alainadavisauthor

[alainadavisauthor]

writeblrs please interact !! i want more pals <3

rbs appreciated ! especially looking for:

(dark) fantasy / supernatural writers

found family enthusiast

enjoyers of morally ambiguous characters

(if you’re interested in these! check out my wip)

[alainadavisauthor]

HOW TO: WRITEBLR;

so youve migrated from writing twt to writeblr -> what now?

the following is my masterpost on the ins and outs of navigating the writeblr landscape! while it can be scary to deep-dive into the world of writing on tumblr for the first time, there are a few actions you can take to make it a lot easier to interact and share your writing.

psa: this is neither an extensive nor complete list of writeblr tips! but i hope it can help :)

INTERACTION;

interacting with others is one of the most important aspects of writeblr. im going to be splitting this section into a number of sub-sections because there are several topics relevant to creating a system of communication with other writers on here.

likes and reblogs; unlike twitter or other social media sites, likes do not hold the same weight on tumblr. as well as liking a post, the most important step you can take is to REBLOG. reblogging will share a post to your blog and thus your feed. in doing this, your followers and anyone who checks out your blog are going to see the post, rather than if you just like or comment. reblogging allows more people to interact with a post. content creators (including writers) can be motivated to continue posting when their posts are reblogged because it shows there are enough people interested in their works. the same goes for you! the more you reblog other people's works, the more likely your own posts will be reblogged, thus gaining more traction for all your hard-earned efforts.

taglists; you might be asking: what is a taglist? a taglist is usually featured at the bottom of your post when you share your writing. it includes people who have shown interest in your works - all you do is simply @ them. it means that people who are keen won't miss out on seeing the things you post about your wips! it is essentially an opt-in type deal, where people can choose to be added or removed from being notified about updates, excerpts, and the like.

don't abuse your taglist. don't tag them for every little thing you post about your wips - try to keep it to major posts like excerpts or new art, etc.

**** A HANDY HINT: writeblr etiquette states that you should never just add people to your taglist. only add them if they specifically ask.

tumblr tagging system; the tumblr tagging system is going to be your best friend as a writer. tags allow you to manage your posts + can act as a navigation system for your blog.

when tagging, make sure to not replace characters if it's for a trigger warning. 'assault', for example, should never be replaced with '@ssault'.

if posting an excerpt from your wip, i would suggest the following tags as the bare minimum: 'WIP NAME', 'WIP NAME EXCERPT'. if you're posting it as part of an event, you may also wish to include 'EVENT NAME'. you can also have a specific tag for things your friends write, for resources you may find helpful, etc. the possibilities are endless. a hint: the first five tags are the only tracked tags. the most important tags you want to add should be your FIRST FIVE TAGS on a post. furthermore, only the first twenty will show up in the search function.

tags are a good way for you to interact with other writers! when you reblog a post, OP will be able to read your tags where you can add how much you loved their work, etc.

POST FORMATTING;

do; - add trigger warnings to your posts if they contain sensitive topics. - add a plot, characters, etc. other writeblrs want context for your wip beyond just a number of dot points about tropes. - put your post under a 'read more' if it is a long post. - tag any nsfw content. - add a transcript of any photos/images under a 'read more'.

don't; - use any sort of fonts beyond the regular when writing a general post. using the 'chat' font, for example, reduces accessibility to your posts and makes it difficult for people to read. - just post dot points of your wip. - plagiarise. - use other people's posts as a place to self promote.

PINTEREST IS NOT AN ART SOURCE;

this is one of the biggest differences between tumblr and other social media sites: pinterest is. not. an. art. source. the truth is that people aren't going to care if you post a moodboard with nothing beyond a few random photos of a castle and a knife, etc. sure, they may look pretty, but don't do it for a number of reasons.

first, you should always post art directly from a credited source (e.g. unsplash or picrew).

second, it doesn't show enough about your wip! people want context! not just random photos!

thirdly, most photos or art on pinterest do not CREDIT their sources. this is theft and this is bad. which leads me onto the next topic.

CREDIT YOUR ARTISTS;

CREDIT ALL ARTISTS. if you use any sort of artwork, i swear to all things holy, give credit to the ORIGINAL sources. pinterest, as mentioned, is not an art source. most artwork on that site is stolen or posted without credit, which, funnily enough, is a form of theft. if you're going to post any form of photo or art, please give credit. it doesn't matter what form it takes; link to the original artist or photographer in a way that is not hidden.

MOODBOARDS AND GRAPHICS, OH MY;

one sad truth about being on tumblr, as with a lot of social media sites, is that your posts will gain a lot more interaction if you use some form of graphic or photo along with your writing. graphic making may seem daunting but it doesn't have to be! they don't have to be complicated or anything more than a few photos - as long as they have relevance to your wip. moodboards are not necessarily a bad form to take when making graphics for your posts. however, if it just features a random collection of photos that tell your audience nothing about your work, they're not going to care. writeblr is all about actually imparting information about your wips, rather than just vibes. ****as mentioned, any form of artwork or photography needs to be credited to the original source. however, etiquette is also to not repost art without express permission from the artist. if you don't have permission to use someone's art, DO NOT put it in your moodboard or graphic.

BLOG AND BLOG THEMES;

tumblr is a really great site for expressing yourself through your blog, especially if you use custom themes! if (like me) you're terrible at javascript and any form of http coding, there are a number of blogs you can search for to find custom made themes that are easily adaptable for your needs.

but why use a theme beyond expression?

one of the best aspects of using themes is the navigation aspect. most writeblrs have some form of navigation page (beyond just simply using the tumblr tagging system) to allow their audience to find information about their wips, writing resources, and the like! it makes going through your blog easier for both you and others.

also: make sure to include information about yourself on the blog (but of course, not to the point of doxxing yourself). most tumblr users, especially those on writeblr, will think you're most likely a bot if you dont include at least some things about yourself. the most common things to add are name, age and pronouns! also a dni can be used.

WRITING TIPS AND TRICKS;

titling your wips by @crtalley

plot structure by @nouveauweird

how to blurb by @yvesdot

notion templates for writers by @atelierwriting

the tropes guide by yours truly

so you're missing a plot by @seasteading

novel length by @serpentarii

thank you to everyone who helped me in writing this post! love you all <3

[alainadavisauthor]

[alainadavisauthor]

I feel like there’s needs to be, like, handbook for authors who post on Ao3 for effective metatext.

By metatext I mean like tagging, summary, and authors notes (especially initial authors notes at the beginning of a fic). The means by which we communicate to our readers what they’re getting into.

Because we kind of all have to learn it by osmosis and there are conventions but nobody’s really taught them at the start, so there’s inconsistencies and misunderstandings or people just not knowing things through no fault of their own.

This ends up breeding frustration and confusion and in the worst cases resentment, hurt, and aggression.

I’m severely tempted to make such a handbook and get it circulating.

I think it would do fandom a lot of good.

[alainadavisauthor]

Oh so ur a writer?? Prove it. Drop the last sentence of ur wip in the tags

[alainadavisauthor]

i love my therapist but i hate being in therapy. 10 minutes before my appointment, i'm in a meeting with my boss - we discuss my artistic choices; my boss recommends i artistically choose less. 10 minutes after therapy, i wash my hair and think about everything that was said, and then i have to switch it off, like a lamp, and go back to work again.

i was on a walk the other day and someone had the perfect combination of his cologne and whatever-else. it was almost exactly his scent. i fucking hate that. after all these years, i remember that? i tell my therapist - i feel like a fucking wolf. try telling a middle-aged blonde lady. oh i scented him on the air. i'm 30, and i'm having a panic attack over something that would be a plotline in the omegaverse.

what they don't tell you about mental illness is that if you are lucky enough to survive it into adulthood; it becomes a weird slice of your life. because you do, eventually, have to build a life. i realized in a panic somewhere around 22 - oh. i don't know what i'm fucking doing, because i always assumed i'd just go ahead and die. i didn't die, and i'm grateful for that, and i'm very happy about that choice. but it does mean that i am an adult in an apartment, living with my conditions side-by-side like. oh, that's my roommate, adhd. ignore the glass, bytheway, that's ocd.

so you pick your stupid life up by the scruff of the neck and you're, like glad for it (so much laughter and light and friends you would have never thought possible, when you were in the worst of it). but it feels so strange to be dancing around these odd little microcosms, these patchwork moments of your symptoms. if you have a panic attack at night, you still need to wake up and walk the dog in the morning. if your depression is making everything boring, well, you don't have any sick days left, and a job's not really supposed to be that exciting anyway. your ocd tears out each individual leg hair, and then, an hour later, you sigh, patch up the bloody bits, and go get dinner with friends. and the life is kitten-quiet, mewling and pathetic, but it's also like - it's yours, so you're fond of it.

and it's like - you're real. so you still enjoy pushing the shopping cart really fast and then riding on the back of it down an empty aisle. and you're not, like, so sick anymore that when you accidentally drop a mug you burst into tears (except for the days you do that. which are bad). and no, you're not allowed around certain items anymore. oops! but you've learned to be good about brushing your teeth most days of the week. and you sometimes in the middle of the day you have a little freak-out about how fucking unfair it all is, how fucking hard, how other people can just do this without having to fucking hurt the whole time. and then you sigh and force yourself to sit down and fucking journal about it so you can tell the nice middle-aged blonde woman yeah i had a hard day but i practiced grounding. you still sometimes want to burst out of your own skin, but you force yourself to eat kind-of healthy and to take your vitamins. you let yourself chop off all your hair in the sink in a dramatic poetry of control and relief - and you also have developed good hobbies that help you move your body more frequently. you feel helplessly behind, lost in the shuffle - but you also practice gratitude, taking stock of what you have garnered. because you're trying. even if you're never gonna be normal, you have something... close enough.

and the little kitten of your life, this mangy, starlit tigercub, this thing you expected to rot so young: in your arms, it turns itself over, belly-up. exposing this new soft part, all the organs and guts. like it's saying i trust you now. you won't give me up.

[alainadavisauthor]

Plot tables: Mapping out and organizing all your plots and storylines

Can't organize your plot and are juggling between several plot lines? I got your back, I present: Plot tables!

(I'm probably not the only person to use these, but I have no idea if these are commonly used and I just don't know about it or I actually did something with this)

Here's a loose example I threw together. It's just a normal table where each column represents a different storyline within the same story. It shows you roughly what should happen in each chapter / scene.

e.g., from the example table, we see that in chapter / scene 1, there's a chase scene where the police lose track of the criminal they're following, as well as in the same chapter we see character B and C break up.

It's nothing groundbreaking, but it's something I want to share considering the amount of people I see complaining about juggling 50 million storylines and having no orderly way to keep track of it

[alainadavisauthor]

devastated to announce that actually sitting down to write, with no distractions, actually works 

[alainadavisauthor]

bi people have so many powers and can cast so many spells

[alainadavisauthor]

rb to have a super gay 2023

[alainadavisauthor]

2023 Word Tracking Spreadsheet

It’s here!

The 2023 Word Tracking Spreadsheet is available and ready for you to get started in the new year.

For those who have used it before, there is one change this year: I’ve added a column to record hours worked in a day, and to track those hours, and that’s been added to daily charting.

For those who have no idea what this is: way back when, I decided I needed visual feedback for my writing, to help me see progress even when I wasn’t sure I was making any. This spreadsheet was born then, and has gone through a lot of iterations since then. 

In order to make it easier to share, both the instructions and the actual Excel file are now shared through Google Drive.

Instructions for 2023 Word Tracking Spreadsheet

Downloaded 2023 Word Tracking Spreadsheet

[alainadavisauthor]

2023 Word-Tracking Spreadsheet

For some ungodly and probably-cursed reason, I decided to spend the last fortnight of 2022 making myself an Excel book to track my words in 2023. I already track my work hours, which is really fun to look back on, but I realised that because I don't track fanfiction or non-"work" writing on that, I was missing data (*horrified gasp*!). This book rectifies that. After putting feelers out, it became clear that others were interested in having a blank version of the spreadsheet for their own use, so. Here it is!

Download links

→ 2023 Wordcount spreadsheet

→ Downloadable instructions

About

I won't go through the entire book in detail here – that's what the downloadable instructions are for – but I will give a quick rundown of what the book contains.

Once it's set up with your projects, all you have to do is put data into the Daily words table. Everything else generates from that.

The word-tracking spreadsheet has:

A daily wordcount line graph for the year

A monthly totals bar chart, with stacked columns so you can see by colour which projects you worked on that month

Daily and monthly averages

Original versus Fanfiction comparison chart

A pie chart that shows which projects were worked on most

Project-specific line graphs like the NaNoWriMo graph.

This is not a pledge or goal-tracking book (although if you have the know-how, you could probably add sheets for that). If you're after one of those, I recommend checking out @tryslora's 2023 word tracking spreadsheet, which is really extremely cool.

A brief look at the charts

(under the cut to save your dashes):

This is a snippet of the daily graph (it's waaay too big to take a full screenshot). It's pretty basic; it just shows the trends in writing across the year.

Monthly totals chart:

This one tracks your total for the month, and shows which projects were predominant. (I do this on Clockify with my work hours, and it's great to look back on for scheduling purposes).

Averages

This one will take some time to be meaningful, but by the end of the year you'll have an accurate summary of how many words you write per day and per month on average.

Comparison charts

This is the original/fanfiction comparison chart. It'll show you the difference each month so you can see where your writing was weighted across the year.

And this is the project pie chart, which will change throughout the year as you write. By the end, you'll be able to see definitively which projects you worked on the most overall.

Project Wordcount Chart

And finally, the project wordcount chart. I set up this practise one across November and December 2022:

So that'll give you an idea what it looks like.

And that concludes the tour. I've done my best to test everything and make sure it works, but please do let me know if something seems broken!

[alainadavisauthor]

Kate Baer, New Year

[alainadavisauthor]

Dear Writers (My 2023 Wish For You):

Happy new year 2023.

My wish for you is that you discover within you a story so incredible and awe-inspiring that you forget all the pain you've been experiencing while you work on it - or better yet, that it helps you work through the pain you've been experiencing.

I hope that if you have a big project you've been trying to tie up, that you find a seamless and perfect way to tie everything together in a neat little bow and send it out to readers.

I hope that if you're fretting about publishing that you find the perfect publisher for you, whether it be a company or you - and that if you self-publish, that you find the courage to sell yourself, because I know a lot of us struggle with that.

I hope that if you have been struggling to find the motivation and/or inspiration to write, that it slaps you across the face and says I'M HERE AND I'M HERE TO STAY - I wish you hours and hours of motivation coupled with the perfect ideas to inspire you for months on end.

I wish you boundless energy, and as little burn out as you possibly can experience.

I wish you kind and passionate readers, who light aflame when they read your writing, who get excited at the mere thought of reading your works and who express their excitement in a way that sets your own soul ablaze for your work.

I wish you the patience and mindfulness to be able to step aside and take breaks when you need them, and not force yourself into continuing when you're exhausted.

And I wish you a heart of compassion for your own downfalls as a writer, that your mind is reminded that it does not make you bad but human. I wish you understanding that every single writer has struggles and downfalls when it comes to writing that they have to be mindful of and that your mind remembers to be gentle with itself when reading its own writing.

I wish you a happy and conducive 2023 in your writing.

Happy New Year, Writer Friends.

[alainadavisauthor]

[alainadavisauthor]

[alainadavisauthor]

Ladies, gentlemen and those of non binary persuasion, I have started.