Thanks For The Tag :) I Love Talking About My Top Songs

Co-workers: you're so anti-social, always in your little world.

Me: *sitting in the corner, disassociating while writing my book in my head*

Remember: the more difficult you make it for them to realize a report is false, the more useless you make the portal.

How to start your book

Here are my best tips to write your opening chapter in your novel like a pro.

Start in a peculiar situation What is a situation that’s totally unexpected to your readers, but an everyday occurrence to your characters? Start there!

Make sure you cover all these elements 💜 Introducing your protagonist 💜 And their flaw 💜 And what they struggle with 💜 Build a first look at the atmosphere of your book 💜 Signal your genre 💜 Establish your narrative position

Keep it all about the intrigue! It’s very tempting to unload everything onto your reader in the first chapter, because you just want them to know everything. But the more you can hold back, the more intrigue you will create, and therefore - more reason for the reader to keep flipping pages.

Don’t forget to hint at your story question Now this is a really important step that a lot of writers leave out and their first chapter suffers for it. It has to do with your hero’s flaw. This will be closely connected to the story question you’re asking. Make sure you include a quick hint at the bigger conflict that your story will be exploring and how your hero’s flaw might play into it.

Your characters are key Absolutely the most crucial thing about your first few chapters is to establish a connection with your characters. Character empathy is what drives readers’ interest. Don’t go in with a whole character backstory, but instead show us who they are right now, and why we should care about what happens to them.

Things to avoid ❌ Info-dumping! ❌ Introducing too much about your world all at once ❌ Introducing too many characters ❌ Giving your readers answers instead of questions

Also…

Want fully customizable templates for your writing? Character sheets, outlines, chapter treatments, world-building, questionnaires and more?

Grab our 3 E-books for writers through the [link here] or below! They each come with 40 pages of easy theory and resources.

The Plotter’s Almanac

The Character Bible

The World Builder’s Chronicle

the-plottery.com

Writer's ToolBoox

The Writer's ToolBoox is a pack of 3 extensive E-books that cover the areas of: character craft, world building, and plotting. It comes with

Could you maybe write some prompts for portraying an unreliable narrator?

How to Write an Unreliable Narrator

-> 8 Tips to Writing Unreliable Narrators - Writer's Digest

make them a liar. Have them commit their faults outright, contradict themselves in the narrative, prove them to be a liar by their actions, have them hint that they know more than they're telling, reveal the truth a little later than they should, or have gaps in their memory.

shift their motives. Give your character conflicting desires and changing drives. Keep your reader guessing about their true mindset. (Are they in love with Character B? Or are they obsessed with Character B? Do they want to help B, or do they want to harm B?)

make them more clever than they appear. Have your reader believe your character is innocent and incapable of cunning and calculating schemes. Maybe they appear innocent and naive to the reader, and only later it is revealed that their childish actions have purpose.

use your secondary characters. Have them catch your narrator in lie, reveal that they are a victim of your narrator's lie, reveal a truth that the narrator has yet to share with the reader. How they treat the narrator can also show their unreliability. Sharing personal histories with the narrator may expose a side to the narrator that the reader hasn't seen.

add an unpredictable act. When a calm, thoughtful, innocent character suddenly does something out of character and a little unhinged, they become unreliable. (ex: a grieving woman suddenly throws all of her husband's belongings in the lake.)

4 Types of Unreliable Narrators:

-> What Is an Unreliable Narrator? - MasterClass

Picaro. The picaro is a character who has a knack for exaggerating.

Madman. The madman is unreliable because they are mentally detached from reality.

Naif. The naif’s narrative abilities are impacted by inexperience or age.

Liar. The liar is the most deliberate of all the unreliable narrators. The character fabricates stories, often to paint a better picture of themselves or achieve a desired outcome.

If you like what I do and want to support me, please consider donating! I also offer editing services and other writing advice on my Ko-fi!

The New Republic

Trump Wants Snitches to Report on DEI. There’s Just One Problem.

Donald Trump wants people to expose diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts in the federal government. The idea is already flopping.

The threat was loud and clear: Report your so-called “DEI” employees or else. What exactly “DEIA or similar ideologies” means is up in the air, but the message was out there. And so was the email address of the DEIA snitching hotline. Fake emails quickly started to roll in. ‘I don’t care, fuck these McCarthyite bastards,” one BlueSky user said, with an screenshot attached of an email to the hotline where he ironically reported Donald Trump and JD Vance for being “put in their positions solely because of their race and/or gender despite the fact that they are wholly unqualified for their jobs and, in some cases, have criminal records.” “Anyone have a script to fire off a billion e-mails an hour??” another user asked in the replies. “Anyone can email anything of any size even if it crashes the site,” one X user noted. The scope and effectiveness of this latest phase of Trump’s anti-DEI crusade remains to be seen.

Alternatives to google docs

For various reasons, this is now a hot topic. I'm putting my favorites here, please add more in your reblogs. I'm not pointing to Microsoft Word because I hate it.

Local on your computer:

1.

LibreOffice (https://www.libreoffice.org/), Win, Linux, Mac.

Looks like early 2000 Word, works great, imports all formats. Saves in OpenDocumentFormat. Combine with something like Dropbox for Cloud Backup.

2.

FocusWriter (https://gottcode.org/focuswriter/) Win, Linux.

Super customizable to make it look pretty, all toolbars hide to be as non-distracting as possible. Can make typewriter sounds as you type, and you can set daily wordcount goals. Saves in OpenDocumentFormat. Combine with something like Dropbox for Cloud Backup.

3.

Scrivener (https://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener/overview) Win, Mac, iOS

The lovechild of so many writers. Too many things to fiddle with for me, but I'm sure someone else can sing its praises. You can put the database folder into a Dropbox folder for cloud saving (but make sure to always close the program before shutting down).

Web-based:

4.

Reedsy bookeditor (https://reedsy.com/write-a-book) Browser based, works on Firefox on Android. Be aware that they also have a TOS that forbids pornography on publicly shared documents.

My current writing program. Just enough features to be helpful, not so many that I start fiddling. Writing is chapter based, exports to docx, epub, pdf. You can share chapters (for beta reading) with other people registered at Reedsy.

5.

Novelpad (https://novelpad.co/) Browser based.

Looks very promising, there's a youtuber with really informative videos about it (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHN8TnwjG1g). I wanted to love it, but the editor didn't work on Firefox on my phone. It might now, but I'm reluctant to switch again.

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So, this is my list. Please add more suggestions in reblogs.

Drawing bases & pose references pt 63 🫶

3 extra drawings for patrons!

List of symptoms

I hate having whump fantasies that involve some vague fever that doesn’t have consistent symptoms to make it feel real. Here’s a handy list to flesh out the nature of your whumpee’s illness.

Let’s go:

Dizziness/faintness

Congestion

Sneezing

Coughing

Headache

Muscle aches

Joint aches

Cramping

Exhaustion/lethargy

Shivering

Wheezing/trouble breathing

Sore throat (trouble speaking and swallowing)

Sweating (leads to dehydration)

Flushed and/or pale skin

Delirium (delusions, nightmares, lack of filter, inability to regulate emotions, hallucinations, incoherent speech, confusion)

Nausea/vomiting

Abdominal pain (burning, stabbing, soreness)

Chest pain (burning, stabbing, soreness, tightness)

Pain/pressure behind the eyes

Feeling too hot or too cold

Weakness

Blurred vision

Weight loss (loss of appetite)

Rapid heartbeat

Abnormal breathing (rapid, shallow, panting)

Sensory sensitivity (light, sound, touch, smell, taste)

Tell me more……

hi! I’m always looking for character design sheets/questionnaires to fill out for my characters, but I rarely find any I like. do you happen to have any suggestions?

Character Design Sheets/Questionnaires

(And My Alternative...)

While I think character design sheets/questionnaires can be fun to do, I also think they’re unnecessary and a bit of a time sink. After all, your character’s favorite kind of pizza won’t tell you much about who they are as a person, and probably doesn’t affect the plot at all.

In terms of fleshing out a character, I actually find it much more valuable to focus on the important things: Basic Biographical Details

Full Name: Nickname: Date of Birth: Gender: Description: Background Information Birthplace: Back Story: Current Residence: Occupation: Skills: Hobbies: Additional Details (If Applicable)

Aliases: Species: Powers: Crimes: Charges: Accomplices: Affiliation: Relationships

Parents: Siblings: Extended Family: Significant Other/s: Exes: Closest Friend: Friends: Coworkers: Classmates: Housemates:  Neighbors: Impact Traits

Positive Traits: Negative Traits: Emotional Wound: Internal Conflict: Pre-Story Life Goals: Pre-Story Life Goals Motivation: Story Goal/s Story Goal/s Motivation: Stakes: Voice: Arc:

Fun Details

Quirks & Mannerisms: Hopes & Dreams: Likes & Dislikes: Clothing Style: Pet Peeves: Those are most of the big ones I worry about. Ultimately, if it doesn’t impact the story, character development, or truly help you understand who this character is, it’s not really important.

I hope that helps! <3

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Have a question? My inbox is always open, but make sure to check my FAQ and post master lists first to see if I’ve already answered a similar question. :)

I don't know what I miss more, having free time to draw or these fellas

The raven cycle!!!!

Oh I love these guys. Everything about these books, I want to draw them soooo much more (I probably will)!!

Guys I'm back-

It has been a nightmare lately this is the only thing I managed to draw in weeks? Finals and uni stuff that's taking all of my time and energy, slowly turning me into a cafeinated slug (worst part is caffeine doesn't even have an effect on me? I only drink coffee for the TASTE can you imagine). Anyway the rush won't be over until end of January but hopefully I'll be able to ignore the stress and draw anyway :)