turntochapter13

[turntochapter13]

Watch this video! It’s really important and please don’t stop sharing this!

[turntochapter13]

60 Awesome Search Engines for Serious Writers

[turntochapter13]

Think

Before you speak, think about whom you are speaking to. Consider the idea that they may be going through something, and if you know what that something is, cater to it, and form your words with caution. Consider your tone, your words, and how they as the person you have come to know will interpret those words. Work through your own feelings, and don't have them meld your speech into something you did not want. If you want your emotion portrayed, think about why, and make sure it's reasonable. This is not a way to keep you silent, more or less, it's a way to make sure the things that you want to be heard aloud have a chance to blossom instead of something you will regret later. Don't blurt out everything that comes to mind, and don't allow whatever the other side of the conversation says to override you with emotion if it is something you are not a fan of. Even if they state something distasteful, understand that they may not be thinking about what they are saying either, that they are emotional, or mad for a reason you don't know and thus don't have the power to judge. Find the cryptic behind their slander or malaise and work your way through that and not the misconstrued blanket they have covered it in. However, allow yourself to ground them in reality, and don't give up on them. Don't let them get away with something just because they mask it with anger or apatheticness, sadness or annoyance. Show them that what they say, just like whatever anyone else says impacts themselves and the listeners. Don't come off as pretentious or condescending. Listen to both sides if you are to be the third party. Don't let words dig you too deep, but don't scold yourself if you find yourself doing that. It is human nature, and we all have different ways of regarding the words that others tell us. Still, work towards that goal. With every conversation, understand the way of dissecting it so the outcome becomes better with each speech. 

[turntochapter13]

When ao3 is currently experiencing problems and you don’t know what to do or where you’re gonna read your gay stuff in the meantime:

[turntochapter13]

A side-project I’ll be working on for a while before I get it beta’d and such :)

March 11, 2013

His eyes are too tightly shut and it’s starting to white out the all-consuming black that comes with the comforting blanket of lids. The click of the door it prominent enough to hit Bucky’s ears from where he is shoving his face as far as it will go into the damp pillow on his bed. It makes him flinch and restart the feeble attempt of recuperation.

He has to calm down the rise and fall of his chest otherwise he’ll never get up, and he’s already given one too many shows for the few teachers that care to be considered nothing but regular old introverted teenager syndrome.

He pushes himself up with his arms and gets off the bed. It creaks unsatisfyingly and urges Bucky to look at it again, but he walks into the bathroom and avoids the mirror as he grabs the toothpaste and starts the mundane quotidian factions of life. He brushes his teeth too hard and there’s a hint of blood that comes out in the wad of spit he chucks in the glistening white sink.

He knows it was either from the harsh bristles or biting his cheek too hard because he makes sure to keep his teeth clean. He likes the pride and the way he can take control over the circumstances. It’s his.

Once he’s done all he can in the bathroom, peeing, trying to brush through the tangles of his hair and haphazardly checking it in the mirror, reluctantly washing his face of invisible grime that loves it’s obstinate hold on him, he goes out into his bedroom.

He’s so grateful he has his own bathroom. He can curl up in an enveloping bath for hours and no one will yell at him, and he can study his face in the mirror for unnaturally long while no one comes to raise an eyebrow at him impatiently. Sure, there’s that hesitation where he looks at Atty’s claiming initials on all the old hand-me-downs and hidden nooks of folds in walls and aged furniture, a brief spell of longing and grief, but the room is his now and he has his bathroom.

He finds a faded black t-shirt with bleach stains and an old rock band on the front that he loved for two months in some year long gone but able to withstand the small growth he’s had. It’s big on him actually and he vaguely remembers swimming in it when it first arrived in mail from some shady online shop that probably gave the family computer a virus. It’s relatively clean, well-worn but comfy, and he yanks it out of the closet from where he put it there about a week ago once his mother shrewdly screamed at him to organize his room.

Black jeans and a blue hoodie complete the clumsy ensemble. He feels the niggling urge to throw the hood over his head, but his dad will positively smack him on the back of the head for being the disrespectful twit he is, and they’ll laugh and laugh and shove breakfast in their faces. Though, Bucky thinks he’s already headed out.

He opts to keep the migraine forming behind the bars quiet for a little while longer and keeps the mothballed hood down. It matched his haggard black backpack. He constantly chews on whether or not he is a goth in discretion by subconscious impulse, or if he’s simply too bland to care.

Elle is frying some eggs for herself when he enters the kitchen, and she gives him a smile as he comes in before looking at him more deeply. Her face molds into one of unreadable blankness before swiftly returning to her sizzling slices of ham. Bucky has to clamp down on his tongue hard in order to not make some disconnected joke that will certainly push Elle into a whispered rant.

The Barnes kitchen in excruciatingly rusty but clean all the same. They can’t afford to replace the faded toaster or the microwave that malfunctions more than it works. The ‘tile’ peels and has been peeling ever since an incident including little Bucky flying onto the kitchen floor so hard he cuts both knees open and scabs the corner of a faux tile block stickers in the process. Since then, everyone's been apathetically scuffing their feet on it and it’s lifted a few more squares during.

It’s exponentially dead to say the least, washed over in bleach bypass, like a vacant xerox of the kitchen in a fifties show after it’s been abandoned for too many years to fend for itself. All in all, Ms. Lucille Ball would not be very pleased. A plus, though, would be the rays of sun that shine right in from the window at the sink, at least, a blessing on a good day.

But it isn't a good day, sadly. He wanted it to be a good day. The remnants of birthday cake are still laminated on his tongue. Seems like the teeth cleanse didn’t do the trick. He’s going to renew them now by having some more for breakfast. But his body is aching and the minor headache is congesting his head. He thinks he may have a sinus infection, but he’s barely ever sick, so it’s hard to sense whether it’s serious or run-of-the-mills.

He’s stressed out because he was too tired last night to finish his math homework, and he fell asleep only to lose more of the energy once he was awoken too early this morning as well. But he hopes he can straighten it all out on the bus to school. It’s not that heavy of a load.

His sweet mother walks in, t-shirt and shorts awry from rolling around in bed he’d suppose. She glides her hands through his brushed out hair and shakes it affectionately. “Morning, bug.”

“Morning,” he scrapes out.

She pays no mind to Elle and pours herself a cup of coffee. It steams up and billows soft puffs of smoke into the air. “Have a good birthday. Honey?”

“Yeah, it was great, Mom. Thank you.”

“How does the laptop work, hmm?”

“Great.”

“Come on, I work my butt off for it, and all I get is ‘great’?”

He hesitates. “It’s nice resolution. The internet’s a little slow, but that can be chalked up to the house... I really like the features, even if the storage is a bit wonky. I can even make little designs of the icons I put on my desktop. It reminds me of the old computer we had, you know, the one dad had to throw out for some mysterious reason.” He finishes off with a smirk as Elle knowingly laughs at the last sentence.

His face melts when it returns to his mom, expression clenched and taut. He goes back to the cake he’s jabbing his fork into to make pictures in the icing before he eats it. When a few seconds die and Elle’s laughter tags along, he uses his training to understand he did something wrong.

He needs to leave for school now. He needs to go to the bus and ignore the dying winter while he waits for The Big Bumblebee to come. He’s been calling it that ever since he’s being using one for transit.

“Why can’t you just be appreciative?”

“Mom… you know I appreciate you, come on.”

“”The storage, mom, and the internet, mom. Fix it, mom.’” she imitates whiningly.

“I love the laptop. It’s amazing, better than the old computer. I’m sorry that I made you upset.”

“You realize how hard I worked for that, hmm? And what? Alls ya gonna do is be a brat about it, and talk trash about it?”

“Mom, I was stupid, and i’m sorry.”

“Yeah, okay, you ain’t sorry for shit.”

“I-”

“I thought dad went to work.” Elle interrupts. She’s looking out the window, and Bucky can’t help but see her white-knuckled grip on the counter’s ledge. He imagines the frayed and stiff silestone pattern cracking under her grip and shattering as it hits the ground.

He licks his lips in trepidation. He thought his father had went to work also. A fork is clenched within his own hand. He looks down and realizes that it went right down to the bottom of the plate, bypassing airy chocolate and striking the glass with a clink.

Hands can do so much damage. Someone can try and save a ladybug from a windowsill. They could hold it between their two fingers just so it doesn’t fall, and at the same moment, that ladybug could be dying from suffocation.

His shoulders begin to suffocate as thick hands sit on them agonizingly slow. They wrap around the corners as tightly as leather on skin. It’s only for a second, and then the feeling is gone, and time has passed because his dad is kissing Bucky’s mom on the cheek and Elle is trying to pretend like she isn’t staring at Bucky while failing terribly.

“Come on, James,” He starts as he steals a piece of bacon from the frying pan and shoves it in his mouth, unorthodoxly sloppy, acutely condescending. “I wasn’t gonna leave you to have breakfast alone post-birthday. I ain’t that kinda father.” The heat on the meat had to have done something to the callous digits, but he has done everything but pay mind to his fingers, and Bucky’s timing it. Maybe he just doesn’t feel it? Numb? Toxic immunity complex?

“Welp--” Bucky starts picking up his mess. There’s a sad face etched in the gleaming white whipped icing. “--school’s calling my name.” It’s barely finished, but he throws it away so his mom doesn’t yell at him later for stashing it in the fridge.

“No, stay for breakfast, James. You barely had anything for dinner last night.”

“It’s fine, dad.”

“Elle’s already making breakfast. Sit down.”

“Actually, I was packing a breakfast. I have that the NYU tour, remember.” Elle intercepts.

Just thinking of the impending loss of his sister’s presence makes him want to leave. Both that and the clock are teaming up on one side of the tennis court to attempt to domineer the big burly monster of a player on the opposite side. He tries to hide the smirk when he imagines them all hopping up and down, up and down, just like the little old Wii avatars.

“And how are we going to afford that?” His dad’s voice filters in, flat as printer paper, lifeless as… well, death.

“Do you ever listen to anything I talk about? I’m applying for a few scholarships. My grades are decent, and my coach said a few scouts mentioned me at the last meet, you know, the one you guys were too busy to attend.”

“Watch your tongue with your father, young lady.” His mom squeezes in.

It’s a balloon ready to pop when it gets hugged too roughly between his dad, who has jumped out of his seat with a fist pound on the wood table that rattles from force for emphasis, and the indefatigable will of Ellena Barnes. The only pregnant weakness is sent with her worried eyes towards her kid brother. He doesn't get it, and goes to pick up his backpack when he realizes it’s feet away, at the table, and he’s pasted onto the ugly wallpaper.

“I’m going to head to the University early,” Elle bitterly spits. Her and their dad have never gotten along. She was basically always out of the house. She had pretty friends, nice friends.

The last friend Bucky had was Measia Alberson in kindergarten. He proposed to her with a ring pop. It was the first attempt of peer interaction, and subsequently the last.

“Bucky, do you want to walk together?” Elle is asking quietly, like it’ll withstand the laser gaze of their father. Their mom is nibbling on the rim or her coffee mug, priorly instigating spectator, what a cheap double negative guise.

“N-no, i’m- I need to get going. Really. It’s like two minutes till the bus gets to the stop.” The backpack is snatched and he’s practically skipping out of the door.

“James!” How does Bugs Bunny do it?

He walks slowly back into the kitchen on a trembling toe. He’s going to miss school. He can’t miss school. It’s really hard to catch up in History when your teacher’s too nice and too chill and says, “You’re good. Don’t worry,” when you’re unsure if you have done everything correctly, and he didn’t even actually look, but trusts his students way too much.

Three slithering shadows are haloed by stripes of sun, not so pretty, except for Elle of course, who's still glaring at their dad. Finally, Bucky’s pupils want to dial down the dramatic photography, and his dad has his hands in his armpits. His tightened lips reek of disappointment. “Aren’t you going to say you love your family?” The face softens up, a wonky dial that that changes at slap of wind.

“I love you guys.” Bucky smiles, and it hurts.

[turntochapter13]

How to Link on Ao3

Have you ever went onto Ao3 and’ve seen This little feller ? (not the beautiful picture, but the line underneath it that supplies readers with a shortcut to get to a website) And have you always wanted to do that outside of the chapter or work text box? (for ex: in the notes or the summary)?

Well, I, an oblivious baffoon when it comes to HTML shortcuts or whatever, have found what seems to be the simplest way to do it.

Copy and paste this... line(?)... below and then substitute in the following areas:

-in the quotation marks, put the link that you are looking to give a shortcut for.

-where it says ‘name’, simply delete that word and add whatever you want to show instead of the link (that/those will end up being the underlined words)

-make sure to have the og from below pasted somewhere in your notes or something so that you can just copy it again whenever you need this hack and substitute the name and the link.

<a href="insert link here">name </a>

This is my very brief Shortcuts for Dummies explanation and I will probably get corrected by someone who actually know what they are doing, but I just wanted to share what I found helps. :)

[turntochapter13]

Some Onomatopoeias for ya ;)

All credited to this website:

https://kathytemean.wordpress.com/2009/12/29/onomatopoeia-word-list/

[turntochapter13]

What is wrong with“...She was broken...”?

Disclaimer: I am not any sort of professional or connoisseur for writing and the correct grammatical or developmental evolution of the overall plot or... whatever, but I just wanted to do a little opinion thing that kind of ties into half backed up advice... idk Ill just move on. 

So I have a little pet peeve when it comes to writing, but it's not to call out anyone on their writing, because a work can still be extremely beautiful even if this comes into the wraps of its development because considering all of the big dos and don’ts of writing, it could be summed up as a minor contingency error.

I sometimes read works, and I do start to get that little tingly feeling when you know it’s going to be really good, pertaining dominantly to angsty works because that's my forte, and it’s the main subject of this little exert. They have amazing portrayal of character emotion, the setting is sublime, everything is working up to the first crescendo of the plot, when that word, THAT WORD, shows up. This word that I am so vigorously talking about is.... broken.

The thing to understand about ‘broken’ is the complexity behind it. It is an intense words used to provoke a lot of empathy from the reader. that is why it needs a certain amount of build up.

Imagine it this way. You’re reading about Bucky Barnes. He is about to have a major break down due to his overlapping traumas. The story should in theory explain a little bit of how he is doing in the beginning, what is going on with his relationship with characters around him. How is he adapting to what has happened to him in his past? What of that coping is faulty and of fault when it comes to blaming the causer of his break down? All of this seems smooth, but imagine randomly in the very middle of it all, he is blatantly called ‘broken’.

NO “Things weren’t going great. He was broken. He felt a lingering pull from the memories of his past.” See, this could pass, but you could do so much deeper revelation, because after you use your strongest of the sad words, then you have to settle for subpar after that. That’s why some writers even wait for chapters filled with misery and pain before they use that blessed cherry of a topper.

YES “Bucky was on a tight rope, balancing precariously on both sides, or trying to, stuck in the limbo of okay and not okay. Nothing seemed to help the urge to dissolve into the acidic tableaus of his path, painted vividly behind his eyelids in an array of grotesque and faded visions and words, ragged and seeping with infection. He was broken.” A word like broken needs a certain back round to it, and not just a few words to explain the settling. That's what the first two sentences builds up to. See, it just needs at least one sentence to explain the intensity you are aiming for before saying something or someone it utterly broken.

If it started with the third line (of the 2nd quotation) alone, then the plan for an escalation can be thrown out the window, unless the work you want it kind of in reverse (saying the apex of his emotional state, then going through the explanation of why said state is the way it is, then showing the outcome)

A great comparison I thought of was a studio interview, which is those long interviews interviewers take in a specific place, for an elongated amount of time (lets say 20 to 40 min) setting up for a certain mood or expression, while the interviewee is there to provide information about an important subject of person, maybe even themselves. For these interviews, you always have to take into account the order in which you question your subject because you can’t ask your most important and influential question around five minutes in because then the rest of the questions will be boring and overshadowed.

(My god, I really don’t know how to simplify, do I? How many paragraphs am I in now??)

The most bothersome thing of all with this word though truly is when it is used in dialect. Nobody just says someone is broken. The exceptions for this one are way sparser and harder to excuse.

Beginning

Steve: (to Nat on the phone) I'm worried about Bucky

Nat: Why, what’s wrong?

Steve: He’s broken.....

*..... wtf.....*

End

With dialect, 98% percent of the time, you’re going to need a lot of build up for a character to brazenly state that they are or someone else is broken. Real conversation doesn’t work like that. You need to have a whole lot of accumulation between the character and their confrontation with the ailments before hand.

If you want an example, watch Ian Gallagher’s “I'm not broken” speech from Shameless.

Well, that wraps up my unnecessarily long confrontation with the word, broken. 

Good day!

[turntochapter13]

Can Anyone Hear Me?

I had little spurt of energy for something Flash related that I always had the idea for but never felt like writing out after I hit a little block with chapter 3 of my Tragedy's Favorite Toy series. I'm not sure if I should finish it though...?

[turntochapter13]

Word of the Day #3

re·ga·li·a

noun

~ the emblems or insignia of royalty, especially the crown, scepter, and other ornaments used at a coronation.

~ the distinctive clothing worn and ornaments carried at formal occasions as an indication of status.

"the Bishop of Florence in full regalia"

[turntochapter13]

Word of the Day #2

os·ten·ta·tious

adjective

characterized by vulgar or pretentious display; designed to impress or attract notice.

"books that people buy and display ostentatiously but never actually finish"

[turntochapter13]

Word of the Day #1

ad·a·mant

adjective

refusing to be persuaded or to change one's mind.

"he is adamant that he is not going to resign"

[turntochapter13]

Color Thesaurus References

DISCLAIMER: These aren't mine, and I did not create them. I am only distributing them to people who may need them. :)

[turntochapter13]

Synonym Replacements (Part 1)

Yes, synonyms are truly an eclectic vocabulary expansion lover's dream. I, for one, am always attempting to find better words to use, especially so I don't repeat myself. These are the limited few reference charts for some synonyms I found and I plan on posting more, but for now, enjoy!

(DISCLAIMER: none of these charts were made, edited, or thought of by me. I'm just sharing them with all the aspiring writers out there who want to learn a new word or two.)

[turntochapter13]

Heyo everyone! I'm working on a pretty big project, and I'm actually really excited to see where it goes. My first chapter has a 12.7k wc and that alone is the longest thing I've ever written. I'm so happy to go forward with this even though its a freaking pain getting correct research considering this is a WWII and The Great Depression (and dust bowl) compliant piece.

I'm revising the first chapter right now and then I'm going to send it to my beta. It's probably going to be up on my Ao3 account soon. I don't really have a following at all, but I just like posting my progress somewhere to see how I grow. Anyway, wish me luck!

Lili <3

[turntochapter13]

HIGHLY recommend this work of art to all who are interested. I'm so sad it's coming to an end though. 😭

Update-   Howdy! To all the wonderful folks who read my Stucky HS AU “The King of the Jocks: The King of the Misfits”, I’ve been feverishly working to write the next TWO chapters, which, except for a coda, will be the last. The final drafts are finished, and I’m knee deep in the editing process, so hang in there…more Steve, Bucky, and their incredibly screwed up (but awesome) gang is coming soon. Yay! 

Catch up on Ao3 here: The King of the Jocks: The King of the Misfits

[turntochapter13]

I was looking for some correct titles to use when working with houses' exteriors and ended up diving a little deeper than first anticipated. I found some diagrams for windows, doors, roofing, and exterior supplements. I was first trying to under stand the extravagancy of a victorian house so I could describe it accurately in. my work, and I also found a website that explains the purpose for all. of those fancy rooms big house have so I'll leave that below. :)

I am 100% positive I will make a part 2 for this sometime in the future as well.

.

http://www.buffaloah.com/a/DCTNRY/v/vicrooms.html

.

Lili <3