eapearson

[eapearson]

I love your question, though! 

As of now, I write in English 99% of the time; I’ve gotten so used to writing everything in English these past 10 years, between studying in America, teaching in England, and obviously just writing stories, French doesn’t even come naturally to me anymore as far as writing is concerned.

I still do all my math in French, though. Counting in English is HARD 😂

(original post)

[eapearson]

Channelling my inner Jo March while brainstorming my novella 🤣

[eapearson]

The Slow Path

One of the things I’m learning to embrace about the writing world is the pace of it all. Anyone doing any kind of research about how publishing works will quickly find out that traditional publishing (having an agent & getting published by a publishing house) often takes years. I haven’t tried getting into traditional publishing yet, so my experience is a bit different. Back in November 2020, I…

[eapearson]

The Writing Itch

One of my earliest memories related to writing has me sitting at our very first computer, holding a favorite book of mine open in one hand, and typing it up with the other. It was a slow process, pressing each letter one by one with my index finger, the keyboard still an unknown entity to me at the time. There was no creativity behind it, just me writing up the first couple of pages from that…

[eapearson]

Although Submachine Guns (SMGs) are one of the primary weapons in the Mass Effect Trilogy, they are rarely used by players as their primary weapon. They do make a great weapon of choice for support classes, though, as they tend to favor lightweights to optimize their power recharge speed, and they are particularly useful in close to mid-range combat. With this guide, you will learn all about the 5 best SMGs in Mass Effect 3.

[eapearson]

To anyone first playing the Mass Effect Trilogy, it can be a bit daunting to try figuring out which armor to use, which is why most new players tend to stick with the default armor. And that’s not a bad choice in itself; the default armor comes with its own perks! But as soon as you start looking into the different armors available to you in Mass Effect, you realize how broad your choices are, and how many different powerful characters you can make. Just like with weapons, the armor you pick for your Shepard depends entirely on your playstyle and which class you choose. In this guide, you will learn about the three best armors in Mass Effect 3, one for each type of player – offensive players, support classes, and infiltrators.

[eapearson]

One of the best aspects of the Mass Effect trilogy is how versatile it is. Two players can have widely different experiences, depending on which classes they choose, or on their playstyle. What makes a weapon great will therefore vary from player to player. There are however some fan favorites that are fan favorites for a reason. In this article, you will learn everything you need to know about the ten best Mass Effect 3 weapons and how to get them.

[eapearson]

In its remastered version, there are five different endings you can get in Mass Effect 3. Just like with Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2, the choices you make throughout the game have an impact on how the game will end for you. This guide will explain how to get each possible ending. Spoilers ahead.

[eapearson]

To this day, Mass Effect 3 is known in its community for having one of the most divisive game endings of all time. After all these years, the question remains: is Mass Effect 3 good or bad? In this article, I offer a fair and unbiased review of Mass Effect 3.

[eapearson]

I was asked what sort of explicit writing lessons I learned from "taking notes" during my hate-read of David Weber's work five years ago, so here we go:

Pure exposition is bland, and needs to be salted with other things like character interactions and foreshadowing if you want people to swallow it instead of ignore it.

Less is more when introducing characters. Give just enough to imply other things, you don't need to spell it out.

Worldbuilding that caters to your interests is fine. Worldbuilding that panders to your interests is not. And yes, there's a difference.

Basic research on things you're not interested in is still important if you're planning on referencing specific details, especially if those details are real world things with a lot of history of their own.

The death or personal sacrifice of a character who readers have grown to know and love, even for a short time, is more memorable and impactful than any number of anonymous casualties in the background who we have never met.

Conversely, introducing a character and then immediately killing them off makes readers leery of investing in anyone, so there's a fine balance there.

People don't usually give their personal biographies in their inner monologues.

Foreshadowing is important; it's the foundation for later revelations. The bigger the revelation, the more you need to foreshadow.

Suspension of disbelief will not work when you directly contradict your previously established details.

If you're putting your ideology in the story--which you're going to do, because it informs your worldview which you're writing your story through--having it be the Most Perfect, No Drawbacks Ever thing to the point where even the antagonists admire it is exasperating. It will have drawbacks. Examine them. Don't pretend they don't exist.

Likewise, having one group or institution or political body that is blatantly favored by the author and then having the antagonists admire it is also tiresome. Yes, we get it. Your favorite society was born on third base and thinks it hit a home run. Don't think we haven't missed that you never show this perfect society from everyday person street-level. It has humans in it, ergo it has flaws. Show them.

Conversely, showing rival institutions and ideologies only as exaggerated strawmen and anyone who follows or belongs to them as being either idiots or corrupt is even more tiresome--and just makes it all the more hilarious when you undermine your own strawman all the while insisting that, "no, they're bad, they really are! Look at how bad they are!" It just comes across as petulant. Let them have the win and show it as such, and use that as showing why people might believe in it--or is your own conviction in your ideals so weak that you're afraid of questioning in the slightest?

Emotionally intense climaxes are the payoff for plot arcs. Don't cut away to a different scene or back away emotionally. If you're showing a climactic duel, show the duel, don't go talking about technical details. Let us experience the moment through the character's perspective.

Societies change over time. They just do. The culture of a hundred years before will be different from the culture of the present. Social pendulums exist and swing back and forth as the new generations reacts to their upbringings. Institutions evolve. Political and social status quos do not last for centuries practically unchanged, even in near-isolation.

Worldbuilding generally exists to support the story and the characters, not the other way around.

Building up an antagonist and then killing them off unceremoniously off-screen through no action of the protagonists is just bad storytelling, full stop. Doubly so if it is obvious from the historical model that you're pulling from that they were too big a threat to your favs and needed to be nipped in the bud.

Historical models are a guideline or inspiration, not an outline, and if you treat them as such, then it becomes very obvious when you break from that outline and why.

Let your readers think. You do not need to walk through every logic chain while holding your readers' hands for them. Yes, some will manage to screw it up and draw the wrong conclusions, but first, when you spell nearly everything out, it becomes obvious when you're trying to be sneaky because it's the one thing that's not explained, and second it robs the reader of the ability to invest their own thoughts and analysis into the story. All they have to do is regurgitate yours.

~~~

There's probably more if I went brain dredging, but those are the major high points. It's amazing how much you can learn from critically examining bad writing by a mediocre ideologue.

[eapearson]

Confessions of a Writing Hoarder

[eapearson]

"Making It" As a Writer

“Making It” As a Writer

Over a year ago, I quit my job as a full-time teacher. The reasons why I quit are neither here nor there—although I could probably squeeze quite a few posts out of my four years experience in the classroom. All you need to know for the purpose of this particular post is that I did quit. Left the UK, where I had been working, went back to France and to my family, putting an end to a twelve-year…

[eapearson]

Hello! Your blog post about fanfiction getting you a paying gig has some factual inaccuracies: ffnet and LJ both predate your 2003-2004 timeline. Yes, fanfic archives still existed and wanted submissions emailed in the early 00s, but those sites came online in 1998 and 1999 respectively. While you may have been unaware of them, it would help your reliability with strangers like me to update the post. Thanks, have a nice day!

Thank you for the information! I was definitely not aware of those websites when I first started writing, not at the very beginning. I can't believe I didn't discover LJ until 2007 haha!

[eapearson]

How Writing Fanfiction Got Me a Paid Writing Gig

How Writing Fanfiction Got Me a Paid Writing Gig

I have learned through the years that admitting to writing fanfiction in the writing community is a bit like admitting Titanic is your favorite movie. What’s wrong with Titanic, you may ask? Well, nothing at all, in my humble, not-at-all-biased opinion. To me, it’s a masterpiece of storytelling. Is it the best story ever told? Nah. Does it rely heavily on tropes and clichés? Yup. Does that make…

[eapearson]

On the Beach

  I found myself thinking about the places that impact us the most as children. I believe we all have a couple of these places we immediately think about when we start recalling our childhoods, places that shaped us. They come through in our writing, too, for those of us who love to write. To me, the place that shaped so much of my childhood is the beach that was just outside our home, and the…

[eapearson]

First drafts are SUCH FUN, aren't they? 😭

I have to remind myself of this every time I'm writing a first draft. I love rewriting/revising/editing more than anything else, love the process of shaping something wobbly into something so much stronger, playing with words and sentence structures.

But I can't do that unless I have written something. Damn.

[eapearson]

I have officially “launched” my website on WordPress, and a blog to go along with it. It’s all rather bare at the moment, but it’s there, which is an achievement in itself, considering I’ve been procrastinating doing this since January! 😅