llesbianwrites

[llesbianwrites]

early morning writing hack (real) (it's been working for about a month now):

think about the scene you're going to work on that morning not when you sit down to write, but the previous evening. this is daydreaming but with purpose. think about what might happen and how the characters feel about it. get excited. don't write a single word.

go about your evening normally, doing whatever else you do. your subconscious is a slow cooker and while you do other stuff, it's working on your idea for you.

get up early, like an hour before you'd need to start your day if you were cutting it close. everyone else in the world is snoozing their alarm, so no one can bother you rn. you're free! no one can judge your writing, not even you!

(optional i guess but it really helps me) unless the first few words of your scene are already clear in your mind, warm up. I've abandoned the idea of warm-up drabbles or whatever the hell people recommend. instead, I pull up a story by someone whose writing I love, and I type out a fragment of it in a blank doc, reading the words out loud as I go. this wakes up my writing brain as I become aware of how their prose and dialogue work their magic, when and where they reveal new information, how each detail leads to the next. I'd advise doing this with work that is of high quality and purposeful, so you can learn their tricks, but I'm not the boss of you.

write!!!!!!!

don't stop to judge if it's good or not!! it's too early for that shit!! if the draft sucks you can fix it later but you need the draft done first!!

do stop once yesterday evening's daydreaming prep has run out and you're out of steam. (sometimes the momentum can reveal the next part of the story you hadn't actively considered yet, but don't depend on it.) if you hit a wall where you have no idea how to continue, or it's still too vague to put words down, trying to push through will only bring frustration. and even if you do manage to write a bit more, the chances you'll end up scrapping it later because it doesn't fit are significant. just call it there, you're done.

take a minute to appreciate what you accomplished. you now have words you didn't have yesterday. you won the day, and meanwhile everyone else is still asleep, the absolute losers

if you use a word tracker, go ahead and input your word count for the day. maybe you got a lot done, or maybe you didn't; it's a victory either way. on mornings when I've been struggling, writing and then erasing and writing again, if I'm too pissed off to check the word count I just put down a symbolic number, like 50 words. it may not look like much, but when I look at the month's stats it feels good to have proof that I showed up and did the thing even when it was hard.

now you can start your day. and frankly at this point I don't give a shit how annoying my day is, because I already did the thing I care about getting done, so I'm not going through work resenting every task for stealing brain juice I could've used for writing in the evening. "I'll write when I'm done with work" is the ADHD hubris devil speaking.

and now it's the evening and you're free to daydream again!! and use absolutely zero brain power!! wheee!!

[llesbianwrites]

hyperfixation please stay with me long enough to complete the project. hyperfixation do not fade. hyperfixation finish what you started for the love of god

[llesbianwrites]

If you had to brutally narrow it down to just one, who’s your favourite of your original characters?

[llesbianwrites]

love characters who are like "this is how the world works. this is how it has to be (because if i'm wrong i have to face what i've done // if i'm wrong i have to face whats been done to me) "

[llesbianwrites]

[llesbianwrites]

Going insane about kicked dog with rabies type characters

[llesbianwrites]

I'm convinced mama dragons carry their babies around in their mouth for protection, like how crocodiles do...

[llesbianwrites]

20 examples of periodic solutions to the three-body problem

[llesbianwrites]

i need a clairvoyant gf who's always jacking off to visions of my death and putting me in dangerous situations so she can ogle at what would happen to me if they played out before saving me at the last second so bad tbch

[llesbianwrites]

fun facg if you all cashaop me 500 bucks i can literally help you reach salvation and bring you to the light

[llesbianwrites]

i think they shouldve taken me on a polar expedition not because i would be useful or especially resilient but because my preexisting mental health conditions would have made me an interesting wildcard

[llesbianwrites]

an unstoppable force (the backstory i have for my dnd character) vs an immovable object (my roleplaying abilities)

[llesbianwrites]

the further it gets from when i first made this post and the longer it takes for me to actually start writing has to get funny at some point right. Right.

i need to start writing again <- third time i’ve made a post saying this

[llesbianwrites]

wip wthursday

thursday is basically wednesday when you think about it!!! when you consider it!! but thank you so much @frenchy-and-the-sea for tagging me - i forgot how much fun writeblr things are lol and actually have an excuse to write was so so nice! thank you sm!!

this excerpt is from. we'll be optimistic and say the first draft of whalefall <3

“There’ll be more,” she said. She was floating, a thousand miles away, the adrenaline keeping her sky high. Her head swam with black dots, her vision going nuclear. She wanted to lay down. Sleep for a thousand years. She wanted to be back home and with her father and she wanted him to say she did a good job and she wanted — she wanted. Like that had ever mattered. Alé didn’t need any prompting. “Lucky! Willa! Get Ruhi below deck then get back up here — I want this ship out now.” The ship sprang into action. Dove sank to her knees, shoulder aching from the gun, and let her head fall to rest on the nearest crate. Her eyes slipped shut. She would have sat there for the rest of her life, just breathing, just feeling her lungs move, if Bellamy hadn’t chosen that moment to creep up beside her. “Lemme see.” “I’m fine.” She was speaking to the box. It was a miracle Bellamy could understand her at all. “Well, the blood and gunshot wound say otherwise. Let me see.” Slowly, painstakingly, Dove peeled herself away. Movement brought pain, and as Bellamy began to prod at her cheek she couldn’t help but wince. A crease fell between her eyes, lips pursing, fingers poking just a little harder. “Ow,” Dove said, like her flinching wasn’t enough. But she didn’t jerk away. And she knew Bellamy didn’t want to hurt her. She knew how to do that better than anyone. When it happened she’d feel each inch of the blade. “Just a scratch,” she said. “Tides be damned, it’s just a scratch.” Dove waited for the relief to crush her. Eyes slipped shut, unmoored, Bellamy’s cool fingers against her skin the only grounding force left. But it never came. Tremors raced up and down her spine, electric spikes of leftover energy, sapping her strength and reducing her to shivers. When Bellamy pulled her hand away, she had to bite her tongue to keep from reaching for it back. “Always knew I was lucky,” she said, voice wobbling. She swallowed and tried again, opened her eyes. “Probably won’t even scar.”

tagging @antihell @encrucijada @clypso @chayscribbles @megarywrites @hungryfictions @justthehopeleft and literally anyone who is a writeblr, i have not been active in so so long so if you see this please consider yourself tagged!!

[llesbianwrites]

WIP Wednesday Whenever

Apologies again to @becausedragonage for tagging me at a reasonable time on a Wednesday and only getting a response a day later. I'm struggling to find time for creative ventures, folks! This week has been so busy! Ahh!!!

That said, the extra time did give me a chance to unearth an old attempt at a prelude for my original story idea, and I'm keen enough on it that it might survive in some capacity when I give the story another go. We'll see! For now, take some unedited Seven Cities after about a million years.

Despite every scrap of evidence to the contrary, the prevailing theory was that Alex Sheffield had deserted his Service vessel for a simple lack of anything better to do. His hammock had been discovered swinging gently on the gun deck early in the morning, empty save for the folded squares of his scrubby work shirt and the oft-patched breeches that were still holding on by their threads. These were provisions of the slop chest, owned on paper but rented in spirit, and so had been left behind, tucked neatly beneath a thick nest of threadbare blankets; but his boots, his coat, and the tiny ditty box that he had scrounged for months to buy had all vanished into the night. Or, as one of the younger sailors had been quick to point out, into the sea — the whole homely little scene swung beside a propped-open gun port, the only one in that state, which led out into the grimy blue-green waves lapping rhythmically against their hull.   “He wouldn’t,” Bryce had argued instantly, in the voice of a man trying very hard to be certain of himself. “What cause would he have? Only a madman makes for open sea in the dead of night, a dozen ship-lengths from shore, carrying all that he has along with him. Only a fool does it a single night before leave is granted, before his pay is shared out! That is —” “That is Alex Sheffield,” had come the reply, rising from the grumbling night watch who had been roused by the commotion. “And no surprise for it. His was always a cat's loyalty, lad — kept around by the promise of meat and of a warm bed only. If he finds it agreeable to spit on the old man’s charity for some unfathomable scheme of his own design, then let him go, says I. And take his shirts.” Tahir, from his place perched against the long guns, had only been able to agree with the unfathomable scheme bit. Little madman in the making though he was, Alex had also been in the best of their captain’s good graces. He had been receiving personal instruction on the makings of a Navy sailor many times his senior for the better part of seven months now, and had taken to them with the sort of relish that Tahir had thought was reserved exclusively for street kids around a sweet jar. He had, by cleverness and luck alone, reaped the sort of status and high regard that you could not buy with charm or money, and from one of the few men in the world that Tahir thought was worth it.  And, perhaps most importantly, Alex Sheffield couldn’t fucking swim. So, he hadn’t just tipped himself over the side. So, he hadn’t decided on a whim to thumb his nose at the old man’s time and effort. It was something closer to survival that sent him scuttling away from the last five years of his life — or at least, something no less than a threat to it. But saying that out loud would be giving away the game, and Tahir barely knew the rules yet: so, instead, he sat by quietly as the morning watch worked themselves into a frenzy over the news, and then joined the first scouting party that was allowed leave to scour the shore.

Tagging: @girlwonderers, @dalish-farther-roam, @dragonologist-phd, @llesbianwrites, @nuclearanomaly, @bladeverbena, and anyone else who'd wanna join! I just threw a few tags out of folks I know to have done this sort of thing in the past so no pressure to do it! (But if you do...I wanna see...)

[llesbianwrites]

[llesbianwrites]

First post via @professor-pants, second post via @manywinged, tags via @toastsnaffler