kaylewiswrites

[kaylewiswrites]

Veronica! I'm creating a spatial horror story and in DESPERATE need for inspiration! you seem like the right person to ask.. do you have any movie/game/podcast suggestions other than the 'obvious' (ie anatomy hill house eskew Mabel etc)? thank u in advance!!

ahhh that’s so sweet thank you 🥺 I would love to read your story afterwards if you would be comfortable!! I’m only just getting into the meat of spatial horror myself so most of knowledge is just the basics but I’ll try my best of what I can think of off the top of my head!

- it’s an obvious one so I’ll briefly mention but it wasn’t on your list but house of leaves for sure!! I’m not done with it but the spatial horror of it is off the charts and the whole passage about the house as a labyrinth is just whew.

- I just remembered this video literally existed tonight but adult swim’s This House Has People In It. Technically the story is about a disease but I feel like the house does play enough of a major role to be consider spatial horror!

- I also recommend checking out kitty horrorshow’s other works besides anatomy including her haunted cities series which are all free. while they don’t necessarily have a linear story like anatomy, they are really cool to just explore throughout and get a feel for the atmosphere

- this might be a little basic as well because I see this video recommended all the time for this topic now but if you haven’t definitely check out Jacob Geller’s video essay Anatomy and Control: The Legacy of the Haunted House because it’s very informative and well-executed. He also included this article which I thought was a really good read.

that’s all I can really think of rn but I’ll probably add more when I can!! good luck on your story <3

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also shoutout to kaylee @dykivist who I really credit to getting me into the concept to begin with and who has the best tag for spatial horror ( architectural hauntings) so i really recommend checking it out and following her 💖

[kaylewiswrites]

‘Do not ask your children to strive’ by William Martin

[kaylewiswrites]

I need people to stop blaming the death of movies on “quips”. A quip is just a funny line of dialogue. That’s all. Like I just saw a post talking about quips and the death of movies and brought up Pirates of the Caribbean as an example of a better movie and yes it is but also that movie is FULL OF QUIPS. I just rewatched The Princess Bride. It’s all quips. Every single line. And it’s a masterpiece.

Movies suck when people don’t care about the art they’re making. That includes them not caring about their quips. Which is why a lot of comic relief dialogue ALSO sucks now. But the problem isn’t that funny dialogue exists.

[kaylewiswrites]

Getting really sick of all the "There's No Place Like Chrome" ads on youtube. There's Firefox. Firefox saves your passwords. Firefox autofills things if you want. Firefox also does things that Chrome doesn't like allow adblockers, and it does not mine your data and sell your information for advertising purposes. Google is really trying to push people to use Chrome so they can take as much data from users as possible in order to make as much money as possible and it's borderline sinister.

Anyway, download Firefox.

[kaylewiswrites]

Watching yall say "trans rights" in ya bio but still talk about buying Hogwarts Legacy

[kaylewiswrites]

Giving and Receiving Great Feedback

                A part of every writing process is receiving feedback from others, and likely reading someone else’s work and giving it yourself. First, we do this because there’s no such thing as a perfect writer, and what happens in our heads when we read our own work may not necessarily be what the reader is getting. As well, reading others’ work helps you with your literacy skills, and what’s important to you as a reader (plus, it’s just nice to return the favour).

                So here’s some tips to giving good feedback:

Your should never tear apart the work. Your feedback should inspire the writer to keep going and make their piece better—not quit or give up. Balance suggestions and compliments.

Try to refrain from suggesting your own ideas unless specifically asked for. What I mean by that is avoiding statements such as, “maybe instead of (this), the characters do (this)” your job is not to write the story for them, and often, you might not be making the work better, just different.

Ask pointed questions instead, but ultimately leave the work up to the writer. Something like, “I wonder what (character) was thinking during this moment?” Or “from what I know so far, here’s my prediction for what’s going to happen.” It’s up to the writer to decide whether your questions/predictions need to be answered in the work, and how.

Always start and end with some specific positive feedback. There is always something good about every piece of work—it can be a great detail, some interesting dialogue, a concept you really like, the tone, a character.

In general, it’s most helpful to include specifics or details about what’s working and not working in the piece. Take quotes, write down page numbers and paragraphs, lines. That’s infinitely more helpful than just saying “your descriptions are well written.” If you catch yourself saying that, try adding, “such as in line (really good line) or (another good line).”

When receiving feedback, remember it’s ultimately your work and you get the final say, but remain open to the suggestions and comments you’re receiving. Try them out, but don’t be afraid to end up not including them if they aren’t working for you. Never argue, even if you think your feedback giver is wrong—they took time out of their day to read your work, you should thank them for their thoughts. Even something simple like, “Thank you very much for your feedback, I appreciate the time you took to read my work” is great.

                If you’re looking for a feedback buddy, maybe try pairing up in the comments or reblogging this post! There’s a great community of writers here, don’t be afraid to reach out.

                Good luck!

[kaylewiswrites]

The thing that I really don’t get about Harry Potter fans who are desperately trying to justify playing the incredibly antisemitic new game is… why aren’t y’all the most mad about this? Like the correct response to “they turned my favorite piece of wizard school childhood nostalgia into literal blood libel” is “WOW FUCK THAT”, not “oh ok, then I guess I like blood libel now :)” How do you diehards not see turning your fandom into actual pro-genocide propaganda as a betrayal? Why aren’t those of you who still love Harry Potter mad as hell that Hogwarts Legacy exists, and shouting that from every possible rooftop that no one should play it?

(…I mean, I guess I know why, but still.)

[kaylewiswrites]

I’m not entirely sure when or why I decided to slowly work through stylized cities of Exandria in gold but they’re very soothing to create and I’m slowly but surely developing the style for them as I go. 

[kaylewiswrites]

[kaylewiswrites]

Your annual reminder to not donate to Salvation Army!

[kaylewiswrites]

Contrary to popular belief, abandoned WIPs are crucial to the writer ecosystem, as they become the fertile soil from which completed works grow. Without them, the landscape would be sterile and barren

[kaylewiswrites]

WE’VE BEEN SAYING. WE’VE BEEN TELLING YOU.

DON’T. FUCKING. ENGAGE. WITH BRAND. TUMBLR. ACCOUNTS.

[kaylewiswrites]

The amount of brands joining Tumblr is truly scary (check out @brand-directory to see a list and block them all) so we'll need to do more than just post cringe. We need to get the least brand-friendly possible. Everyone post your freakiest most NSFW cringe shit. It's time for cock is one of my favorite tastes it's time for pussy in the scarmophogus. Keep fucking shooting they need to all leave here screaming (and remember, don't engage with brands, not even to make fun of them)

[kaylewiswrites]

Epithets aren't all evil

Here me out. I think there is a place for epithets in novel writing.

For those unfamiliar, epithets are when a person or thing is referred to by a quality they have, rather than their name or pronoun.

Examples:

"The older brother frowned, but the younger one laughed," versus, "James frowned, but Liam laughed."

"The red-haired girl sang," versus, "Annie sang."

"The King knelt before the peasant boy," versus, "King Kai knelt before him."

The problem most people have is that epithets rarely add anything to a story and they draw attention to themselves. And you should really only be drawing attention to important details, otherwise the writing starts to feel cheesy.

People tend to use epithets in one of two scenarios. Either we don't yet know the character's name (which is a valid and practical excuse), or the writer worries they've said the character's name too much and decides to switch things up (this is where the cringe happens. it's really common in fanfic).

However, I would like to argue for a third use of epithets -- a second acceptable use of epithets -- that everyone seems to forget. Because, when used in this manner, epithets are poetically delicious.

Consider, for instance, my favourite quote from Crime and Punishment:

“The candle-end was flickering out in the battered candlestick, dimly lighting up in the poverty stricken room the murderer and the harlot who had so strangely been reading together the eternal book.”

We know these character's names (and the name of the book). But changing this line to:

“The candle-end was flickering out in the battered candlestick, dimly lighting up in the poverty stricken room Raskolnikov and Sonja who had so strangely been reading together the Bible.”

it loses something, doesn't it?

Here, the three epithets are giving us symbolic context. Raskolnikov and Sonja reading the Bible is not a particularly important detail. But a murderer and a sex worker (two "sinners") reading the book of salvation together? That's some poetry, right there.

The epithets bring out the juxtaposition (contrast) that otherwise would not be evident and, in doing so, call attention to one of the book's central themes -- redemption.

The placement of this sentence is also worth noting. It is the last sentence of the chapter. Another issue people sometimes take with epithets is that they increase the narrative distance between the reader and the character, making them less relatable. Placing the epithet right at the end makes the reader feel like they are zooming out on these characters or looking down on them from above (symbolic given we're talking about the Bible, eh?). This give us a chance to put some distance between us and the characters, to reflect on the book and it's themes as a whole, to come to our own conclusions rather than having our judgement skewed by proximity to the characters.

When I first read it, it felt like taking a breath.

In conclusion, please

use epithets to show symbolic connections between characters, events, and objects.

use epithets sparingly, but use them for emphasis.

use epithets at moments where where it feels natural to increase the narrative distance, such as scene breaks and the beginning and endings of chapters.

do not use epithets unless they add something -- don't use them as a substitute for character's name if that name is already known.

Epithets aren't all evil.

[kaylewiswrites]

already got a blazed marvel post. the adpocalypse is closer than we think so heres your daily PSA

don't interact with corporate tumblr accounts

yes even to dunk on them. i don't care if you have the sickest burn of the century lined up, don't even give them the time of day

the eventual and inevitable fall of twitter marks a change in the advertising industry, and tumblr is unclaimed territory. if we want tumblr to remain the social media bastion it has become, it needs to remain as unappealing to corporations as possible. do not engage. in a marketing strategist's eyes, any kind of attention is good attention. don't "silence, brand" them. don't kungpowpenis them. don't send them hate anons. don't hate-follow them. corporate tumblrs are not a single entity and they will not be harassed off this site. we only have a shot at repelling them because of tumblr's lack of an algorithm. so turn off recommended posts on your dashboard, put it chronological order, and install an adblocker. if you don't seek out these blazed posts and actively ignore them when they happen upon you, the corporations will starve. in this case, the best kind of protest is a silent one

[kaylewiswrites]

Hi all! This is going to be a quick introduction because this whole thing is a massive work in progress, but welcome to the Writers of Color Archive, a project meant to set up and run a searchable database for writers of color in the writeblr community.

To put it simply, what we especially wanted to do is take the responses to @jezifster's post (see here) and make it easy to find new writers and content to support. Are you a [genre] writer who wants to interact more with other [genre] writers? Do you want to find Ko-Fis to donate to or Patreons to subscribe to? You should be able to do that and more once this project is running.

Right now, we're working on a Google Form attached to a Google Sheet. (There's an entry on the form to give you an idea of this might look like at the end.) Please note that if the form is what people want to stick with, it'll be another option to getting your info in the archive, rather than a complete replacement to the post itself. One of the many purposes of this sideblog is to keep up with the post and reblog new entries when we find them. Please feel free to continue reblogging the post.

Another purpose of this sideblog: To give you an opportunity to let us know what you need. And first and foremost, the form and the sheet aren't final just yet. Please feel free to test both out and let us know what you think! Is it easy to navigate? Is there information we can add? Something else we need to change? Please don't hesitate to let us know! Our anon asks are on, and we'll also be keeping an eye on replies and reblogs.

That's about all for now. Once we're sure we've got a system that works for everyone and the right info this sort of database needs, we'll be able to start the migration process. Thanks so much for reading, and thanks in advance for everything!

[kaylewiswrites]

To do something positive on top of all this, if you're a writer of color, can you reblog and share something about yourself or your writing projects? Links so people can check them out would be great too!

It's not just about dunking on racists but making sure the stories that need to be heard are heard.