#writing what writing

[aceofsages]

SPOILERS FOR FANTASY HIGH SOPHOMORE YEAR!!!

one of the best things in fantasy high is the bad kids multiclassing. it makes sense. of course they'll multiclass, or change their college, or get their stats changed. of course they'll give up being something.

because that's what teenagers do! they change, they evolve, they want to choose something different now that they know better than when they were fourteen. some don't, and that's alright too!

fabian growing and becoming a bard and his own man is good!

gorgug becoming an artificer is awesome and makes sense!!

fig becoming a literal archdevil and changing her college is amazing!! because she grew up! all of them did!!

idk if this has been talked about before, but that's what makes fantasy high soo god tier in terms of ppl playing teenagers and urban fantasy. all of the cast saw the assignment and fucking aced it.

[greekedtext]

oh no I was merely skimming the d&d players handbook (for the first time since the dinosaurs roamed) and I accidentally created a tiefling bard with a robin hood complex whom I desperately wish to play

[butchfalin]

the funniest meltdown ive ever had was in college when i got so overstimulated that i could Not speak, including over text. one of my friends was trying to talk me through it but i was solely using emojis because they were easier than trying to come up with words so he started using primarily emojis as well just to make things feel balanced. this was not the Most effective strategy... until. he tried to ask me "you okay?" but the way he chose to do that was by sending "👉🏼👌🏼❓" and i was so shocked by suddenly being asked if i was dtf that i was like WHAT???? WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY TO ME?????????? and thus was verbal again

[sylvies-kablooie]

i do unironically think the best artists of our generation are posting to get 20 notes and 3 reblogs btw. that fanfic with like 45 kudos is some of the best stuff ever written. those OCs you carry around have some of the richest backstories and worldbuilding someone has ever seen. please do not think that reaching only a few people when you post means your art isn't worth celebrating.

[so-many-ocs]

[on the verge of having a complete breakdown] i need to make some kind of list or perhaps sort things into categories

[bethanythebogwitch]

Some writers: *meticulously plan out every plot point and the tone and meanings before they start writing*

Me:

[ursulaklegay]

its so scary to put yourself out there but a SINGLE message saying "hi i loved what you made it touched me in some way" makes it all worth it 10000%

[pixiemage]

Please, for the love of god, please don’t be this person. No matter how long it’s been since an update, no matter how many unfinished stories are sitting on their account, no matter what - do not be this person.

Not only is it insanely rude, but you also do more damage than you think be being such a self-entitled ass about something someone created for free and for fun. “This author” can see what you say.

RIP decency indeed.

[sing-you-fools]

me: this is a background character who's in one scene, has two lines, and is completely irrelevant to the rest of the story. i am going to stop obsessing over what to name him and use the random name generator on behindthename.com. i am going to accept the first thing it gives me and move the fuck on.

behindthename.com:

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

the fact that shakespeare was a playwright is sometimes so funny to me. just the concept of the "greatest writer of the English language" being a random 450-year-old entertainer, a 16th cent pop cultural sensation (thanks in large part to puns & dirty jokes & verbiage & a long-running appeal to commoners). and his work was made to be watched not read, but in the classroom teachers just hand us his scripts and say "that's literature"

just...imagine it's 2450 A.D. and English Lit students are regularly going into 100k debt writing postdoc theses on The Simpsons screenplays. the original animation hasn't even been preserved, it's literally just scripts and the occasional SDH subtitles.txt. they've been republished more times than the Bible

[aceofsages]

First Line Game

Rules: List the first lines of your last 10 published fics and see if there’s a pattern.

Thank you to wonderful @jonairadreaming for the tag!!

1. love me like i'm brand new [Wednesday; wenclair]

When Enid lands in San Francisco for winter break, she has to give herself a pep talk in the bathroom mirror.

2. so take my hand, take my whole life too [Santa Clarita Diet; abby/eric]

Abby Hammond chooses law after high school, mostly for the fucking irony of it all.

3. green-eyed (monster) [Wednesday; wenclair]

Something festers inside Wednesday—a gaping chasm of roiling emotions that Wednesday, for all means and purposes, should like, but doesn’t.

4. want something just like this [Wednesday; wenclair]

Enid lasts four days without sleep.

5. (on my soul, amore) your indelible mark [Wednesday; wenclair]

One slip.

6. see you as you are [House of the Dragon]

"Ser Criston," says Alicent. "Bring me the eye of Lucerys Velaryon."

7. you left me, sweet, two legacies [DCEU; superbat; genderbend]

They walk side by side.

8. wild nights would be (our) luxury [Iron Man movies; pepperony; genderbend]

His eyes roamed the crowds as he took a break, leaning against the bar counter in a way that indicated polite disinterest in conversation-one that was acceptable and not offending.

9. so i travelled back down that road [Iron Man movies; pepperony; genderbend]

He was shaking.

10. flashbacks in a film reel [Harry Potter]

Draco couldn't stop staring at the knife in his hand.

----

tbh, i'm not really good at analysing stuff, but i think in all of these I tend more towards writing something that's physically happening/they (the characters) are doing--ig i try to ground the readers into the worlds by physicality before something emotional.

(or i could be wayy off the mark in my pattern*shrugs*)

----

absolutely no pressure tagging @simplynotcapable @mokkkki @hashtagdrivebywrites @tollingreminiscentbells @dark-princette and anyone else who sees this! literally, anyone who comes across this can hop in!! <3

[jasper-bold]

He smirked

He teased

He growled

His gaze softened

This is the entirety of the writing knowledge put into SPN.

[daisywords]

One of my biggest nitpicks in fiction concerns the feeding of babies. Mothers dying during/shortly after childbirth or the baby being separated form the mother shortly after birth is pretty common in fiction. It is/was also common enough in real life, which is why I think a lot of writers/readers don't think too hard about this. however. Historically, the only reason the vast majority of babies survived being separated from their mother was because there was at least one other woman around to breastfeed them. Before modern formula, yes, people did use other substitutes, but they were rarely, if ever, nutritionally sufficient.

Newborns can't eat adult food. They can't really survive on animal milk. If your story takes place in a world before/without formula, a baby separated from its mother is going to either be nursed by someone else, or starve.

It doesn't have to be a huge plot point, but idk at least don't explicitly describe the situation as excluding the possibility of a wetnurse. "The father or the great grandmother or the neighbor man or the older sibling took and raised the baby completely alone in a cave for a year." Nope. That baby is dead I'm sorry. "The baby was kidnapped shortly after birth by a wizard and hidden away in a secret tower" um quick question was the wizard lactating? "The mother refused to see or touch her child after birth so the baby was left to the care of the ailing grandfather" the grandfather who made the necessary arrangements with women in the neighborhood, right? right? OR THAT GREAT OFFENDER "A newborn baby was left on the doorstep and they brought it in and took care of it no issues" What Are You Going to Feed That Baby. Hello?

Like. It's not impossible, but arrangements are going to have to be made. There are some logistics.

[so-you-read-the-usernames]

Female characters who are the sole voice of reason <<<<<<< Female characters who think of themselves as the sole voice of reason but who are actually just as insane as those around them

[aspiringwarriorlibrarian]

You know, it's kinda funny how much of high fantasy centers around kings and nobility and courtly intrigue considering that the archetypal high fantasy, Lord of the Rings, had the rather explicit moral of "saving the world is up to this backwater hick and his gardener because no politician, least of all inherited nobility, would have the ability to see past their own ambition and throw away a weapon". Oh sure, Aragorn is a great king and all, but there's a reason he's over there running a distraction ring while the hobbits do the real work. Sauron loses because he gets distracted by kings and armies and great battles (i.e. typical high fantasy stuff) letting Frodo and Sam sneak through his back door and blow it all to hell.

Just saying, maybe old Jirt knew what he was saying when he said that the small folk doing their best and holding to each other was more powerful than a dozen alliances and superweapons and we should respect him for it.

[ramblesamongstardust]

I understand the "I will die for you" ship dynamic, but what about the "I will not let you die, I will not let myself die- we will, at any cost, survive" kind of couple?