themes: oppression and revolution, flimsy promises, hight but shattered ideals, danger everywhere, dreaming of a better future, forbidden love, fighting the apocalypseÂ
setting: dark sci-fi city with lots of different quarters and buildingsÂ
status: drafting, beginning to write
POV: third person limited
ęĽ - synopsis:
The resistance group âC.R.O.W.â fights underground against the cruel, dictatorial government of Plutus, their country. Â Like crows indeed, they operate under cover of darkness, coming and going as they please.. Their entire existence is like playing with fire.
And yet they are children, outcasts to whom life means nothing. Their only goal is to return freedom to Plutusâ population. For this, they spare no risk.
But then a strange gambler appears. He is a dazzling trickster who takes money out of the pockets of politicians and the rich in casinos and nightclubs. Â Who he is or what he wants, nobody knows. There is only one name: Elliot.
ęĽ - the cast
Ada - one of the resistance fighters. She is the youngest and fastest of them all, but also the loneliest
Pearl - Adaâs best and perhaps only friend. Works as a singer in a night club and is the girl of Smiley Backett, one of the biggest mobsters in town
Smiley - a gangster boss. Not particularly attractive, but powerful. Helps C.R.O.W. with their missions
Carmin - another resistance fighter. Scout of C.R.O.W. and possibly in love with Ada
Elliot - the mysterious gambler. There is only that name and nothing else
ęĽ - writing excerpt
Ada ran without looking. She knew the way by heart. The only important thing was to lose the policemen who trudged along the road close behind her. âWretched walruses,â Ada thought, smiling her bright smile into the dark, freezing air.
âYouâre clearly in the wrong profession!â she called over her shoulder.
There was the hatch. Within seconds she had pushed it open and slipped through.
She heard the policemen pass her outside. They would be busy for a few more hours, she knew.
Quietly she groped through the dark corridor. From a distance she heard Pearlâs voice:
âThough the words may be wrong
Weâre singing it because you ask for it
So weâre singing it just for you
How high the moonâ
She sneaked into Pearlâs dressing room, picked out a simple black satin dress and changed. Then she ran back down the corridor, but took a different turn and finally squeezed through a small, nondescript wooden door in the wall.
Directly in front of her was a pool table with a single man leaning against it, scowling at the stage where Pearl was about to start the next song.
âHi, Smiley,â Ada murmured in his ear.
The man flinched. âOh, hi Ada.â
âDonât you think youâre a little jumpy for a man of your profession?â
âIâm in a bad mood,â he grumbled.
Ada sat down beside him on the table.
âOh no, Smiley is grumpy,â she said teasingly.
âShut up, itâs not funny. Some kid just gave me a bad time at a poker game. He must have cheated, thereâs no other way.â
âOh really? Who was he?â
âI donât know, I never saw him before.â
Ada giggled and turned away. Sometimes she wondered what Pearl even saw in him. He wasnât handsome and he wasnât even particularly rich for a gangster boss. It was probably the adventure and the fact that Smiley did have a sense of humour and, even if you couldnât tell, was very smart.
Pearl had finished now and came over to them.
âYouâre not still talking about that guy?â she asked Smiley. âSometimes you just lose, it happens.â
Smiley shook his head. âI know, but somehow he seemed peculiar to me. He didnât, how shall I say, cheat honestly.â
Pearl raised her eyebrows.
âThere was no way to cheat, I saw it clearly. But he did it anyway.â
âWell, boy, donât worry your head about it, someone was smarter than you for once.â
Ada had listened carefully to their conversation. It sounded very similar to what had happened to the Secretary General last week at roulette, but not in a small nightclub, but in one of the big casinos in the city centre. He had been given a one-time tip and bet two hundred grand on 17, but at the last moment the ball bounced over the edge and landed on 18. Only one other man had been involved in the game and he had bet on 18. It had been a terrible loss for the General Secretary and it had been in all the papers. But there had been no trace of the anonymous other man ever since.
ęĽ - aesthetic
elegant casinos; cubes and cards; the shimmering promise of another life; leather suits; hazy atmosphere; watch your step; red lights shining from high-tech buildings; frozen rivers; never-ending winter, but no snow
genre: historical fiction, bittersweet romance with elements of drama, comedy and crime
setting: 1920s England, switching between the London demimonde and the majestic country manor of the family
status: drafting, beginning to write
themes: trauma, alcoholism, fighting for your believes, shattered idealism, disappointed love, conflicts between political views and religion, extremely macabre humour
ęĽ - synopsis:
Young aristocrat Alexander Harris returns from the First World War having left behind not only his fiancĂŠe but also some of his common sense. What he has left is alcohol and his unshakable pride, but he has lost his faith in humanity forever.Â
Far from his family, he becomes the glamorous mascot of the London demimonde. At the âCosmopolitan CafĂŠâ, where everything that is in any way dishonest meets, he gets caught up in the devastating maelstrom of champagne, gambling and endless affairs, and finally even commits treason when he agrees to spy for Russia. He knows everyoneâs darkest secrets and uses them when he has to, but despite his cynical exterior he is not a heartless person. On the contrary, there has hardly ever been a more tender-hearted one, but this was first smothered in the turmoil of war and then with liquor.
And yet he is a holy man, the patron saint of sinners, and somewhere, underneath all the dirt and sarcasm, is still the dreamer who wants nothing more than to travel and finally leave everything behind, because deep down he is - contrary to all assumptions - a true citizen of the world.
ęĽ - the cast
Alex - the protagonist; is a complete wreck (mentally), but laughs the louder, the worse it gets
Clarence - Alexâ best friend; tries to stop him from the worst nonsense, but rarely succeedsÂ
Ivy - Alexâ cousin. His partner in crime and also sheâs a cocaine addict
Daniel - used to be Alexâ lover, but the war made the flame die down. Still one of his best friends, though
Travis - Alexâ older brother. Very correct (heâs going to be duke, so he has to be), but loves him very much
Blume - mysterious girl Alex meets at the opera. Who is she? Where is she from? What is she doing?
ęĽ - writing excerpt:
The Cosmopolitan was strange in the morning. Dust particles danced in the rising sun shining through the high windows and the chandeliers threw tiny splashes of light in all directions. A curious milky glow covered everything. As he stood on the wide stairs leading to the exit, Alex thought he could still hear the laughter and music of the previous evening, but now everything was empty and deserted. Not even the busy waiters could be seen.
A funny feeling, he thought. Everything was quiet, the front door seemed to almost completely shield the sounds of the street.
Alex let his gaze wander through the room. Back there was his regular table, where they had been sitting last night.
Anger rose in him and outraged, he stepped up the stairs. He would now go and look for Clarence and have a serious talk with him. What was this brute thinking of just dumping him. Him, the great Alexander!
He fought tooth and nail against the oppressive feeling that was rising in his chest. A few days ago he had received a telegram from Daniel Gainsborough saying that he would henceforth study English History and Latin at Oxford. This news affected him more than he admitted to himself, for he realised that his old friends were scattered in all directions, and that he was the only one left without a degree and now almost without money, a foppish shadow of his former self.
At all costs he wanted to prevent his already crumbling heart from breaking completely, for he did not know what he would do then. Â
ęĽ - aesthetic
shimmering pearls, silk gowns, polished shoes, tear-soaked handkerchiefs, dirty streets, the smell of secrets, sound of typewriters, patterned stockingsĂdark, old houses, the thrill of the stage, golden dreams and bitter nightmares, the taste of wistful memories and the call of the wide world
ęĽ - playlist
love is the sweetest thing â fantasia in f minor â der nuĂbaum â youâre as pretty as a picture â spring â kitty-valse â oberon: overture â waltz of my heart â the nutcracker: the christmas tree â the land of might-have-beenÂ
hey y'all uhh i hate to be that person but my laptop of nine years is dying and i really really need a new one,, it would be awesome if you commissioned me for artwork or fanfiction because i need a laptop to draw/write/do schoolwork đ
I do!!!! My wip is called Rushing Whispers, and this is the folder in my Google Docs for it
If I click the sub-folder â1971â which has every chapter that takes place in 1971 (written by date) it looks like
So I have the Part# after the date, in brackets.
May 11, 1970 (P1)
December 13, 1971 (P70)
So if I need to find the 34th chapter I just type âP34â into the search function, or if I need all the parts I wrote in a certain month, I just search that month
Iâve always written my chapters on separate documents. It takes less long to load, I donât have to scroll for 57 years, and itâs easier to keep track up (for me)
And when I post my story, I add the date into the table of contents Iâve called âDate Mapâ
I kinda do that, but more with scenes than chapters, as I wonât know how the chapters are structured until Iâm done with the first draft for the story Iâm working on atm.
I will put them together in one file once I enter the first editing/rewriting phase. But since I plan to use Scrivener, I will probably keep some form of separate files :)
after finishing up 3 chapters in the past couple of days (7.3k words, give or take some), I wanted to share with all of you what Iâm doing now to simplify my process later.
first off, this is not specifically EDITING, but in a way it is. editing is a long process, and itâs usually aided by other people. this is a solo process that can streamline the editing process that comes later after the final draft.
evaluate the first thing I always do is evaluate my piece. I like to do this by reading through my first chapter and figuring out if it has everything I wanted to include in it, and figuring out if it sets the right mood for the rest of my story. if it doesnât, I move onto step 2.
find my weak spot every writer has an Achilles heel. mine is usually secondary character development. I develop the hell out of my main characters, but sometimes, my supporting characters can end up a little weaker because of this. this wonât always be the case. for you, it could be world building, or not writing in detail. whatever your weakness is, catch it here so that you can be more conscious of it and weed it out of the rest of the draft.
read through the rest of my draft so far usually, I start the clean up process at 3-4 chapters or 10k words, whatever comes first, but I might have written more than expected, so Iâm going to take the time to give it a once through and read what I have to pick out if thereâs anything I wanna add or subtract.
add and subtract usually, I will have scenes I donât think I gave justice to, and in that case I will add to them so that they can be more pronounced, and sometimes Iâll cut a scene all together, it really depends on how the chapter should feel in my opinion.
smooth and detail usually, once Iâve added and subtract, now it needs to be smoothed out with filler scenes and transitions. this is where youâre going to do all of the smaller touches and detailing.
finish up once Iâve finished doing all of this, Iâm usually good to go, and start on writing my next couple of chapters. it might be good to do this once every few chapters, usually ever 3-4 depending on how much youâre writing, if not, pick how many words youâd like to do it after and do this process over again.
now you have a cleaner draft so that you can streamline your editing process at the end of your first draft, and youâll be on your way to your next and/or final draft soon!
after finishing up 3 chapters in the past couple of days (7.3k words, give or take some), I wanted to share with all of you what Iâm doing now to simplify my process later.
first off, this is not specifically EDITING, but in a way it is. editing is a long process, and itâs usually aided by other people. this is a solo process that can streamline the editing process that comes later after the final draft.
evaluate the first thing I always do is evaluate my piece. I like to do this by reading through my first chapter and figuring out if it has everything I wanted to include in it, and figuring out if it sets the right mood for the rest of my story. if it doesnât, I move onto step 2.
find my weak spot every writer has an Achilles heel. mine is usually secondary character development. I develop the hell out of my main characters, but sometimes, my supporting characters can end up a little weaker because of this. this won't always be the case. for you, it could be world building, or not writing in detail. whatever your weakness is, catch it here so that you can be more conscious of it and weed it out of the rest of the draft.
read through the rest of my draft so far usually, I start the clean up process at 3-4 chapters or 10k words, whatever comes first, but I might have written more than expected, so Iâm going to take the time to give it a once through and read what I have to pick out if thereâs anything I wanna add or subtract.
add and subtract usually, I will have scenes I don't think I gave justice to, and in that case I will add to them so that they can be more pronounced, and sometimes I'll cut a scene all together, it really depends on how the chapter should feel in my opinion.
smooth and detail usually, once I've added and subtract, now it needs to be smoothed out with filler scenes and transitions. this is where youâre going to do all of the smaller touches and detailing.
finish up once I've finished doing all of this, I'm usually good to go, and start on writing my next couple of chapters. it might be good to do this once every few chapters, usually ever 3-4 depending on how much youâre writing, if not, pick how many words youâd like to do it after and do this process over again.
now you have a cleaner draft so that you can streamline your editing process at the end of your first draft, and youâll be on your way to your next and/or final draft soon!
hi! this might be a bit random but what could be reasons why two people hate each other? i wanted to go for something like gut feeling cause i donât want too much angst but iâm scared it might come off as too shallow
Not random at all!
Reasons For Your Characters To Hate Each Other
Bad first impression: When A and B meet, A is in a bad mood. Theyâre snappier than usual and make a rude remark / completely ignore B. B decides then and there that they hate A, causing A to hate B back.
Bad reputation: B has been told time and time again that A is bad news (e.g A is mean, shallow, manipulative, stuck up, etc.). When they meet A, they decide not to give A a chance and presume the worst of them.
Association: A associates B with a bad person / a bad time in their life. For example, B is friends/related to Aâs worst enemy or B had something to do with a bad experience that A had. B isnât directly responsible for anything bad in Aâs life, A just associated them with bad things and therefore dislikes them.
Conflicting ideas: Even if theyâre on the same side, they may both have different ideas/opinions that theyâre unwilling to give up.
Misunderstanding: Very simple. A believes that B wrong them in some way or that B is
They simply donât mesh: They feel like their personalities donât work together. They may see the other as boring, stuck up, too loud, too quiet, stubborn or a million other things.
Recently, I saw a blog post online about how you should write in scenes instead of in chapters, and honestly I really loved that idea and thought some of you would appreciate it as well. Right now, as a lot of you know, I am working on a WIP called Family Tears, and while I am not writing it in scenes, after reading the article I read, I feel as though I should be.
there are big benefits of writing in scenes
if you have something you know you want to include, a scene youâve been imagining in your head, you can make it work and you can place the scene wherever you feel it should go and then just integrate it in with fillers and transitions.Â
it can help you be more organized. you can breakdown your chapters into a certain number of scenes you really want to include, and once you have those scenes, you can add more to it to make it smoother.
it can help you evenly distribute things out, and can make it easier while planning because you just have to decide how long you want the scenes in each section.
it will help you spot unessential scenes to the plot because they will be weaker than the ones you actually need, which will help you not stress out over the scene not working, because you can just take it out or fix it so that it works for what you want it to do.
To me, writing is a flexible craft that can be bent to your will, because youâre the creator. You donât always have to follow a chapter by chapter breakdown, and if youâre getting tired of that cookie cutter, you can try something new and see if it actually makes you progress more as a writer.Â
If anyone else has another way they like to breakdown their writing, Iâm super interested in these mechanisms.
Hi! I really like your titles for your stories, and I'm currently struggling to name my WIP. Do you have any tips for coming up with titles? If not, no worries! Have a good day!
Aw, thank you! Itâs always heartening to hear that people like the titles for my books â¤
Honestly itâs often a total accident when I come up with a decent title â When Dealing With Wolves was supposed to be a placeholder but when I announced that, a whole bunch of followers came out of the woodwork to tell me how much they liked it so I was like âhuh, guess I should keep this thenâ. So I can give you some tips because Iâve hoarded many over the years, but I give them to you with the full disclaimer that Iâm Not Good at following these tips myself. Also, before I start Iâd just like to slip inâ
A BRIEF NOTE ON PICKING TITLES
Titling things is hard sometimes. You may want to change a title several times, or you might strike gold on your first try. The biggest tip I feel I can give you is: focus on telling your story first and slap a name on it afterwards. A title is usually (if not always) intrinsically linked to the story in some way, and so it stands to reason that finding a Proper Title⢠for a WIP will be difficult until itâs in a more polished form. Never be afraid to use placeholders!
SOME QUICK AND NIFTY TIPS FOR TITLES
the title is a worldbuilding reference:
NOTE: this works best for / is most commonly used in titling fantasy or SciFi works, but is in no way restricted to them. âWorldbuildingâ refers to any genre, since each story you create is a storyworld in itself.Â
⢠The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson â the title is the title of a book that exists within the storyworld; a book which has a profound impact on the protagonists in different ways.
⢠The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien â Tolkien invented hobbits for this book, and Bilbo Baggins is held up an example of what hobbits should be by dint of many peoples outside of the Shire having never seen a hobbit before
⢠The Handmaidâs Tale by Margaret Atwood â the story is about the country of Gilead, which divides women into various functions and exploits them, based on biblical passages. Handmaids are used to bear children, but theyâre also forbidden from writing or reading so the title is like a tongue-in-cheek nudge toward the rules of the storyworld.
the title is pretty but actually self-explanatory:
⢠The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton â Evelyn Hardcastle is going to be murdered; the man who has to save her is put in seven different bodies throughout the course of a time period (I think itâs a day?) and must race to solve the murder before the time-loop is reset. In essence, Evelyn is murdered seven times. (It might also be a play on The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, but Iâm not sure).
⢠The Return of the King by J. R. R. Tolkien â the idea that a king must return to Gondor is integral to the trilogy, but it doesnât come to a head until this last book in which we learn that a steward holds leadership of the city until a king returns â which is exactly what happens.
A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness â There is a monster. It calls on a young boy at night. On a more thematic level, this young boy is trying to cope with the impending âmonsterâ of his motherâs terminal illness and death, and finds solace in the company of a real, tangible monster who turns out not to be overly monstrous at all.
using lines, phrases or concepts from the text itself:
⢠The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers â the story is about a found family crew onboard on a ship that punches wormholes in space, making its way towards a distant planet. This planet is described as a âsmall, angry planetâ and the journey to get there is very long.
⢠Simon Vs The Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli â Simon is the main character, trying to find his way through coming out in a heteronormative society. He and his soon-to-be boyfriend have a conversation via email about the concept of the âhomosexual agendaâ, in which Simon says âThe Homosexual Agenda? I donât know. I think itâs more like the Homo Sapiens Agendaâ. (i.e., heâs trying to work out who he is while chafing against the heteronormative idea of what it is to be human).
⢠Five Quarters of the Orange by Joanne Harris â Itâs been ten years since I read this, but the gist is: there are five characters caught up in a secret that extends back to their childhoods. In an important scene, they have an orange which was gained by suspect means (it p much symbolises their dangerous secret), and split it up between their group into âfive quartersâ. Itâs also a very compelling title because you canât have five quarters of something! itâs impossible! (Yes, I picked this up entirely because the title was intriguing and I wanted to know how an orange could have five quarters. I barely remember the plot but that symbolism struck me right to the core, so I think it deserves a place here).
use a concept/word/phrase that nicely sums up the bookâs themes:
NOTE: this was initially part of the previous section, but I think there is some distinction. A title can draw on the themes of the story without having a clear textual link (but can still retain a clear âmetaâ link? is what Iâm trying to say here)
⢠Vicious by V. E. Schwab â this is a book that examines the lines between hero and villain in a storyworld inhabited by very morally grey characters. Even when these characters do acts that could be objectively good/have âgoodâ intentions, everything is undercut by themes of revenge, bitterness, jealousy and, as the title suggests, viciousness.
⢠Wicked by Gregory Maguire â A transformative retelling of the Wizard of Oz from the P.O.V of the so-named Wicked Witch. The title fits because Maguire examines exactly how and why Elphaba is regarded as wicked, and what wickedness actually is.
⢠Life After Life by Kate Atkinson â the MC starts her life again after each âuntimelyâ death, with subtle variations each time as her choices take her in different directions. She is living, quite literally, one life after another.
title the story after an important place or character:
NOTE: âimportantâ means main setting/main character but can also have a thematic element involved in why the author chose that place or character as the title
⢠Jane Eyre (aka Jane Eyre: An Autobiography) by Charlotte BrontĂŤ â Jane is the main character and narrator; part of her character arc also revolves around her discovering her own identity and learning to take pride in her own self, despite her not having an impressive family name or fortune.
⢠Wuthering Heights by Emily BrontĂŤ â Wuthering Heights is the setting for a large part of the story, but on a thematic level itâs also where all the strife that drives the plot first originated from and where it consistently draws all the characters back to, no matter how hard they try to escape its shadow.
⢠Eragon by Christopher Paolini â Eragon is the main character, and his true identity is buried at the heart of the vast fantasy epic that unfolds over the next books (also his name is basically âdragonâ with the âdâ replaced, and the books are about dragon riders).
naming a book after a place or character can also be more indirect / meta, such as:
⢠Room by Emma Donoghue â the child who narrates the book has never left the single âroomâ (itâs actually a shed, but I digress) in which he was born; as far as heâs concerned, this room is his entire world and so he thinks of it as Room in the same way we think of Earth as the planet on which we live
⢠The Time Travellerâs Wife by Audrey Niffenegger â the novel is about Clare whose husband, Henry, has a genetic disorder that causes him to involuntarily travel through time. Although Henry is the one who fits the bill for the typical âprotagonist with special powersâ and narrates a chunk of the book, its big focus on how Clare copes with being the one who has to wait behind whenever Henry time-travels. Itâs a spin on the trope of a wife/betrothed waiting for her lover to return from some sort of journey without knowing if heâll ever come back, and examines the wants, fears and feelings of the said wife, hence the title of âThe Time Travellerâs Wifeâ.
â The format of this piece in my Resources For Writing Period Pieces series is different due to it covering only a portion of a century, which has much more documentation and recorded historical details. Iâve done this in a way that covered each decade almost separately, but put all four under the umbrella of âearly 20th centuryâ. I hope this is helpful to all of you historical fiction writers out there. The other two articles covering this century will be formatted the same way. Happy researching!
Ko-Fi || Masterlist || Work In Progress || Request
Major Events
Below are links to extensive lists of events, categorized by individual years within the indicated decade. There you will find summaries, information, and timelines that will help you with further research.
1900s
1910s
1920s
1930s
Popular Culture & Society
Music
1900s
1910s
1920s
1930s
Literature & Art
1900s
1910s
1920s
1930s
World Leaders
1900s
1910s
1920s
1930s
Technology
1900s
1910s
1920s
1930s
Politics
1900s
1910s
1920s
1930s
Notable Eras of The Time PeriodÂ
Edwardian Era
First World War
Interwar Britain
Progressive EraÂ
Jazz Age
Xinhai RevolutionÂ
Warlord Era
Chinese Civil War
TaishĹ periodÂ
Roaring TwentiesÂ
Great Depression
Popular Names
1900-1909 Male and Female
1910-1919 Male and Female
1920-1929 Male and Female
1930-1939 Male and Female
Clothing
Edwardian Fashion
1900s
1910s
Western FashionÂ
1920s
1930s
By Country
1900s by country
1910s by country
1920s by country
1930s by country
Support Wordsnstuff!
If you enjoy my blog and wish for it to continue being updated frequently and for me to continue putting my energy toward answering your questions, please consider Buying Me A Coffee.
Request Resources, Tips, Playlists, or Prompt Lists
Instagram // Twitter //Facebook //#wordsnstuff
FAQ //monthly writing challenges // Masterlist
MY CURRENT WORK IN PROGRESS (Check it out, itâs pretty cool. At least I think it is.)