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How do I make a monarchy oppressive but still have some characters have a decent quality of life, at least compared to others? (Actually, how do I make oppressive monarchy in general? I see it a lot but I don't have much of a grasp on how it works in stories)

Writing an Oppressive Monarchy

To write an oppressive monarchy, you first have to understand what oppression is. When we talk about government oppression (versus systems of oppression), we're talking about a ruling group (be it a monarchy, government, society, or class) who exercises unjust authority and power on depowered groups. Restricted freedom, impeded civil liberties, withholding of basic necessities like food and medicine, excessive taxation, low wages, slavery, servitude, unfair judicial practice and punishment, or any combination, are just some of the burdens placed on an oppressed society by the oppressive ruling class. You can do research to learn more about government oppression as there's lots of information out there.

When you have an oppressive ruling group, there are only three ways someone can still have a decent quality of life in that society:

1 - They are part of the oppressive ruling group, whether that's the government, monarchy, etc.

2 - They are part of a middle group that benefits from the oppression but is not actually part of the ruling group. The citizens of the Capitol in The Hunger Games for example aren't the actual government, but they benefit from the oppression of the districts.

3 - They have escaped the reach of the oppressive ruling group and are able to live life on their own terms.

I hope that helps!

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I’ve been writing seriously for over 30 years and love to share what I’ve learned. Have a writing question? My inbox is always open!

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You're worth waiting for. Write at your own pace. Your readers can wait a bit longer.

Your worth as a writer isn't hinged on your ability to constantly create & bang out writing.

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You are a writer because you write. That's truly all it takes. You don't have to prove your worth to anyone. Your love for storytelling and desire to create is enough.

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Literally cannot emphasize enough that my #1 writing advice is to stop being afraid. Stop being afraid of sounding too cringe, or too stupid, or too horrifying, or too horny, or too weird, or too much, or too little, or too you. You need to put your entire pussy into your art. Sure, it won't be to everyone's tastes, but if you keep yourself to the blandest tamest safest roads possible you will be of no one's tastes, not even yours.

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97 character motivations

Here’s our masterlist of 97 character motivations that you can use in your novel to spark an idea for a character arc!

Saving a family member from capture

Saving a sibling from disease

Saving a pet from danger

Saving the world from ruin

Saving a friend from heartbreak

Saving the town from financial ruin

Saving friends from dangerous deadly situations

Saving a love interest from dying

Saving themselves in a dangerous world

Saving a community from falling apart

Saving a child from a potentially dangerous circumstance

Saving a place or location from evil forces

Saving a ghost from limbo

Overcoming a phobia

Overcoming an addiction

Overcoming marital struggles

Moving on from loss

Finding a significant other

Finding a new family (not blood-related)

Finding true biological family

Finding out an old secret

Finding a way home

Reconnecting with long-lost friends

Getting out of a dark state of mind

Finding peace in life

Beating a disease

Beating an arch nemesis

Forming a peaceful community

Transforming a location

Bringing someone back to life

Winning a competition

Going on an adventure

Getting a dream job

Keeping a secret

Escaping a location of capture

Proving a moral point

Proving a political point

Winning a political campaign

Betray someone

Ruin someone’s life

Find a suspect or killer

Find the answer to a mystery

Discover ancient sites & secret histories

Perform a successful ritual

Summon the dead

Save a country from dictatorship

Become the most powerful in a community

Outshine a family member in business success

Prove someone wrong

Win prize money to help someone in need

Get revenge on someone who wronged them

Find the person who wronged them

Develop significant scientific progress

Gain respect from family

Get over an ex-lover

Move on from a painful death

Keep their community alive

Lead their community

Heal people in need

Preserve a species (animal, alien, plant…)

Discover new world

Get recognition for hard work

Become famous

Get rich to prove themselves to people who doubted them

Break a long tradition

Challenge the status quo of a community

Defeat a magical nemesis

Take over a location to rule

Find out truth behind old legends

Help someone get over their struggles

Prove their moral values

Prove their worth to an external party

Become a supernatural creature

Keep something from falling into the wrong hands

Protect the only person they care about

Start a revolution

Invent new technology

Invent a new weapon

Win a war

Fit in with a community

Atone for past sins

Give top-secret information to an enemy as revenge

Kill an ex-lovers current partner

Reinvent themselves

Raise a strong child

Make it to a location in a strict time period

Find faith

Find enlightenment

Find out more about the afterlife

Confess love to a friend

Solve a moral dilemma

Have a child of their own

Avoid being alone

Run away from past struggles

Reinvent themselves as a new person

Impress a colleague or boss

Avoid a fight or war breaking out

If you need a hand getting started on your novel, we have 3 coaches at The Plottery who can work with you intensively for 4 month to skill up your writing and help you finish your first draft.

Apply through the [link here] or below!

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“I’ve found most authors have the wrong mental picture of the process. Instead of a sprint, publishing is more like a marathon. Slow, steady and consistent action will get you your audience and success.”

— W. Terry Whalin

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hold your children

I'm just exploding in slow motion until the rest of episode 7 comes out

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My only real and valid writing tip is that you google every word you make up for your fantasy stories. That's It

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Probably the single hardest lesson for me to internalize in writing was that you don’t design a character you design a character arc.

One reason you as a writer might end up stuck with a flat or boring character, or one that just isn’t doing the things you need to create a vibrant plot, despite working out all the details of their life for hours, is because you’ve made the mistake I always do. You’ve made a character who is a blend of all the characteristics you envision for them, rather than saving some characteristics for the end of their journey. 

What do I mean by this? Maybe you envision a character who is a handsome prince, honest, brave, and true. In your plot, though, he’s going to be an antagonist for a bit but you don’t really want him to be seen as a bad guy, necessarily. But when you drop him into your story, he’s just… there. Being honest, brave, and true. 

That’s because the prince has no character arc. He is a static figure, a cardboard cutout. 

Let’s go a little deeper with a great example of one of the best character arcs in YA animation: Prince Zuko. He is, objectively, honest, brave, and true (to his cause of finding the Avatar) from the outset. But he’s also a dick. He’s a privileged, imperialist brat, who is rude to his uncle and vicious to our protagonists. 

By the end of the series, though, Prince Zuko is still honest, brave, and true, but he’s also a good person who has learned many lessons over the course of his trials and obstacles. He has failed over and over again at his initial goal of capturing the Avatar. He has failed at winning his father’s regard. He has failed at numerous smaller goals of day to day adventures. He has learned from all of these. We have seen his journey. But, if you started your vision of how to write Zuko from who he ends up being, he’s got nowhere to go as a character. 

It’s not just about what flaws he has corrected though. It’s about what lessons about life he has internalized. What flawed views of the world he has corrected and how. 

Rather than saying, “The character starts out a dick and learns to be nice,” be more specific. “This character starts out believing the empire he is loyal to is morally in the right for its conquests, but over the course of working for that empire’s ruler and seeing his cruelty first hand, not to mention fighting the empire’s enemies and mingling with its civilian victims, he becomes a better person and learns the error of his ways.” 

Already, right there, you have more than a cardboard character. You have a character who has an arc that molds to your plot. 

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You don’t own fanfics. They’re inherently public domain because they aren’t your IP. Agree or disagree with AI, there are no grounds for “protection” from AI because it isn’t your IP to begin with. That’s what you chose when you chose this medium

Oh dear.

Okay, you get an answer, because at least you took the effort to write your ask out properly, even if you are hiding behind the grey, sunglassed circle.

Do I, or any fanfic author for that matter, have any legal claims to our work? No, not really, no. (Although if someone took a fic, filed off the serial number–deleted the fandom specific elements–, and then had it published for financial gain, yeah, that would be a case.)

BUT

Fandoms are built on a social contract that says we respect each others work, the effort people put into their art. We don’t steal or disrespect the work of our peers. By feeding people’s fanworks to AI you both steal and disprect it, and we need to make people realize that before it’s too late–before fandom falls apart, because there will be no more real, actual fanworks.

Disrepectfully,

Orlissa

(i can’t believe I have to say this)

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I need a word for horny but not in a sexual way more just like wanting kisses and hugs and affection or something

This is a great question! The best way to write about desire in a way that makes readers feel invested is to write around it.

Instead of using just a single word, use language that hints at something simmering below the surface. That way, you build tension for your readers, making them invested in the outcome of your characters' relationships. Here are some tips for how to write romantic desire in various ways (including some handy synonyms at the end as well).

Unconscious movements

Covert glances

Licking and biting lips

Mirroring the other's movements

Parting or crossing of legs

Touching one's own skin

Swallowing more than usual

Blinking rapidly

Short breaths

Playing with one's hair

Fidgeting

Leaning closer than usual

Internal feelings

A fluttering heartbeat

Comfort in the other's presence

Knots in your stomach

The sensation of other sounds being muffled

Nervous tingling

Short of breath

Hypersensitivity

Sudden weakness

Thumping pulse

Emotional overwhelm

Goosebumps

Behaviours

Surrounding oneself with reminders of the object of desire (like things that smell of them, or an object they hold dear)

Creating reasons to spend more time with the other person

Loss of inhibition

Impatience and irritability

Setting active goals to attain the object of desire

Conscious and subconscious fixation

Changing oneself to better suit the other's wants

Feigning other interests to promote jealousy

Showing resolved desire

Finally feeling personally fulfilled

A sense of calm and peace

A shift in focus from pursuit to personal happiness

Feelings of contentment

A change of life priorities

Feeling like an obstacle has been overcome

A more relaxed manner or expression

Personal and romantic growth

Showing unrequited desire

Pining for lost love

Frustration and anger

Bottling one's feelings

Living in denial

Feeling rejected

Falling into a personally damaging pattern of pining for the wrong people

Strained friendships

A sense of disconnection and isolation

Some handy synonyms

Craving

Longing

Yearning

Wanting

Hunger

Thirst

Covet

Infatuation

Obsession

Attraction

Passion

Fascination

Lust

Pining

Aching

Burning

Need

Love

Devotion

Rapture

Appetite

Frenzy

Frisky

Amorous (thank you, @quotidias, for the contribution!)

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Goooood day. I'm asking you this because this problem has been bugging me and making my writing seem dull and very boring. When I edited my writing I realized that all my characters talk the exact same way. Like it's just one person talking the whole time. Do you have any tips so I can fix this problem? Please and thank you.

Giving Your Characters a Unique Voice

When all your characters sound like the same person, it’s almost always because you--as the writer--don’t really know who these people are. You might have a general picture in your mind of what they look like, but beyond that they’re cardboard images. Part of fleshing characters out is giving them a unique character voice.

Character voice is the way the character’s personality comes out in the things they think and say. The following things are characteristics of character voice:

- how little or how often they speak - whether they are concise when they speak or wordy - words, slang, or catchphrases they use often - the amount of obscenities they use, if any - speech quirks like saying “um” or “uh” a lot - bad habits like interrupting people or trying to finish others’ sentences - their attitude and how it affects the things they think and say - tone, quality, and pitch of their actual voice - accents - what they do when they speak (do they use a lot of hand gestures, etc.)

So, the very first thing you have to do is flesh your characters out. Give each one a unique personality and know how that personality effects how they speak, when they speak, what they say, how they say it, and their body language while they speak. Someone who is shy or reserved probably won’t speak a lot, and when they do they’ll probably speak in short, direct sentences. A bubbly extrovert, on the other hand, will probably speak a lot more often. They may talk fast, speaking in several short sentences in rapid succession, interrupting themselves to snort or giggle. Someone who’s brash or self-centered may try to dominate the conversation, frequently interrupting others or arguing with whatever else is said. Personality plays a big role in character voice, so it’s important that you flesh those personalities out so you can see these people as more than just flat pictures in your mind.

Another thing you’ll want to do is figure out any quirks or hallmarks related to how the person speaks. This could be an accent (which you can state when they speak, as in, “she spoke with a country twang”) or cultural/regional dialect. It could be using a lot of technical jargon or rarely using contractions. It could be swearing a lot or calling everyone “sugar” or “hon.” These kinds of quirks can even extend to body language and facial expressions while speaking. Figure out a few of these kinds of quirks or hallmarks for each character, and they’ll be that much more distinct when they speak! :)

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ᴛʜɪʀᴛʏ ᴡᴏʀʟᴅ ʙᴜɪʟᴅɪɴɢ Qᴜᴇꜱᴛɪᴏɴꜱ

what are major cities in this world?

what is the currency?

what is the form of government?

what is the name of the leader?

what aesthetic fits the world?

what creatures roam this world?

is there a type of magic / sorcery?

is this in the past or future?

do earth and humans exist?

what is the weather like?

describe the main locations

what is the belief system?

what are some unique animals and plants?

what genre does this fit in?

describe the daily life of an inhabitant

what are the world's populations?

are there social classes?

how did this world come to be?

what are the stakes?

how is the cost of living?

what are the central areas of this world?

is the technology more or less advanced?

do the people in this world have enemies?

what are big events that have taken place?

how is gender and orientation assumed?

what are expectations?

what are the world's biases?

what dark history does it have?

what is important to the economy of this world?

who are the figureheads of this world?

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naming your characters - writing tips

name them after someone important

give them a name from their time

choose a name with a meaning that matches their personality

a name that foreshadows their future

name a character after someone you love

give them an unremarkable first name and call them by their last name

don't name two characters the same name, even with most reason—it gets confusing

avoid names that are too similar—"Anne" and "Anna", for example

choose names the audience will remember

research the meaning beforehand

choose a plant name

choose a colour name

invent a name by putting vowels and letters together

pick either a very unconventional name or very plain name

generally don't make too many characters or it could be confusing for the reader

choose a name associated with the character's personality

name them after a celebrity (with meaning)

name them after yourself!

pick a name you would want yourself to be named

go nameless until you find the right one—or keep switching when you feel you do

^^ try out many names

think of names from that genre