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Cowardly choices a character could make

Betraying/not helping someone to save themselves

Refusing to stand up to an abuser/bully/someone generally being rude to them

Abandoning a cause they once believed in as it's risky/unpopular

Letting someone else take the blame because they're scared of the punishment

Running away in a crisis

Lying to avoid consequences

Withdrawing from love/connection out of fear of the conflict it could cause

Running away from an argument and hiding in fear

Making excuses instead of taking action on something important

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Just in case

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Writers, here’s your reminder that you should be doing warm-ups!

Athletes need to warm up. Musicians need to warm up. Artists need to warm up. Heck, I even have to play a few matches in video games before I get into a groove every day.

Warm-ups help you get into the right headspace, give you more control of your actions and word choice, get you comfortable in your physical setting (eg: with your keyboard, notebook, tablet, or whatever you're writing with), and spark creativity.

Even if you don’t think you have spoons to write, sit down and do a couple warm-ups. If you still don’t want to, that’s alright. But. I think you’ll be surprised how often they help break that ice.

5-15 minutes is all you need. I personally set a timer for ten minutes each time and do not stop writing until the time is up. Your warm-up can be anything at all so long as it gets you writing and starts nudging those creative juices.

Here's some common warm-ups:

Journaling. Just jot down some notes about your day. Feel free to really lean into something that you noticed. We're going for description and details -- try to avoid settling into a spiral or focusing on something negative that will upset your creativity.

Short story prompts. Type that into Pinterest and pick the most ridiculous, cliche thing you can. Write a little scene, story summary, or even a rant about why you do or don't like the prompt. Just write.

Vocab challenge. If you like a bit more critical thinking to get you in the zone, have a random vocabulary word generator spit out five or so words. Check their meanings and jot down a little story or thought that includes all five. You get more familiar with beautiful and descriptive language, and it gives you a much narrowed prompt (which is lovely if you're like me and suffer each time there's an open-ended task assigned).

Character moments. Try putting your character into a generic setting and write down almost meticulously what their thought process would be. Follow them realizing they've just stepped in mud or dreading the start of the day. Pick a mundane thing and describe them working through it. This will not only get your writing going, but it will wake up the character's voice in your head.

Ongoing storytelling. Did you know that Whinnie the Poo was A.A. Milne's warm up story? He would jot down a quick little story with those very basic characters and did so every day. Whatever came to mind. He kept writing little tidbits on the same characters and eventually it turned into a series. Having that ongoing plot with isolated scenes and simple characters can help you feel more motivated to sit down and write.

Get-to-know-you-questions. Google a list of basic first-date questions (there are a million out there) and answer one yourself. Go into specifics. Where do you most want to travel and why? Let yourself ramble until the question is fully answered.

Writer's block blues. This is a favorite of mine. If you're truly stuck, write about being stuck. Eg: 'I'm supposed to write for ten minutse, but that feels so stupid and impossible. No one is goign to read this anyway. I have no ideas and the page is so overwhelming when its blank. I used to be able to write on and on and nothing could stop me. it was like breathing. but now I have nothign and do nothing and I can't even do a stupid prompt-' Even the rambling and ranting got me writing. It made things easier. It made writing this post easier. Also -- notice the typos? Yeah, don't fix those. You're in writing mode, not editing mode when you're doing this. If you edit while you write, you're forcing yourself to stay in your executive and calculating headspace rather than falling fully into creativity and dream. Ignore the mistakes. That's for future you to handle.

I've officially rambled far too much, but I hope that helps even a little bit. Live well and write often, my friends. Best of luck to you <3

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your dark fantasy novel doesn't need a logic-based magic system it needs a bear with a human face

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em dash is so fucking sexy. puts her in a paragraph 8 times.

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You know, I’ve never personally been lifted from the ground by my neck to be strangled, but uh, is there a reason y’all never like….. kick the person holding you? Like characters straight up just dangle there and gasp, like you have legs! Use them you stupid bitches!

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the most annoying people are people who don't understand storytelling. they be like "oooo how convenient that this thing happened to the main character in the very beginning". yeah no shit. that's why the story begins here

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"came back wrong" what about Came Back Afraid. You used to be brave. Too brave maybe, defying the odds at every turn, a fighter, cocky, playing with fire, first to throw yourself at the enemy. Until one day it all caught up to you. You came back, somehow, but now you know all too intimately how it feels to lose, to die, to be destroyed. Now you flinch and freeze and cower at the slightest provocation. Who even are you now if you can't be brave? The grave may have let you go, but the mortal fear still grips you tighter than ever.

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Periodic rent-lowering-gunshots:

Fiction is not reality.

You can enjoy things in fiction that would be awful in the real world. Like playing a murderhobo in a game! In the real world, being or supporting a murderer-thief would be pretty damn awful, while in the game it's just good fun. Same with anything else you choose to do with the pixels on the screen, like kinks that don't affect anyone real, so they're okay in fiction, but would be pretty damn bad in real life.

No one else is responsible for your online experience. They are required not to harass you, but they are not and never will be obligated to not post about ships, kinks, or tropes you dislike just to avoid you seeing them. It's up to you to blacklist words or phrases, block tags, or even block users as needed to avoid seeing content that upsets you.

No one can force you to read anything against your consent. Any content you don't like seeing can be instantly avoided by closing out of the offending post/fic.

You are not owed an online experience free of discomfort.

Nothing that happens in your imagination can ever make you a bad person. Words you write or read about fictional characters will never make you a bad person.

The claim that media consumption influences real-life behavior is intellectually dishonest and serves only to excuse the behavior of real offenders.

Fiction is a safe way to explore horrifying or confusing concepts. Therapists agree that fiction, even (or especially) about taboo topics is a good coping mechanism, especially, but not exclusively, for trauma survivors. Fiction is to adults what play therapy is to children. This doesn't stop being true if the work in question is of a sexual nature.

Sex isn't an inherently worse or better motivation than anything else. A work written to create feelings of arousal isn't dirty, shameful, or in any way less pure than works written to entertain, provoke moral questions, or for other reasons. And worth noting is that multiple purposes can exist in the same story, especially fanfiction.

You aren't entitled to an explanation for why someone reads, writes, or otherwise enjoys certain works, kinks, tropes, ships, etc.

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Some of the biggest fantasy worldbuilding fails that I see, in no particular order

Gods without religion. The Gods are real and a known historical fact, but virtually nobody is religious.

Cultural racism/discrimination without structural racism/discrimination. Discrimination that exists only in microagressions or mean comments, without existing in any sort of structural way.

Secret history with no clear reason for it to be secret and no clear method for maintaining that secrecy. Major parts of the world's history are kept entirely secret, even though there's not an obvious reason to do so and even when history has shown this is virtually impossible to enforce (especially in a world with any movement or communication across borders).

Large, homogeneous countries. Even without immigration, virtually no country larger than the Vatican will be fully homogeneous in terms of culture, dialect, beliefs, traditions, etc., much less a large one with limited communication technology as is often seen in fantasy. The Planet of Hats problem.

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god. the number of people who see "self publish original fiction" and are like. "but you can just write as a hobby! it doesn't have to be a job! publishing isn't for everyone!"

did you know: you can self publish whatever you want for free and for fun and it's fine actually. you don't even have to edit if you don't feel like it. stick a chapter at a time on your neocities website. upload a word doc to smashwords. export to a pdf and put it on dropbox. i don't know what youtube channel making fun of ebook covers got to you, but you don't actually have to meet a wordcount minimum or wait until you can afford to pay a cover artist. write 20k about your OCs kissing and make a cover in canva and upload it literally anywhere. you have self published original fiction! upload it somewhere with a tipjar or a pwyw option and be shocked by how many people will give you a dollar for something they could have just had for free. you are the only one stopping yourself.

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I love you speculative biology. I love you worldbuilding projects. I love you creature design. I love you fantasy biology. I love you speculative evolution. I love you science fiction.

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what they don't tell you is that a well-written fic can get you to ship anything, and i mean ANYTHING. notp? not anymore. you will stay up late thinking about and crying over them for the rest of your life. characters you don't even know from a piece of media you've never engaged with? fuck it, they belong to you now. problematic ship that you loved to hate and now just love to love, that you must never tell your friends about? don't worry, ao3 knows how to keep a secret. like. a well-written fic will have you acting UP and that's a fact baby !!

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A character, ill or injured, sleeping in a manner not usual for them as further illustration of their ailment's impact- a character who usually sleeps soundly and curled closely into themselves instead splayed out in a restless, feverish doze; a character usually quite active and liable to wake at the slightest noise instead huddled into a shivering fetal position and so deeply asleep it's difficult to rouse them; a character who usually sleeps under only a single light blanket smothered under a pile of quilts and comforters, or vice versa; a character with one habitual sleeping position instead lying on their opposite side or on their back or with one limb akimbo; a character who is usually very particular about their sleeping environment falling asleep without any of their usually necessary accoutrements or rituals or, conversely, a character who is usually able to fall asleep at the drop of a hat requiring much assistance and coaxing; a character having dreams or nightmares unusual for them, or sleepwalking or talking; a character sleeping with an unusual configuration of pillows or propped up in a particular position- any manifestation of a character's injuries or illness that extend even into their sleeping hours.

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Writing Deaf Characters | People are People

I am a HoH person who has issues with the represention of deafness in media, and the lack of representation in general. I would love to see more deaf characters, but without the encumberments, so here is a guide on how. This is part two of two. Speech is Speech is a  guide to writing signed language and the technicalities around it. People are People is an outline of the characterization of deaf characters and the tropes that absolutely need to be avoided.

The age trap

Characters are stereotyped into a set of traits that stem from their deafness, and are highly dependent on their age. For example, the old grandma who’s deafness is incorporated into her sweet, amicable character. “Sorry dear, didn’t quite catch that.” She says on the end of almost every sentence, and it’s supposed to be funny. Maybe it is a bit funny in a comedy skit put together by a deaf comedian, but when done by hearing people it is mocking, verging on cruel. The same is also seen in sweet, naive deaf children who are shy “because they can’t hear.”

I do understand that this character trope is really easy to fall into. I used to do it too, unthinkingly; in fact, I myself probably fit the “shy, deaf child mould” on the surface. You’re not a bad person for making this mistake, because a lot of people do. Nobody has ever thought to ask if it is wrong.

How to get around this? There are other ways to make your elderly grandparents lovely, quaint people than cramming them into the “sweet, going deaf and dentures” archetype, which frankly, is getting a little boring. You could even make them deaf/HoH from birth, have them use signed language- (even if not deaf from birth)- and throw in a fun bit of conversation where they learn the new slang from their grand-child/the MC. The representation would be such a treat for our community, and make the characters that much more interesting for your readers!

As for the children, give them character. It’s as simple as that. Deaf children may be quiet because they are told off for shouting, or mocked for never saying anything in spoken English at all; I know that’s what happened to me. Make your children quirky, and you can show that through their hearing aids/implants- in fact, please do! I knew a boy in the year below in first school. He was profoundly deaf, as was I, and he such a personality to him. And he used his hearing aids to shout that out proudly: mismatched coloured moulds for his aids that were semi-transparent and filled with glitter. Someone else I knew of- (an art teacher friend of an art teacher)- steampunk modified their hearing aids and honestly? Iconic. That being said, remember not to focus only on them; this is just a point that you can build from. People are people!

The shock of spoken language

This plot trope/device is one that just makes me incredibly sad. The deaf character uses signed language, and that makes them happy. They speak in their own language, but the hearing people act like this is not enough. The deaf character then uses spoken language, and woah- it’s a miracle, they speak perfectly, they’ve achieved greatness, what a wonder! Acceptance!

I think this stems from the “deaf and dumb” character trope seen in a lot of the literature of the 20th and earlier centuries. This was a character that would garner reader sympathy through pity for their terrible situation. They were usually unintelligent, simple girls who were tragically pretty despite their horrid imperfection. What woe! And then they spoke at a moment of intense emotion, and it was this huge deal. Although this was something that upset me as a young child reading literature in an archaic language I only just understood, I realize that, as above, this is something that has been hugely normalized.

If you are going to have your non-speaking character speak, there are a set of conditions to keep in mind:

Imperfect speech. They won’t speak incredible, perfect English, unless they’ve had extensive speech therapy and used spoken English before.

Not for your validation. The non-speaking character must choose to speak of their own free will; not to make an adult or hearing/speaking person happy. If you go down this route, make sure that you, as the author, stress that this is morally and ethically the wrong thing for that person to do.

Not as a dramatic device. Don’t have your non-speaking character suddenly speak out at a moment where you want your readers to feel Emotion, such as a horrific event or a death.

Not an acheivement or a big deal. If they use spoken English, they use spoken English. It isn’t a massive deal or event to be focused on. Doing so would do that little thing of making signed language inferior, as I made a point of in post one.

In Summary

Flesh your characters out. Give them dimensions. Extend them from their deafness. Explore different angles. Treat it as a part of their identity without retracting from them as them.

It’s important to know that although the general community treats deafness as a blessing at the most, or at least as a part of their identity and as a culture of its own, not everyone shares this. Some people chose to have implants, and some choose not to. Some people with implants still used signed language, and others use spoken.

There are different types of deafness and hearing loss as well, from hidden hearing loss to nerve damage. Here is where you can read up on these: [X]

The deaf and HoH community is as varied as any other community in any other place. There are deaf clubs and dicoes, organizations, companies, and events. All sorts of things. My favourite is the one time the National Deaf Children’s Scoiety decided to take a bunch of deaf children out on sailing boats in high wind, me in the boat with someone who only used sign. Language, support and openess differs from country to country, and if your deaf character is in a fantasy world, play with that!

What kind of hearing aids are offered, if at all? What are the stereotypes, conceptions and mis-conceptions surrounding deafness? What is the sign language like? If you’re inventing a spoken language, invent a signed one too!

Research the community in the country where your book is set if in the real world, and find out what it is like. Decide what kind of deafness your character has, too.

Is it a genetic deafness? Does is come as a part of something else? Was it from birth, or is it gradual? Hearing family, or non-hearing family? What kind of hearing loss? Read up on  the types and decide.

And last of all, if you’re a hearing person and you do write a deaf character and follow these guidelines, you’re brilliant. If you’re a deaf/HoH person who has anything else to add, feel free. Input is always valued.

Thank you for taking the time to read this, and best of luck to everyone with their writing.

This is part of my weekly advice theme. Each week I look at what you’ve asked me to help with, and write a post or series of posts for it. Next week: settings and character development/rebuilding characters (including heroes, anti-heroes, villains, and every other kind of character).