the world is a dark and scary place

various musings, writings, and other assorted things. Mostly NaNo stuff. Sideblog for liuet. add me as a nano buddy

[thebibliosphere]

This is more of a problem on Facebook and Twitter, but there are some fellow authors who get a tad... upset when you talk about money and royalty earnings.

Needless to say, my frankness about how royalties work and just how little many of us are earning from our labor has drawn the ire of a few people, even here on Tumblr.hell.

I'm not particularly bothered by this. In my view, they're the same people who won't discuss wages in the workplace because they don't want anyone else to earn what they do. They know the system is unfairly rigged, but they like it that way because they're scared if more people are educated about how things work, they'll lose whatever competitive edge they think they have, thus enforcing the status quo.

Needless to say, I don't care for this view.

I'm very much a "holy shit, two cakes" kind of creator. I also very firmly believe in pulling people up behind me and spreading the wealth of information that was shared freely with me by other like-minded individuals who also believe that the mysteries around publishing are gatekeeping bullshit and everyone deserves the chance to earn money from their creative endeavors, not just the people who can afford to.

Anyway, David Gaughran's 'Let's Get Digital: How To Self-Publish And Why You Should' is an invaluable resource for indie authors and provides great insight into how publishing and distribution work. It is available for free through the retailers listed on his website.

If you don't want to publish exclusively through Amazon, draft2digital.com does global ebook and also paperback distribution. (I've only used it for ebooks, but I'll be trying out their paperback options for my next book.) You can pair it up with a books2read account to create easy-to-post buy links. Draft2Digital also allows for distribution through library lending services like Overdrive. So that's neat. (NB: if you use d2d, you can't use Kindle Unlimited, so be aware of what links you have active and where if you decide to enroll in KU. You can always opt for wide distribution again once your KU time expires.)

D2D also recently partnered with FindawayVoices.com for audiobook distribution. You can find voice actors there, or you can upload your own files if you already have them. You can submit to Audible through them, too, but you'll earn a pittance more if you upload directly through Audible. Findaway also allows for library lending distribution through Libby and several other global equivalents.

If you need ISBNs, you can buy them cheaper in bulk from Bowker at myidentifiers.com

Individual storefront options like Payhip.com and Gumroad.com are also great ways to allow people to buy directly from you, though I soured on Gumroad after the whole NFT thing and their CEO harassing people on Twitter over it. Payhip is now my preferred storefront, and as an added bonus, they calculate VAT in European countries as well, so that's one less thing for me as an indie author to work out. As an added bonus, Payhip can be directly integrated into your author website if you have one. It's a feature I'll be implementing soon.

itch.io also allows for the sale and distribution of ebook files, though I haven't used it yet.

If you don't have the means to hire a cover designer or the means to do it yourself in photoshop, Canva.com has some decent-ish ebook templates. Just make sure the images and fonts you're using have the right licenses for commercial use.

Editing and formatting are also extremely important, though I know not everyone can afford them. If you can, I highly suggest doing so and shelling out extra to have them format your work across mediums. Ebook formatting is different from paperback formatting, and it can look very strange if you just try to format an ebook into a pdf. It is a skill you can teach yourself (plenty of youtube videos) if you really want to, but I prefer to throw money at my editors, who provide formatting as an additional service. Whatever you can afford to do to streamline the process is money well spent.

Also, do not be shy about using affiliate links to sell your work. Authors lose a solid chunk of money to places like Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple, etc., in distribution fees. Whatever pennies you can scrape back through affiliate links for directing traffic to those sites is hard-earned--and it is literal pennies sometimes. You can also integrate any affiliate links you do have into draft2digital, so they auto-generate, which is handy.

When it comes to paperbacks, BookShop.org offers the best affiliate earnings, and a percentage of the sale goes toward supporting indie bookstores. They do not take that percentage from your earnings, they pay it themselves. Libro.FM is the audiobook equivalent of BookShop.org, and they also give a percentage of sales to supporting indie book stores.

Anyway, I hope that helps someone. Good luck out there.

Also, if you're the person who sent me the irate email about "giving away trade secrets," feel free to die mad about it. 😘

[ineffable-writer]

This is all vital stuff to know if you’re going the indie route, and I genuinely cannot imagine why people would give you hate for it. Like, putting the core value of just being a good person aside, being unhelpful and competitive towards other authors is just a terrible business practice.

I’m coming at this from the traditional side, admittedly, but I’ve got some indie background too. And in both worlds, who you know and particularly who likes you is a bigger competitive edge than any “trade secret”.

Because yeah, sure, if you give someone some help and the right tools, there’s a chance they’ll beat you for a top 100 spot or an award—but worst case scenario, the author in that spot is now your friend.

And suddenly all that traffic from that success is following them on Twitter, so when they help you hype up your next launch you get that traffic too. They decide to put together a collaborative anthology? Guess who gets an invite. They want to do a blog tour? Guess who’s on the list.

I swear I don’t mean to make it sound like friendships should be transactional, and friends never owe you their connections, of course. But if you run around making enemies, not only are you gonna lose immediate opportunities, you’ll lose opportunities with people they know. Writers talk. I know a guy in my trad circle who’s just a jackass, and he made an entire writing degree absolutely worthless because the entire network (the whole point of a cw degree!) knows he’s a schlub.

Anyway. Tangent over. This is all amazing advice for prospective indie authors, and it should be shared widely, and screw people who climb the ladder and kick out the rungs below them. The whole benefit of indie publishing is that it’s more accessible in some ways than traditional. No one needs to be undercutting that because of some perceived power trip.

[thebibliosphere]

Oh, authors absolutely talk. Editors too. There are people's names who are mud in all the indie (and trad) circuits because of how they treat people. And yeah, networking is a huge factor in gaining traction. Anyone who claims otherwise either paid for the success or isn't talking about the necks they stepped on to get where they are.

In indie terms, these tend to be the type of people who couch their writing advice in terms of "if you're not spending money on ads, you're not taking things seriously and don't deserve to succeed."

I pissed a few of them off a while back when Phangs broke into the top 100 Paranormal Romances on Amazon without paying a cent in ad revenue. That was a wild few (irate) radars to fall across.

Unfortunately, there are some people lower down the rungs who see this sort of behavior and seek to emulate it. I personally don't get it and try to ignore them wherever possible. But if they're going to come at me trying to start shit like this person was, they need to be prepared for the fact that I am unapologetically feral when it comes to not giving a fuck about what they deem as "the integrity of publishing" and I will retaliate by doubling down on being as helpful as possible.

Too many stories are lost to the gatekeeping of the industry. If I can help a few more see daylight by providing resources that are readily available on google but often intimidating to research, I will.

[jewfrogs]

this is so mean but sometimes i see published writing and suddenly no longer feel insecure about my own writing ability. like well okay that got published so im guessing i dont have much to worry about

[naamahdarling]

I have a friend who is an editor, and gets submissions of mostly poetry and short stories.

I have had a glimpse into her slush pile, and let me tell you, the contents were unbelievable and immediately disabused me of the notion that reading through submissions is in any way glamorous. People have the nerve to submit unhinged paranoid ramblings, fetish porn, and a seemingly endless supply of poems about masturbation.

I no longer feel like my fiction is somehow an imposition on the people who read it. It may be forgettable, but at least it isn't typeset to look like sperm.

Do not be afraid to submit your work. Your competition is not only worse than you think, it's worse than you ever imagined.

[silverhand]

Do these three things to get to the top of the slush pile:

The place has a style sheet. Use it. They say they want your MS in 16.5 point Papyrus italic with 0.8 inch margins all around, guess what you're doing before you send it off? Save As, reformat, send it. In the absence of a specific guide: Courier 12 pt (Times New Roman if you must), double spaced, align left, tab 0.5 at each new paragraph.

Check the word count. Don't submit novellas to 2500 word short story venues. BTW, you format the MS in that old style above because the question isn't literal words. Courier 12pt double spaced gives you 250 words per page for typesetting purposes. 2500 words is 10 ms pages, 5000 is 20 pages, etc.

Don't send your romance to Analog or your war story to Harlequin. If it's a cross-genre story, be sure there's enough of what the publication is focused on to interest them, but breaking through is hard if that's not something they usually do.

That's basically what every single editors' panel at every con I've ever been to has boiled down to. And invariably, someone tries to get up and argue with them, not realizing it's not a discussion.

Bonus tip: Don't be in any way cute in your cover letter. Just the facts/Luke Skywalker's message to Jabba the Hut in ROTJ.

Enclosed/attached is my story <Title> for your publication <Magazine>. It is x (rounded to the nearest 500) words. I can be reached at <email> (that you check regularly and isn't likely to dump things into spam) and <phone>.

(If submitting a hard copy: The manuscript is disposable. A SASE is enclosed for your response./A SASE is included for return of the manuscript and your response.)

Thank you for your consideration.

If submitting a novella length piece or greater, a brief and complete summary is appropriate.

In the midst of an interstellar revolt against an evil galactic Empire, vital weapon plans fall into the hands of a farm boy on the edges of the galaxy. With the help of an aging warrior from the Old Republic, and a smuggler with a dark past and his imposing alien copilot, the four set out to deliver them to the rebel forces but are instead flung into a rescue mission to save the beautiful princess who stole the plans as worlds are destroyed by the might of the Empire's weapon, the Death Star.

Captured by the Death Star on route to deliver the plans, they manage to escape the base with the princess, the old warrior sacrificing himself to make this possible. As the Death Star approaches the rebel base, they use the captured plans to stage a desperate final stand. In a fierce space battle of single-pilot ships over the surface of the moon-sized weapon, the farm boy manages to make the critical shot with an unexpected assist from the smuggler, destroying it.

Never under any circumstance put a cliffhanger into a query letter summary. There is no faster way to get the entire MS binned than doing that.

Happy writing.

PS "Top of the slush pile" means into the top 25% of manuscripts received. Three quarters of the submissions don't take the trouble to do even those three basic steps.

Now, that still means 25/100 submissions or 250/1000 submissions, but it still improves your odds and forms the basis for starting a relationship with the publisher for the next piece you send them.

PPS This is obviously about prose. Poetry certainly has its own submission rules, and I know none of them. If you're writing poetry, find out what they are.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Random mansion generator

The Procgen Mansion Generator produces large three-dee dwellings to toy with your imagination, offering various architectural styles and other options. Each mansion even comes with floorplans:

https://boingboing.net/2019/07/12/random-mansion-generator.html

[something-from-elsewhere]

Oooooh! Saving this

[lady-feral]

That’s fun

[vesperlionheart]

Hey, but don’t fall asleep on this Medieval Fantasy City Generator   

[awrenthatwrites]

Reblogging for the last!

[writingquestionsanswered]

NEAT.

[carrieonwriting]

some highlights from my writing seminar with honestly one of my favourite authors of all time who shall remain nameless bc i dont want her to know i was spilling her secrets online

The first trick is to detach yourself from your idea. You don’t have just one novel inside you, and it’s not a big deal if you don’t finish this novel.

She was skeptical of the common advice “just write!!1!” - she talked about how long ideas for her most popular novels were marinating inside her before she properly wrote them

As a continuation of that, she was a big believer in knowing what you want to write before you write it. Not what you’re going to write, what you want to write. 

The first thing she decides about a novel is what the mood is going to be, and this informs every other decision (e.g. the mood for Shiver was bittersweet)

Ideas should be personal, specific, exciting and they should exclude secondary sources. A personal idea isn’t necessarily autobiographical (which should be avoided), but it speaks to your emotional truth. 

She said she had been read Ronsey fanfiction and she couldn’t view her car in the same way since. 

Story is the thing that seems most important to reader but is most changeable to the author - story is subservient to your mood and your message. Change what you like in the plot as long as your book retains its sense of self.

Story is conflict, exploration and change. A good story has active tension -the characters want something, instead of just wanting something not to happen (e.g. wanting to kill an enemy instead of simply defending a stronghold against an enemy) 

A story needs to have a concrete end, something to be done. 

Satisfaction is important - deliver what you promise to the reader. The other shoe has to drop. Ronan Lynch doesn’t ever talk about his feelings, so its rewarding when he does. 

Earn your emotional moments (she threw shade at Fantastic Beasts lmao)

Forcing a character to be passive is dissatisfying to the reader. 

Characters are products of their environments, consistent/predictable, nuanced and specific, moving the plot, and subservient to other story elements. 

She always starts with tropes for ensemble casts like sitcoms. Helpful for building good character dynamics.

Write scenes with characters saying explicitly what they’re thinking and then go back and make them talk like real people in the edit. 

An action can also prove what they’re thinking, instead of making them say it or another character guess it (e.g. Ronan punching a wall). 

Move the reader’s emotional furniture around without them noticing. 

All her books follow the three act structure. Established normal -> inciting incident -> character makes an Active Decision -> fun and games -> escalation -> darkest moment -> climax. 

Promise what you’re going to do in the first five pages. 

Read your book out loud. Record yourself reading it. 

If you have writer’s block, it’s because you’ve stopped writing the book you want to write. She likes to delete everything she’s written until she gets back to a point where she knew she was writing what she wanted to write, and then carrying on from there. 

[ms-mazarin]

Words to replace said, except this actually helps

I got pretty fed up with looking for words to replace said because they weren’t sorted in a way I could easily use/find them for the right time. So I did some myself.

IN RESPONSE TO Acknowledged Answered Protested

INPUT/JOIN CONVERSATION/ASK Added Implored Inquired Insisted Proposed Queried Questioned Recommended Testified

GUILTY/RELUCTANCE/SORRY Admitted Apologized Conceded Confessed Professed

FOR SOMEONE ELSE Advised Criticized Suggested

JUST CHECKING Affirmed Agreed Alleged Confirmed

LOUD Announced Chanted Crowed

LEWD/CUTE/SECRET SPY FEEL Appealed Disclosed Moaned

ANGRY FUCK OFF MATE WANNA FIGHT Argued Barked Challenged Cursed Fumed Growled Hissed Roared Swore

SMARTASS Articulated Asserted Assured Avowed Claimed Commanded Cross-examined Demanded Digressed Directed Foretold Instructed Interrupted Predicted Proclaimed Quoted Theorized

ASSHOLE Bellowed Boasted Bragged

NERVOUS TRAINWRECK Babbled Bawled Mumbled Sputtered Stammered Stuttered

SUAVE MOTHERFUCKER Bargained Divulged Disclosed Exhorted

FIRST OFF Began

LASTLY Concluded Concurred

WEAK PUSY Begged Blurted Complained Cried Faltered Fretted

HAPPY/LOL Cajoled Exclaimed Gushed Jested Joked Laughed

WEIRDLY HAPPY/EXCITED Extolled Jabbered Raved

BRUH, CHILL Cautioned Warned

ACTUALLY, YOU’RE WRONG Chided Contended Corrected Countered Debated Elaborated Objected Ranted Retorted

CHILL SAVAGE Commented Continued Observed Surmised

LISTEN BUDDY Enunciated Explained Elaborated Hinted Implied Lectured Reiterated Recited Reminded Stressed

BRUH I NEED U AND U NEED ME Confided Offered Urged

FINE Consented Decided

TOO EMO FULL OF EMOTIONS Croaked Lamented Pledged Sobbed Sympathized Wailed Whimpered

JUST SAYING Declared Decreed Mentioned Noted Pointed out Postulated Speculated Stated Told Vouched

WASN’T ME Denied Lied

EVIL SMARTASS Dictated Equivocated Ordered Reprimanded Threatened

BORED Droned Sighed

SHHHH IT’S QUIET TIME Echoed Mumbled Murmured Muttered Uttered Whispered

DRAMA QUEEN Exaggerated Panted Pleaded Prayed Preached

OH SHIT Gasped Marveled Screamed Screeched Shouted Shrieked Yelped Yelled

ANNOYED Grumbled Grunted Jeered Quipped Scolded Snapped Snarled Sneered

ANNOYING Nagged

I DON’T REALLY CARE BUT WHATEVER Guessed Ventured

I’M DRUNK OR JUST BEING WEIRDLY EXPRESSIVE FOR A POINT/SARCASM Hooted Howled Yowled

I WONDER Pondered Voiced Wondered

OH, YEAH, WHOOPS Recalled Recited Remembered

SURPRISE BITCH Revealed

IT SEEMS FAKE BUT OKAY/HA ACTUALLY FUNNY BUT I DON’T WANT TO LAUGH OUT LOUD Scoffed Snickered Snorted

BITCHY Tattled Taunted Teased

[d8rkmessngr]

THIS

[yumawrites]

This is a genius list especially by the way it’s sorted out!!!

[stimman4000]

.

[thebibliosphere]

Writing the copyright page is legitimately giving me a heart attack. Either that or I’ve fucked up my meds. Aaaaah. I’ve only ever had to do this for other people before. I can’t believe I’m writing my own copyright page.

Also hi it’s 4am and I’m still a raging insomniac, how we all doing?

[thebibliosphere]

Oh, educational moment, just in case you ever need to write one of these things, they are actually really simple. All it consists of is

The Copyright Statement 

“All rights reserved.” 

And that’s pretty much it. You can totally get away with  “© 2017 Author Name. All rights reserved.” if that’s all you want to write but it must include either the © symbol with date, or use of the actual phrase Copyright followed by date and name. Otherwise it doesn’t mean anything.

You can also get away with writing just all rights reserved if you want, but it’s often better to go into more detail, things like “all rights reserved, no element of this book may be recreated or distributed except with the express permission of [either your name or your publisher]” tend to hold up a lot better when it comes to suing someone for stealing your work, as does adding in the disclaimer spiel that all elements of the book are fictional and you totally didn’t base that one character on that one guy/place etc etc. You don’t technically need one, but it’s good to have. Like underwear ie cover your ass.

The copyright page is also a good place to give your contact details, such as author website or email, and to also credit your artists/editors/people who helped you get the book in print. If you are going through a place like Barnes and Noble for distribution, I think you need to buy your own ISBN regardless of whether  epub or not, but I’d need to look that up. As it stands you don’t need an ISBN for kindle publishing or self distribution, although I know some people think it’s a good idea to, and honestly it’s good if you can afford it. I can’t at the moment but I likely will at some point.

This is how the Hunger Pangs one currently looks:

Hunger Pangs. First Edition. © 2017 by Joy Demorra. All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law. For permissions contact: [info @ weblink]

(This does not include fanfiction written for fun, you are welcome to play in my sandpit <3)

Please only purchase authorized electronic copies of this story. If you have somehow obtained this book through other means and have enjoyed it, please consider buying an official copy from [weblink]. 

The author appreciates your support and despite popular belief, does not subsist on the tears of readers alone.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

This book contains content of an explicit and mature themed nature, and is intended to be enjoyed by those of and above the age of consent.

The author does not assume responsibility for third-party websites or their contents. (As an aside, <—this is how I get out of saying I’m not responsible for the weird vampire kink y’all are gunna post on Ao3 just in case some puritan mob gets their pantaloons in a twist over it and decide I’m responsible for your lack of morals lol)

Cover art by _____; cover design and layout by _____. Edited by _________

Digital copies of Hunger Pangs are available for purchase on Amazon, Patreon or by contacting Joy at [info @ weblink]

For Trade Paperback visit [weblink]. 

I’ll likely edit this again and run through it a few more times before I consider it finalized but yea. Job done. That’s a copyright page.

[letswritesomenovels]

A tool to check creative and technical writing for potential improvements.

This is a really cool site you can use to check your work for things like filler words, adverbs, passive voice, and lexical illusions .

It’s not a substitute for actually editing your work, but you can use it to point out features of your writing that you find difficult to spot on your own.

[dynamicsymmetry]

Good stuff.

[tarysande]

Guys, I edit professionally. This list is legit. Incorporating these suggestions before you hire an editor will save you A LOT of money. Even if you did these and nothing else, you’d see significant overall improvement in your work.

That said, you don’t have to overthink these things when you’re writing a first draft. If you write, “she said angrily” in a first draft, you can always revisit the phrasing in a second draft. I mention this because overthinking style can lead to a loss of momentum, and losing momentum is why so many people never finish a draft. Give yourself permission to write fast, write messy or ugly, and edit your draft into beauty later.

[duchess-of-mandalore]

Editor here as well. This is a fantastic list. Study it. Memorize it. Live it. I’d also add that if you want to improve as a fiction writer, one of the greatest things that you can do is to start taking acting classes or audition for theater productions. That will particularly help with this part (which is, in my opinion, one of the most important points in this post):

Think visually when you write. Show the emotion; don’t rely on adverbs to tell us how the character is feeling.

Put differently, think of what a camera can pick up on when an actor is conveying an emotion. Instead of writing “he said angrily,” ask yourself how an actor would show what “angrily” means. Different characters might do different things for different emotions, but the point is that your writing will benefit if you can link emotions to actions and vice-versa.

For example, in a story I recently wrote, a female character receives shocking news from a male character that’s hard to process. In my first draft, I just had the two of them sitting on the sofa for the duration of the scene. However, I knew that visually, that was boring, and it didn’t really help to convey the woman’s pain. So I tried something more active. The female character goes to pour herself a glass of alcohol in order to steady her nerves, but still in shock and reeling from what she’s heard, she sets the glass on the table with too much force and it shatters in her hand. 

Adding this element opened up new avenues to explore as the two characters to react to the broken glass. It gave an action and drive to the scene that was much more interesting than if I had just had the two characters sit on the couch and talk through the shocking news (the shattered glass also provided a subtle thematic image, serving to mirror the woman’s newly shattered heart). The same character development that I originally intended still occurs through the conversation the characters have, but it does so in a way that more visually interesting. I could picture a scene like that being filmed for a movie, and it helped drive home the emotion of the situation more effectively.

That’s the kind of thing that theater experience can help with because acting teaches you to think about how a story is conveyed visually as much as through dialogue and narration.

And if joining theater isn’t an option (or makes you want to vomit from stage fright), a good way to start noticing exactly what actors do to show emotion is to watch film/tv clips on mute (do it with clips where you already know what’s happening and what the characters are feeling, and then try it with random clips that you haven’t seen before, to see if you can still understand what emotions the characters are displaying).

Your audience (and your editors) will thank you!

[oliviapaigewrites-deactivated20]

Symbolism! Yeah! 

Disclaimer: Again, my advice is always just that: advice. It’s often to teach beginners or help those struggling, so these aren’t set in stone rules! Experiment! Write freely! Write on!

[shadowprince27-deactivated20200]

Archery information for writers that no one asked for but probably some of you need and I like talking about archery, so here it is.

when you put an arrow on the string, the verb is called “nocking” i.e. eyes glued on the target, he nocked the arrow

also the part of the arrow that gets put onto the string is called the nock. depending on the type of arrow this can be a piece of plastic glued into the arrow, or with wood or bamboo arrows it can be carved into the shaft of the arrow itself

you do not close an eye when aiming or shooting; you see better with both eyes open.

everyone has a dominant eye that more naturally your brain focuses with. that determines whether you are right or left handed when shooting, and doesn’t necessarily correlate to whether the person is right or left handed in anything else

so if you’re writing a character who has difficulty seeing out of one eye, take that into account when they are shooting

if they are right eye dominant, they hold the bow with their left hand and draw the string with their right. if they are left eye dominant, they hold the bow with their right hand and draw the string with their left

if they shoot left, the quiver sits on their left side/hip/thigh. shoot right - right side quiver.

there are several different ways to draw, if you are writing something historical or in a specific region, then do research on that style of archery. but for a generic place to start that is a more universal way of drawing a bow, here are some things to include

the chin stays down. raising your chin will fuck up your aim

the pointer finger on your draw hand rests on the side of your chin/jaw, and the string of the bow will touch the tip of the archer’s nose

weight is on the balls of your feet, leaning slightly forward off your heels

if it is an older bow/barebow, there is not usually a place for the arrow to rest on the bow. this means the arrow rests on the archer’s hand. if they are not wearing a glove on that hand, the fletchings (that’s the feathers on the arrow) will more than likely slice their hand when firing. this scars.

so if you’re wanting to describe someone observing and archer’s hands (hands are hot, don’t @ me) they would see a silver scar about halfway between the pointer finger knuckle and palm of the person’s hand. (turn your hand vertical and trace down the length of your pointer toward your thumb and stop next to the knuckle. that spot there.)

most archers wear something to protect their fingers on the hand that draws the bow. even with that, they have callouses. without it, a lot of callouses, scars, and blisters.

most common draw uses three fingers on the string: pointer, middle, ring. the arrow sits between the pointer and middle. just like where the draw point is, this is not universal and do research if you’re doing something culturally important.

barebow means that the bow is bare of any instruments. no sight, no weights, etc. the most basic/traditional form of bow

a recurve bow is anything where the tips of the bow curve back around forward, away from the archer

a compound is what you think of as a modern hunting bow, and is recognisable by having wheels at the ends and three strings

arrows have three fletchings that form a triangle, the point faces the archer so that the flat of the arrow will pass the flat of the bow on release. the arrow sits on the side of the bow facing the archer

archers with a larger/raised chest will sometimes where a chest protect so that the string does not catch when firing (this is regardless of gender, i know several cis-men who need it as well)

string can also catch on the forearm that is holding the bow and creates bruises and welts if you don’t wear a protector. modern ones are small plastic and cover just the spot, with elastic holding it in place. traditional ones are leather and wrap all the way around, lacing up on the back of your arm like a corset.

there is literally so much more, but i feel like this is plenty to get you started, and as always, feel free to drop an ask in my box if you need something more!

[reverie-lavellan]

idk if anyone will find this useful, but this is how i go about planning my stories. i mostly write fantasy, so that’s what this is most applicable to. but it could work with other genres too.

so there’s three major components to a story: the characters, the plot, and the world. creating them individually is the easy part, but they all connect and affect each other in different ways. (like you can’t have a character who loves peaches and eats them every day if they live a peasant in a region that doesn’t grow peaches, for example.)

so i created a cheat sheet to help connect all three components together.

1) the world creates the characters.

this is related to the peach example above. the characters should be a direct result of the environment they grew up in and the environment they currently live in.

2) the characters are limited by the world.

also related to the peaches. characters can’t do anything outside of what the rules of their surroundings and universe allow, such as eating peaches when they’re not available. this also applies for magic users. they can’t have unlimited magic, so keep in mind what you want out of both the characters and the world when creating magic systems.

3) the characters carry the plot.

we’ve all heard it before: “bad characters can’t carry a good plot. good characters can carry a bad plot.” but we all like a good plot anyway. try to make sure you’re not giving your characters too heavy or too light of a plot to carry.

4) the plot pushes the characters.

if nothing in the plot happens, your characters will remain static forever. if you struggle with plots, try starting with what character development you want to happen, then go from there.

5) the plot depends on the world.

you can’t overthrow the evil government if there isn’t one. think of what your world needs most and what your plot is centered around, and fit those two together.

6) the world is changed by the plot.

even if your plot is centered around something most of your world would call “insignificant”, the world will still experience some change from the plot. either the evil government will be gone, or maybe that one teacher is now way more careful about keeping an eye on the test key. either way, the world will be different from now on.

final note: usually people will be able to write one or two of the components with ease, but don’t know where to go from there. i personally can’t write plots, but thinking this way has really helped me actually make a story out of the world and characters because i looked at what i needed from what i had. i really hope this can help you too! happy writing!

tl;dr this is a cheat sheet to help anyone who struggles with writing one or two of what i consider the three major components to a story.

[arisaint]

SOME ITEMS YOU SHOULD KNOW WHEN CREATING A TOTALITARIANISM FOR YOUR STORY

Is your story a dystopian universe but you don’t know how to begin? Are there some things missing or you feel your totalitarian government is not 1984-ish enough?

Well! I am here to give some tips based on my own experience living under a regime of this kind and reading about these systems. These are some tips for writers and roleplayers who want to create their own totalitarian worlds. So, here we go!

IDEOLOGY & PILLARS

The ideology is the base of the new order of a totalitarianism. Depending on the beliefs of the regime, the way they see the world and how it works, the nation will transform differently.

That’s why in A Brave New World, which pillar is genetics engineering, is built as a society divided in different genetical castes; or the reason why The Handmaid’s Tale world is based in a radical religious ideology that dominates women and punishes those who sin; or why The Man In The High Castle follows the nazi’s philosophy on superior races and idolizes Hitler’s figure; or why Fahrenheit 451’s books prohibition influences the roles of firefighters.

There are plenty of fictional and real (unfortunately) examples. An ideology usually has rules and laws, perspectives, a determined political and social system, a deity or figure it admires and an official truth.

OFFICIAL TRUTH

One of the main goals of a totalitarian system is changing completely the reality as it is known. For this reason, the absolute truth of certain events is a threat for the system.

For a totalitarian government, the truth expressed by the “official sources” is the only and absolute truth. Anything that comes from another voice is a lie or even a delusion. Working hard on building their own reality is the reason why they take over media and spread their own version of a story just to make the rest of the versions look fake.

An innocent man was killed by the system because he was protesting against the crisis? According to the government, “the person was killed because he was a menace to the people, he was an assassin and was trying to foster anarchy within the country. That’s why the brave authorities were obligated to shoot him”. With this version, the government is seen as the hero, conveniently. Because yes, conveniently, the official truth never soils the reputation of those in power. It usually spreads hatred on its enemies (those who oppose the totalitarianism ). The official truth’s goal and function is to change reality completely in order to achieve the absolute anchorage of the people on power. Take this always in mind because it’s probably the most important thing a totalitarianism does to stay in power. The stakes are too high to let people know the truth.

CHANGING THE PAST

As a consequence of the official truth, spreading the painted version of a current event is not enough. It’s also necessary to change the past and rewrite history. And, of course, with the same and convenient goal: making the system on power look like a hero and savior. So, any symbol, event or element that says the contrary or represents a confusion of this understanding, is erased from history books, removed from town squares (statues and sculptures are victims of the government if they don’t fulfill the new order’s values) and are eventually forgotten by future generations. Everything that belongs to the past and threats the totalitarianism ideology, even the slightest littleness, will be erased from the collective consciousness to reconfigure the thoughts of society about the past.  

Is there a hero from the past of the nation who doesn’t follow the ideology of the regime? Their name will be erased from history books and their statues will be replaced by a more convenient hero that follows the government thoughts. Eventually, the first hero is forgotten and never named again.

NEW LANGUAGE

Words are powerful weapons and totalitarianisms well know that. For this reason, they’ll always opt on adopting the “new language” that will be part of the new order with the objective of killing the unnecessary past and controlling the society even in the way they speak and what they hear.

As it’s perfectly and clearly stated in Orwell’s 1984, the Newspeak replaces the Oldspeak so the regime can dominate people’s thought. When creating a totalitarianism, it’s important to have that in mind: they will always want to control what their people say, do and think. Because that’s the safe way to stay in power, if nobody thinks different, nothing different will happen.

The new language, in many regimes, is shown as a war one. Always using words such as fight, battle, soldier, comrade, brigade or troop to make their people believe there’s a constant war, that peace can only be found through battles and that those who think different are enemies.  

BIG BROTHER

The totalitarianism needs to show a face, the face of a savior who will replace God or any other idol of the people. Even if it’s real or not, dead or alive, it’s the face of the government and its’s an obligation to pay respects to it. Propaganda fuels the omnipresence of this character, even if it’s human, they make sure the people think otherwise: that it is a deity, the hero of the society. The ideology of the regime seeks for the exaltation of this leader and make it be loved by people.  

PROPAGANDA

The official truth, the new order and the exaltation of the Big Brother of the system is diffused exclusively through propaganda. It is the precious tool of every totalitarianism and is always used to the point of being abusive and invasive. It will be on billboards, television, newspaper (if there are), bulletins, everywhere. And of course, this propaganda is designed with the new language of its governors. It’s supposed to have the same personality of the whole system. And the goal is evident: brainwashing. The propaganda of a totalitarianism has one or several messages to send to the people, and eventually, make them repeat it and believe it.

For example, the famous 1984’s phrases “War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength” are meant to send that precise message to their people and make them believe these statements are actually true (official truth).

SECRET POLICE

This kind of governments eventually create their own police. And the goals of this service is not to protect people even if that’s the “official truth”. The reality of this agency is to safeguard the system and get rid of anyone who means a threat to it.

Murders will be covered as accidents or suicides, prison will be filled with protestants and detractors, there will be torture centers to make people confess valuable information for the police. This is how they act. They are hitmen, feared by the people because, sooner or later, society learns the real function of that police. Being a cop of this service turns you into the guard dog of the government, and of course, betrayal is also punished within the members of the secret police.

The Gestapo, KGB and Thinkpol are clear examples of how the secret police of a totalitarianism work. Of course, it’s not an ethical duty. On the contrary; they only care about those who order and pay them, not the people. For example, the Thinkpol’s duty wasn’t to protect the citizens of Oceania, but arresting those who attempted against the Inner Party.

CENSORSHIP

In order to spread only, but only the messages the totalitarianism needs, there has to be a censorship of the media and people. This kind of regimes will aim on media because of its influence on people. They’ll take newspapers, TV channels and radio stations and regulate what they say. There’s usually an official (TV or radio) channel from the government that announces bulletins of news and the propaganda of the regime.

Not all totalitarian governments have total control of media, some clandestine and rebel mass media outwit the regulations and censorship. But, of course, depending on how effective is the secret police, those acts will have consequences.

Regarding political parties, the definition of totalitarianism doesn’t allow the existence of opposition parties, for there can be only one, the unique political party.

BRAINWASHING & INDOCTRINATION

A totalitarian regime always needs to maintain the sheep inside the farm, and it doesn’t want questioner sheep. That’s why they recur to brainwashing, to avoid any risk that could overthrow their government.

The main reason of propaganda and censorship is precisely brainwashing. Propaganda exists to spread what the government wants their people to think and censorship exists to eliminate any tergiversation and “lie” that could confuse them. If the totalitarianism is well established, their people will be completely brainwashed.

Another way this kind of regime use to indoctrinate is schools. Spreading the messages to the youth when they still haven’t built their own opinions it’s a key strategy for totalitarianisms. This is how they secure the brainwashing of new generations.

There are many ways to indoctrinate a society, and it’s always a priority for the regime. Because people who think, will eventually oppose you. They can’t let that happen.  

OPPRESSED SOCIETY

How does a society under a totalitarian system behaves? It all depends on how strict is the system, what they promote through their new order and laws and how established are they on people (brainwashing). What we have to understand it’s that these regimes do not recognize human dignity and the person as an individual. They are just tools for their system and objectives. And, for this society, freedom doesn’t exist.

In a totalitarianism, the people blend with the rest of the collective, becoming idiot masses that just repeat the propaganda they consume. They are a collective, a mass, a medium for the government. They have no rights, they are just instruments with no dignity nor individuality. That’s why the duty of the society it’s to obey and never complain.

Do not limit yourself on making one kind of society, they all react differently to these regimes. Depending on how well established is the new order, it will be harder for people to think by themselves, and become slaves of the system, obeying the regime.

Nevertheless, if you want to create a conflict, there’s always exceptions: citizens who still think for themselves, understand there’s something wrong with the system and will fight it.

RESISTANCE MOVEMENT

And that conclusion bring us here: the main conflict of a totalitarianism it’s a —usually clandestine— group of resistance. Even the toughest totalitarianism has a resistance counterpart, because that’s how human nature is: always looking for a little hole to freedom even in the deepest caves.

Again, the size and quality of the resistance movement depends of how strict it’s the totalitarianism and how efficient it’s their secret police. However, there’s always, ALWAYS, someone who thinks differently and becomes the enemy of the regime. If you want a conflict for the government, there needs to be a resistance group, even if it is small. Also, there are many types of groups, they can be violent, pacifistss, anarchists, etc.

If your story doesn’t involve a coup against the totalitarianism, I suggest you to equally include this group, because they always tend to exist. Besides, a totalitarianism feeds itself from the drama of having enemies, so even if there’s not a big resistance group, they’ll create their own fictional enemy and blame all their problems on them. 

As a final suggestion, if you want to get involved into dystopian worlds and totalitarianisms, read a lot about them, especially I recommend you to read George Orwell’s 1984, for he portrayed a totalitarianism perfectly clear and it’s probably the most emblematic example. Also read a lot of history and real totalitarian regimes! Learn a lot from reality! It’s more akin to 1984 than you think.

Reminder: use this knowledge and write stories to always condemn totalitarianisms! Because we need to use power of literature to fight against what’s unfair. And believe me, as a person who lives in a regime like this, it’s not funny to see a story glorifying a totalitarianism.

Hope these tips are helpful for your stories!

[writersrandomramblings]

Elements of culture.

[pitofghosts]

worldbuilding tips

populations and peoples don’t just suddenly change at a border marker. cultures interact and blend.

there are usually a multitude of cultures in one place, and religions often have different factions within them

what are the differences between the upper and lower classes? is there a lower class? what system is used? fuedalism? capitalism? communism?

how does your society view and deal with poverty?

think about the diaspora. invent a large population of immigrants. why are they there? how long have they lived there? how does their culture now differentiate from their homeland?

languages. is there a global lingua franca (a language that people use to speak internationally. historically this has been latin and french, and right now, english)? if so, why That One? are there smaller lingua francas within different nations?

a large country will almost always have smaller languages within it. put some in. you don’t even have to name them, just have someone mention that they often have to translate for their parents

the lingua franca will usually be the language of the majority, but not always. if a particular ethnic group has control of the government, and therefor education, then that language will probably become more widespread. although sometimes there are “official languages” and “daily languages”

i could write a whole other post about languages honestly

what things do different cultures see as beautiful? is it eyes? hair? what parts of the body are considered scandalous. are the bodies of men and women seen differently? how do people feel about breasts?

how is makeup used? is it daily? is it ceremonial? do different colours and patterns have meanings or is purely for aesthetic? is it seen as gendered?

basically just don’t take everything in your culture as the “norm.” there is no norm. the world is weird.

learn about other cultures in our own world. please.

[sunderlorn]

FINALLY 👏 SOMEONE 👏 SAID 👏 IT. 👏 ALL OF IT.  👏ALL AT ONCE. 👏

(Thank you @fallingawkwardly​ for bringing this to my attention.)

[wistfulwizard]

Yup, I agree with a lot of these, it points out many cliches, I think there are good things to consider and more variety in fantasy worlds would be nice. However, something about it was bothering me. Is it that sometime epic fantasy just need focus on that : being epic and fun? Authors shouldn’t feel they have to fixate on world building to please all the Brandons of the world and make everything realistic because they are first most writing an engaging stories. Good worldbuilding can be a part of it but there are great stories with minimal amount of it. Do I really want to read 3 chapters on horse breeding ? NO. And more science ? Could be fun, but that’s not the appeal for me : the perrilous realm, the enchantment, the wonder, the misty lake from which a lady slowly emerges, the wounded hero losing his path in the forest at twillight, the radiance of a sunset on a city of silver and gold, the sword that speak to tell the sad warrior it agrees to drink his blood as he kill himself, the young girl flying among the clouds on a goose, the great dwarven cities carved in mountains and glittering with gemstones, etc..

That’s what I love about fantasy : the magic. And I like when the worldbuilding makes me feel that the magic is real, not when it tries to be realistic.

Some of Brandon’s complains are linked to idea that a fantasy story isn’t realistic enough, because many authors are deep in the worldbuilding rabbit hole, and while trying to construct real-like secondary world can be fun, it’s very hard to do well because there is always one more thing thing to consider. Along the way they forget about what makes fantasy magical and fun.

[petermorwood]

All of these are things a writer might need to know for worldbuilding purposes (I remember Terry Pratchett nattering to @dduane​ and me about “rain shadow effect” in Discworld) but have very little relevance to the actual craft of storytelling.

Bringing a story to a screeching halt for exam-paper answers to a list of bullet points like the OP isn’t how such research is used. Answering that list is what goes into Supplementary Material, like cutaway diagrams of Star Destroyers or how to cook the cuisines of Westeros (yes, cuisines plural; not all the same soup.)

James Bond boarding a plane isn’t a cue for the history of flight from the Wright Brothers onward. His vodka martini shaken not stirred isn’t an excuse for that long argument about bruising the gin and why vodka isn’t used for martini anyway. Drawing his Walther PPK shouldn’t - though some thrillers do - prompt a digression about muzzle velocity and grain-weight of ammunition.

It’s good for the writer to know all these things; it means, even in fantasy where they’ve made it all up themselves, that they’ll be writing about something “solid”, and the assurance of such writing is what makes some fantasy worlds feel so real. But unless these things have some bearing on the story - usually by having an effect on plot direction or character development - they have no business being shoehorned into what is a finite amount of space between Beginning and End just to show how much research the writer has been doing.

That said, there are a couple of very worthwhile points in the OP that go further than off-screen worldbuilding: for instance, weights, measures, distances, coins and especially language. These shouldn’t be the same everywhere, and are important enough to have an effect on the story.

”The Common Tongue” is a convenience, but isolated villagers speaking it with 100% fluency is unlikely. There can be interesting tangles (comedy to relieve tension, or something deeper) when a character who only knows the Proper Version of a language gets into a conversation with someone speaking dialect (Eton-and-Oxford English meets Geordie or Glaswegian.)

How about the same word with a different meaning? Modern example: is the person saying “Nice buns” referring to baked goods or anatomical features? Context makes it clear, but maybe not fast enough to avoid trouble.

There should indeed be small businesses - bookbinders, printers (or at least scriptorium-style copy shops), saddlers, blacksmiths, swordsmiths, cobblers, weavers, all providers of the impedimenta of adventure. There’ll be taverns and eating-houses, so is there smuggling? How much is a pound of pepper in the open market versus under the counter?

Maybe there’s an embargo on the booze from a hostile country but it’s still popular; that’s why brandy - already smuggled in peacetime to avoid excise duty - continued to come illegally from France to England during the Napoleonic wars. Wine wasn’t smuggled to the same extent because it was lower-profit, so drinkers shifted from claret (French, enemy) to port and Madeira (Portuguese and Spanish, ally.)

There should also be bankers and merchants, and if you think that sounds dull, check on what the Medici and Fugger banking houses got up to during the Renaissance, and how they got so powerful.

There’s a phrase in Ireland: “Your money’s no good here.” That’s usually nice to hear, it means you won’t be able to pay for a drink since others are buying it for you. However, once currency goes beyond RPG-style “gold, silver and copper pieces” you start getting foreign money and that money may be “no good here” in a more awkward way.

Is foreign money always acceptable? Is some acceptable and others not? Why not? “I don’t like the look of it” is a frequent reason. Though they don’t have the Queen’s head on them, notes issued by Scottish or Northern Irish banks are legitimate UK Sterling currency. But try shopping with them in England and see how far you get.

Is coinage actually coinage, or just bits of gold or silver in convenient shapes? Has the metal content been debased so the weight value is less than the face value? (I did the “hero melts silver coins to shoot a werewolf” thing in “The Demon Lord”, then had the hero find out that devaluation hadn’t left enough silver in them to do the werewolf any real harm…)

“Why aren’t your character’s teeth rotting?” - because in the medieval setting on which a lot of fantasy is based, they didn’t eat tons of refined sugar since it hadn’t been “invented” yet. (Wall-to-wall bad teeth is yet another Mucky Middle Ages cliché which probably originated with “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”.)

Interesting detail: in the mid-late 1500s when sugar became more available, it was still hugely expensive. Rich people ate lots of it to prove they could, so sugar-related tooth decay was a disease of the rich (Elizabeth I’s teeth were a mess). Less-rich people sometimes stained their teeth to simulate decay and suggest they were wealthier than they were…

The king being worried about his nobles increasing their power through marriage and alliance is sound enough, but also a Chekhov’s Gun - unless it’s going to have an effect on the later story, mentioning it in lengthy detail serves no purpose apart from Showing Your Work.

Who domesticated the wheat used to make the bread your characters are eating? Who invented the ale-making process for the beer they’re drinking? Who breeds the horses they’re riding?

Unless it has an effect on the plot, who cares?

What matters in story terms is who offered their last piece of bread to the characters and why. Who’s getting drunk on the ale and about to talk too much so they give something away. Who’s riding a horse so different to the usual run of local ones (an Arab in a land of Icelandics, for instance) that they might as well carry a “Not From Here” flag.

Fantasy isn’t unrealistic, and good fantasy rests on a solid bedrock of its own alternate reality.

What it shouldn’t be is dull.

[transmutetheblankpage]

GUIDE: NAMING A TOWN OR CITY

This post was originally from a FAQ, but since the original link is now defunct, I am re-posting it here.

There are many things to keep in mind when naming the town or city in your novel:

1) Genre/Theme/Tone

It’s very important to consider the genre and theme of your story when choosing a town name. Take these names for example, each of which indicates the genre or theme of the story: King’s Landing (sounds fantastical) Cloud City (sounds futuristic) Silent Hill (sounds scary) Sweet Valley (sounds happy and upbeat) Bikini Bottom (sounds funny) Radiator Springs (sounds car-related) Halloween Town (sounds Halloween-related) Storybrooke (sounds fairytale-related) 2) Time/Place It’s also important to consider the time and place where your story takes place. For example, you wouldn’t use “Vista Gulch” as a name for a town in Victorian England. You probably wouldn’t use it for a town in modern day North Carolina, either. Vista is a Spanish word and would normally be found in places where Spanish names are common, like Spain, Central and South America, the southwest United States (including southern California), Cuba, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, and Florida. 3) Size/Settlement Type An isolated town of 300 people probably won’t be Valley City, but a sprawling metropolis of 30 million could be called Windyville, because it could have started out as a small town and grew into a large city. 4) Geography Words like gulch, butte,and bayou tend to be regional terms. You probably wouldn’t find Berle’s Bayou in Idaho, or Windy Butte in Rhode Island. Words like mount, cape, and valley are dependent upon terrain. Most of the time, you won’t have a town named “mount” something unless there are hills or mountains nearby. You wouldn’t use “cape” unless the town was on a cape, which requires a large body of water. 5) History Is there a historical person or event that your town might be named after? The Simpsons’ hometown of Springfield is ironically named after its founder, Jebediah Springfield. Chattanooga, Tennessee is named after the Cherokee town that was there first. Nargothrond, in The Lord of the Rings, is an Elvish town with an Elvish name. 6) Combination of Words

person name + geographical term = Smithfield, Smith Creek

group name + geographical term = Pioneer Valley, Settlers’ Ridge

descriptive word + geographical term = Mystic Falls, Smoky Hill

person name + settlement type = Smithton, Claraville

landmark + settlement type = Bridgton, Beaconville

Word Lists

Types of Settlements

Geographical Features

Place Words

Common Suffixes

Other Descriptors