#also im doing multiple povs in each chapter so like im gonna have to figure out how to switch from one dean to the other

[bloodydeanwinchester]

oh no i just finished the part of my fic that only has one dean in it so now i'm gonna have to figure out how to write two dean's in a scene without it being confusing 😩

[kimnjss]

wait pause 😔🤚🏻

jungkook (ignoring the multiple girls) is actually sweet.. obviously bc its arya, but he really do be looking out for his own friends.. him going out his way to do what he feels is best for his friends, even though he knows he shouldnt insert himself into every problem the couple has (i kno he always does it bc he likes to push their buttons sometimes cause hes a lil shit but he knows when to draw the line) he may be a fuckboi but he just really wants his friends to be happy 🥺 when he thinks he doesnt deserve the same for himself 😔

jungkook saying “doesnt want to go thru the shit arya n joon go thru” when arya asked him when he was gonna have a serious relationship kinda felt like a half truth.. idk he might be like kinda hot!hoseok in this case.. living in the moment type of thing and is in no rush to be in a serious relationship and if it happens, it happens. however rn his feelings are directed towards a girl who is his friend and is already taken by his other friend, so he’s creating as much distance as possible. and the it-was-actually-one-drunk-person-and-the-other-sober-drunken kiss didnt help his situation..

idk why but i feel like jk, joon and hoseok are similar when it comes to their feelings/emotions.. dont get me wrong, they are very affectionate, physically and vocally.. but all three live inside their heads for too long..

jungkook isnt being honest with himself, when he does realise something about himself and his feelings, he dismisses it and blocks it off, and distracts himself until he forgets about it and then it comes back, rinse and repeat.. namjoon isnt communicating with arya properly (neither is she but im like comparing the boys rn LOL) and when he does start showing emotion, its really passive-aggressive (??), its almost like he’s saying something but he isnt saying anything at the same time?? did that make any sense 🤡 idk sometimes its like he expects arya to read his mind and vice versa.. (ALSO not them going back to making out as if nothing happened.. they better have talked 😀👊🏻) but they do love each other, its the communication thats 🥴

and hoseok, if that last part was anything to go by 😬, but whatever he is thinking about to create boundaries to address the co-dependency from his side (dialling it down maybe??), he better be careful bc yn isnt stupid and she picked up on mood change quickly, he’s gotta communicate with her or else it aint gonna be easy in the long run.. yn isnt a mind reader and if he wants things to go smoothly like the past few months have been, he has to speak up and make yn understand how he feels from his pov.. he really be thinking about his feelings about yn and pleasuring yn at the same time.. king of multi-tasking??

(have i connected any dots yet 😳 i swear im getting rusty AJDBAJEBSKAJ)

okay also its either i read thru this chapter quickly or my eyes are playing tricks but i swear this is one of the quicker party fucks LMAOO 😳 although it makes sense cause there’s still a party going on downstairs LMAO but not like its stopped others before 💀 but also hoseok was kinda getting overwhelmed with his feelings/thinking there so..

whew its been a while since ive written something this long 🧍🏻‍♀️idek what ive said anymore -🤼‍♀️

PHEW THIS WAS SO LONG I’M JUMPING !!

okay !! first ., jeongguk has a lot going on the inside ., but when it gets down to it - he’s a really great guy . like his bedroom habits aside . he’s always honest nd clear abt what he’s looking for . he plays around ., but not in the ‘ruin my life’ type of way . his friends always come first to him . there aren’t any times where he has left them hanging nd them being happy correlates to him being happy . same when it comes to arya . his feelings for her are strong nd once he noticed that ., he set boundaries for himself bc of joon . he never crosses them . the only thing he wants for her is to be happy . 

it’s a mixture of both really . he’s not miserable . he enjoys having a line of girls nd meeting new people nd doing his thing . he’s young nd thats how he has his fun . buut if the right girl were to come around - he would not be against settling down nd being in a serious relationship with her . buut the right girl for him right now is already the right girl for someone else - who happens to be his best friend ., so there’s really nothing else he can do . so he buckles down into his hoe life . 

yesss! you got it exactlyyy . they are the exact same when it comes to how they handle their emotions nd all the stuff relating . lmao they’re best friends for a reason . 

the main thing that jeongguk keeps to himself is his true feelings . like on the surface he’s this cool guy that doesn’t care nd has girls knocking down his door nd he’s just out there enjoying himself - not getting attached . nd he’s so into that lifestyle nd focused on making sure that’s who he is perceived as that he ignores everything else that doesn’t fit . not to say he’s not himself ,. jeongguk is himself all the time - his feelings just tend to take a backseat (especially the ones he has for arya bc of how much damage it could do) . // joon definitely wants arya to know what bothers him without properly communicating anything . that comes from the fact that they’ve been together for ten months so he expects her to just know what will make him mad . nd when she doesn’t get it he gets pissy . (they both do that btw) but what they don’t realize that they’ll never go anywhere if they don’t just talk things out . (no they did not have a conversation before making up they just missed each other too much)

his biggest issue is that he’s in his head too much . he’s freaking while realizing that he’s falling in love with her nd that he doesn’t really like being away from her (he’s also extremely dramatic ., it’s not as co-dependent as he thinks) but bc in he’s confused himself when it comes to his feelings for her - he’s more inclined to just shut down nd figure things out on his own . buut that’s not going to fly when it comes to yn ., she’s not the type to take the no communication nd wait around for him to get his life together . even if he doesn’t know what he’s trying to figure out - she’d want that to be told to her so she doesn’t overthink . 

- their smut scene was a little quickie upstairs since they were in yoongi’s room nd the party was going on downstairs still . but hoseok was so deep in his thoughts that it made it seem faster ., he was so overwhelmed with his feelings that being wth yn was like at the back of his mind... (he still did a great job tho so props lmao)

[riceccakes]

Earth, Wind, and Coffee: Chapter Two Analysis

chapter one analysis

welcome back to another installment !! idk if many people are reading this, but i enjoy analyzing my writing so i’m gonna keep doing it :) let’s get started, shall we?

some fun stuff before we start!

the first scene i wrote for this story was the dock scene

usually, when i write, i kind of just start with whatever is the first thing that comes to mind. i’d had the bulk of the story outline in my head, not written yet, but i knew i wanted this reveal about the red lotus attack. so i started with it and wrote as far as i could before deciding i should start the beginning of the fic. most of the original content is there, with some stuff added on, but i took a turn from my dialogue as it didn’t fit the narrative of the story anymore (well get to this point in a later chapter analysis, don’t worry)

not me being heavily inspired by LOVE WITCH by bisexualyoda

around the time that i started this fic and was really writing for it, i found this story on ao3 and literally read whatever chapters were out at that time in a day. it was a story that also influenced me to write in asami’s pov, as a majority of the story is from hers. (this isn’t the only reason tho, but bisexualyoda is a writing god and what else could i do but try to honor them?) it’s a stellar korrasami fic that you should read if you haven’t yet and if you haven’t yet, what are you doing, please go enjoy that masterpiece

and into the chapter we shall go:

i kinda thought it was cool to play off this idea of a barista who can’t sleep but it’s not because of the coffee like you’d expect. 

now, being a diehard korrasami fan, i knew i wanted to apply this to my girls. and, i knew from the get-go i wanted korrasami to meet as if it were more book four, where korra has gone through something really terrible and asami is a really good friend who’s there for her. so i thought it might be cool to put the two together and korra is a barista who can’t sleep. then it was getting to what exactly the trauma was that korra experienced. i didn’t want anything as severe as what korra went through in the series (our poor girl was wrongfully put through the wringer for four seasons) but i wanted something that would stick with her and still haunt her, even after a period of time. my favorite book is book three and i loved the red lotus antagonists, so i played around with their concept and turned it into what’s in the story. i was really pleased when i came up with this and only made some minor changes (i had originally explicitly given korra insomnia. i decided to change this and keep it more ambiguous because i didn’t want to inaccurately describe insomnia and somehow offend anyone who does experience it, i hate doing that) and then i was set to really start the fic.

more about povs:

so, when i first started writing this fic, the idea of multiple povs was an option. in the end, i chose only asami, for a number of reasons, but mostly for one in particular

just like asami, i wanted you guys to gradually learn about korra’s situation. sure, i could’ve went through korra’s pov and been all secret secret about it, but something about that idea doesn’t sit well with me. i liked the idea of gradual connection and in turn concern. i sprinkled some little stuff here and there, to hint that something’s up, but i feel like that’s the hook for you lil fishies to grasp onto. even in that very dock scene, i don’t give it to you right away; i dance around it, just like korra does by talking about tenzin and the temple and i mention the water and korra’s jacket and anything but the reason why korra’s called asami at 2 in the morning to come see her. this kind of tension, this kind of urgency to know what’s going on, i just don’t think would’ve been achieved had i had alternating povs.

something i really love about this chapter is how the first section and third section ends

Makeshift Boardrooms ends with korra being a complete angel and going above and beyond for asami and this presentation:

Asami is speechless. Inside, the tables and chairs have been set up as if it’s a long boardroom, fit with the donuts in the center of the table no one can ever reach. At the far end, a projector screen is set up and a loading screen is displayed on it. Asami stares at the girl, unsure of how to convey how appreciative she is for the gesture.

“Korra…”

“I know,” she quickly speaks up, her fingers behind her back fidgeting even faster, “it’s a lot, but I thought you should get the best kind of practice! And, we hosted a movie night here a while back, I wasn’t sure if Tenzin left all the equipment here but I found it all in one of the cabinets in his office and I,” she’s looking at the ground now, “is it all right?”

“All right?” Asami questions, truly confused as to how Korra could say such a thing. She reaches out, slowly, gently, placing her hand on Korra. The girl’s hands fall to her sides, Asami’s fingertips slowly linger down from the bundled fabric of Korra’s rolled up sleeve to her forearm.

now, A Turn of Events ends like how we know:

Asami falls back onto the couch, ill prepared for the unexpected burst. Korra continues huffing, gasping for air, clutching at her chest and running a hand through her hair. Asami reaches out again and that’s when Korra flinches again. She starts to sob.

“Korra…”

“Get out!”

Asami sits, staring. She isn’t sure if she heard right or not. Korra begins shaking, sobbing inconsolably. Asami just wants to reach out.

“Get. Out!”

Asami grabs her things and rushes towards the door, taking one final glance behind her shoulder. Korra’s hands cover her face, her body flinches and shakes, her sobs ring loudly in Asami’s ears. 

In between each desperate gasp for air, she can hear Korra whisper, “Please, please, stop, stop, please, stop, please.”

Asami feels her heart sink and she opens the door to leave.

i’ve bolded what i love most. it was actually unintentional, i’d only noticed after i finished the chapter and was reading through to edit, but it’s kind of beautiful, bittersweet even. there are parallels here, some less noticeable than others, but parallels nonetheless. the lingering of korra’s name is direct and the events after are strikingly different but in a way connected. in Makeshift Boardrooms, after the mention of her name, korra is sputtering word after word. in A Turn of Events, after the mention of her name, korra only says two words. it’s two sides of the same coin, showing how korra is unfortunately spiraling out and losing control of what’s going on with her. typing it out is kind of hurting me, seeing how korra’s in pain, but im the author and i know what happens later so i shouldn’t worry too much.

now getting onto asami in this section, still, the lingering of korra’s name is the most noticeable parallel. but, in Makeshift Boardroom, after korra responds, asami reassures the girl with physical touch, she’s able to reach out to her. in A Turn of Events, after korra responds, asami doesn’t react, she doesn’t know how to. korra’s in front of her, clearly in pain, and she just yelled at asami, and still asami just wants to reach out to her. once again, unintentional that this happened, but sometimes it’s the unexpected things that turn out for the best. the diction i have here, in repeating the word reach, i think it just further drives home how heartbreaking this chapter’s turned out to be. (shout out to the section title, cause things really did take a turn here) it had all seemed so good, korra was opening up to asami, they were getting closer, and then all of a sudden BAM korra has a panic attack and in a moment of utter fear, she pushes away asami. i know i put angst in the ao3 tags, but now going over it as the author, i see my angst has really gone above and beyond, but hey, i really liked how this chapter turned out

honorable mentions:

in LOVE WITCH, asami and kuvira are basically besties and i loved the idea of their friendship and i wanted to have a go at it myself! finding kuvira’s place in the story, however, was a lil tough to navigate, but when i came up with the bodyguard idea, i really liked it. i hope you guys do too :))

idk if you guys noticed but outside formal fic/writing settings, i pretty much only type in lowercase. however, i do type in complete sentences and the only abbreviation i really use is idk so don’t mind me lowkey projecting onto korra here. anyways, i know most phones have the default setting for texts to be first word already uppercase. i have mine turned off but figured korra would have hers on cause 1) she prefers it this way and 2) even if she wanted to turn it off, she doesn’t know how to. plus, i liked the idea of her enjoying emoticons better than emojis. i love emojis but i always do a lil sideways smiley ( :) ) and to me it’s super cute and i’m sure korra would see it the same way

the end of this chapter is not what i had first intended! truth be told, i didn’t know what exactly was going to happen at the end of the chapter, but i knew what would happen after it, i just needed a bridge. in my og timeline, i had a couple different options: the one i almost went through with was asami suggesting they move into together (which is admittedly super soon and super fast so like, it would scare off korra), another was something intimate that would still scare korra off (this one wasn’t too elaborated on, perhaps a forehead touch, or super close faces, idk. obviously this doesn’t happen, but it had been in consideration), i’d actually even considered something physical, but that was quickly cut off the list, as that is NOT how i wanted this story to go. anyways, because of how this chapter ended, the whole rest of the story changed and i couldn’t be happier.

anything i would’ve wanted to change?

im still super self conscious about the length but at the same time, also not, idk how to describe it. anyways, i think what i actually would’ve liked is keeping something from the Home Life section i took out. when i first wrote it, asami actually had a desk mate and he was flamboyant and sassy and i loved him. looking back now, i would’ve loved to have kept him and the scene with him, but i took it out cause i was scared the chapter was too long. after reading everyone’s comments though, about how they don’t care how long chapters are/longer chapters are better, i gave myself some more slack with the last chapters. his name was ryuichi, rip ryuichi

surprise epilogue is out now too, so enjoy the rest of the fic! if you have any questions, feel free to ask :)))

[inknose]

mdzs read diary part IV, the end

It’s inspiring how much self care wwx is gonna finally get now that his husband will go along with whatever he does, so he’s gotta look out for lwj’s well being if not his own. that is emphatically the STUFF

dragging my hands down I face as I read this, after all these chapters of getting up close and personal with ghouls bleeding from every orifice, slaying ancient beasts, rebelling against the entire cultivation world, the two of them are absolutely paralyzed by middle school crush sleepover math

chicken

he actually drew kissy doodles .... he....

IDK I THINK I JUST DOCUMENTED THIS PART CUZ I WAS STILL SCREAMING you cant expect me to have very useful things to say at this point

this is torture you are both so mushy you are so GONE

This part really stood out to me, it’s an attitude I feel like wwx implies with his inner narration a few times but most clearly says here: he’s not one for allowing himself to exaggerate how bad his circumstances are/could be even a little bit - he’s already lived through some extreme low points and found a way to keep going, so he never makes sweeping statements about what he couldn’t live without (Inner JingYi: you’re supposed to say you’d be lost without him here!!!) Instead he seems to accept as a given that being alive doesn’t guarantee him any pleasantness or joy at all, and as a result his feelings toward being in TRUE LOVE are surprisingly pragmatic, but also colored with such gratitude. There are a lot of things in the novel that struck me, like this, as being just a little to the left of familiar tropes/sentiments, and were more touching for it. Whether it be the influence of culture difference as opposed to what I’m used to reading in most western romance stories, or MXTX’s unique outlook, or a combination of both, it was really refreshing and made me pause over it. Not “I can’t imagine living without you” but “I could be living without you, but instead I get to be with you and I think that’s the best thing that could happen.”

ADJFDKFJ THE UST BEING SO STRONG THAT EVEN THE VILLAIN COMMENTS ON IT IN THE MIDDLE OF EXECUTING HIS EVIL PLANS IS ONE OF THOSE THINGS THAT WILL NEVER FAIL TO MAKE ME LAUGH MY ASS OFF. hes like god damn! here I thought I had problems

it was at this moment that I realized we were doing this Now... I’m still recovering. What a scene. I am so glad I saw the most incredible fanart soon afterwards, bc the fact that someone has already drawn a perfect comic of this part means I don’t have to

I love you so much, you are so annoying, you are perfect... I like how he’s been experiencing openly requited love for all of ten minutes but he’s already figured out how to weaponize it to piss people off

doing!!! his!!! job!!!!!

ahh... it’s a really good story. JGY is a great character. One of the most interesting differences for me between drama watching vs. novel reading experience is that without an actor to bat his vulnerable doe eyes at you and smile faintly with his cute dimples, the book does not go much out of its way to try to lull the reader into a false sense of security around him or *endear* him to you the way the show does. But just by seeing events through wei wuxian’s POV, its still enough to evoke pity or understanding towards him. The overall impression is a bit more detached though, there’s less emphasis on the spectacle of how he could manipulate everyone closest to him and more of a general feeling of resigned tragedy that everyones the worst on this bitch of an earth.

I CANNOT DEAL WITH YOU FOR EVEN ONE MORE SECOND!!!!

I clearly paused to take note of less and less parts at the end & the extras due to: a) too excited to reach the end b) too spicy to photograph and c) too sleepy cuz I kept reading in the middle of the night. but I absolutely took the time for Bro We Are Teens appreciation corner:

I’d absolutely read 40 more extra chapters of their monster-of-the-week field trip antics.

god... poor Jin Ling now basically has to deal with divorced parents that talk shit about each other to him whenever he is saying with one of them. except they are both his uncles. just a disasterhood of all uncles from start to finish. AUUUGH wei wuxian and jiang cheng have fucked me up completely, I dream of them reconciling but I also REFUSE to believe it would ever be easy. let me know if theres a fanfic that absolutely tortures you for decades before they hug

HAHAHA oh no this man ain’t making it to immortality thats for damn sure. HE’S JUST GONNA TRY AS HARD AS HE CAN HIS WHOLE LIFE NOT TO LOOK AT HIM BUT THEYRE *MARRIED* SDLKFJSF ohhhh it’s too funny, like... the mundane domestic family drama IN the fantastical swords and sorcery setting is what really ratchets up these things from amusing to fucking hilarious I think

aaaa the end... final random thoughts? No not final, I would like to please keep discussing at length and exhaustively, all the time please - CQL has gotta be one of the best TV adaptations I’ve seen. ANY adaptation of anything would be lucky to be so good!! reading the novel has just made me appreciate it even more.

- I don’t think I can do justice to what I find most fascinating about comparing the two versions briefly, to do that I need to get drunk and ramble at my friends for hours but... the condensed version is something like this. Really all the significant differences between the two versions (besides the ones which can be attributed to censorship and therefore aren’t worth discussing) are a side effect of the structure of how the story is told - there’s barely anything changed arbitrarily. Aside from having a cold opening, the drama sticks to a very linear version of the story, and I think for a TV show or film, that’s probably the best way to do it. We see everything, we get shocked and tricked and betrayed and surprised along with the characters, we feel the biggest impact at the climactic scenes having experienced all the build-up. The novel on the other hand is not only much more non-linear in WHEN we learn bits and pieces of information, but that information is also obfuscated under wei wuxian’s multiple layers of Unreliable Narratoritis, which are as follows: 1) difficulty remembering things because of personality/avoiding painful memories/actual memory loss, 2) No Homo Goggles still on, and 3) a wry sense of humor that makes the reader unsure of how much they can trust his attitude toward things, especially near the beginning. The experience of reading is a puzzle the reader has to mentally piece together through all of the above listed camouflage, and the puzzle itself is a three-sided mystery: One - How Bad of a guy was Wei WuXian really, and how exactly did all the bad stuff in his life go down; Two - wangxian epic pride & prejudice gambits; Three - political murder mystery. (I love stories like this btw... though I fully admit I’m glad I watched first this time bc it might have taken me a long time to tackle otherwise.) Because of this, where the drama wants to pull you in and submerge you in all the most potent emotional parts, the novel in direct contrast deliberately side-steps around these things and asks that you hurt yourself by filling in the blanks. In fact the more intense emotions and painful memories involved, whether it be his relationship with jiang yanli, his DEATH, the darkest days of war times etc, the more the novel evasively withholds details. I actually really like both styles of storytelling but each one is obviously way better suited to its medium. ANYWAY.... THATS BASICALLY WHERE MY BRAINS AT WHILE IM READING GAY SWORD WIZARD BOOKS

- The extras are so saturated with domestic married bliss that it’s a good thing I stopped taking pictures because I’d just take a picture of every page. this is too much for me to take... I did jump the gun a few times and read a few fanfics while I was still mid-read of the book (I tried to hold out but alas I am mortal) and at one point after finishing I was like “wow what fic was it in where lwj says something cute and wwx kisses him in public but they’re in the corner of the restaurant so no one really sees... OH NO WAIT that was actually in there.” and ... and that’s the LEAST OF IT... *stares into the distance* theyre married wow

- I ofc couldn’t help but see a few vague blogs beforehand so honestly I was braced for something like, wildly ooc for the sake of porn to happen in the extras... I definitely appreciate how the incense burner porn interludes could be uhhh a lot for many people and not my personal cup of tea in terms of smut however [here follows the words of a poisonous frog who has dwelt her whole life in the rainforests of BL] the concept is also surprisingly SWEET SDFLKJF like wwx sees lan wangji’s darkest mixed-up violent teenage fantasies and he’s just like aww babe you had a crush on me!! just... good for them

- I swear I’m not gonna rehash every cute married thing they do but wei wuxian grading papers in the tub........................rEALLY GOT ME

- I want to Draw - ok thats enough if I keep going I’ll just write “wei wuxian grading papers in the tub” seven more times probably

[shitfics]

hi, im a fanfic writer who is trying to break into original fiction and publication. i noticed in the notes of one of your short stories that you were trying to write longer chapters. One of my favourite stories by you, One of These Nights is 90,000+ over 11 chapters. what kind of advice would you give to someone like me who struggles to break over 2,500 words per chapter? how can i work to make my chapters longer and still be interesting like yours? thank you x

Oh gosh, thank you so much! I'm hoping to break into original stuff too, and maybe get published, but don't have much hopes for it yet...still slugging away at my wip. ^^; It's sweet that you hold my stuff highly! And I'm sorry this got a bit long…I'm not good at being succinct when trying to talk about writing things, since I still feel so clueless myself. I’ve put most of the rambling behind a read more. 

For me really, writing longer things has just taken time…not in the sense of taking time to write a story (tho obvs it does), but like, each thing I wrote naturally got longer and longer as I got more used to storytelling, I guess? At this point, I think everything I write is almost too long, so I'm wondering what story it was I wanted longer chapters on…lol. It was kinda like lifting weights in a way, lol…I took a long time before I could get to 90k, and you can kinda see how each story got longer and longer (copy and paste was 12k, synchronicity/book of blood were around 20k, da au was 40k in part one/60k in part 2, and the hyung au was 90kish). 

Ofc I have a few breaks from that pattern, but those were kinda 'side projects' for fun that I wanted to keep short, like the esports ontae. Wherever you're at right now in terms of overall story length, I think writing regularly is the most important for building the "endurance" for longer stories and scenes -- and being as patient with yourself as you can about getting there is ideal. It’s a lot like working yourself up to lifting heavier weights, imo.(And full disclaimer though, my confidence/mental health wrt my writing is generally rock bottom, so I know it's not easy lol.)

Once I got into writing longer stories, I've kinda grown to see writing as having two kinda moods: gut-level writing, stuff you HAVE to get down and are dying to write, and the 'fill-in', less exciting parts or parts you really have to discipline yourself to get through.

For writing fic (especially shorter fic), I know I started with just gut-level writing. And for short stuff, that's generally all you need! I really struggled (and still kinda do) when I got to the point where that wasn't enough to fill in a long story, but I've kinda found a way of dealing it.

I don't know if it's a good habit, depending on how you work and how your ideas come about, but for me, I start by writing as much as possible for the scenes I do have fairly established in my head, then create an outline and fill in/revise the rest. It makes it easier for me to feel like I'm working off of inspiration and not just a rigid outline, so I get a good mix of the story/characters 'developing naturally' and 'not going entirely off the rails.' I will say that I think I struggle with endings because of it tho, since the 'gut-level' stuff for me rarely/never touches that part of the story. I usually have to outline to figure out where I want things to end up or what I want to show last.

For the your chapters question -- I'm not sure if by 'chapters' you might mean scene (since a lot of people break things up that way), or if you just mean in terms of other chapter divisions, but I'm gonna try and address both!

Personally, I don't really think in terms of chapters, if that makes sense? That part comes way later when I'm writing. Like right now, I'll be honest and say I don't have set 'chapter' divisions in my head yet for my wip, lol, tho the scenes might be long enough for stand-alone chapters. When I start a story (either with just inspiration or from an outline), it's a matter of scenes, and then after that, I figure out how many scenes I want in a chapter and what would feel "right" in terms of dividing them.

Usually, when I end a chapter it's either because it's an emotional high-point, it feels like a "natural" place to break (due to a jump forward in time for the next scene/resolution to a current conflict), or it's somewhere I need to change the point of view (if I'm writing a story with multiple). Like, for a high-point, I'd think of ending after the scene in hyung au where Jinki comes out, or in the esports thing, where ontae sleep together the first time. For "natural" break places, it's often a matter of time/resolutions, like…jongyu parting ways before jinki starts japanese promotions in hyung au, or in my current wip, them kinda breaking up for a few months after a fight. Pov changes for breaks are pretty self-explanatory and I could go on forever about how I try to pick which pov to use for a scene/chapter, but I think the most important thing is to use those breaks to avoid confusion.

As far as interest goes -- making sure scenes have enough "meat" to them without dragging can be hard, esp if you're trying to setup a plot. Imo, scenes are interesting when there's conflict or emotional high points of some kind (which can be a lot of different things). Once you figure out which of those you want in a scene, I think it gets easier to write around that.  Like, to go back to hyung au, when Jinki came to visit Jong at Blue Night and they hung out after -- I started the scene just knowing I wanted Jinki to surprise him, because I thought that'd be cute.

So in thinking about what purpose the scene might serve to move things forward…I knew mood-wise I wanted to capture some more of the uncertainty of how to act around each other, now that they're both know the other is gay, have Jinki be torn between making a move/confessing and his fear of changing things for the worse, set them up for some messy revelation of feelings in the next scene, and ofc have them both be horny because how else are you gonna feel being around your crush for the first time in a month.

Once that was kinda setup in my head, it was easier to fill in what the characters say/how they act. Jinki flirts with Jong on air, because that's 'safe' (it can't go anywhere since they're in a studio and it'd be easy to dismiss as not serious since he's in Onew-mode), Jong is defs very

And as another note…. I just think some parts are always going to be difficult to write, because we all have different strengths when it comes to writing. Like, I hate writing setting descriptions, so I don't do it much and generally provide a bare-minimum for scene context -- but when I need more for the purpose of mood or plot or whatever, it feels like pulling teeth. Since it's such a miserable process for me, and that's so long, I assume that means it sucks or it's a real slog for whoever's reading it, but…they don't always correlate.

Not every part of a project is gonna be fun -- which sucks! -- but it's also why it's important to take mental breaks and imo, step away from your story at milestones. It's not great to make yourself miserable for writing, (I say while I doing just that most of the time), but I think going in with the knowledge that it IS going to be hard sometimes can help. The more stories you write, the more you'll be able to hone your instinct for like...if you're struggling because there's something wrong with the plot/scene/prose or if it's just because writing be like that sometimes.

Oof, this got too long, and I don’t even know how much of it is useful, but I hope it might help a bit? Thank you again for the compliment and best of luck with your writing!!

[aristarshower]

21 questions writing-themed!

I was tagged by @setterslsett !!! Thank you so much!!! Sorry it took me so long! My wifi died and I’m on data :/

rules: tag 5 or more other writers. if you aren’t tagged, feel free to use these questions anyway and consider yourself tagged!

1. Short stories, novels, or poems?

All! I love novels tho! I love planning series! Most of my ideas are big series! I love short stories too but I’m not sure if I’m good at them? I used to write a lot of poems but stopped after a while. I should start again!

2. What genre do you prefer reading?

Fantasy! Contemporary stuff too sometimes! YA, urban fantasy, high fantasy, scifi, sff... I’ll read pretty much anything fiction tbh! Bonus points for good rep!

3. What genre do you prefer writing?

Fantasy! I love world building so much!!!(If you need someone to help you figure out stuff or just talk out a world hmu) I love drawing maps too!!! I also write scifi!!! But most of my writing kind of combines genres with one being predominant and another the background genre? Does that make sense?

4. Are you a planner or a write-as-I-go kind of person?

Both! I love planning though ngl! But I am writing Star Catcher one chapter a week with very minimal planning! I usually plan out some basic outlines and figure out the minutiae of the writing while I write!

5. What music do you listen to while writing?

I don’t usually listen to music while writing especially anything english cause it confuses me when I write. I listen to stuff in my other languages or just instrumental stuff sometimes but mostly I prefer silence to let myself immerse!

6. Fave books/movies?

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

7. Any current WIPs?

So many tbh!

WIP 1- Kaiden- Fantasy. Bi MC(First person POV all from Kai’s. The next books are each from his siblings. It’s a seven book series). He is a vampire prince exiled after a war forced to leave his wife and kids behind. His good behavior ensures their survival but he is now involved in Dwarvian politics and shit is getting real with old evil coming back to haunt the world.

WIP 2- Destiny-  Fantasy. My oldest and first manuscript. Currently shelved in favor of Kai but I am editing it slowly. It is a multiple POV with ace woc lead and a mlm couple as the other mcs. It is a avatar(last airbender) like world with marks that determine people’s powers. But anyone with a pure mark is considered too powerful and unlucky(there’s lore) so they are shunned. Unmarked are also shunned cause people are shit. There are kingdoms, industrial revolution, badass queens who thirst for war, antagonists who want to free the goddess of Death from her cage and protags of a prequel who failed in saving the world first time around. It’s a trilogy(Destiny, Unmarked and Broken).

WIP 3- YA fantasy, Ace woc and wlw woc are MCS. Librarian army fighting word monsters. Also a trilogy(Librarian’s Apprentice, Librarian’s Duty, Librarian’s Hoard).

WIP 4- Star Catcher (scifi) which I am posting now on tumblr!

These are the main WIPS but there are others I make maps for or write random scenes when I’m too blocked on these! I have like 38 ideas which I jump around on so it’s all one big mess.

8. If someone were to make a cartoon out of you, what would your standard outfit be?

Probably a salwar? I wear a lot of kurtis and salwars or maybe button downs or plaids with black jeans!(I have a new jacket with kind of indian monsters printed on it that I adore so maybe that too?)

9. Create a character description for yourself:

The bright sunlight turned their long dark hair into different shades of brown, most of them beautiful, some of them weird. Their eyes were closed and the wind danced delicately through the lashes settling into the curve of their neck making them shiver. They adjusted their glasses and rubbed at the perspiration on their chubby cheeks. It was going to be a hot day.

(I’m very sleep deprived and I’m so not used to writing about myself so don’t judge me!)

10. Do you like incorporating people you actually know into your writing?

Not completely. I pick bits and pieces of others and myself to blend into characters tbh!

11. Are you kill-happy with characters?

Not really? I go where the story goes tbh. I don’t kill anyone on purpose? I make them suffer but not all the time either!

12. Dream job?

Author duh. But also anything that would let me be financially stable tbh.

13. Coffee or tea while writing?

Coffee usually but I don’t make a drink just to write.

14. Slow or fast writer?

Fast when I feel like it but feeling like it happens only when the stars are aligned!

15. Where/who/what do you find inspiration from?

Random crap. Also @julesdap is a blessing and I’m lov her

16. If you were put into a fantasy world, what would you be?

I want to be something with magic! Preferably with no gender! But my first would always be dragon!

17. Most fave book cliche? Least fave book cliche?

again so many!!! Fav has to be the happy/hopeful ending! Least fav is “strong” female protags hating girly stuff cause they are not like other girls!

18. Fave places to write:

Anyplace I don’t get distracted. I used to love writing near a lawn but I don’t live there anymore so gotta adjust :(

19. Fave scenes to write?

Absolutely hate dialogue? Love descriptions! But I’m shit at both so eh

20. Most productive time of day for writing?

four fucking am usually but I don’t have one time. I cram in writing when I can and when my fuckt up brain lets me do things.

21. Reason for writing:

I suck at everything else? I suck a bit less at writing? lmao

seriously though, I just love the escapism and creating whole worlds tbh!

(sorry im not tagging anyone, I got very little sleep last night cause nightmares so I’m gonna turn in now! Anyone who wants to do it please tag yourself from me!)

[sineala]

Hi Sine! I recently re-read your Star Trek AU--which is BRILLIANT--and I noticed that it's got a pretty complex plot. Then I thought about it, and a lot of your fics have multiple things going on in them at once. I think Living On Your Breath has something like four plots: Steve's personal, Tony's personal, the villains, and then Carol&Wanda's. Plot complexity is something I'm trying to get better at, so I thought I'd ask how you come up with and manage everything! Thanks for writing!

Thanks for asking! I had to think about this for a bit, but I came up with a few rough guidelines for how I handle plot. I’m putting this under a read more because (1) I am wordy, and (2) I don’t want to spoil either of those stories for anyone who hasn’t read them.

A disclaimer: I am entirely self-taught in that I have never had a writing class in my life and I don’t really do well with those writing help books. So basically what I have learned has been picked up by reading a lot of books, reading a lot of fanfic, and writing a lot.

This is not so much a plot tip as General Writing Advice, but there’s an Ira Glass quotation that circulates Tumblr every so often that I really like:

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”

I’ve certainly had this problem; I’ve spent years not writing because I’ve come up with ideas I knew I couldn’t execute to my own standards. And then I did it anyway, and eventually I got better and now I’m at a point where if I have an idea for a story it is probably something that I feel like I would enjoy if I wrote it (as opposed to “God, I can’t pull that one off, I hope someone else writes it”). It does make leaving exchange prompts kind of tricky because I think one up and then NO I WANT TO WRITE IT MYSELF. (The Jar is a Cap-IM Holiday Exchange prompt I nearly left before deciding I wanted to write it myself.)

Anyway. Plotting long stories. The big difference between a long story and a shorter story  is that you need to be conscious of the overall structure and where you are going. You know all those rising action/climax/falling action plot outlines? Take a novel you like and think about it like that. Break it down. If you want a long story that feels cohesive, you’re probably going to want to adhere to that basic structure. You don’t necessarily need to make an outline of that form – I don’t bother – but you should have in your mind the idea that three-quarters of the way through (or so) is the Big Important Scene that your story has been building towards, and then the rest is cleanup.

I am generally writing romance stories, and the tropes of the genre are such that there are often a lot of shortcuts I can take when I am trying to work out what’s going to happen, especially if these are first-time stories – the big moment is the characters declaring their love, finally getting together, and so on and so forth. So you ask yourself, okay, what are the obstacles to their love? Why didn’t they get together before? Maybe they have to learn to love each other. Maybe Steve doesn’t know Tony is Iron Man. Throw the obstacles in their path! Make them get over them!

But the reason these stories get so long on me is that that’s not usually the only plot. The other plot can be personal to the characters (say, Tony’s drinking problem) or involving the personal lives of the other characters, or, heck, maybe they even have to save the world. Basically I just… intersperse the development of both plots, and I try to make sure that every scene is furthering something: either plot or characterization. (When I am outlining the story itself, I try to keep tabs on this.)

Because these are generally romance stories, the A-plot, the one I give the most weight to, is probably going to be the romance plot, and the B-plot is going to be whatever else happens in the story. The absolute best way to join these plots together is to make them both build together and then hit their respective plot climaxes at as close to the same time as you can manage. If the B-plot is saving the world, Tony is tragically injured in the fight with supervillains, and that’s when Steve tells him he loves him. If the B-plot is personal discovery, Tony gets sober and decides he can be with Steve. Something like that.

How do I keep track of this? I used to do it in my head. I don’t recommend that part. I know some people can handle writing novels by the seat of their pants, but I work a lot better with outlines; I have a lot of abandoned novels where I basically didn’t remember what was going to happen next, and… whoops. I actually do all my outlining and writing (of long stories, anyway) in Scrivener (which is the best program I have ever spent money on). I like Scrivener because it’s set up to handle stories with a lot of ancillary research material, and furthermore it’s organized by scene, which makes a lot of sense to me.

First is the brainstorming. I like to bounce my ideas off other people when I am still in the thinking stage (like “hey, would you read a story about X?”) and then I spend a while mulling over The Scenes That It Makes My Brain Really Happy To Think About, which are usually (for me) probably the climax of the story. (This might be Steve And Tony Finally Get Together or Steve Finds Out Tony Is Iron Man or Steve Cradles Tony’s Broken Body In His Arms.) In my current WIP, it’s probably Steve Realizes He Loves Tony After All.

And then eventually I make an outline. The outline is basically a complete synopsis, scene by scene, of everything I want to happen in the story, with as much detail as I need. Sometimes there will be bits of dialogue, sometimes it will be OH FUCK SOMETHING PLOTTY HAS TO HAPPEN HERE, FIGURE OUT WHAT IT IS. Because generally I will know that the non-relationship plot must advance before I know exactly how. (I revise it as I go.) The outline for the Trek AU is about 1500 words. (The outline for its sequel is 3000 but it uses more complete sentences as it was intended for other people to read.) I stick this all in the Research pane of Scrivener along with my canon notes and whatever else I need to refer to while writing. This is a good time to stop and make sure that the outline feels like a story – all the emotional beats are in the right place, there’s a good mix of A-plot and B-plot. and so on and so forth. I just squint at it and wing it but I’m sure there are various exercises you can do if you like that sort of thing.

Then I do the actual scene breakdown. Because I’m using Scrivener, it has this very cool functionality whereby every scene has an associated “notecard.” You can give each card a title, organize them in folders by chapter, reorder them, and write up whatever you want on the notecard; I fill it with a description (expanded from the outline) of what’s going to be in each scene. Sometimes if I have multiple POVs I will color-code each scene.

As for specific complex plots, let me tell you about how I came with the stories you asked about.

Living On Your Breath was easier because it was for a RBB, and the artist (Phoenix) had a few suggestions about canon, and from there I let canon help guide me to filling out the plot. The art that went with it was Tony in leather and fishnets, choking Steve out. Which is, you know, evocative. Phoenix had suggested that the plot involve mind-control (which seemed reasonable as Tony looked pretty evil in the picture) and also she wanted to know if I could write a story set in Avengers v3, which I had never read, but I was game.

So, I thought, okay, this was going to be a story where a mind-controlled Tony had somehow captured Steve and decided to choke him. How could I get a plot out of that? Well, I thought, what if the drama of the story isn’t just about Tony being villainous? What if it’s a story about kink and consent? What if maybe Steve would have wanted Tony to choke him out when he wasn’t evil? What if Tony secretly wanted that too and Steve had no idea? Well, that seemed like a decent amount of angst to me.

And that right there suggested a basic plot structure. Steve and Tony would get together at the beginning, and we would establish that Steve had these unfulfilled kinky desires, and they would be happy together but not A+ perfect because they are not talking about all their unmet needs because, let’s face it, they have communications problems. Then Tony gets kidnapped and mind-controlled, and kidnaps and tortures Steve, and he does everything Steve wants except it’s fucking terrible because, well, Steve didn’t so much want Tony the supervillain to whip him. Just regular Tony. And so the rest of the story was going to be about them healing and putting themselves back together (although getting worse before they get better) and reclaiming everything they did and admitting their secret kinky desires and having Tony choke Steve out in a truly wholesome and loving way.

I knew that there was going to have to be some kind of plot involving villains – I mean, someone had to do the kidnapping and mind control – so I went looking for obscure villains (since I’d had enough of AIM and Hydra) with a grudge against Steve and ended up, unfortunately, with the Secret Empire. They were so obscure, I told myself! Surely Marvel wasn’t ever going to use the name for something big! Ahahaha. *sobs quietly to self*

I also decided that it might be nice to have the events of canon going on as a backdrop to the story, and as soon as I read v3 I knew exactly what I was going to do because, see, I fell in love with Carol’s drinking arc. Avengers v3 starts out so sweet and the team loves each other and then… it kind of starts to fall apart. Not that they don’t love each other, but it’s apparent that several of them have Problems, and Carol’s drinking is the definition of a Problem. So I wanted to have the team start to go along perfectly and then break apart as Carol does, with Steve and Tony’s post-mind-control relationship along for the ride at the same time. Suppose it all comes to a head with Steve and Tony on the same mission that gets Carol kicked off the team? And then, well, we know Tony goes up to Seattle in canon for recovery from a fight in canon – what if, in this version, he brings Steve with him? And later on, when Carol drop-kicks Tony through a jet and finally sobers up, what if Steve is there too? So that way both Tony and Carol get to get better at the same time. Recovery arc for EVERYBODY.

Honestly I added Wanda because I figured that Carol needed SOMEBODY to be there for her (it really irritated me that the team basically just kicked her out on her own, in canon) and she and Wanda clearly like each other a lot. Having said that, about 50% of Carol’s plot is straight out of canon, dialogue included, although I played with the timing, added Wanda, put Carol in the Blue Area mission, and gave Steve and Tony a massive breakup in the middle of the mission.

The structure of this one was pretty simple – before, during, and after Steve’s captivity. Every scene in the During section was one of Steve’s days. During the After scenes I was basically trading off Steve/Tony and Carol & Wanda plot development.

Straight on till Morning was trickier to plot. For most of its imaginary life, it didn’t have a plot; it was me sitting around and thinking, “Gosh, I like the Avengers and I like Star Trek and I want to imagine the Avengers in spaaaaace.” But that wasn’t a plot. That wasn’t even anything close to an idea for a story. So it just kind of sat there for a couple years rattling around my brain. And, really, the backstory all came first, and the plot kind of sprung out of everything there had to be in order to put the backstory in play.

One day I was sitting there thinking about what the Avengers would be in the Star Trek universe, and I thought, “Well, obviously Steve is a starship captain and OH MY GOD STEVE IS A GENETICALLY-ENGINEERED SUPERHUMAN FROM THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.” I had been thinking of the story as a complete fusion, where no one existed with their regular Marvel identities, but suddenly it occurred to me that if Steve existed in the Star Trek universe and had still been Captain America in World War II, things could get really interesting – because the Federation, bastion of diversity and tolerance, is fully prepared to hate the fuck out of you if you are genetically-engineered. Especially, and I am just guessing here, especially if you are from the twentieth century. Steve would predate Khan and the other supermen, but, well… maybe Steve was the first Augment. So that’s an interesting idea! The one universe where being Captain America would actually be reviled!

So that’s not a plot, either, really, but that’s part of a plot: Steve has a Terrible Secret. He is an Augment. What’s going to happen when Tony learns his terrible secret? Well, he’s probably going to take it pretty badly.

Steve’s backstory was pretty much a direct port of the Cap stuff plus making him frozen twice so that (1) he could have prior starship command experience and (2) I would throw off everyone who assumed that him being frozen once was the way I was translating his comics backstory. At least until the scene where Tony gets out his Cap poster, anyway.

Tony’s backstory was a little more complicated. Because the thing about an AU is, you have to ask yourself which elements of a character and their backstory are 100% essential. And the weird thing about Tony is that a lot of the things that are key components of his superhero life don’t really translate to Star Trek. Like, take Tony’s famous MCU line, “genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist.” Welcome to the post-scarcity economy, Tony; there’s NO MONEY. That knocks out “billionaire” and “philanthropist.” “Playboy” is, let’s face it, probably also linked to “billionaire,” and for 616 Tony it gets use as basically part of his intricate layers of personal masks where he doesn’t sleep with nearly as many people as he wants you to think he does. That leaves “genius.” And we’re gonna make him a Starfleet engineer! Everyone’s a genius there!

The Iron Man suit, likewise also out. Because, yes, it’s cool, but it’s not Star Trek cool. A flying suit? Try a starship. Maybe he designs starships, I said to myself.

So what are the key qualities of Tony? His genius, his engineering aptitude, his general personality, let’s throw in his former alcoholism, and of course his Vietghanistan trauma leading to heart injury. So something happened to him on Planet Vietghanistan, obviously, and whatever it was hurt him, but it didn’t lead him to make Iron Man. But he still needed to do something heroic, but it had to be Trek-style heroic. What if he saved a bunch of his shipmates? What if he saved a bunch of his shipmates and built a ship to rescue them and Captain Yinsen died tragically in his arms? And what if Tony was so fucked up by all of this that he decided to quit Starfleet? Until, of course, he meets Steve.

This suggests an arc for Tony’s character, the same way Steve’s backstory suggested an arc for him: Tony learns to love himself, Starfleet, and Steve. Maybe not in that exact order.

And remember, Steve has A Secret. Well, that’s going to interfere with Tony learning to love him. Obviously Tony will eventually come around. So from there you can see where the major obstacle to Steve and Tony’s happiness is going to be.

The first third-to-half of this story was therefore pretty easy to write, because it was just a matter of introductions and shoving in all the backstory. Meet Tony. Meet the ship. Meet Steve. Let’s go to Starfleet Academy and learn a bit about the Prime Directive and Tony’s tragic backstory. Meet the crew. Set off on a maiden voyage. Tell Steve about Augments, watch him freak out, and watch Tony have no clue why.

And then, of course, there had to be A Plot. Every scene basically advances the worldbuilding, Steve’s character, Tony’s character, or the plot. This was also pretty easy to come up with, because it’s Star Trek, and if you want to make your Star Trek story feel like Star Trek, steal a Trek plot. Of course they beam down to a planet and meet some aliens. Then something goes terribly wrong, something bad happens to the ship, but it is all fixed just in time and they sail on. You know how it goes. There is a pre-existing structure. I had actually been joking that if I couldn’t think of anything I’d just sex pollen Steve and Tony and well… I couldn’t think of anything else. Sex pollen it was!

I think sex pollen actually works well, because it is a very Star Trek trope (quick, count all the sex pollen episodes; you might need more than one hand) and also because the absolute worst time to find out that your captain is an Augment is after you’ve been forced to sleep with him to stay alive. I figured that scene was going to be one of the super important plot moments.

I debated using a Trek alien race or a made-up race but decided to go with Skrulls, on the grounds that evil shapeshifters are also very Star Trek and also I thought maybe I could fool people into thinking I made them up as long as I didn’t bring in Veranke until after the Skrull reveal.

And then, well, the ship is in danger, Tony nearly dies (you can tell that Star Trek II is one of my favorites) sacrificing himself to save the ship, gets his heart injured again, decides while he’s dying that he was being an idiot about Steve, and lets himself actually love Steve.

Basically, it is literally several actual Star Trek plots mashed together with Captain America’s backstory and a lot of infodumping. It is honestly way simpler than it looks; there were plenty of existing models for How To Tell A Star Trek Story and I pretty much just stole them.

I hope that helps.

[meanderfall]

//tornadoes thru ur window, completely shattering the glass: for the writer meme, 5 - 6 - 8 - 10 - 15 - 21 - 25 - 27 - 28 - 29 - 30 - 34 - 36 - 39 - 45 - 47 - 48 - 49 - aaaand 50: how long do you usually let an idea fester in your mind before you're like, "okay, i'll write you down u little fucker"? ALSO IM AWARE THIS IS A LOT, LMAOOO

LDJF;KFGSKGF ADRI MY LOVE, MY WIFE, MY KNIGHT, MY SUN AND MOON, THANK YOU OMG, I HOPE YOU’RE READY FOR A NOVEL OF AN ANSWER LMAO

5.     How much writing do you get done on an average day?

LMAO I ACTUALLY HAVE THIS CALCULATED PER HOUR just bc that’s how long my train ride is. So I can do about 400-500 words in 50~ minutes.anyway tbh, I write almost never, but when I do, I try to get around 1000 words done??? that’s usually when i lose steam too. (though i guess if i did 500 word spurts instead throughout the day, i’d get more done) (TO CLARIFY, the only reason it’s so much is bc i only write when I know /exactly/ what the scene is gonna be and im motivated. if u sat my ass down in front of a computer each day and told me to write, I’d probably only get 100 in two hours, less even.)

6.     Single or multiple POV?

I’m a multiple pov hoe. I’ve thought before of writing something in entirely one pov, but tbh i dont think i could do it if the thing is longer that a 2000 word one shot.

8.     Oldest WIP

I HAD TO PULL OUT MY USB FOR THIS GODDAMN

Okay so, my oldest wip ever, is an original story I started in, I think, 2011 and wrote throughout the year. It’s got about 22k words down, but tbh i dont think im ever gonna touch it again.fanfic-wise, my oldest wip is a harvest moon fanfic, that’s around 6k words i think? and i was planning on re-writing it bc i didnt like the characterization of one of the characters and i wanted to fix that, but it’s been like five years now, i dont think it’s ever gonna be done. (I still want to though). (and u can find said wip on my fanfiction.net account)

10.  Do you set yourself deadlines?

My guy, i’ve never set a deadline for myself in my entire life. I think I tried to do it once, and i completely let it pass by. (Though the fanfic i mentioned previously, im pretty sure i updated once a week before i fucked up)

15.  How do you deal with writer’s block?

I either set it aside (and never pick it up again lmao) and let it stew in the back of my mind until I get something else, oR I POWER THROUGH THIS MOTHERFUCKER, and I’ll probably only write 50 words and hate every single last one of them, but I got it done and it’s better than nothing and hopefully tomorrow i’ll actually have something. (also, sometimes when powering through, what i write ends up inspiring me and im like “oh of course!” and i blaze through it)

21.  Who is/are your favourite character(s) to write?in case u havent noticed yet, about 99% of all my characters are snarky to some degree. I need a character with a wry sense of humour, and I’ll usually stay in their pov a lot. The only other character “type” I have are the sunshine pure cinnamon rolls who care and love everyone. Oh, and I guess also the ones who are pissed and bitter at the world at large. (I should.... probably... try to get out of this comfort zone...)

25.  Favourite part of writing

okay tbh, my favourite part is when I’m winding down from a good writing session, and I just feel so proud and alive, because I was productive and I created something with my own two hands and mind, and there are very few things that are as incredible as that imo

27.  Favourite line/scene

okay so this was hard to pick??? not to mention it’s all crap you’ve seen before but whatever.

There’s this one:

“McCreewas abruptly reminded of when he was nothing more than a teen, snarling andfurious at everyone around him, not willing to trust anyone. And he wasreminded of Gabriel Reyes who stayed calm and collected in front of his fury,gently rebuking him when he crossed a line; who praised him when he did welland willingly trusted him to have his back even though McCree didn’t trust him;who seemed to quietly understand why McCree acted in certain ways, accepted it,but encouraged him to choose better. Gabriel Reyes, who had faith in him whenhe wasn’t even sure he liked himself.“

And this one:

“IfWash’s head was a ghost town, then the Meta’s was a fucking wasteland.

Butthe worst part wasn’t the scorched earth and completely lifeless landscape, norwas it the stormy brown clouds above. No, the worst part was the lava that wasslowly inching its way up the mountain. It bubbled and simmered an awful sicklyorange as it creeped up bit by bit, not fast at all, but inexorably to the topof the mountain, going against all laws of physics. It was so awfully wrongthat he honestly felt sick witnessing it. Not helping was the sizzles it madeas it burned through whatever little vegetation there was and (he had no ideawhy he knew this, maybe it was because he was connected to the Meta’s brain?),it felt like the lava was actually gouging the earth, opening cracks andseeping inside, corrupting and destroying what lay within.

Wasthe Meta even a person anymore?”

(I proooobably would’ve picked something from the tuckington au but.... a lot of my favourite stuff is dialogue, or snarky narration, and idk it’s hard to choose and there aint a lot of depth to it)

28.  Favourite side character

OKAY THERE’S THIS ONE SIDE CHARACTER IN ONE MY ORIGINAL STORY IDEAS WHOM I ADORE (even though he has no name yet lmao) BUT HE’S BASICALLY REALLY SWEET AND CARING AND HE’S TRYING HIS BEST TO BE HAPPY AND SUPPORTIVE FOR ALL HIS COMPANIONS BC THEY’RE ALL GOING THROUGH HARD TIMES, BUT IT’S REALLY HARD FOR HIM AND HE’S INWARDLY SUFFERING SO MUCH BUT HE KEEPS SMILING FOR PEOPLE ANYWAY AND FLDG;DKHGFKG I LOVE HIM

29.  Favourite villain

I’m... cheating for this, I’ve never written a villain ever actually (and tbh what the fuck??? how??? i have so many original story ideas and none of them are villains??? what the fuck (maybe the true villains were the friends we made along the way))

okay so, originally, this character was gonna be the villain alright. She was mean, cruel, snarky, cunning, and manipulative. But as time went on, and I started exploring her character, wondering why she was like this, what her goal is, and I changed and shifted the plot of the story around she... sort of... became the main character. woops.

30.  Favourite idea you haven’t started on yet

IM ONLY GONNA USE ORIGINAL STORIES FOR THIS BC HOLY SHIT

Honestly, I’d probably have to go with this idea I had of a living person picking up the scythe of a Grim Reaper and becoming one and having to learn the ropes of the job.

Okay, I lied, it might actually be this detective series idea I had, wherein the main character, a police officer, has to investigate cases that, for the most part, are reminiscent, or re-imagined versions, of Quebec folk tales, and she has to figure out why the fuck this is happening.

34.  What was the hardest scene you ever had to write?

FIGHTING AND ACTION SCENES I HATE THEM SO MUCH OH MY GOD THEY TAKE FOREVER AND I ALWAYS FEEL LIKE IM FUCKING THEM UP HORRIBLY I HATE THEM (I could give u a specific example, but i dont want to)

36.  Last sentence you wrote

“Shut up.”

(this is actually how chapter 2 of my tuckington high school au ends lmao and there’s nothing to gain from it have fun adri)

39.  Weirdest character concept you’ve ever had

OH SHIT I ACTUALLY KNOW THE ANSWER TO THIS QUESTION, okay so the i have no clue where the idea came from, but for some reason i had this idea of a character who’s mental stability or whatever was linked to these bracelets she wore??? but it was more like she became more primal and animalistic the more bracelets were taken off until she lost all sense of identity, and i think it’s because she was being controlled or used by an organization or whatever. This was just a random idea that I had and okay i know it’s dark af, but it’s honestly the weirdest one. (tbh…. im not sure i have one that could be considered weird…)

45.  How much world building do you do?

all of it. just. all of it. I need to know clothes, food, architecture, cultural norms, the history of the world, how the fuck people can communicate when there are multiple countries and multiple languages, and this is why absolutely none of my original stuff has ever been written

47.  Best way to procrastinate

Day-dreaming scenes and ideas instead of writing them

48.  What’s the most self-insert character/scene you’ve ever written?

W O W ADRI U WANNA CALL ME OUT THAT BADLY HUH?

honestly it’s probably that main character/villain i mentioned previously, bc i just gave her all of my self-loathing and she was supposed to sacrifice herself heroically in the end and there was gonna be an entire speech about why she was the right person to do this. (if it makes u feel any better, I’ve modified it so she doesn’t actually die and everyone is like “wtf? NO!”)

also the protagonist in story, i just gave her my depression and general lostness in life. (most... of my characters... start off with a part of me I want to explore, but over time, as I flesh them out, they become their own people, and actually have nothing to do with me anymore tbh)

49.  Which character would you most want to be friends with, if they were real?

THAT SWEET CINNAMON ROLL I MENTIONED BEFORE OMG YES, I WOULD PROTECT HIM WITH MY LIFE

50: how long do you usually let an idea fester in your mind before you’re like, “okay, i’ll write you down u little fucker”?

*LAUGHS HYSTERICALLY* OH MAN ADRI U HAVE NO IDEA WHAT YOU’VE JUST ASKED DO U OMG WAIT UNTIL U HEAR THIS

okay so u know that story with the cinnamon roll and main character/villain? The basic plot of that story has been in my brain since around 2011. I still haven’t started to write it. (though, to be fair, that story has changed so goddamn much since 2012 holy shit, and for the better tbh)

tbh adri, ur like 80% of my impulse control, and by that I mean you make me impulsive enough to actually write things instead of letting them ruminate in my brain forevermore. Hell, I’ve only started to get back into writing fanfiction because of you, okay, if u weren’t around I’d probably just give up on writing ever, and let the idea of being a novelist be nothing more but a fantasy i daydream about.