// a song in every breath

she/they/I don't really mind, just no it/its ⟣✦⟢ old enough to (legally) use social media in Australia vaguely queer (it's complicated) and neurodivergent (it's complicated again — AuDHD, L2 support needs, Other Brain Things outside clinical diagnosis) Vietnamese diaspora member; writes in English ⟣✦⟢ I do not use generative AI tools in my writing, and I do not consent to my writing being used to train AI models. The value of art lies in the life that made it.

[limenaetcetera]

(Image credit: Raja Nandepu)

AO3 ✦ Pinterest

I can't stop you from reading my work based on your stances, but I can block you if I simply don't want to see your posts, or those stances of yours are along the lines of "maybe not everyone deserves rights". Unless it's that latter case, me blocking you is probably not out of spite.

As I usually don't trust Internet strangers will follow one, my only explicit DNI is people who know me offline. (let me work through my issues in peace I beg of you 🙏🙏🙏) If you think you might know me IRL, send me an ask or a DM and I'll respond to it with some questions to verify. Please refrain from browsing my blog while you wait.

Reblogs of individual posts aren't necessarily endorsing the OP's other posts or personal beliefs.

The

Hi! My name's Limena, pronounced /lɪˈmɛˌnə/ [click here for IPA to speech] and I'm an overly-pretentious teenager who likes to put characters into situations for fun. I'm an enjoyer of sci-fi, fantasy, worldbuilding, hurt/comfort, humour, and anything with metafictional, genre-blending, or 4th-wall-breaking elements. I swear I'm nicer than my Tumblr-post-writing-style makes me sound.

This place is mainly for my original works and characters. While fanfic will probably come up here and there (and you are welcome to ask me about it), this is not a fandom-oriented blog.

My works are for fun first and foremost; if I'm looking for critique I will make that clear.

I don't take requests for writing. Suggestions, prompts or ideas are welcome; just be aware I might not follow them. If that happens, your suggestion will be posted for other users' use.

I'm not comfortable posting explicitly sexual writing; at most it may be alluded to in a "fade-to-black" sort of way.

Please don't interact with me one-on-one in a flirty/sexual way (i.e. no messages, comments, reblogs etc. of that nature if they're clearly directed at me).

Tagging system

#writing or #writeblr — posts about writing in general and/or the writing community on Tumblr specifically.

#the creative process — posts about the "behind-the-scenes" work of writing, including advice on locking in

#writing resources — tips, tricks, and tools

#writing memes — jokes and memes about writing

The following tags refer to creative projects:

#project tag: anywhere but here — story involving an astronaut stranded on an icy planet, an intelligent siphonophore colony, and time loops as suicide prevention

#project tag: derelict — story involving escaped living weapons caring for each other, heavy-handed hopecore visible mending metaphors, and a post-apocalyptic future that is mostly underwater

[bloodiedbriars]

“dad and the dog he didn’t want” but it’s caretaker and the whumpee he didn’t want

[redstonedust]

a lot of media assumes robots would be immortal but i think its a lot more interesting to explore robots dealing with their parts wearing down and battery life shortening and all the horrible little failings that come with being a complicated machine. sure they can replace parts but you'd assume you cant completely ship of theseus them, or it'd have pretty big rammifications on their sense of identity. idk. give me robots with distinct, unique signs of aging. as a treat.

[daisywords]

I have the opposite of the disease that some people complain about where people forget to ever break paragraphs. I am breaking paragraphs every two sentences. I can't help it. I'm sure my drafts read incredibly choppy but I'm addicted

none of this is dialogue I'm just doing this for no reason

[pheita]

Memo to everybody :

Never be afraid to recycle an idea you had for a WIP you abandoned. Sometimes the idea needs a different set of characters or a different setting.

[indecisive-behaviors]

An addition:

Never be afraid to recycle an idea you had for a project you already completed. Sometimes ideas really are just that good and deserve to be used more than once.

[mytrinketsandknickknacks]

Don't be afraid to use the same recipe to make a new cake

[insert-witty-user-name-here]

[malwarechips]

"i think", i say, about my own ocs, who i made,

[rosexknight]

“my headcanon is…” i say about the canon that i made about my own characters

[lelif]

on survival

-// @aridante // @orivu // @buzzkillgirls // ? // ? // richard siken// @cemeterything // moomin, tove jansson// @disenchanted-killjoy // isn't that enough, shawn mendes// @ prettytheyswag on twitter// @ coletyumuch on twitter// ? // ? // bird by bird, anne lamott// undertale// @strawberrycircuits

[actualized-animal]

look. the nature of the artist (any kind) is to become inexplicably obsessed with certain themes and motifs for a few years and just milk that subject matter to death. when respected artists do this, art critics refer to it as a “period.” the only thing separating you from them is fame and accolades. to your haters you will be “that freak who’s fixated on drawing weird trains,” while to your admirers, you are simply in your “tiny trains made out of household appliances” period

[tunisian]

the holy trinity: the father (fuck it we ball) the son (it is what it is) the holy spirit (to be cringe is to be free)

[unspeakablearchives]

[mimsylost]

I can’t believe we actually have to speak this out loud

[valtsv]

unfortunately i can never hate on a "power of friendship" narrative no matter how corny because the thing is it's literally real

[ellipsus-writes]

Today is the biggest day for Ellipsus since we launched in 2023... 👀

Back then, we began building Ellipsus out of a simple belief: writers deserve a place to create, collaborate, and share their work without handing over their words, their data, or their creative process to bad actors and Big Tech—a promise that matters now, more than ever.

Nearly 600k writers and counting are writing on Ellipsus because of this promise. We see everyday how writers are rejecting Big Tech's data mining model in favor of tools that respect user privacy and reflect our values.

We’re a small full-time team building, maintaining, supporting, and improving the tool every day. And to keep doing that sustainably—without compromising the promises that brought people here—we’re introducing Ellipsus Plus.

Plus is a set of optional features on top of free Ellipsus, designed to help fund the continued development of Ellipsus for everyone, free and paid; while helping us stay independent, ad-free, and working to improve the tool well into the future.

That means the Ellipsus you know is staying free: you can keep writing with unlimited documents, drafts, collaborators, and core features. Free Ellipsus will continue to receive updates, improvements, and new features too, including major work already planned (like offline syncing and native apps).

Plus features have been designed alongside community feedback, our pricing shaped by our users around what felt fair and sustainable.

Every Plus subscription leads to ultimate ownership of the tool. Not metaphorical ownership, but real ownership, including all future updates to the Plus plan. No endless subscriptions. Once you’ve paid, it’s yours. Really.

Our introductory Plus features are designed to be fun, creative, practical, and help you get the most out of the tool! We really hope you enjoy them. Here’s a quick overview:

Custom themes

Make your writing space feel like home with custom themes! Use any colors, gradients, images, or .gifs you love. Share with friends and readers. The choices are infinite.

Writing Insights

See insights into your writing process and spot patterns faster across ten AI-free metrics—like vocabulary diversity, sentence length, sentence rhythm, word frequency, and more. Writing insights are opt-in only, and run on local data, so your text never leaves the editor. 

Customizable Snippets

We all love snippets! Now you can give your words an extra personal touch. Customize your snippets with media backgrounds (GIFs, images), fonts, text colors, and custom themes—you can even add byline credits for authors and characters!

Emboss

Emboss is an AI-free, visible work history feature for human writing, showing the time, labor, and love that went into your work. Instead of using "AI verifiers" to "judge" a finished piece after the fact, Emboss shows the writing-process data already inside Ellipsus: time spent writing, writing sessions, edits, thinking pauses, revisions, and other metrics you choose to share as part of your Writing Journey.

You can also show how your work evolved over time with selected version history snapshots. Emboss is private by default, and opt-in.

We hope you’re as excited about Plus as we are! Try Plus free for 7 days, no payment required. You can read more (and sign up!) on our Plus page.

Again, there’s tons more to come, and we can’t wait to build it for you. Free or paid, Ellipsus is going to keep getting better. Thank you for your support.

Have questions about Plus? We’re hosting an “Ask the Team” doc where we’ll be answering your burning questions. Please make comments there! Now please, go forth and explore!

- the Ellipsus Team xo

[cepheusgalaxy]

wanting to see more Black whumpees like me just absolutely getting it like really being shattered to the ground and kicked while they're down then crying their hollow eyes out for my sadistic pleasure vs not wanting to perpetuate the fetishizing glorification of violence towards Black bodies by colonialism&racism 😍

[cepheusgalaxy]

anyways it is very important to be aware of that kind of stuff bc we live in a racist society and its very easy to perpetuate systemic violence even in the little ways (im not perfect myself and like im somewhat more lighter-skinned than my peers even so i dont feel the hit of racism as roughly as some of them do) BUT for what its worth i think its a very worthwhile line to walk. whump is also about the validation of pain & exploring suffering while humanizing your unlucky main character and Black (+ other nonwhite) characters should get that too. make your nonwhite whumpees cry their eyeballs out and feel hollow in face of the world today #myagenda

[cepheusgalaxy]

they also deserve tragic backstories + sweet caretakers + the reclamation of bodily autonomy in recovery + identity issues + drowning in the puts of utter despair + generally have the worst time of their lives while an audience sympathizes with them. it shouldnt be just the white boys who get it. hold my hand. let's put our Black characters through such hellish torment that they come out on the other side feeling a tangible gab between who they became vs who they used to be. together.

(still on the same vein, this post by @/creatingblackcharacters is a pretty nice resource to start out i think every now and then i reread it i think it has nice things to keep in mind)

Post by @creatingblackcharacters · 1 video

💬 17  🔁 815  ❤️ 1387 · “The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth” - Violence, Violent Imagery & Black Horror · TRIGGER WARNING: mentions of de

[cumvvelt]

"Guy" and "man" have different connotations with adjectival nouns. Like "tree guy" = arborist but "tree man" = he lives in a tree, or maybe he is a tree.

[thedupshadove]

"I know a guy" = "I have a useful contact."

"I know a man" = "I am about to tell you a story."

[turtletotem]

“He’s a great guy” = he is pleasant and fun and well-intentioned

“He’s a great man” = he has saved countless lives and changed the world irrevocably

[grocki]

sci fi is all about getting so scared and ripping tubes out of yourself. people miss this

[grocki]

sci fi is all about desperately trying to reclaim your violated bodily autonomy. it’s all about asserting that you are a being with agency, and you can choose what happens to your own person, even if that’s ripping tubes out of yourself. and also sometimes an alien is there

[daisywords]

not everything in a story has to or should be "realistic" but in my opinion there's a level of illusion that should be maintained, and I think that's the actual problem that many people try to pinpoint with the "unrealistic" criticism. Dialogue shouldn't be written like an actual transcript of human speech, but should contribute to the illusion of a real person speaking. A character is a tool of the story, not a narrative, but we're trying to maintain the illusion that they are a person. Worldbuilding should exist to serve the story, not to be a perfect simulacrum of how every aspect of nature/society etc. would actually play out for real. But there should be the illusion that it could be real, that organizations and systems would operate in such a way, that people might behave in such a way.

in conclusion: "Is this realistic?" <<wrong question. "Does this serve the illusion or disrupt it?" <<now we're talking