despommes

[despommes]

There have been a couple of posts going around about how smut writers have the challenge of keeping a sex scene interesting when there's only a few different actions and a few different body parts to talk about

And yes, funny jokes about writing, but when I see posts like these I want to scream

If you feel like the sex scene you're writing is repetitive, no number of synonyms for "thrust" will help you. Synonyms for "cock" or "cunt" will REALLY not help you.

Sex scenes are character studies as much as they are action scenes. What are the characters' frameworks for what they're doing? Emotions, thoughts, specific physical sensations. If there are metaphors, do the metaphors make sense with the characters' experiences/the story's theme's/the setting? Is the sex scene completing a character arc, even a small one? Is there a character arc within the sex scene itself, even a small one?

A really good sex scene is specific and grounded to the physicality, emotions, and thoughts of the characters involved. Even if it's a PWP!

It's been said that the largest sex organ is the brain, and this is not a joke, especially when we're talking about the medium of the written word!

[despommes]

Things That May Be Causing Your Writer's Block- and How to Beat Them

I don't like the term 'Writer's Block' - not because it isn't real, but because the term is so vague that it's useless. Hundreds of issues all get lumped together under this one umbrella, making writer's block seem like this all-powerful boogeyman that's impossible to beat. Worse yet, it leaves people giving and receiving advice that is completely ineffective because people often don't realize they're talking about entirely different issues.

In my experience, the key to beating writer's block is figuring out what the block even is, so I put together a list of Actual Reasons why you may be struggling to write:

(note that any case of writer's block is usually a mix of two or more)

Perfectionism (most common)

What it looks like:

You write one sentence and spend the next hour googling "synonyms for ___"

Write. Erase. Write. Rewrite. Erase.

Should I even start writing this scene when I haven't figured out this one specific detail yet?

I hate everything I write

Cringing while writing

My first draft must be perfect, or else I'm a terrible writer

Things that can help:

Give yourself permission to suck

Keep in mind that nothing you write is going to be perfect, especially your first draft

Think of writing your first/early drafts not as writing, but sketching out a loose foundation to build upon later

People write multiple drafts for a reason: write now, edit later

Stop googling synonyms and save that for editing

Write with a pen to reduce temptation to erase

Embrace leaving blank spaces in your writing when you can't think of the right word, name, or detail

It's okay if your writing sucks. We all suck at some point. Embrace the growth mindset, and focus on getting words on a page

Lack of inspiration (easiest to fix)

What it looks like:

Head empty, no ideas

What do I even write about???

I don't have a plot, I just have an image

Want to write but no story to write

Things that can help:

Google writing prompts

If writing prompts aren't your thing, instead try thinking about what kind of tropes/genres/story elements you would like to try out

Instead of thinking about the story you would like to write, think about the story you would like to read, and write that

It's okay if you don't have a fully fleshed out story idea. Even if it's just an image or a line of dialogue, it's okay to write that. A story may or may not come out of it, but at least you got the creative juices flowing

Stop writing. Step away from your desk and let yourself naturally get inspired. Go for a walk, read a book, travel, play video games, research history, etc. Don't force ideas, but do open up your mind to them

If you're like me, world-building may come more naturally than plotting. Design the world first and let the story come later

Boredom/Understimulation (lost the flow)

What it looks like:

I know I should be writing but uugggghhhh I just can'tttttt

Writing words feels like pulling teeth

I started writing, but then I got bored/distracted

I enjoy the idea of writing, but the actual process makes me want to throw my laptop out the window

Things that can help:

Introduce stimulation: snacks, beverages, gum, music such as lo-fi, blankets, decorate your writing space, get a clickity-clackity keyboard, etc.

Add variety: write in a new location, try a new idea/different story for a day or so, switch up how you write (pen and paper vs. computer) or try voice recording or speech-to-text

Gamify writing: create an arbitrary challenge, such as trying to see how many words you can write in a set time and try to beat your high score

Find a writing buddy or join a writer's group

Give yourself a reward for every writing milestone, even if it's just writing a paragraph

Ask yourself whether this project you're working on is something you really want to be doing, and be honest with your answer

Intimidation/Procrastination (often related to perfectionism, but not always)

What it looks like:

I was feeling really motivated to write, but then I opened my laptop

I don't even know where to start

I love writing, but I can never seem to get started

I'll write tomorrow. I mean next week. Next month? Next month, I swear (doesn't write next month)

Can't find the time or energy

Unreasonable expectations (I should be able to write 10,000 words a day, right????)

Feeling discouraged and wondering why I'm even trying

Things that can help:

Follow the 2 min rule (or the 1 paragraph rule, which works better for me): whenever you sit down to write, tell yourself that you are only going to write for 2 minutes. If you feel like continuing once the 2 mins are up, go for it! Otherwise, stop. Force yourself to start but DO NOT force yourself to continue unless you feel like it. The more often you do this, the easier it will be to get started

Make getting started as easy as possible (i.e. minimize barriers: if getting up to get a notebook is stopping you from getting started, then write in the notes app of your phone)

Commit to a routine that will work for you. Baby steps are important here. Go with something that feels reasonable: every day, every other day, once a week, twice a week, and use cues to help you remember to start. If you chose a set time to write, just make sure that it's a time that feels natural to you- i.e. don't force yourself to writing at 9am every morning if you're not a morning person

Find a friend or a writing buddy you can trust and talk it out or share a piece of work you're proud of. Sometimes we just get a bit bogged down by criticism- either internal or external- and need a few words of encouragement

The Problem's Not You, It's Your Story (or Outline (or Process))

What it looks like:

I have no problems writing other scenes, it's just this scene

I started writing, but now I have no idea where I'm going

I don't think I'm doing this right

What's an outline?

Drowning in documents

This. Doesn't. Make. Sense. How do I get from this plot point to this one?!?!?! (this ColeyDoesThings quote lives in my head rent free cause BOY have I been there)

Things That Can Help:

Go back to the drawing board. Really try to get at the root of why a scene or story isn't working

A part of growing as a writer is learning when to kill your darlings. Sometimes you're trying to force an idea or scene that just doesn't work and you need to let it go

If you don't have an outline, write one

If you have an outline and it isn't working, rewrite it, or look up different ways to structure it

You may be trying to write as a pantser when you're really a plotter or vice versa. Experiment with different writing processes and see what feels most natural

Study story structures, starting with the three act structure. Even if you don't use them, you should know them

Check out Ellen Brock on YouTube. She's a professional novel editor who has a lot of advice on writing strategies for different types of writers

Also check out Savage Books on YouTube (another professional story editor) for advice on story structure and dialogue. Seriously, I cannot recommend this guy enough

Executive Dysfunction, Usually From ADHD/Autism

What it looks like:

Everything in boredom/understimulation

Everything in intimidation/procrastination

You have been diagnosed with and/or have symptoms of ADHD/Autism

Things that can help:

If you haven't already, seek a diagnosis or professional treatment

Hire an ADHD coach or other specialist that can help you work with your brain (I use Shimmer; feel free to DM me for a referral)

Seek out neurodiverse communities for advice and support

Try body doubling! There's lot's of free online body doubling websites out there for you to try. If social anxiety is a barrier, start out with writing streams such as katecavanaughwrites on Twitch

Be aware of any sensory barriers that may be getting in the way of you writing (such as an uncomfortable desk chair, harsh lighting, bad sounds)

And Lastly, Burnout, Depression, or Other Mental Illness

What it looks like:

You have symptoms of burnout or depression

Struggling with all things, not just writing

It's more than a lack of inspiration- the spark is just dead

Things that can help:

Forget writing for now. Focus on healing first.

Seek professional help

If you feel like it, use writing as a way to explore your feelings. It can take the form of journaling, poetry, an abstract reflection of your thoughts, narrative essays, or exploring what you're feeling through your fictional characters. The last two helped me rediscover my love of writing after I thought years of depression had killed it for good. Just don't force yourself to do so, and stop if it takes you to a darker place instead of feeling cathartic

[despommes]

I Will Destroy You, Nick Flynn

[despommes]

Curated Spotify playlists to liven up your D&D sessions!

I have always loved playing D&D with background music that fits the location, mood, or type of combat, so I created several playlists on Spotify. This project is something I've been working on since December 2019, and something I want to share with you all! You can find the list below.

If you have suggestions for songs/tracks to include, or if you want a specific playlist that is not in this list yet, please let me know! And most of all, have fun!

Locations

Astral Plane

Ball/Masquerade

Bazaar

Castle/Court

City

Desert

Dungeon

Festival

Forest

Jungle

Monastery

Mountains

Schools of the Arcane

Ship

Tavern

Temple

Town/Village

Underwater

Moods

Creepy/Eerie

Dramatic

Enchanted

Energetic/Adventurous

Heroic

Grand

Intrigue

Menacing

Mysterious

Night

Peaceful

Sad/Mourning

Silly

Tender/Emotional

Combat

Small Battle

Big Battle

Boss Battle

Tavern Brawl

Chase

Themes/settings

Ancient Greece

Bard songs

Patrons/Visions

Visions/Dreams

[despommes]

tumblr / happy together dir. wong kar wai / june by florence and the machine / x / tumblr / the thrill, the fear, the hope / blade runner 2049 dir. denis villeneuve / dirt and desire, the phenomenology of female pollution in antiquity by anne carson / tumblr / it takes two by steve mccury / jim butcher / e.e. cummings

[despommes]

i hope you write (i hope we both write)

[despommes]

Researching as a Writer

Start Broad

begin with a list of more general topics and get specific as you go.

for example, research for a historical fantasy novel might follow a chain that looks like this:

life in the 1700s -> life in 1700s france -> 1700s french etiquette and lifestyle depending on class -> 1720s french fashion for middle and upper-middle class women.

starting with a general understanding of the topic you want to cover and narrowing down to specifics will make it easier to build on your knowledge as you go.

Think Critically

consider the source. if it doesn’t cite primary sources (for example, letters and photographs from a specific era and location), what sources does it cite? follow those sources if possible.

is the information reliable? is it provided by an educational institution or an expert on the subject?

who is the author? do they present any bias? what do they have to gain by promoting a specific mindset or conclusion? has any of their research been debunked?

Anecdotes

in general, anecdotal evidence is not sufficient for academic writing. luckily for you, this is a fiction writing page, and anecdotal evidence is usually fine!

work with a combination of scholarly sources and personal experience. if you’re trying to depict a specific health condition, you might consult medical sources about the technical details of the condition, as well as seeking firsthand accounts from people who have that condition.

remember that people are not monolithic! there are often forums online where people are more than happy to discuss their experiences; cross-consult these for common elements.

Lists

keep track of your sources!! if you ever need to consult something later on, it will be way easier to open a list of resources than go digging through your search history.

additionally, if you come across lists of sources compiled by other people, save those!! you are probably not the first person to research the specific topic you’re looking into, and there are entire websites dedicated to gathering research!

wordsnstuffblog.com/research has compilations of sources for everything from writing injuries to global period pieces by century.

Resources

if you can, check out your school or public library’s websites! they will often compile scholarly resources to access for free.

look for open access or open source sites like project gutenberg that archive and digitize historical documents and other works. scienceopen and the directory of open access journals are more of these. search using keywords!

keep an eye out for websites made specifically for educational purposes (those with .edu at the end of their addresses).

[despommes]

[WHILE COVERED IN MY OWN BLOOD, PUNCTURE WOUNDS IN MY NECK VISIBLE, VERY CLEARLY LIGHTHEADED] i love you. i want you to eat well.

[despommes]

Anyways, my increasingly unpopular take in this day and age is that no one is entitled to know anything about an author's personal life. They put their stories out there for you to judge, they didn't put *themselves* out there. And expecting queer people to out themselves before you decide whether or not they deserve harassment is just fucking heinous.

[despommes]

lay me gently in the cold, dark earth

astarion/tav | nonbinary tav (they/them) | 5.8k words | rated E

summary:

Like a stubborn rose bush, the love Cazador would have cut out of you at the root has grown wild. Perhaps it had always been there, struggling to survive in the scorched earth of your heart. Waiting for someone with gentle eyes and gentler hands to cut you open, to dig out the centuries of rot, to untangle the twisted and knotted roots of you and let you see for yourself what grows. (the cemetery scene, continued.)

ao3 link | twt link | playlist included in ao3 notes

[despommes]

lay me gently in the cold, dark earth

astarion/tav | nonbinary tav (they/them) | 5.8k words | rated E

summary:

Like a stubborn rose bush, the love Cazador would have cut out of you at the root has grown wild. Perhaps it had always been there, struggling to survive in the scorched earth of your heart. Waiting for someone with gentle eyes and gentler hands to cut you open, to dig out the centuries of rot, to untangle the twisted and knotted roots of you and let you see for yourself what grows. (the cemetery scene, continued.)

ao3 link | twt link | playlist included in ao3 notes

[despommes]

Your fic about astarion and nykos with the home and garden imagery made me cry. Stunning work.

thank you so much!! i'm so happy you liked it :) it's the first fic i've written in a couple years so i was nervous posting it. messages like this make me glad i did though. i hope you have a good day!

[despommes]

WORDS/PHRASES TO USE INSTEAD OF

very:

extremely

strikingly

incredibly

overly

awfully

damn

dreadfully

totally

genuinely

unusually

highly

quite

talk/whisper:

speak

tell

chatter

discuss

gossip

converse

prattle

blab

mention

utter

chitchat

verbalize

mouthed

voice out

murmur

mutter

mumble

suddenly:

unexpectedly

out of the blue

all at once

without warning/notice

instantly

surprisingly

in a flash

out of nowhere

in an instant

like a shot

abruptly

on spur of moment

by surprise

before you know it

with one's guard down

look/saw:

watch

view

glance

glare

gawk

set eys on

stare

peek

gaze

glimpse

sight

scan

peep

eyed out

perceive

noticed

witness

these are just some words that are often redundant in texts but of course, these synonyms would still depend on the context of what you are writing. i will add more if i can !! you guys can also add more if you want to.

[despommes]

Skip Google for Research

As Google has worked to overtake the internet, its search algorithm has not just gotten worse.  It has been designed to prioritize advertisers and popular pages often times excluding pages and content that better matches your search terms 

As a writer in need of information for my stories, I find this unacceptable.  As a proponent of availability of information so the populace can actually educate itself, it is unforgivable.

Below is a concise list of useful research sites compiled by Edward Clark over on Facebook. I was familiar with some, but not all of these.

⁂

Google is so powerful that it “hides” other search systems from us. We just don’t know the existence of most of them. Meanwhile, there are still a huge number of excellent searchers in the world who specialize in books, science, other smart information. Keep a list of sites you never heard of.

www.refseek.com - Academic Resource Search. More than a billion sources: encyclopedia, monographies, magazines.

www.worldcat.org - a search for the contents of 20 thousand worldwide libraries. Find out where lies the nearest rare book you need.

https://link.springer.com - access to more than 10 million scientific documents: books, articles, research protocols.

www.bioline.org.br is a library of scientific bioscience journals published in developing countries.

http://repec.org - volunteers from 102 countries have collected almost 4 million publications on economics and related science.

www.science.gov is an American state search engine on 2200+ scientific sites. More than 200 million articles are indexed.

www.pdfdrive.com is the largest website for free download of books in PDF format. Claiming over 225 million names.

www.base-search.net is one of the most powerful researches on academic studies texts. More than 100 million scientific documents, 70% of them are free

[despommes]

Hi folks! Here is the masterpost of writing tips and guides I’ve written! These guides encompass what I have learned, found useful, or what works for me, so I hope they are in some way useful for you! 

Finished guides:

Showing vs. Telling

A (Quick) Guide to Foreshadowing

Writing About Food

A Guide to Opening Lines

Top Tips for Clues, Red Herrings and Breadcrumbing

Beta Reading and Feedback

A Guide to Inciting Incidents

A Mini Guide to Writing Mysteries

A Guide to Writing Unreliable Narrators

A Quick Guide to Varying Sentence Starters

Upcoming Guides:

Imagery (Using simile/metaphor/personification and other literary techniques)

My asks are open for any suggestions for guides or questions/topics to included/covered! 

Disclaimer: As with every writing guide and every piece of writing advice, these guides are in no way to be taken as completely 100% correct for everyone! The wonderful thing about writing is how personal it is and there is no one-size-fits-all in writing advice! Nor should there be. 

[despommes]

How do I describe a tired person? I got 'dark circles under the eyes' but it kind of stops there.

[despommes]

Conveying emotion in your writing

One of the most crucial elements of good writing is making readers feel your characters’ emotions. Here are some of my tips for doing just that:

1. Use the right POV

Third person omniscient is a great narrative point of view, but unless you are using expert techniques like free indirect discourse/stream of consciousness, it’s going to be quite difficult to immerse your readers in the emotions of your characters.

So, if emotion is a key aspect of your WIP, I would suggest trying either first person or third person deep.

I’m sure most of you know how first person works. Third person deep means that the narrator is inside the POV characters’ heads, conveying all they experience and feel to the reader. This can be very powerful and is the POV I’m using for my current WIP.

These POVs allow the readers direct/close interaction with the characters’ thoughts and feelings. Therefore, the characters’ emotions will have a stronger impact on the reader.

Once again, I’m not saying that it’s impossible to convey emotion through other points of view. These are just easier.

2. Use physical reactions (and metaphors)

My biggest tip would be not to tell the reader how your character is feeling, but rather show them.

Saying “she was sad” will have much less of an impact than “her body was trembling, tears rolling down her cheeks as a ragged sob broke from her lips”.

Use physical cues to show the reader the character’s emotion.

You can also use metaphoric language e.g. “there was a fist closing around her heart, squeezing until she couldn’t breathe”. But this has to be done with circumspection and skill. Using cliche or over-the-top metaphors will make your writing seem sloppy.

3. Use form to your advantage

Use your intuition to utilise language/structure as an extra method for conveying emotion.

Use short sentences for fear/anger/severe sorrow. Long, flowing sentences for sadness etc. You’ll feel what’s right for the moment.

Use the right diction. Words like ‘heavy’, ‘cold’, 'dark’, 'hollow’ etc. suit a sombre mood whilst words like 'bursting’, 'full’, 'bright’ will fit a happy scene. These are silly examples, but the point is that word choice is important.

Use form to communicate the way you character is thinking in that moment. If their thoughts are quick, use short sentences. Rapid pacing. If their thoughts are disjointed, break off your sentences midway etc.

4. Less is often more

Multiple pages of heart-wrenching emotion have their place, but don’t feel like you have to elaborate too much. Your readers will probably get bored and won’t be impacted.

It can be very powerful to convey emotions quickly. One sentence or paragraph could be enough. And it often leaves a bigger impression on the reader.

Similarly, you don’t want to inundate your writing with one emotional scene after the other. Your readers need a break, otherwise they will become drained and won’t feel anything after a while. Save the tear-jerking for when it is most appropariate and it will be impactful.

5. Allow yourself to feel the emotions

I hate to break it to you, but writing is feeling. It’s exposing yourself to the things your characters are going through and allowing yourself to feel it completely.

If you allow yourself to be consumed by the emotions of your character, chances are that you’ll write a very powerful scene.

So, let yourself be happy and smile at your computer screen like an idiot. Be mad. Start crying. It’s a part of the writing process and it’s beautiful.

If you have any further questions about this topic (or any other aspect of creative writing) please feel free to ask.

Reblog is you found any of these tips useful. Follow me for similar content. Comment with your own tips.