I Love This Pov!! :oo Please Add Me To Your Taglist???

Pinterest mood board I created for my wip short story, "Bud and Bunny".

The story takes place in New York during the 90s, exploring the toxic bond between a young girl and her older brother, who restricts her freedom from the world outside their cramped apartment complex.

Stuck in an unanticipated editing spiral at the beginning of Draft 2 of Project Istanbul, oh and mourning the plot lines that got chucked for the Greater Good. Goodbye side character whose only purpose was to be aesthetically pleasing, I never knew you.

It’s been some days. What have I been doing—ha! actually writing! How relieving. The weather’s cold and I’m enjoying scenic walks to my local cafe, strapped w my laptop and headphones.

A bit early perhaps, but is anyone doing NaNo this year??

Me decaying in bed writing my wip in front of the fan in summer, August.

Hi! I know Yellow Houses is on the back burner project wise, but damn if I'm not curious about it! Could you tell me a bit more about the university that Ellen attends? Anything really from how it looks to the types of classes they offer to they types of unhinged students you'd see milling about?

Happily! Thank you for your interest.

Yellow Houses takes place in a “college town”, where you only have a handful of locals. The university is an old rickety building shaped like a cylinder. It’s not aesthetic to say the least, blocky with lil AC units jutting from the windows, etc. The vast majority of the students are in the environmental resource management program.

Excerpt:

Half the town was made up of rich college kids who enjoyed nature photography, skiing, shot-gunning beers before noon. During the winters they jumped in the lake in negative forty weather. There would be an ambulance parked up the street if Henry Baker were to have a stroke again; ready to drag him out of the lake by his blued, freckly legs.

It’s so hard being a writer sometimes because you can tell yourself over and over again that you’re writing for yourself, and yet you will always crave the interaction, you will always want to share, and for people to like the thing you put your heart and soul into. It’s just hard when you can see the numbers, and the constant comparing, having the self-doubt and wondering why you even bother trying when there are people much better than you.

All you can do is keep reminding yourself that it’s your story to tell, and no one else can tell it like you. You love it, and there are others out there who will love it, too, and the numbers absolutely do not reflect your worth or your storytelling.

You’re incredible, and you’ve got to keep writing because your story is worth telling.

🍿?

Share an out-of-context line from your wip. (this one’s from Yellow Houses!)

We didn’t have any pictures of him so they were all I had to stare at, which was rare, but when I did, I imagined him on a ferry crossing the Marmara Sea, nibbling on simit, dark hair flattened against his forehead from the breeze, contemplating the mess he’d made and regretting it immensely. 

This sounds amazinggg, I would 100% watch :)

Church Mud - The Netflix Series

thank you @radwrites​ for the template!

Having both finally escaped the cult they were born in - and reunited after four years - twins Dorothy and Felix embrace their newfound freedom, navigate their trauma, and figure out who they are.

Y’all I cannot express how much this fake Netflix series lives! in my head! rent free! I think this story would be so cool as a series and if I weren’t a little terrified of screenwriting, I would 100% play with that as a form alongside the novel. 

The vibes of this came out a lot grittier than I imagine the story? That element is 100% there, but there’s also a very hazy, dreamy element to the story and I think it’d be very interesting to see how those intersect visually. My biggest fantasy for CM as a series is that it’d look like it was actually shot in the 80s and have an all 80s soundtrack (although there are some contemporary gems I’d be sad to cut out the OST). The only comparison I can really draw is Twin Peaks (which I’ve only seen like five episodes of oop) - but not in terms of content at all, rather the hazy vibe of floating between different stories with this growing unease and intensity - and perhaps some of the surreal elements too. Also this one shot is Major CM Vibes:

This isn’t structured exactly like the book - episode 2, Cadmium Yellow, is a combination of chapters 2-3 and also chapter 8, which is the first chapter in Dorothy’s POV. Because of the nature of writing split POV the split between Felix and Dorothy is obviously much “sharper”, but a TV series format would allow me to jump between them in one episode and still have clarity.

I also love the idea of a series for this story because it’d allow the POVs of the non-POV main characters (Beau, Jolie, Isaias) to also be included - hence the episode Pistachio Beach, which would be Beau centric and we’d actually get to directly see his backstory. As much as I love the twins as POVs and the story very much revolves around them, I’m definitely interested in the extra depth the story could get in this form. There are a lot of times when I wish I could add a chapter in Beau or Isaias’ POV but the idea of more than two POV characters is too much to handle lmao

I had so much fun with this, and I would 100% do another for episodes 6-10 when I write more content (ah discovery writer things)! I see my stories as movies playing out in my head and if anyone else does that you’ll know that not everything can be translated into words. So it’s really cool for me to imagine my stories in this format, because in a sense it’s the “truest” to what I see in my head.

Episodes 1-5

Everything Holy

Four years after his twin sister escaped the Christian cult they grew up in, nothing about Felix’s existence has changed. This is why he has to escape too.

Cadmium Yellow

Dorothy’s roommate, Jolie, returns to the city and brings all their repressed baggage with her. Felix struggles to adapt - but a new friend is eager to show him all of San Francisco’s colors.

Pistachio Beach 

Beau doesn’t sleep well. Troubled over a future he doesn’t know and a past he doesn’t understand, he has two coping mechanisms: call Felix; drive to the beach.

Cult Characteristics

The growing number of cults scattered across California is a growing cause for concern. When they hide in plain sight, it is crucial to know the red flags.

Revelations, Revelations

Felix hasn’t spoken to God in a month. Although he doesn’t find Him at the local Church, he does find someone with the same problem. Jolie has a proposal for Dorothy.

The next novel update should be coming soon! My goal is January 11th, because that’s Felix’s and Dorothy’s birthday so we have to celebrate ofc

church mud taglist - @kitblogsthings​​ / @bijouxs​​ / @ezrathings​​ / @isherwoodj​​ / @bookpacking​​ / @alicewestwater​​ / @svpphicwrites​​ / @avi-burton-writing​​ / @aetherwrites​​ / @radiomacbeth​​ / @sunwornpages​​ / @coffeeandcalligraphy​​ / @ladywithalamp​​ / @wolf-oak​​ / @keira-is-writing​​ / @jennawritesstories​​ / @cream-and-tea​​ / @bauliya​​ / @themillionthdraft​​ / @you-are-my-neverland​​ / @lasbrumas​​ / @occiidens​​ / @shaelinwrites​​ / @wri-tten​​ / @catgirlnya​​ / @nbnoyas​ / @oceancold​ / @august-iswriting​ / @write-like-babs​ / @hekat-ie​

First drafts are fun, easy, as long as I don’t extensively read what I’ve written. I’ve been sitting in libraries. Yesterday I had my first ever chai tea latte.

I forgot about this short wip, I hope I didn’t lose the actual document now

I wrote this short story a while ago, intending to submit it to some magazines, leaving it to decay chill until I had time off from uni to edit it. Currently busy af w *shiny* new novel, but  I wanted to share some of it on here to motivate me to work on it. Alors,,,,,,

genre: spooky lit-fic logline: Trudging through the barren Arizona desert after a night out partying, a group of friends come across a cupcake shop owned by a creepy old lady and her cannibal husband.  TW: drug use, dead rats, disturbing cupcake ingredients, murdery elderly people.

Everything had been going well up until I lost my pink sneaker. It jumped into an Uber and drove off waving, never texted or called, leaving me to live my life without protection from sharp objects or raccoon shit lying around my frilly socked feet. Then we missed the last bus.

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