#kaatiba

[bebewrites]

I promise I searched your blog, but how do you (specifically) zero draft? The post that showed up in a search of your blog was like, bullet point writing whatever is in your head for the.wip, which I think is v cool and would help me finish lofm! So I'm curious how you do it!

Oh yes, okay! I don't think I've actually explained it anywhere, but I love talking about this.

what is a zero draft?

The great thing about a zero draft is that you can pretty much make it whatever you need it to be. For me, I was having a hard time with the middle of my story. I've started and stopped this wip so many times, always getting hung up at the same part as I approach the middle. I've always had a very clear picture of the beginning and the end, but never how to get all the way through from point A to point B. My original outline had things in brackets like [character growth] and [plot stuff], but what does that mean!?

My goal was to get all the way through. So I opened a blank document, started at the beginning, and literally rambled and talked my way through the entire story. I didn't write real prose. It was all stream of consciousness. It was me describing what happens in the story as if I was telling it to a friend. The zero draft was my rubber duck. This was my brainstorming document. I used common vernacular and slang and abbreviations. There are bullet points, numbered lists, sidebars where I rambled about a scene I completely forgot to mention in a previous section. Lots of comments about things I need to include in the next draft. Literally anything and everything I thought of went into the zero draft.

A zero draft can be as long or short as you need it to be. Mine ended up being around 40k words. But I've seen other people say a zero draft is 10k to 20k words. It's really up to you! And when you feel like you've covered enough of the story to move on to the next draft.

And you don't have to go about a zero draft the way I did! Recently, an author I love and follow on instagram (Casey McQuiston) shared in their stories that when they were writing their most recent book, they zero drafted each chapter before they wrote it out. Casey said that because of this, it was first time they didn't have major edits and rewrites afterwards. So if you find yourself needing a little more structure and sense of where you're going, I think a zero draft could be super helpful!

Of course you don't have to have a zero draft, and if you've got a good sense of the plot and character arcs, you might not need one. But it can be a great way to brainstorm and figure out those things if you need to!

[you-are-my-neverland]

Hi hello hope you're well! Could you possibly tell me more about your nano wip Pirates? 👀

yes!! i could!!

well, firstly, as you can see, i don't have a title for it...so that's why it's just called 'pirates' for now. this wip is set in a fantasy universe where the earth, sea, and sky were created from the bodies of the great gods (not as gruesome as it sounds, but i love a good sacrifice/creation by dismemberment cosmogony. thank you mythology literature class i took over the summer). magic is therefore insinuated into nature itself; some are born with the ability to access it, while some can't (i.e some people have magic, some are Just Normal).

now, these great gods each have a Heart that was/is basically their magical core. whoever possesses these Hearts will have infinite power, etc; you know, the usual. there are two Hearts considered to be hidden in the actual world, the Stone Heart and the Star Heart. the Stone Heart is split into four pieces, presumably, two of which are with the overarching religious organization of the world, the All Seas Assembly (ASA), and the other two which are lost. the Star Heart has never been seen/found, and is the end goal of one of the wip's main protagonists, arete. arete's mother was a famous pirate on the quest to find the Star Heart, which she ultimately failed at. before passing, she magically imprinted a map onto arete's skin that would lead her to the Star Heart.

arete is ten when her mom dies, and manages to escape the destruction of their ship by being sent out to sea. she ends up on the island of caelus, near the village of kynohue, where akane lives with her mother. akane is our other protagonist, despite the fact that she'll be missing from much of the actual story. her father was killed by pirates after standing up to a crew who attacked their village, and so akane's life has not been great lately either. kynohue is now a tributary village that has to pay to the pirates monthly/quarterly in order to live.

the story as i conceptualize it now has at least two arcs. well, technically three if you count the pre-actual written story arc involving arete's mother, iriyin. the arc i'm working on for nanowrimo is an arc that covers arete and akane's life together in kynohue (with akane's mother, emi), which lasts for around five years (it won't be entirely sequential; there's mostly the beginning, scattered scenes showing growth and the passage of time, and then the end, but i'm still at the beginning if that makes sense). after those five years, when arete is fifteen and akane fourteen, they get separated after the village is attacked by the pirates, though not before making a promise to meet again one day.

after that, there's a six year time skip, and the story will pick up again with arete, now twenty-one, truly beginning to build her crew. her end goal has always been fulfilling her mother's wishes (which she is magically obliged to as well) and finding the Star Heart, but there's of course a lot of ocean to explore and other side routes to take before them. she's also waiting to reunite with akane as well; the two have no idea where the other is in the world, or if they're even alive. i've got a ton of cool characters in planning stages for their actual crew (a deaf swordsman, a miracle doctor, a navigator with a perfect sense of direction on a quest to find her brother, assassins, etc), but for nano i decided to focus on the first arc because that's what is solid in my head. not sure how much will actually make it into the main wip, but it's been ok so far.

alright, i hope this all made sense! there's a ton more worldbuilding behind the scenes, but these are the key conceptual details you need to know. thank you for your interest!

[sindar-princeling]

Boromir and Aragorn for the (amazing) ask meme?

Boromir: Describe something your close ones think/believe that you will never understand.

Half of my friends and family prefer the warm seasons to the cold seasons while I want to die all summer long (it's honestly the closest answer I could come up with, it was a very tricky question for me - it's really hard for me to recall a situation where it was my opinion vs a few other people's opinions, it's usually just scattered)

Aragorn: What is something you wouldn't be able to hand/show/give access to to anyone else?

my ao3 password aksjsqkznsixjd

(there are just some things that I write which simply feel too personal to have them connected back to me yet, even by people close to me; I feel like that's probably a pretty universal feeling though)

Thank you for asking!!

[antihell]

oh also! If ur looking for web weaving I have a tag for it: kaatiba.tumblr.com/tagged/quote%20collage where I collect them! It will probs help u find the people who actually make them! (If that is what web weaving means haha this is my first time coming across the term)

this is so late but thanks so much i’m about to go on a following spree on my other blog!!

[ardawyn]

Happy birthday! You're one of the most talented writers I've had the pleasure of interacting with! I hope you have a fantastic year, one that's easy and full of joy and good things and ease. ❤️

Oh my goodness you're making me cry! You're so sweet! I can only give that back to you. Thank you so, so much dear 💕

[eeveewrites]

4, 7, 23 for the meme!

You’re a darling and a dear and I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

4. Share a sentence or paragraph from your writing that you’re really proud of (explain why, if you like)

From Strange Sparks:

“Shiner’s, huh?” he mused as they sat in one of the obnoxiously red booths, picking up one of the menus from the wire rack at the end of the table. The booth was pressed against one of the large windows, giving them a fantastic view of an abandoned gas station, the deserted roadway, and miles of the buttery yellow emptiness he had gotten so used to that surrounded Braveridge. The only sign of life was the young couple leading their two laughing children into the Dairy Queen next to the dilapidated gas station. Though, with the ‘D’ on the sign flickering the way it was, he wondered if it was actually supposed to be an “Airy Queen” instead. “Do they specialize in black eyes or in beer?”

Okay so. I’m not usually great at description, especially not in first drafts. It’s definitely a weak point in my writing. But this entire scene, not just this paragraph, was so much easier to write description-wise than normal. The fictional city Strange Sparks takes place in, Braveridge, is located in the area I was born and raised in. So it was really nice being able to bring it to life in my writing! And I’ve read this to some friends and they agree that it sounds just about right for where we live so apparently I did a decently good job. It’s not great and it’s not pretty, but it’s home.

7. What do you think are the characteristics of your personal writing style? Would others agree?

Oof. Uh...I don’t really know tbh? Probably too much internal monologing and switching over into people’s thoughts. I like to try and show the readers exactly what my POV characters are thinking and put the readers in their heads while still maintaining a third person perspective. But I’ve never really finished a first draft, so I’ve never had to go back in and really analyze my writing while editing/rewriting a second draft and I prefer not to introspect too deeply.

23. What’s the story idea you’ve had in your head for the longest?

Oneiria! It’s changed a little bit, but the basic plot has stayed the same. I think I came up with the plot and the idea of Dreamwalkers....6-7 years ago? Most of my plots have changed so drastically since I came up with them originally, but Oneiria has always just kinda been chilling in the back of my head and hasn’t gone through too many evolutions.

[akoumi]

L for the name meme?

i’ll do this for lukas from deadshot!! 

Full Name: just lukas! most regular people don’t have last names, and lukas is one of them. only rich, important people have surnames. 

Nicknames, If Any: nope! lukas is short, and he doesn’t like being called luke. 

Hogwarts House: slytherin!! 

Gender: male.  

Sexuality: pansexual!! 

A Song I Associate With Them: beat the devil’s tattoo by black motorcycle club!! may or may not absolutely adore that song myself 

3 Important Relationships: 

his relationship with conr!! it’s very familial, kind of like if your father was ten years older than you and a very friendly, very homicidal maniac

his relationship with sal!! it’s the first time he’s ever had a true romantic relationship before. 

his relationship with myrah!! it’s also very familial, like if your little sister could wield two guns at the same time and call you a loser while busting open some heads

2 Fears: 

the ocean. see, an ocean isn’t something that really exists on prometheus, but he’s heard about enormous bodies of water on other planets that go on below for miles and take up over half of the planet. absolutely terrifying. 

losing people he cares about, though it’s a very very real possibility. living there, you have to be prepared for death. either yours or others’. 

1 Element of their backstory: 

he joined islea, conr, and myrah when he was fourteen!! before that, he ran with another, smaller gang of little cutthroats. 

[tracle0]

I said it on wattpad but I gotta say it here too: thank you so so so much for ur comments and votes on CofM!!! I'm so glad u like Halah and my descriptors I'm genuinely so moved ❤

friendo hello! 

Oh haha no worries about that, it was a delight to read! Maybe I’ll spend some time stalking your tags tomorrow, who knows, not me, I have no plans and I’m also running out of free time but! I do know that I regret not checking it out sooner!!!

tbh I have had a Very Bad Day today so being able to read the beauty that was your book actually kinda helped??? I could take my mind off uhhhh my head going ‘SAD TIME SAD TIME SAD TIME’ for a bit so! thank you! 

Halah is precious and if anything bad happens to her I will kill a man