who’s got the bag with the box.

He wonders instead if Red Hood will judge him for the mountain of food he’s about to order.

[creativepromptsforwriting]

Masterpost: How to write a story?

Compilation of writing advice for some aspects of the writing process.

How to motivate myself to write more

How to get rid of writer’s block

Basic Overview: How to write a story

How to come up with plot

How to create a character

How to make a character unique

How to write conversation

How to write the last line

How to create a villain

Introducing a group of characters

Large cast of characters interacting in one scene

Redemption arc

Plot twists

How to write a summary

How to write romance

How to write emotional scenes

How to write yelling

How to title fanfiction

How to use songs in a fanfiction

Fatal Character Flaws

Good traits gone bad

More specific scenarios

Slow burn

How to create quick chemistry

How to write a bilingual character

How to write a character with glasses

How to write a polyamorous relationship

How to write found family

How to create and write a cult

Criminal past comes to light

Reasons for breaking up while still loving each other

Forbidden love

Date gone wrong

Causes for the apocalypse

How to create a coffee shop atmosphere

How to write enemies to lovers

How to write lovers to enemies to lovers

Arranged matrimony for royalty

Paramilitary Forces/ Militia

Honeymoon

Academic Rivals to Lovers

Love Language - Showing, not telling

How to write amnesia

AU ideas

Favourite tropes

Inconvenient things a ghost could do

Milestones in a relationship

How to write age difference

Platonic activities for friends

Introducing partner(s) to family

Writing a stratocracy

Reasons a couple would divorce on good terms

Love Language - Showing you care

How to write the mafia

A Queen’s Assassination Plot

Crime Story - Detective’s POV

Giving the reader butterflies with your characters

Evil organization of assassins

Last day on earth

If you like my blog and want to support me, you can buy me a coffee! 🥰

[bookishdiplodocus]

How to stop researching (or worldbuilding) and start writing

This is actually advice my mentoring professor gave me when I was writing my first thesis.

He said: Accept that you are never done. There is always more to know, more to research, more questions raised than answered. At some point, you just got to start writing.

Now, “easier said than done, this accepting”, I thought.

I started writing because my thesis deadline was looming. But what if you’re writing a novel and you have no deadline? How do you know when it’s okay to stop researching? When is it okay to stop worldbuilding? (Which is just like doing research, but in your own head instead of in reality.)

My advice to you is: start writing, and you’ll run into the gaps you still need to fill. Then you know what to research before starting your second draft. Let your story tell you what it needs.

For example:

Just fill your margins with a to-research-list for your future self.

That way, it’s also managable: “I finished my first draft, and I have a list of 317 things I need to decide on.” Instead of: “I saw on tumblr that you can’t build a world without knowing everything about the sewage system! And gosh, I haven’t invented three languages yet!”

Advantages:

You get things done.

It’s not overwhelming.

You don’t spend your time inventing things you’ll like so much that you want to infodump them into your story.

You mainly research things that are relevant to your story.

Well, knowing you, you already researched enough irrelevant stuff too.

You get things done.

I hope this was helpful. Don’t hesitate to ask me any questions, and happy writing!

Follow me for more writing advice, or check out my other writing advice here. New topics to write advice about are also always welcome.

Tag list below the cut, a few people I like and admire and of course, you can be too. If you like to be added to or removed from the list, let me know.

Keep reading

[did-you-know]

Medieval castle stairs were often built to ascend in narrow, clockwise spirals so right-handed castle defenders could use their swords more easily. This design put those on the way up at a disadvantage (unless they were left-handed). The steps were also uneven to give defenders the advantage of anticipating each step’s size while attackers tripped over them. Source Source 2 Source 3

[severalowls]

Not really the best illustration since it totally negates the effect by having a wide open space for those ascending. Castle tower staircases tended to look like this:

Extremely tight quarters, with a central supporting pillar that is very, very thoroughly in the way of your right arm.

Wider, less steep designs tend to come later once castles moved away from being fortresses to simply noble family homes with the advent of gunpowder.

[mactiir]

Oh! Pre-gunpowder military tactics are my jam! I don’t know why, but this is one of my favorite little details about defensive fortifications, because the majority handedness of attackers isn’t usually something you think about when studying historical wars. But strategically-placed walls were used basically worldwide as a strategy to secure gates and passages against advancing attackers, because most of the world’s population is right-handed (and has been since the Stone Age).

Pre-Columbian towns near the Mississippi and on the East coast did this too. They usually surrounded their towns with palisades, and they would build the entrance to the palisade wall in a zigzag – always with the wall to the right as you entered, to hinder attackers and give an advantage to the defender. Here’s some gates with some examples of what I’m talking about:

Notice that, with the exception of the last four (which are instead designed to congregate the attackers in a space so they can be picked off by archers, either in bastions or on the walls themselves) and the screened gate (which, in addition to being baffled, also forces the attackers to defend their flank) all of these gates are designed with central architectural idea that it’s really hard to kill someone with a wall in your way. In every culture in the world, someone thought to themselves, “Hey it’s hard to swing a weapon with a wall on your right-hand side,” and then specifically built fortifications so that the attackers would always have the wall on their right. And I think that’s really neat.

[his-quietus-make]

Ooh, ooh, also: Bodiam Castle in Sussex used to have a right-angled bridge so any attacking forces would be exposed to archery fire from the north-west tower on their right side (ie: sword in the right hand, shield on the useless left side):

[petermorwood]

These tactics worked so well for so long because until quite recently lefties got short shrift and had it trained (if they were lucky) or beaten out of them.

Use of sword and shield is a classic demonstration of how right-handedness predominated. There’s historical mention of left-handed swordsmen (gladiators and Vikings), and what a problem they were for their opponents, but that only applies to single combat.

A left-handed hoplite or housecarl simply couldn’t fight as part of a phalanx or shield wall, since the shields were a mutual defence (the right side of the shield covered its owner’s left side, its left side covered the right side of his neighbour to the left, and so on down the line) and wearing one on the wrong arm threw the whole tactic out of whack.

Jousting, whether with or without an Italian-style tilt barrier, was run shield-side to shield-side with the lance at a slant (except for the Scharfrennen, a highly specialised style that’s AFAIK unique.) Consequently left-handed knights were physically unable to joust.

There’s a creditable theory (I first read it in “A Knight and His Horse”, © Ewart Oakeshott 1962, 1998 and many other places since) that a knight’s “destrier” horse - from dexter, “right” - was trained to lead with his right forefoot so that any instinctive swerve would be to the right, away from collision while letting the rider keep his shield between him and harm. (In flying, if a pilot hears “break!” with no other details, the default evasive direction is right.)

The construction of plate armour, whether specialised tournament kit or less elaborate battle gear, is noticeably “right-handed“ - so even if a wealthy knight had his built “left-handed” it would be a waste of time and money; he would still be a square peg in a world of round holes and none of the other kids would play with him.

Even after shields and full armour were no longer an essential part of military equipment, right-hand use was still enforced until quite recently, and to important people as well as ordinary ones - it happened to George VI, father of the present Queen of England. Most swords with complex hilts, such as swept-hilt rapiers and some styles of basket-hilt broadsword, are assymetrical and constructed for right handers. Here’s my schiavona…

It can be held left-handed, but using it with the proper thumb-ring grip, and getting maximum protection from the basket, is right-handed only. (More here.) Some historical examples of left-hand hilts do exist, but they’re rare, and fencing masters had the same “learn to use your right hand” bias as tourney organisers, teachers and almost everyone else. Right-handers were dextrous, but left-handers were sinister, etc., etc.

However, several predominantly left-handed families did turn their handedness into advantage, among them the Kerrs / Carrs, a notorious Reiver family along the England-Scotland Borders, by building their fortress staircases with a spiral the other way to the OP image.

This would seem to be a bad idea, since the attackers (coming upstairs) no longer have their right arms cramped against the centre pillar - however it worked in the Kerrs’ favour because they were used to this mirror-image of reality while nobody else was, and the defender retreating up the spiral had that pillar guarding his right side, while the attacker had to reach out around it…

For the most part Reiver swords weren’t elaborate swept-hilt rapiers but workmanlike basket-hilts. Some from Continental Europe have the handedness of my schiavona with thumb-rings and assymmetrical baskets, but the native “British Baskethilt” is a variant of the Highland claymore* and like it seems completely symmetrical, without even a thumb-ring, which gives equal protection to whichever hand is using it.

*I’m aware there are those who insist “claymore” refers only to two-handers, however the Gaelic term claidheamh-mòr - “big sword” - just refers to size, not to a specific type of sword in the way “schiavona” or “karabela” or even “katana” does.

While the two-hander was the biggest sword in common use it was the claidheamh-mòr; after it dropped out of fashion and the basket-hilt became the biggest sword in common use, that became the claidheamh-mòr.

When Highlanders in the 1745 Rebellion referred to their basket-hilts as claymores, they obviously gave no thought to the confusion they would create for later compilers of catalogues…

[chroniclesofrettek]

Also, muskets had their whole “Flint and steel and gunpowder” thing on the right side so if you tried firing it lefty you’d get a face full of fire. More recently, rifles eject their spent shell casings to the right, so if you’re a lefty you get some hot metal in your eye.

[systlin]

good post this is a gOOD POST

[poemwriter98-deactivated2025091]

@moonlitskinwalker

[aurorajay]

This is fascinating history and now I really want to read a story about assembling a secret team of left-handers to take a castle by surprise!

[ingridverse]

Contemporary example: I was in a fencing club at university one year, and the left handed fencers had a huge advantage since they were attacking from an unfamiliar side. They, however, always practiced against right handers and had no such disadvantage.

Until we had one match between two left handed fencers, and it was very satisfying to watch.

[thecaffeinebookwarrior-deactiva]

Resources For Writing Deaf, Mute, or Blind Characters

Despite the fact that I am not deaf, mute, or blind myself, one of the most common questions I receive is how to portray characters with these disabilities in fiction.

As such, I’ve compiled the resources I’ve accumulated (from real life deaf, mute, or blind people) into a handy masterlist.

Deaf Characters:

Deaf characters masterpost

Deaf dialogue thread

Dialogue with signing characters (also applies to mute characters.)

A deaf author’s advice on deaf characters

Dialogue between deaf characters

Mute Characters

Life as a Mute

My Silent Summer:  Life as a Mute

What It’s Like Being Mute

21 People Reveal What It’s Really Like To Be Mute

I am a 20 year old Mute, ask me anything at all!

Blind Characters:

The 33 Worst Mistakes Writers Make About Blind Characters.

@referenceforwriters masterpost of resources for writing/playing blind characters.

The youtube channel of the wonderful Tommy Edison, a man blind from birth with great insight into the depiction of blind people and their lives.

An Absolute Write thread on the depiction of blind characters, with lots of different viewpoints and some great tips.

And finally, this short, handy masterpost of resources for writing blind characters.

Characters Who Are Blind in One Eye

4 Ways Life Looks Shockingly Different With One Eye

Learning to Live With One Eye

Adapting to the Loss of an Eye

Adapting to Eye Loss and Monocular Vision

Monocular Depth Perception

Deaf-Blind Characters

What Is It Like To Be Deafblind?

Going Deaf and Blind in a City of Noise and Lights

Deaf and Blind by 30

Sarita is Blind, Deaf, and Employed (video)

Born Deaf and Blind, This Eritrean American Graduated Harvard Law School (video)

A Day of a Deaf Blind Person

Lesser Known Things About Being Deafblind

How the Deaf-Blind Communicate

Early Interactions With Children Who Are Deaf-Blind

Raising a DeafBlind Baby

If you have any more resources to add, let me know!  I’ll be adding to this post as I find more resources.

I hope this helps, and happy writing!  <3

[thecaffeinebookwarrior-deactiva]

Updated with more resources, specifically for characters who are blind in one eye.

[thecyndimistuff]

Boba, lounging intimidatingly on his throne: you know why you’re here, scum. Now it’s time for you to pay. 

Fennec: *cracks knuckles*

Alien rando who accidentally crossed Boba: uhhhhhh not to ruin the moment here, but who’s THAT? 

*points to the side where Din is lying face-down on the floor crying uncontrollably, alcohol spilled all over his Darksaber*

Boba, extremely offended: THAT is The Mand’alor! A ruler, a warrior, a king! Show him some respect!!

Alien rando, very confused: oh, s-sorry.

Din: *SOBS LOUDER*

[theemotionmachine]

Virtue requires a delicate balance. 

[tobi-kelma]

This could be a great set of descriptors for tracking social stats in a game.

[appel-likes]

Woah

[shaelit]

A good chart for character development, especially when contrasting how they are vs. how they see themselves.

[lyssthewriter]

This is also great for turning virtues into flaws.

[homunculus-argument]

 Hey, to you sci-fi/fantasy writers out there (and maybe some others, but this is mainly for things that can’t really be researched irl), if you want to write a character who is a driven, passionate expert on something, don’t write about them rambling indifferently about some boring, mundane part of it. Give them a deep, intense hatred of some oddly specific wow-I-did-not-even-know-that-was-a-thing-and-it-would-have-never-occurred-to-me-that-it’s-a-bad-thing thing they’ll gladly rant about.

 Write a dragon rider who really fucking hates it when a dragon is trained to bow while being reined. A space ship engineer who is pissed off when perfectly good antimatter ship has been adapted to run on neutral matter. A historian who is still not over the massive failures of a general who lost a specific battle 300 years before she was born.

 The guy currently giving us a series of lectures on the restoration of historical buildings really, really hates polymer paint. At the artisan school our stained glass teacher really hated this one specific Belgian artist - we never really figured out what did that guy even do, but he’s been dead for over 200 years and our teacher was glad that at least he’s dead.

 Experts don’t just know things you’ve never thought about. They’ve got strong opinions about it.

[wufflesvetinari]

from last year’s workshop: Cool Writing Hacks that ripped my heart out but made my work better anyway.

-not every line of dialog needs an action attached to it. somebody doesn’t need to shrug or scratch their arm or glance at other people every two seconds of a conversation unless the motion means something. you’re not writing stage directions and you can trim this stuff down to make your dialog snappier. (this one in particular felt like a callout of me specifically, goddammit)

-if you want the audience to remember something–especially something that will be important in a climactic moment–you have to show/tell them at least twice beforehand. preferably three times. otherwise they will not remember! they simply will not!!

-the room layout isn’t usually all that important BUT if there’s going to be a fight scene you BETTER fucking figure out a way to convey that entire layout early in the scene or no one will know what the fuck is going on

-on that note, get somebody to read your fight scenes even if you are ABSOLUTELY SURE they make sense on the page. on the first pass they probably don’t. (unless you have a gift i would kill for. some do!)

-eyes cannot talk. eyes can’t talk! it’s easy to say that someone has “rage in their eyes” or “their eyes were telling me to run” but that’s all shorthand for other body language we notice subconsciously! try digging in and describing that body language instead. you will likely get something richer that way

[wufflesvetinari]

oh i forgot all the stuff about immediacy!!

say you’re in Natasha’s POV. you can either say:

“Natasha sat on her porch with a glass of lemonade, watching the movers unload. She saw one of them stumble with what looked like a pained wince. She noticed that the other men kept their distance.”

OR:

“Natasha sat on her porch with a glass of lemonade, watching the movers unload. One of them stumbled with a pained wince. The other men kept their distance.”

we are already in Natasha’s POV, and we established in the first sentence that she was watching the movers. so we don’t need constant reminders that we’re behind Natasha’s eyes–we can just see what she sees! this puts us closer “behind her eyes,” so to speak, and lessens the distance between the reader and the scene.

[catchymemes]

[whifferdills]

https://www.the-pro-creator.com/2019/01/I-hate-adobe-and-so-should-you.html

[sinmenon]

I’m posting the links here because the link keeps on a loop with adfly

IF YOU DRAW OR DESIGN Instead of PHOTOSHOP, try GIMP Instead of LIGHTROOM, try PAINT.DOT.NET Instead of ILLUSTRATOR, try INKSCAPE Instead of INDESIGN, try CANVA or SCRIBUS

IF YOU MAKE PICTURES MOVE Instead of PREMIERE, try DAVINCI RESOLVE Instead of ANIMATE/FLASH, try OPENTOONZ or BLENDER Instead of AFTER EFFECTS, try WAX, BLENDER or FUSION

IF YOU BUILD WEBSITES OR SOFTWARE Instead of DREAMWAVER, SPARK or XD, try WIX, WEEBLY, or WORDPRESS.COM or WORDPRESS.ORG

IF YOU DO STUFF THAT REQUIRES THESE OTHER PROGRAMS Instead of AUDITION, try AUDACITY Instead of ACROBAT PRO, try FOXIT READER or PDF ESCAPE Instead of INCOPY, try LOVING YOURSELF AND USING LITERALLY ANYTHING ELSE (WHO USES THIS???)

IF YOU NEED STOCK PHOTOS OR FONTS Instead of ADOBE STOCK, try PEXELS, UNSPLASH, or PIXABAY Instead of ADOBE PHONTS, try GOOGLE FONTS or DAFONT

BONUS: If you need FREE MUSIC OR SOUND EFFECTS, try YOUTUBE AUDIO LIBRARY or SOUNDBIBLE

My bonuses:

IF YOU DRAW OR DESIGN Instead of PHOTOSHOP, try FIREALPACA , SAI , SKETCHBOOK or KRITA (these latter two are great!) Instead of LIGHTROOM, try PHOTOSCAPE

IF YOU MAKE PICTURES MOVE Instead of PREMIERE, try SHOTCUT Instead of ANIMATE/FLASH, try PENCIL2D ANIMATION, LIVE2D, OR E-MOTE

IF YOU NEED STOCK PHOTOS Instead of ADOBE STOCK, try MORGUEFILE.COM

[wordsnstuff]

Do you have any tips on how to make sure your character stays consistent throughout the book? (especially for a newbie)

Get to know your characters really well before you even start the first draft. It’s a time commitment, but it’s well worth it. If you write the story with an already solid knowledge of who your character is, how they present themselves, what their motivations are, and how they change over the course of the plot, you’ll have a much easier time keeping the character portrayal consistent, as well as interesting. 

I have a couple articles that will help with your character development in the planning/outlining stages of your story:

Ways To Fit Character Development Into your Story

When To Stop Planning

Character Trait Form

Tips On Introducing Characters

Tip On Giving Characters Flaws

As well as some master posts of resources:

Resources For Creating Characters

Resources For Describing Characters

Questions I’ve answered:

Having Trouble Connecting To Your Characters?

Giving Characters Bad Traits

On Making Scenes/Characters Unpredictable

Showing Vs. Telling And Characters

Keeping Characters From Sounding Identical

And finally, some prompt lists to inspire you:

31 Days Of Character Development: Wordsnstuff May Writing Challenge

Interview As Your Character

[htnks-deactivated20210929]