skullwrites remade

writing resource sideblog / follows from demonites

[sanctimonies]

for anyone that is still active that follows this blog, i won’t be posting much here. you’re welcome to follow me at @spillme to keep up with my stuff. i may archive this blog in the meantime. thanks for your loyal support over the past couple years!

[botwstoriesandsuch]

Pssst

Hey, are you an artist or writer with WIPs?

Come here... I got a secret for you pssst come ‘ere

[kittmoon]

waiting in deep suspense

[botwstoriesandsuch]

Psst you ready here comes the secret

Here it comes

[moinsbienquekaworu]

I am also very curious about this secret

[botwstoriesandsuch]

Your time spent enjoying the creative process is infinitely more valuable that any final project you create. So stop putting yourself down for never finishing or posting those WIPs because every moment you spent creating something you loved is a moment not wasted. Your progress and talent is measured by your passion not your number of posts.

[lizard-is-writing]

Your Characters Are Lying! How to Spin Lies & Keep the Reader Guessing

As everyone knows, when anyone in pretty much anything says, “I’m fine” or some variant of that, you know it’s a lie. We’re practically programed to think that nowadays, so first, keep that in mind when you’re writing, next, let’s talk about how to get more clever than that. Let’s talk lies: 

Lies are seductive. I don’t mean that in a romantic context, though it can exist there too, but basically, the rule is that whatever is said, you’ll want to believe it. Even if it’s far-fetched. You want it to be true. 

Why is the character lying? The reason will be character development, so make it good. Explore the possibilities behind their motives, make them sneaky. 

Why is the character being lied to? What does the character want so badly that they might possibly believe this lie? This is more character development whether or not the character believes the lie. 

Plan your lies. You don’t have to plan it all out, but make sure you know who knows what about who. This is a way you can be really sneaky. Even if the reader knows everything, it’s still exciting to see how it all unfolds. 

As far as lies go, its a great way to show character as well as adding an extra layer of conflict and tension. It can get confusing but a few properly executed lies will add an extra layer of dimension to your story. Happy writing!

[writeness]

one of the best pieces of writing advice i’ve ever gotten:

if a scene isn’t working, change the weather.

it sounds stupid, but seriously, it works. thank u to my screenwriting professor for this wisdom

[fineillsignup]

tips for choosing a Chinese name for your OC when you don’t know Chinese

This is a meta for gifset trade with @purple-fury! Maybe you would like to trade something with me? You can PM me if so!

Choosing a Chinese name, if you don’t know a Chinese language, is difficult, but here’s a secret for you: choosing a Chinese name, when you do know a Chinese language, is also difficult. So, my tip #1 is: Relax. Did you know that Actual Chinese People choose shitty names all the dang time? It’s true!!! Just as you, doubtless, have come across people in your daily life in your native language that you think “God, your parents must have been on SOME SHIT when they named you”, the same is true about Chinese people, now and throughout history. If you choose a shitty name, it’s not the end of the world! Your character’s parents now canonically suck at choosing a name. There, we fixed it!

However. Just because you should not drive yourself to the brink of the grave fretting over choosing a Chinese name for a character, neither does that mean you shouldn’t care at all. Especially, tip #2, Never just pick some syllables that vaguely sound Chinese and call it a day. That shit is awful and tbh it’s as inaccurate and racist as saying “ching chong” to mimic the Chinese language. Examples: Cho Chang from Harry Potter, Tenten from Naruto, and most notorious of all, Fu Manchu and his daughter Fah lo Suee (how the F/UCK did he come up with that one).

So where do you begin then? Well, first you need to pick your character’s surname. This is actually not too difficult, because Chinese actually doesn’t have that many surnames in common use. One hundred surnames cover over eighty percent of China’s population, and in local areas especially, certain surnames within that one hundred are absurdly common, like one out of every ten people you meet is surnamed Wang, for example. Also, if you’re making an OC for an established media franchise, you may already have the surname based on who you want your character related to. Finally, if you’re writing an ethnically Chinese character who was born and raised outside of China, you might only want their surname to be Chinese, and give them a given name from the language/culture of their native country; that’s very very common.

If you don’t have a surname in mind, check out the Wikipedia page for the list of common Chinese surnames, roughly the top one hundred. If you’re not going to pick one of the top one hundred surnames, you should have a good reason why. Now you need to choose a romanization system. You’ll note that the Wikipedia list contains variant spellings. If your character is a Chinese-American (or other non-Chinese country) whose ancestors emigrated before the 1950s (or whose ancestors did not come from mainland China), their name will not be spelled according to pinyin. It might be spelled according to Wade-Giles romanization, or according to the name’s pronunciation in other Chinese languages, or according to what the name sounds like in the language of the country they immigrated to. (The latter is where you get spellings like Lee, Young, Woo, and Law.)  A huge proportion of emigration especially came from southern China, where people spoke Cantonese, Min, Hakka, and other non-Mandarin languages.

So, for example, if you want to make a Chinese-Canadian character whose paternal source of their surname immigrated to Canada in the 20s, don’t give them the surname Xie, spelled that way, because #1 that spelling didn’t exist when their first generation ancestor left China and #2 their first generation ancestor was unlikely to have come from a part of China where Mandarin was spoken anyway (although still could have! that’s up to you). Instead, name them Tse, Tze, Sia, Chia, or Hsieh.

If you’re working with a character who lives in, or who left or is descended from people who left mainland China in the 1960s or later; or if you’re working with a historical or mythological setting, then you are going to want to use the pinyin romanization. The reason I say that you should use pinyin for historical or mythological settings is because pinyin is now the official or de facto romanization system for international standards in academia, the United Nations, etc. So if you’re writing a story with characters from ancient China, or medieval China, use pinyin, even though not only pinyin, but the Mandarin pronunciations themselves didn’t exist back then. Just… just accept this. This is one of those quirks of having a non-alphabetic language.

(Here’s an “exceptions” paragraph: there are various well known Chinese names that are typically, even now, transliterated in a non-standard way: Confucius, Mencius, the Yangtze River, Sun Yat-sen, etc. Go ahead and use these if you want. And if you really consciously want to make a Cantonese or Hakka or whatever setting, more power to you, but in that case you better be far beyond needing this tutorial and I don’t know why you’re here. Get. Scoot!)

One last point about names that use the ü with the umlaut over it. The umlaut ü is actually pretty critical for the meaning because wherever the ü appears, the consonant preceding it also can be used with u: lu/lü, nu/nü, etc. However, de facto, lots of individual people, media franchises, etc, simply drop the umlaut and write u instead when writing a name in English, such as “Lu Bu” in the Dynasty Warriors franchise in English (it should be written Lü Bu). And to be fair, since tones are also typically dropped in Latin script and are just as critical to the meaning and pronunciation of the original, dropping the umlaut probably doesn’t make much difference. This is kind of a choice you have to make for yourself. Maybe you even want to play with it! Maybe everybody thinks your character’s surname is pronounced “loo as in loo roll” but SURPRISE MOFO it’s actually lü! You could Do Something with that. Also, in contexts where people want to distinguish between u and ü when typing but don’t have easy access to a keyboard method of making the ü, the typical shorthand is the letter v. 

Alright! So you have your surname and you know how you want it spelled using the Latin alphabet. Great! What next?

Alright, so, now we get to the hard part: choosing the given name. No, don’t cry, I know baby I know. We can do this. I believe in you.

Here are some premises we’re going to be operating on, and I’m not entirely sure why I made this a numbered list:

Chinese people, generally, love their kids. (Obviously, like in every culture, there are some awful exceptions, and I’ll give one specific example of this later on.)

As part of loving their kids, they want to give them a Good name.

So what makes a name a Good name??? Well, in Chinese culture, the cultural values (which have changed over time) have tended to prioritize things like: education; clan and family; health and beauty; religious devotions of various religions (Buddhism, Taoism, folk religions, Christianity, other); philosophical beliefs (Buddhism, Confucianism, etc) (see also education); refinement and culture (see also education); moral rectitude; and of course many other things as the individual personally finds important. You’ll notice that education is a big one. If you can’t decide on where to start, something related to education, intelligence, wisdom, knowledge, etc, is a bet that can’t go wrong.

Unlike in English speaking cultures (and I’m going to limit myself to English because we’re writing English and good God look at how long this post is already), there is no canon of “names” in Chinese like there has traditionally been in English. No John, Mary, Susan, Jacob, Maxine, William, and other words that are names and only names and which, historically at least, almost everyone was named. Instead, in Chinese culture, you can basically choose any character you want. You can choose one character, or two characters. (More than two characters? No one can live at that speed. Seriously, do not give your character a given name with more than two characters. If you need this tutorial, you don’t know enough to try it.) Congratulations, it is now a name!!

But what this means is that Chinese names aggressively Mean Something in a way that most English names don’t. You know nature names like Rose and Pearl, and Puritan names like Wrestling, Makepeace, Prudence, Silence, Zeal, and Unity? I mean, yeah, you can technically look up that the name Mary comes from a etymological root meaning bitter, but Mary doesn’t mean bitter in the way that Silence means, well, silence. Chinese names are much much more like the latter, because even though there are some characters that are more common as names than as words, the meaning of the name is still far more upfront than English names.

So the meaning of the name is generally a much more direct expression of those Good Values mentioned before. But it gets more complicated!

Being too direct has, across many eras of Chinese history, been considered crude; the very opposite of the education you’re valuing in the first place. Therefore, rather than the Puritan slap you in the face approach where you just name your kid VIRTUE!, Chinese have typically favoured instead more indirect, related words about these virtues and values, or poetic allusions to same. What might seem like a very blunt, concrete name, such as Guan Yu’s “yu” (which means feather), is actually a poetic, referential name to all the things that feathers evoke: flight, freedom, intellectual broadmindness, protection…

So when you’re choosing a name, you start from the value you want to express, then see where looking up related words in a dictionary gets you until you find something that sounds “like a name”; you can also try researching Chinese art symbolism to get more concrete names. Then, here’s my favourite trick, try combining your fake name with several of the most common surnames: 王，李，陈. And Google that shit. If you find Actual Human Beings with that name: congratulations, at least if you did f/uck up, somebody else out there f/ucked up first and stuck a Human Being with it, so you’re still doing better than they are. High five!

You’re going to stick with the same romanization system (or lack thereof) as you’ve used for the surname. In the interests of time, I’m going to focus on pinyin only.

First let’s take a look at some real and actual Chinese names and talk about what they mean, why they might have been chosen, and also some fictional OC names that I’ve come up with that riff off of these actual Chinese names. And then we’ll go over some resources and also some pitfalls. Hopefully you can learn by example! Fun!!!

Let’s start with two great historical strategists: Zhuge Liang and Zhou Yu, and the names I picked for some (fictional) sons of theirs. Then I will be talking about Sun Shangxiang and Guan Yinping, two historical-legendary women of the same era, and what I named their fictional daughters. And finally I’ll be talking about historical Chinese pirate Gan Ning and what I named his fictional wife and fictional daughter. Uh, this could be considered spoilers for my novel Clouds and Rain and associated one-shots in that universe, so you probably want to go and read that work… and its prequels… and leave lots of comments and kudos first and then come back. Don’t worry, I’ll wait.

(I’m just kidding you don’t need to know a thing about my work to find this useful.)

Keep reading

[aritany]

Ive been trying to write a contemporary novel and outlining/plotting is.. an issue to say the least. do you have any tips for it?

absolutely! 

Plotting A Contemporary Novel

to define the contemporary genre: 

Contemporary (or realistic) fiction creates imaginary characters and situations that depict our world and society. It focuses on themes of growing up and confronting personal and social problems. This genre portrays characters coming to understand themselves and others. (source.)

without external plot devices (such as magic or the natural framework of a dystopian/mystery/hyper-specific genres) to to drive story structure, the contemporary genre relies heavily on character arcs. 

don’t be afraid to utilize a very basic outline - they are tried and true for a reason.

my plots always include: exposition, an inciting incident, rising action, climax, and resolution. they also generally fit into a three act structure, but those lines are blurry and not as important as those initial elements. here’s a breakdown of what that could look like.

exposition: this is what the world looks like! this is where we are! this is what’s going on! this is who the MC is! essentially - this is the status quo. 

inciting incident: take that status quo and toss it in the trash. something just happened that change the flow of where this story is going. 

rising action: the longest and broadest category. essentially, build tension. create secrets, hint at stuff your MC doesn’t understand yet. make them (and your readers) squirm. 

climax: oh no!! everything Has Gone Wrong!! in fantasy/sci-fi /plots, this is The Big Battle. in contemporary fiction, this could look like: a major confrontation, a loss, a big secret uncovered, or something along those lines.

resolution: ah, okay. we’ve sorted it out. now the tensions have dissolved, and we’ve either returned to the status quo, or we’re in a better place now. 

here’s how this could break down, hypothetically:

exposition: person A is trapped in an unhealthy friendship with person B. 

inciting incident: an old friend, person C, walks back in to A & B’s life, bringing with them a flood of memories. 

rising action: through the influence of person C, person A realizes that person B is making them miserable, but they don’t quite know how to escape, because they have so much history with person B. 

climax: it is revealed that person B did something really terrible, which gives person A the courage to stand up to them. 

resolution: person A is free of person B, and is able to consider a future with friends that treat them right.

that’s just one way that this could work, and this structure works for almost any concept. 

the place most people have difficulty is with the rising action, as this takes up about 2/3 of the story. that’s a lot of book. this is where my personal tactic comes into play: two steps forward, one step back. 

throughout the rising action you want to build tension, but you also want to move plot forward. ideally, this means you’ll be working with an ebb and flow. give your characters forward momentum, but juxtapose that with moments that make them doubt, or give them reasons to be distressed. 

in the above plot, two steps forward, one step back could look like a moment where A is badly mistreated by B, which is hurtful, followed by a moment of reassurance from C, which encourages them in their decision (two steps forward). then maybe B does something lovely, which causes doubt, or maybe C makes a mistake and hurts A somehow, which also causes doubt.

working toward the climax, reverse this. try one step forward two steps back for tension’s sake. maybe B shows up when A needs them while C doesn’t, and then B tells A something bad C said about them, and maybe it’s a lie (two steps back), but then A realizes that B wasn’t telling the truth (one step forward). 

then you’re set up for a climax, since A is ready to confront B about the lie and their friendship!

here are some general tips for plotting:

know your characters well.

ask questions like: what’s the worst thing that could happen? what would hurt them the worst? how do i make that happen?

don’t be afraid to be extreme.

use your own life experiences, if you think that might help. i put a little of my own story into every story i write.

follow up sweet moments with moments that hurt

give your characters unique voices (this is harder than it sounds)

don’t always use your first idea. sometimes your second one will make for a better story.

refer to this post for more ideas about the contemporary genre!

hope this helped, anon! good luck!

[bookofsloth]

your writing has improved and will continue to improve for your entire lifetime. there is no skill ceiling; only infinite space and sky.

[isabellestone]

Novel Outlining - Keeping Track of Those Pesky Subplots

If you like writing complicated novels with lots of subplots, this post is for you.

Don’t get me wrong, detailed planning is not for everyone. Some people prefer to make a first draft and get everyone on the page, but me? Well I’m a bit of a perfectionist. I like to know what I’m going to write in each chapter for a few reasons: 

If I know exactly what’s going to happen in the chapter, I don’t tend to get writers block. The chapter easily flows onto the page.

Having a proper plan helps me keep track of my subplots, so that I can sprinkle in the details as I go.

I like lists. 

I like ticking things off said lists. 

What is the structure of a novel outline?

There are many ways to outline a novel, but I’m a big fan of excel and spreadsheets, even though it doesn’t have spellcheck (sigh).

In the columns I have:

Chapter number

Who’s perspective the chapters from (for all my multi POV pals) 

Date/time of year

Location

Title 

Main plot of the chapter (This is where I write down exactly what’s going to happen in brief words)

And then multiple columns for my subplots 

[ID: an example table of the columns with an example plot] 

I use the word ‘subplot’ loosely. These columns can include:

Character arcs 

Backstories 

Themes

Relationships 

Trails for plot twists (See this post on foreshadowing for more about trails)  

Literally anything you want to keep track of

I would recommending having a new column for each subplot so it’s easy to track it’s progression throughout. 

The beautiful thing about this method is that it allows you to create a plan ensuring you include all the correct signposts and hints in the early chapters, so that they’re ready to become important in the later chapters, without a ton of rewriting. 

It doesn’t work for everyone, but planning is my best bud. 

And hey! You’ll never loose sight of a subplot again!

[patientno7]

the suffering never ends

[sinksanksockie2]

This is the real process

[thewritingbeast-blog]

Resources for you!

Character Ideas:

Character creation masterpost

Character Alignment Chart

More character alignment descriptions

Muslim Character questions

Characters with magical powers

Building a new character advice

How to create a character for an online or tabletop RPG (also a good guide on creating characters in general)

Royalty/nobility TV Tropes page

Basic character profile

OC masterpost

Random character generators - (1), (2), (3), (4)

D&D Character Building Tool

Character Design Ideas:

How clothing affects a character’s personality

Character Design Inspiration blog

Concept art, fan art, cool art to be inspired by

Character design references and inspiration

Sources for POC character design ideas and models

Create your own character model using HeroForge

For horned characters

Body and hair types guide

Random outfit generator

Naming Help:

Amazing site with an endless amount of naming resources

General advice on avoiding naming appropriation

Hispanic Surnames

Gothic Victorian names

Huge master list for character things in general

Masterlist of names of all types - including but not limited to ancient/old world names, Celtic, African, Northern European, Southern and Central American Native names, Japanese, Chinese, Mongolian, Polynesian, and more

Another name masterlist

How to pick a character name guide

Yet another names masterlist

Creating Background/backstory:

Character Sheet/Development Sheet

Another character development list

In-depth character personality, motivations and traits sheet

320 talents and passions for characters

On writing likes and dislikes that aren’t frivolous

Why you should write non-human characters non-conforming to the gender binary

Stereotypes, tropes, and archetypes

Random backstory generator

Assassin and thief character tropes to avoid

Character Interactions and putting your character into your world/story:

Comparing character height/height references

Characters who are scientists and writing about them doing science

Describing what different voices sound like

Describing skin tones

Writing friendship interactions that are platonic

Why having one character knock their friend unconscious to prevent them from doing something is a bad idea

Advice on shipping OCs with canon characters and what to avoid doing

Sweet Polly Oliver and Sweet on Polly Oliver situations (think of Disney’s Mulan for an example)

How to write multiple viewpoints/juggling a main cast of more than 4 to 6 characters

How to make readers care about your morally gray hero/anti-hero

On platonic OC and canon character relationships

How to avoid Godmodding in RPs

When it’s cheap to kill off a character

Writing dialogue

Things you shouldn’t do to canon characters

Avoiding purple prose in writing and RPs

Slang resources

Dialogue tips

Websites to chart your story/plot/character relationships

Bonus art masterlist!

[brucewayneright]

BLESS EVERYONE IN THIS POST.

[wordsnstuff]

Resources For Writing Sketchy Topics

Medicine

A Study In Physical Injury

Comas

Medical Facts And Tips For Your Writing Needs

Broken Bones

Burns

Unconsciousness & Head Trauma

Blood Loss

Stab Wounds

Pain & Shock

All About Mechanical Injuries (Injuries Caused By Violence)

Writing Specific Characters

Portraying a kleptomaniac.

Playing a character with cancer.

How to portray a power driven character.

Playing the manipulative character.

Portraying a character with borderline personality disorder.

Playing a character with Orthorexia Nervosa.

Writing a character who lost someone important.

Playing the bullies.

Portraying the drug dealer.

Playing a rebellious character.

How to portray a sociopath.

How to write characters with PTSD.

Playing characters with memory loss.

Playing a pyromaniac.

How to write a mute character.

How to write a character with an OCD.

How to play a stoner.

Playing a character with an eating disorder.

Portraying a character who is anti-social.

Portraying a character who is depressed.

How to portray someone with dyslexia.

How to portray a character with bipolar disorder.

Portraying a character with severe depression.

How to play a serial killer.

Writing insane characters.

Playing a character under the influence of marijuana.

Tips on writing a drug addict.

How to write a character with HPD.

Writing a character with Nymphomania.

Writing a character with schizophrenia.

Writing a character with Dissociative Identity Disorder.

Writing a character with depression.

Writing a character who suffers from night terrors.

Writing a character with paranoid personality disorder.

How to play a victim of rape.

How to play a mentally ill/insane character.

Writing a character who self-harms.

Writing a character who is high on amphetamines.

How to play the stalker.

How to portray a character high on cocaine.

Playing a character with ADHD.

How to play a sexual assault victim.

Writing a compulsive gambler.

Playing a character who is faking a disorder.

Playing a prisoner.

Portraying an emotionally detached character.

How to play a character with social anxiety.

Portraying a character who is high.

Portraying characters who have secrets.

Portraying a recovering alcoholic.

Portraying a sex addict.

How to play someone creepy.

Portraying sexually/emotionally abused characters.

Playing a character under the influence of drugs.

Playing a character who struggles with Bulimia.

Illegal Activity

Examining Mob Mentality

How Street Gangs Work

Domestic Abuse

Torture

Assault

Murder

Terrorism

Internet Fraud

Cyberwarfare

Computer Viruses

Corporate Crime

Political Corruption

Drug Trafficking

Human Trafficking

Sex Trafficking

Illegal Immigration

Contemporary Slavery 

Black Market Prices & Profits

AK-47 prices on the black market

Bribes

Computer Hackers and Online Fraud

Contract Killing

Exotic Animals

Fake Diplomas

Fake ID Cards, Passports and Other Identity Documents

Human Smuggling Fees

Human Traffickers Prices

Kidney and Organ Trafficking Prices

Prostitution Prices

Cocaine Prices

Ecstasy Pills Prices

Heroin Prices

Marijuana Prices

Meth Prices

Earnings From Illegal Jobs

Countries In Order Of Largest To Smallest Risk

Forensics

arson

Asphyxia

Blood Analysis

Book Review

Cause & Manner of Death

Chemistry/Physics

Computers/Cell Phones/Electronics

Cool & Odd-Mostly Odd

Corpse Identification

Corpse Location

Crime and Science Radio

crime lab

Crime Scene

Cults and Religions

DNA

Document Examination

Fingerprints/Patterned Evidence

Firearms Analysis

Forensic Anthropology

Forensic Art

Forensic Dentistry

Forensic History

Forensic Psychiatry

General Forensics

Guest Blogger

High Tech Forensics

Interesting Cases

Interesting Places

Interviews

Medical History

Medical Issues

Misc

Multiple Murderers

On This Day

Poisons & Drugs

Police Procedure

Q&A

serial killers

Space Program

Stupid Criminals

Theft

Time of Death

Toxicology

Trauma

[imagination-xx]

so your search history is less likely to get you blacklisted by the fbi :) (i also have two more masterlists somewhere on my feed that i’ll probably reblog soon)

[chauceryfairytales-archive]

Alright, I’ve seen a lot of people unsure of which way to go with their contemporary wips that include fantastic elements. Here is a guide if you’re considering either magical realism or contemporary fantasy:

1. Fantastic elements

= magic, supernatural, superstitions, etc. that appear to be real in the story. Common to other genres besides fantasy and magical realism–such as gothic lit.

Contemporary fantasy must have them. It’s fantasy, after all.

Magical realism also has them! Ghosts, centaurs, witchcraft can just show up in magical realism. This is where you might confuse them. On the other hand, more often than not, the brand of fantastic in magical realism is the debatable kind–there’s also an explanation for them that doesn’t involve magic.

2. Both happen in the present world?

 Contemporary fantasy does, as it says in the name!

Half true for magical realism, though. It can be set in the present world, but many magical realism stories are also historical fiction.

3. But both happen in our real world, right??

Contemporary fantasy is set in worlds very much like our own–except that magic is real in them. Not everyone knows about it in a contemporary fantasy setting, and not everyone believes in magic, but it is real beyond doubt.

Magical realism is set in our real world–like in the world of magical realism is ““literally”” our world. Magical realism interacts with reality in a different way than fantasy, which is why you can’t have both at the same time. Fantastic things shouldn’t happen in this world. And they aren’t a consistent in-world phenomenon. But they happen anyway, either in a particular place or to a particular person. Why is this happening??

4. Symbols, metaphors, and suchlike

Of course contemporary fantasy can use symbols, metaphors, subtext to discuss real-world issues. Actually, it might portray them without the author even realizing! Or the readers, until someone else points it out! This isn’t considered a vital part of fantasy stories, though.

It is for magical realism. Even if you, as the reader, have no idea of what the subtext could be, the story likely won’t make sense unless you interpret it in some symbolical way. (Does the author know the subtext? Not sure, I think you write that shit with your heart and find out what it means later, but maybe they do.) This happens because magical realism has developed as a genre used by minorities and/or people suffering under oppressive governments as a way to discuss their experiences and to react to the absurdity of what they were living in a roundabout way, often to avoid censorship or persecution. There are always symbols and metaphors in magical realism.

5. More stuff

- Magical realism got famous under that name because of 20th century Latin American writers. And it is a cultural genre–because magical realism stories are deeply affected by your experience of the world, including your country’s history and cultures. But Toni Morrison’s Beloved is also considered magical realism. So is Kafka’s The Metamorphosis, and Mikhail Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita. So most people would let you call something magical realism even if it wasn’t written by a Latin American author.

- It’s important to make the distinction between fantasy and magical realism because… well, you wouldn’t read an allegory about a dictatorship in someone’s country (maybe the only way the author had to talk about it without being arrested) and say it’s fantasy, right? It would be rude.

- You aren’t sure if you want to (or how to) write magical realism? Try reading in the genre! Magical realism can be just as cool, fantastical, fascinating, problematic and fun to analyze as fantasy!

TL;DR: Although magical realism and contemporary fantasy have some elements in common, they aren’t the same thing. If you want to write a fantasy story that’s set in our real world in the present day, you probably want to write contemporary fantasy. If you want to try your hand at symbolism/metaphors, using fantastic elements to represent your experience of the world (as a minority, for example), you probably want to write magical realism. Please don’t use the terms interchangeably because you risk being insensitive.

[michaelbjorkwrites]

The Progressive Outline — How I balance my plotter and pantser tendencies.

When I first started writing at 13, I was a pantser. I’d develop an initial concept for a story, then just write – making everything up as I went.

Within a year or so, I became a plotter. I wrote extensive character sheets, deeply developed the worlds of my stories, and wrote detailed outlines that spanned not just the current novel, but series-long arcs.

In the years that followed (high school, college, MFA), I oscillated between the two approaches, navigating the benefits and challenges of both, as well as my own evolving preferences – before settling on my current method.

I call it “progressive outlining,” and it helps me do two somewhat conflicting things:

Create an outline for structure and direction

Allow my characters the freedom to organically grow, surprise me, and influence the story

The Progressive Outline

There are three parts to my outlining process:

Initial preparation

Creating a rough outline

Incremental journeys

1. Initial Preparation

Here, I do my initial brainstorming. Starting with the original concept, I generate ideas for the setting, characters, motivations, plot points, magic systems, etc. You can spend as much time as you want in this stage, but for me, the most important things to firmly establish are:

Your main character (and what drives them emotionally)

A small, initial cast of characters

Any core magic or sci-fi elements

The opening setting of your story

Those four things are important, because they’re the foundation of the story – the launchpad, both for the writing and the outline.

2. Creating a Rough Outline

Next, I create a rough outline of the story, and I really do mean “rough.” Instead of detailing every beat of the story from beginning to end, I allow the outline to become increasingly broad and vague the further out it goes.

For example, let’s say my story is made up of three parts. The most detailed section in the outline would be Part 1; Part 2 would be pretty broad; and Part 3 would have just a few high-level bullet points.

In all those sections, however, I try to mark key turning points for the characters and the plot, even if I don’t know exactly what will happen. For example, I might say, “Our characters clash at the festival,” or, “A friend will somehow betray the main character’s trust, hurting their relationship.“

The point of this outline is to provide long-view guidance wherever I am in the story. However, I keep things relatively vague, because I like to delay making specific decisions until my characters are closer to each event.

3. Incremental Journeys

Now the fun part. Writing.

To start, I take my rough outline and make sure the first couple sections are nicely fleshed out. Then, considering everything I learned during my initial preparation and using my outline as a general (but not set-in-stone) guide, I write those first few chapters.

After finishing those chapters, I do three things:

I think about what I’ve learned about the characters and story so far.

Using what I’ve learned, I flesh out the next few chapters in the outline, which might include some further world building or character development.

I write the newly outlined chapters.

Then I repeat those three steps, again and again – progressively outlining and writing my way through the story in short, incremental journeys.

Why do I write this way?

As I said at the beginning, this approach gives me the structure and direction of an outline, without denying my characters the freedom to grow and surprise me. 

That’s why I write this way – outlining, yes, but leaving much of the outline initially broad and vague so that I can let my characters play a more active role in shaping how each plot point comes to life. The process is pretty similar to Flashlight Outlining, if any of you are familiar; the main difference, as far as I can see, is that I also maintain an overarching outline.

Should you write this way?

You’d know better than me! A key part of every writer’s development is figuring out their process, and we do that by writing and experimenting. So give this outlining process a shot if you’re dissatisfied with your current process or want to try an approach that draws from both plotters and pantsers.

And if you already love your process?

Please share it below! I’d love to hear how you write (with or without an outline) and why it works for you.

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Hey there! My name’s Mike, and I’m a writer and copywriter with an MFA in fiction. For more tips on how to hone your craft and nurture meaningful stories, follow my blog.

[writingonesdreams]

This is great advice.

I always start our super vague- I have the whole plot laid out but I’m missing the specifics. Recently I realized I could just start with the beginning and make my way to specific scenes as I write while keeping the broad outline and explaining on it.

Outline being something changeable, something with many drafts as well, that changes as you write seems like the best utilization of the outline.

Getting the turning and key points, the in between things can come as you write. Another thing I do is keeping a list of ideas of what could happen so I can choose the best from it.

[moringmark]

[humanityinahandbag]

This goes for writers, too. It’s actually an amazing thing to put your writing down for a week or two or more, walk away from it, and then go back and read it with fresh eyes. You might not like everything that you see. And that is good! Learning what you need it fix is a part of the process! 

[bauliya]

i think a reason why white people are so afraid of Diversity is that... they have this weird belief that if a character is a person of colour, every aspect of that character should revolve around race, which they find too intimidating. like no, you're probably not going to nail the internal politics of like, the indian-american community, or write a groundbreaking story about a black boy's dealings with police brutality. but! here's the thing! you don't have to! you can just write people of colour swinging swords at dragons, or falling in love w charming sea monsters, or going on funky quests, or having their filler beach episode. it's fine.

[justawritingaid]

How do I talk about the surroundings and atmosphere? Like I wanna be able to talk about everything and have the readers know what’s its like but at the same time, I don’t want to go overboard. How do I make sure that the reader has a detailed picture of the surroundings while not talking about it for too long?

A lot of this info is scattered around other posts, but you’ve asked about balance and it’s about time the other info was brought together. There are a lot of links in this answer, so take the time to read through them because they contain the real details behind what I’m bringing up. 

Writing description can be tough because writing doesn’t exist to give a literal exact picture; it gives concepts to guide the reader’s mind into imagining the scene. It’s pretty much a form of trickery. You don’t write to describe every single thing, and it would be impossible to do so while maintaining a story, so the details included in description are significantly less than in an imagined scene (link embedded). That doesn’t mean you don’t include detail, but rather that you include the details necessary to understand the story and to speak with the narrator’s voice, then let the reader imagine the rest. As you’ve realized, the harder part about this is finding the balance.

General description tips have been covered before, as well as how to nail down an atmosphere (links embedded), but finding that balance is about knowing what’s necessary for the story. Unfortunately, the balance is different for every story and I’ll give the most annoying part of the advice first: oftentimes you don’t know where that real balance is until you start revising a draft. Expect to make a lot of revisions to what you describe, how often, and the details, but there are some guidelines that can help you find a place to aim for:

Description is guided by the narrator. With 1st person or 3rd limited narration, the description is directly filtered through the mind and experience of the narrating character. If a narrator is describing something in detail, then they’re paying attention to it and often blatantly staring at it. Details that the narrator can’t/shouldn’t notice or would not care to notice cannot be expressed (link embedded). Balance is typically found by making sure you tell a story through the narrator’s experience rather than trying to paint a perfect visual of everything. When writing 3rd omniscient, the narrator has a lot more freedom to describe anything and everything, but ultimately you’re still trying to keep the story in mind.

Description controls time. The amount of words taken to describe something mimics time passage in a story. One sentence of description is faster than a paragraph, so watch out for weird implications like your narrator over-describing people they meet because it’s going to read like they’re just intensely staring at them for a bit. When you want to include more detail but don’t want to pause time, weave details throughout the rest of the scene. Balance is typically found by blocking off description that is meant to pause action and time, but weaving other description throughout the scene to maintain forward momentum. When writing 3rd omniscient, the narrator can actually pause time since their commentary isn’t reliant on them existing in real-time. Word count still controls how the reader views time though, so the blocky description vs weaving details effects still stand.

Description controls pacing. It’s not the only thing that controls pacing, but it affects it enough to matter. Pacing is about the flow of how fast or slow a story feels. Some moments can be stretched out because the narrator is experiencing it that way, but that’s best reserved for mostly internal moments rather than pure description. When things are described, the story slows. Balance is typically found by blocking off description that is meant to slow the story, but weaving other description throughout the scene to maintain flow.

Ultimately, setting and atmosphere are there to help paint the scene, but they aren’t the story. Description is most successful when it’s used to help bolster what’s happening rather than being used as a backdrop to set an exact, “perfect” picture. It also plays a significant part in a story’s flow, and some stories are more naturally open to more description than others based on genre, narrator’s voice, what the reader can be expected to understand, etc. 

What happens if you don’t find that balance? You risk losing your readers to confusion, poor pacing, over-detail, or even boredom as the story gets lost in the description. If you reach your draft and realize over-description is an issue, then check out these tips for consolidating description in stories (link embedded).

Good luck with your descriptions!

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[mossyshadows]

been compiling some links to fiction that are free to read online and easy to access - yeah it’s mostly short stories bc that’s what people are more happy to publish for free online as far as i can tell but there is SO MUCH good stuff out there!! 

some authors’ website bibliographies 

LOTS of short story fiction publications/online sites. a mix of well- known/established authors and emerging authors on a lot of them!!

& links to other recommendations articles & also some personal recs (yes, there’s only two lol, i will. add to it later.) 

link to the google doc 💛

[joyful-soul-collector]

So this is kinda random and weird, but do you have any tips/suggestions on how to reveal backstory? I’ve got my character’s backstory all planned out and it’s essential to the story, I just can’t think of a way to talk about it with giving an info dump. Thanks!

Sure no problem! I actually have a bit of a pattern I do when doing character backstory reveals! I may or may not have learned it from watching Avatar: The Last Airbender several times, and I have named it just now: 

Little Hints, Big Reveal.

Ok so the first thing is, obviously, to give Little Hints. Don’t do info dumps at the beginning, that’s the rule about info dumps. Not at the beginning. You can have Little Hints be things like:

something a person says (Avatar Example: Iroh asks Zuko if he remembers what happened “the last time you dueled a master”, it pans over to show only Zuko’s scar, and he says “I will never forget”)

something a person does (Avatar Example: Zuko’s general aggression hinting at his past)

what their goals are (Avatar Example: Zuko is focused on finding the Avatar, and the reason for that is tied to his backstory)

honestly things they wear/what they look like (Avatar Example: Zuko has a giant burn on the side of his face. What the heck is up with that?)

how other people act around them (Avatar Example: People are pretty wary around Zuko, except for Iroh. Does Iroh know something we don’t?)

Any of other hints you can think of! As long as they don’t outright tell you what happened/their backstory, then it’s good!

Now, we get to the Big Reveal. Now, this is gonna sound a lot like an info-dump, and that’s because it is! But the key is, it’s not all the info. Here’s the thing: 

Info dumps are okay. You just don’t want an overwhelming amount on info. 

Now here’s my Avatar Example: Season 1, Episode 12: The Storm. This is the episode where you get the info dump of Zuko’s backstory. 

BUT HERE’S THE THING: You don’t just get an info dump on Zuko, you also get one on Aang. This is where you need to get creative with your info-dumping because the way the writers of Avatar avoiding the overwhelming amount of info is they alternated between storylines. There were three storylines in that episode: 1. Zuko’s Backstory, 2. Aang’s Backstory, and 3. Sokka getting caught in a storm on a fishing boat. That way, you got a bit of each story line, but didn't get bored!

Now don’t worry, there’s more than one way to do this besides having multiple storylines, though that is a great option:

my personal favorite are when something happens and a character gets angry and basically spills their heart out to everyone. It’s the one that happens most in my writing, I call them Rants (like a normal rant but with a capital R for Emphasis)

a character sticks their nose where it doesn’t belong. Oops I just read your diary, oops I went into your secret vault and found a bunch of crazy shit, oops just overheard you and your family arguing, oops I pestered your friend into telling me what was going on (needless to say, these are called Oopsies, cuz I’m original)

something tied to their backstory comes back to haunt them and they have to explain what’s going on. Some examples are: an illness getting worse, a person from their past showing up, a literal ghost coming to haunt them, etc. (I of course call these Old Ghosts)

Any other ways you can think of, this bit is usually more invested in the story, it’s different for each book!

NOW HERE’S A IMPORTANT POINT: DO NOT GIVE ALL THE INFORMATION! There must be more left to learn after this info dump!

Because here’s the thing...

They give you Zuko’s backstory, but not all of it. They make sure you still have more to learn. We learn that Zuko’s father was the one who burned him, but we still have questions! You know why?

Because they gave us more little hints!!!!! What’s Zuko’s dad look like?? Who’s this gal in the front row who looks like she’s really enjoying this??? Will Zuko learn to be better somehow??? AAAAA

And like the like the cycle of the Avatar, it starts all over again. More Little Hints, more Big Reveals. 

The number of hints and reveals varies from story to story based on how long it is, but in my experience, there are often at least 2 big reveals for a character: One at the Climax/Middle, and one at the End. This is not a required rule, it’s just something I have personally observed. 

I hope this helps!! Let me know what you all think!