#writing advice

[sniperfiction]

Notes from Writing Advice Videos

Some notes I took from watching a ton of writing advice videos. Take what works for you and leave what doesn't :)

Character stuff:

Background: Who raised them, and how? Who damaged them, and how? Who heals them, and how?

Secrets: What are they hiding, and why? How far would they go to keep their secret?

Write 3 memories. Happy memory: something that brings them joy. Sad memory: something that makes them sad. Perhaps they would rather forget it? Mysterious memory: either something they don't have all the answers to and would like to figure it out, or something that has more context they don't know about, revealed later in their journey.

Character identity! Write 3 I am statements from their perspective.

Additional notes: Stress reveals character. Characters should adjust their behavior depending on the situation or who is around. Example: You may act differently at work than you would at home. Or meeting with the queen versus meeting with a relative. How does your character react to things? Fight, flight, freeze? Problem-solver or wallower? Blame themself or blame others? Subdued or animated? If they got a gift, would they be overjoyed or feel guilty? Just some examples.

[andreviernes]

Point-of-View

[olrinarts]

Hope it doesn't come across rude to ask some slight writing advice but do you have an opinion on ending a chapter early for a good cliffhanger?

I realized my fic had a pretty nasty spot for one, but it would make the chapter really short. Is it worth it, just to be mean?

Ooooh, good question! (And don't worry, you're not being rude)

Realistically the answer is 'if you wanna do it, do it', but you're asking for more of an opinion than just general advice (though to be clear, if it fills you with glee then you should do it)

But for me personally, I think it depends on how short is 'really short', something I think should be measured on a proportional scale

I have a target word count for chimes of bone, but with that said, I actually tend to measure chapter 'completeness' by number of scenes - I usually have three to four scenes per chapter

So for me, if a cliffhanger falls on scene 3 (and I want to be mean), I'll cut the chapter a little shorter as long as it's still within my target word count. If it fell on scene 2, however, I wouldn't do so

I don't know if you do that kind of thing - you might be a 1 scene/1 chapter person! - but if we use that proportion of quarters, then my opinion would be

1/4: don't cut, too early

2/4: iffy, only cut if it's REALLY GOOD

3/4: safe to cut

4/4: that good good sweet spot

I hope that helps!

[giobun143]

Question to writers!

I am trying to preemptively gauge what rating to give my future fics both on AO3

The fics will have descriptions of blood/injury, fighting/violence, use cursing, and also make reference to sexual activity (but not describing the act itself in detail or even directly if that makes sense? Like only showing the initiation or aftermath)

What rating would y'all give that given my description?

[septembercfawkes]

Really looking forward to next week 🙌🤩 I have 4 thousand people signed up for my class at WorldShift (a [free] online writing conference) 💖 K.M. Weiland, Jessica Brody, Savannah Gilbo, and a bunch of other people who are likely cooler than me are teaching classes too. You can still grab your ticket.

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**more info**

What: WorldShift a 6-day online writing conference When: Aug 17th - 22nd (my class is Wednesday morning) How: 🎟️ Your ticket gives you 24-hour access to each presentation as it airs Upgrade: If you need more time, you can upgrade your ticket to the all-access pass and watch whenever you want. This also allows you to join live Q&A sessions, the literary agent panel, get all the bonus resources, participate in live writing sprints, and other cool stuff. 😎 It's 67 (👀🤨 Who chose that number??)

My class is on structuring your character cast 🙂‍↕️ This is the "director's cut" (read: I had 15-20 minutes more time, so got to include more material than usual) 💫

I hope you'll be my 4,001🙃

Your 🎟️ ->

Worldshift 2026: The Speculative Fiction Writers' Conference

Speculative Fiction Writers' Summit

[aliurophile109]

Day two of coming up with somewhat decent writing tips

Find a balance between descriptive language. If a scene isn’t important, don’t put much thought or detail into describing it. If a scene is important, make sure to describe as much as you can.

You can also use descriptions to have an audience get drawn away from something important, so it jumps out at them once said lengthy description is done. Also works vise versa, where if you want to keep attention on a main thing, keep other descriptions short.

Example 1:

“Dude look at that billboard.”

They looked up, seeing a sign saying ‘injured? Good!’ With a man in a suit giving a thumbs up.

“Holy shit that’s so funny.”

Ex2:

“Yep, this is my house.” They opened the door, allowing a view of the inside.

It was absolutely HUGE. The walls were made of a dark wood, adorned with all sorts of paintings and other such decor. One of which was a replica of “Saturn devouring his son”. They loved that painting.

In the center of the room were two giant staircases on either side, with a slightly darker color than the walls. They started at either end of the room but curved so they met in the center of the second floor.

To the left was the kitchen, with a dark red brick pattern on the floor, but they weren’t actual bricks, they were too smooth to be them. They also noticed the counters and a center island all had marble countertops and white wood bases. They couldn’t see too far in from where they were, but could see the corner of one of the cabinets, appearing to be the same white wood the counters used.

To the right was the dining room, having a long crimson wood table stretching across it. Or so they assumed, since they couldn’t see far into that one either. The chairs were darker red than the table, but similar enough. They were cushioned with white pillows on the seat and back, a nice touch.

They could catch a glimpse of a candle in the center of the table-probably three pointed- with a golden dish below it to catch falling wax. They could actually see a heaping pile of it almost coming out the sides of the dish.

Straight ahead seemed to lead out to a porch, overlooking a huge garden. It was rather far so they couldn’t get a good look, but the little dots of color told them that the garden had to have an extraordinary amount of care put into it.

“So whadya think?”

“How the fuck can you afford this? You work at McDonald’s!”

Alright that’s it for now, cya tommorow (probably) bye bye my lovelies!

[daphnemezerion]

This was an eye opening approach to a first chapter!