Thought I would do an intro since I haven't yet. I'm Kayla or you may know me as @flamingdiva. Mia Thermopolis in The Princess Diaries who inspired me to actually start writing in 2007 when I was 13. For some time after high school, though, I stopped writing. In 2018 my desire to pick it up again grew and I am finally back to writing nearly as much as I did procrastinating school work.
I pretty much write what I like to read: fantasy, sci-fi, YA, dystopian, and mystery. I've written some poetry too.
I love being tagged and getting asks but I am an autistic shy creature with ADHD so it might take me some time to respond!
Favorite writers: Jane Austen, Marissa Meyer, Kathy Reichs, Susan Fletcher, Veronica Rossi, Ruta Sepetys, Meg Cabot
Other interests: Doctor Who, otome games, manga, Asian dramas, SHINee/kpop, Miraculous Ladybug
(links will be added as I post more)
Updated: April 18 2024
Main WIPs:
The Revenged & The Scarlett's Song
A duology (planned) that takes place in my world. Lady Shuntala decides to elope after meeting the wonderful and romantic merchant sailor, Nahuel. Soon, though, she's on a path to piracy in her quest for revenge.
Fantasy, Strong Female Lead, Healing From Trauma, Pirates
Intro post; tag (WIP: The Revenged); character intros
Desktop: project page
And They Were Roommates
A very self indulgent project that has many characters from another WIP (Thylore). After Jayme and Takashti are assigned as- you guessed it- roommates they have to learn to live together and deal with each other's emotional baggage.
Modern AU, Tropes Everywhere, Found Family, Fantasy, Neurodivergent Protagonist, Multi POV
Intro post; tag (WIP: ATWR); character intros
Project page
Secondary WIPs:
Home: Ka'il's Story
As persecution of elves escalate and more go missing each day, Ka'il worries if he would be able to protect his family while helping others. Then the worst happens: he's taken captive by slave traders. Will Ka'il make it back to the home he loves? Will it even be there?
A novella (maybe) that follows Ka'il's journey up to when he meets Shuntala in The Revenged.
Fantasy, Trauma, Slavery, Pirates
Intro post; tag (WIP: Home); character intros
Project Page
The Taste of Thyme
Happy with her job and life, Sadie couldn't wish for anything more than the next biggest recipe from time for her award winning blog. But after some encounters with her boss's son, Liam, she realizes time traveling is far more dangerous than she had thought.
Sci-fi, mystery, romance, diverse cast, historical
Intro post; tag (WIP: TToT); character intros
Project page
WIPs I'd like to get to someday:
Anar (title pending)
When Princess Djamila is orphaned her uncle takes advantage of the situation by trying to force her to wed a vessel of his choosing. Mila and her guardian cat run and end up in the neighboring country. There she befriends Nkiru and comes up with a plan just crazy enough it might work in getting her country back from Uncle Jayesh.
Fantasy, "fake" marriage, strong female lead, big cats
Firebird Summer
Alex and Kella are destined to be together. That's what everyone in their small town knew even before they started dating. It was never a question of if they would stay together but a question of if Alex could hold out long enough to escape his father's drunken anger.
YA, trauma, romance, coming of age, (does 2012 count as historical? someone tell me no)
Ayra's Tale (title also pending)
Four teens and their faerie companions are pulled into a nefarious plot involving the disappearance of Lady Ayra when Zim loses his faerie friend, Ziv, after running away from home.
Fantasy, Found dysfunctional Family, Mystery, Disabled Protagonist
Intro post; tag
Thylore
Saira vows to assassinate Thylore's human king in an effort to end the persecution of elves. Takashti just wants to keep his impulsive, adoptive cousin from getting herself killed while keeping as far away from Saira's lover, Cyrail, as possible.
fantasy, strong female lead, lots of bickering how are they going to lead a revolution at this rate?
Sofia (give it up for pending titles!)
Sofia Alesci has everything figured out. She'll go to college and become one of the best forensic anthropologists in the nation. What she hasn't figured out, though, is how she'll survive having to socialize and why the police won't believe her that the professor has been murdered.
YA mystery, autistic protagonist
writing a short story that’s going to be so fun and sexy, just as a nice change/ break from my big full-on main projects— (20 minutes later) i have forty tabs open as research and the most recent is about the chimney repairs on an east lancashire textile mill
(laughing nervously) obviously it's just for fun and doesn't matter (2 chapters deep into a 1795 book describing tilling and manure in boggy ground near the Mersey)
I don’t think there’s anything inherently wrong with relating to characters, “they’re literally me” etc but if that’s the only way you engage with stories you’re kinda missing the whole point of Characters being vehicles through which we can see perspectives outside of our own. and also you’re going to get upset when the Character acts in a way that is not Personally Relatable to You
doubly for shipping. at risk if biting the hand that feeds me, a well written fictional relationship should ideally be more than a didactic template for how to have a nice relationship
i think as a writer, the older you get and the more you read, the more you realize there are very few actual truly bad ideas. which is a relief. but! the other thing you learn is that stories live and die on the execution and ha ha. lemme tell you. unfortunately. there are lots and lots of bad ways to execute an otherwise fine idea
I genuinely cannot explain to a non-writer what it feels like when a chapter suddenly clicks. it's not satisfaction. it's not relief. it's this horrible specific feeling like you just remembered something you never knew. like the story was already there and you finally stopped being in the way of it. i don't know what to do with that feeling. i just close the laptop and stare at the wall for a bit.
If you're writing anything involving cons, scams, heists, or morally questionable characters who are very good at lying, here are some free resources I've been using for research. Saving you the "why is this in my search history" anxiety.
1. The FBI's Famous Cases & Criminals archive (fbi.gov/history/famous-cases) has detailed breakdowns of real fraud cases, Ponzi schemes, and confidence operations. The language they use is clinical and precise, which is perfect for getting the procedural details right.
2. The FTC Consumer Sentinel Network publishes annual reports on the most common fraud tactics in the US. Great for understanding how modern scams actually work and what makes people fall for them.
3. The Smithsonian's American Art Museum has a free digital collection of forgery case studies. If your character forges documents or art, this is gold.
4. Court Listener (courtlistener.com) is a free legal database where you can read actual court transcripts from fraud trials. Want to know how a real con artist talks under oath? This is where you find out.
5. The Internet Archive's collection of old newspaper crime sections. Search for "confidence man" or "swindle" in papers from the 1920s through 1960s and you'll find incredible real stories that would feel too dramatic for fiction.
Bonus: The Psychology of Fraud section on the Association for Psychological Science website has accessible articles about why people trust, how deception works cognitively, and what makes someone a convincing liar. Essential reading if you want your con artist characters to feel psychologically real.
Reblog to save for later. Your WIP will thank you.
it is honestly amazing how much of writing and editing is just. logistics. like... do i use a name here or a pronoun? if i move this dialogue tag to the middle of this line and break it in half, does the end of the line hit harder that way? what if i move the tag to the front? what if i remove it entirely? ...wait, whose point of view am i in; can i reasonably say this character is appalled, or must i say they look or seem or sound appalled? is this a deliberate action or a step-removed one; is her hand closing on his shoulder, or is she closing her hand on his shoulder? environment environment environment, we need to break all this dialogue up with some narration, the scene is coming untethered. what! are! they doing! with! the rest of their bodies that are not hands! fuck fuck fuck FUCK i forgot we covered this two chapters ago and now i either need to cut this whole chunk or find a reason to reprise the conversation from earlier. name or pronoun? name or pronoun? name or pronoun? move this clause around in this sentence? oh i'll add this phrase-- nope, never mind, past!me added the same phrase two lines down. okay, if i add too much environmental narration it's going to take away from this bit, but not enough and it won't feel grounded. what if i move this to its own line? where the FUCK are their hands?
Unironically the best reason to design a marketing strategy for your books that does not rely on social media is not that most book buyers (outside the USA, at least) don't buy their books based on Insta or TikTok posts; it's not that a platform could change their algorithm one day and all your hard work will be for naught; it's not that you are building your network on infrastructure owned by billionaires who can take away your livelihood on a whim.
It's that social media is annoying AF and I don't want to spend the time and effort required to master it.
(Tumblr my beloved you are different on the basis that there is no such thing as 'mastering it')
It's easy to point at a movie or TV show or book or fic and say "head injuries don't work like that" or "they would be dead of blood loss" and so on and so forth.
But when we're talking fantasy/sci-fi/something else where we are already making some counter-to-reality assumptions—
Canon has clearly established that in-universe, head injuries (for example) do work like that.
In most cases canon has not clearly stated that in-universe human biology is the same as real-world human biology.
So, given the ways in which injuries/medicine/illnesses have been seen to work in canon, what can we conclude about the unseen biological differences there must be?
Protective layer around the brain that drastically reduces the chance of traumatic brain injury but which does cause loss of consciousness when bruised
Improved blood replacement rate
For some reason serious injury may trigger bleeding from the gums (leading to spitting out blood)
*thinks about OCs* *Thinks about OCs* *thinks about OCs* *thinks About OCs* *thinks about OCs* *Thinks About OCs* *thinks about OCs* *THINKS ABOUT OCS* *thinks about OCs* *thinks about OCS* *thinks about OCs* *THINKS about OCs* *thinks about OCs* *thinks ABOUT OCs* *thinks about OCs* *thinks about OCs* *Thinks about OCs* *thinks about OCs* *thinks About OCs* *thinks about OCs* *Thinks About OCs* *thinks about OCs* *THINKS ABOUT OCS* *thinks about OCs* *thinks about OCS* *thinks about OCs* *THINKS about OCs* *thinks about OCs* *thinks ABOUT OCs* *thinks about OCs*
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