transtobio >> albysant
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@albysant
transtobio >> albysant
edit: changed icon, header, and desktop theme! also cleaned up my about

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The most interesting question you can ask about any character is not what do they want. it's what do they believe they deserve. because those two things are almost never the same and the gap between them is where your entire story lives. a person can want love completely and believe they don't deserve it and that belief will destroy every good thing that comes toward them in ways they won't even notice they're doing. write the gap. the gap is the character.
things in fic I'm used to people kind of faking their way through writing about:
the city of los angeles
the city of new york
sex
how drinking alcohol works
how getting high works
how a child of any age speaks
how nuclear physics work
how [my job] works
how debilitating being shot in the shoulder is
how hypothermia works
things I have never before seen someone fake their way through writing about, until today:
what french toast is
read through the notes on this one trust me
Here's some of the notes, starting with the things multiple people brought up:
SHRIMP COCKTAIL:
banahbanah: #flashback to that one fic where Peter Parker frets about drinking shrimp cocktail because of the alcohol
generaldeliciousness: adding: what a prawn/shrimp cocktail is
#why is your character turning it down because they're under 21 #do you think prawn cocktail is a cocktail #this lives in my brain rent-free constantly #the rest of the fic was so normal #and good enough that i'll still re-read it #but bro
And then many, MANY, people wondering if this was actually authour mistake, since Peter really would do this!
POMEGRANATES:
zhajhassa: #haha where's that post that was like someone describing someone eating a pomegranate but they ate it like an apple
thornhands: #once someone wrote persephone biting into a whole Pomegranate #had to stop and stare at a wall for a minute
sungsingsanguine: I once saw someone very confidently write about a character eating slices of pomegranate.
FRUIT TREES:
zagreuses-toast: #given a very endearing glimpse into a writers blindspots by seeing them describe someone sitting under a ''pineapple tree''
salatrash: I remember something about picking watermelons... OF A FUCKING TREE
baander: #cranberry trees
DOUGH/BATTER:
maycelium: #I'm a chef so I'm really used to people not accurately describing how to cook food #But I was surprisingly flabbergasted when someone was writing making a cake and was kneading it. Which uh #Not necessary for cake. It was interesting for sure but just bizarre
livebloggingmydescentintomadness: #the one that drove me nuts was when a character set aside a batch of PASTA DOUGH 'to rise' #pasta doesn't have yeast!! #it does need to REST but it will never RISE #you do not want an airy crumb on your noodles
lovesodeepandwideandwell: #THE ONE WHERE THEY MADE COOKIES BY LADLING BATTER INTO A TRAY
Some other topics:
plot 150 words bed-sharing 200 words smut 800 words projecting my fears, insecurities, and anxieties onto a fictional character 9,356 words fluff 150 words someone who is good at fan fiction please help me budget my WIP, my family is dying
150 words of plot seems excessive.
thank you for the reasonable advice
If your plot feels flat, STUDY it! Your story might be lacking...
Stakes - What would happen if the protagonist failed? Would it really be such a bad thing if it happened?
Thematic relevance - Do the events of the story speak to a greater emotional or moral message? Is the conflict resolved in a way that befits the theme?
Urgency - How much time does the protagonist have to complete their goal? Are there multiple factors complicating the situation?
Drive - What motivates the protagonist? Are they an active player in the story, or are they repeatedly getting pushed around by external forces? Could you swap them out for a different character with no impact on the plot? On the flip side, do the other characters have sensible motivations of their own?
Yield - Is there foreshadowing? Do the protagonist's choices have unforeseen consequences down the road? Do they use knowledge or clues from the beginning, to help them in the end? Do they learn things about the other characters that weren't immediately obvious?

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So last month I got hit by a car and died right. Which I didn't initially realize until I watched some guy haul my body into his pickup and drive off. Which, being that it's deep in rural Michigan, I assume means my body will make some venison jerky and maybe some wall decoration, and I'll be resigned to being one of hundreds of deer ghosts floating around Saginaw, which is w/e. But then I find out the guy works at a taxidermy shop or something, and he's actually pretty good at stuffing and mounting deer carcasses, which I come to find out when I find myself face to face with my old body in the shop window. So naturally, I figure since ghosts need to possess something to interact with the living world and etc etc etc the most logical thing to do is to possess my own body, since it's basically a statue of myself. And a little surprisingly, it actually fits like a glove. Like, since it's my body, it feels like stepping right back into place. So I get out of town and back to my herd, eventually. And that's where the trouble starts coming into it, because after I get settled again, I don't know how to explain to everyone else what feels so weird. Like since I can move my body and do everything I used to do, it's functionally the same, like nothing happened. Or it SHOULD be, so I don't know how to explain how it's NOT. But it's just hard to explain it to someone who's never been hit by a truck I guess
Lots of writing advice on tumblr. It's been years since I've written fiction in a serious way, but I did write a couple of (bad) novels in my early 20's, a bunch of short stories, and also a few hundred thousand words of LARP writing, and I do have a bacherlor's of science in creative writing (lol).
From what I can tell, there are only three universally applicable pieces of writing advice:
Read a lot (mandatory)
Show your writing to people (mandatory)
Have something wrong with you in a way that is impossible to articulate except by writing a novel (optional)
I'm gonna say this, and it's gonna spark a defensive reaction within some of you, but I need you to listen to me and let it sit for a moment before I explain further. It is not a personal stain against your morality.
From both my experience reading works by white writers, and my experience running this blog, I have come to the conclusion that many white writers are too used to relying on Whiteness being understood as the default experience of both your characters and your readers, and it makes you weaker writers with weaker technique overall.
One thought I find myself having often is "well, what do you do for your white characters?" I've grown to understand... Many of you don't 😅 you don't actually understand or apply character design techniques because it is Assumed™ that the reader understands- that the reader has the white gaze. It doesn't need to be Said that your character is white, and will do familiar white things. It is Assumed™ that white characters fall under the Magicking It Away rules automatically, while Black characters have to have reality applied to them first. You don't actually have to... Well, write.
The brilliant Toni Morrison explained this in an interview of hers (here's another; watch her doc!!!) that there's this assumption that one's readers are white. So when she would purposefully- and there's a difference!- write stories for the Black gaze, that certain things didn't have to be explained because we Understood, it would get frustrating for white readers. They felt left out, unappealed to, hurt.
And yet, that's standard fare- and everyone's not writing such specific stories like Toni! To be "fair", we did understand y'all. We had to. But those same techniques, both in writing and in media consumption, I believe are atrophied from white viewers ("I don't watch this because I don't relate!" Or projection of ones own identity into Black characters to be "relatable") because it's not Socially Required for you to apply them.
It's why I'm always telling y'all to study Black creations about Black people. Writing is a craft, and a craft has to be honed!! You have to practice!! I had a whole lesson on this and I feel like everyone glossed over it lmao. I promise it'll make your writing of EVERY character better overall. 🙏🏾
It has recently occurred to me that to make a second draft after the first one I have to... rewrite the entire thing?? Not just, take the document and, edit ON IT, OVER it.
And that a first draft is not really supposed to be... readable?
Guys I need help,.how do you do drafts??
Waitwaitwait.
No, no.
You do NOT have to rewrite. Rewrites are for major structural issues. First draft does not imply second draft in the way that second drafts of essays in english/literature classes work.
Write first draft, and unless there are SIGNIFICANT story problems that need a major overhaul do several editing PASSES:
-one pass for overall structure, pacing, themes, messages conveyed.
-one pass for dialogue. Do all the characters speak exactly the same? Do they talk how people talk?
-one pass for inconsistencies/plot holes/world building
-one pass for style (consistently using “grey” instead of “gray”, characters names spelled correctly, etc etc)
-one pass for readability: simplifying overly complex passages, getting rid of echos, making voice more active etc.
And so on. Each pass, your “first draft” will slowly become your “final draft” that you send to editors. And the above passes don’t even have to be what you use! Those are just things I check for!
Thiiiiis *points up*
But then there are those occasions where you get 7 chapters from the end, and 100k into the story, only to realise you need to fucking fix some shit that is going to need a complete structural overhaul, several new chapters added, and at least one reread of the previous book in the series, so it's guarenteed that a full second draft is going to absolutely be needed....
Who me? Oh yeah I'm fine. *sobs*
Thanks everyone for the advice! And... @author-a-holmes do you need a hug?
@writeblr-of-my-own and @squarebracket-trick
Thank you both for asking, I'm actually fine, this post just happened to hit me on hours 24-ish of being awake, and when I was exactly in the context of realising I'm going to have to do a complete 2nd draft of Darkling.
It just hit just right lol.
Seriously though, MOST of the time a manuscript doesn't need a complete overhaul.
For Changeling, I did exactly what Amandacanwrite explained above. I finished the first draft, and then I would copy/paste each chapter as I worked on it into a new googledoc.
My personal process includes;
Overall plot structure, pacing, themes, and making sure I told the story I wanted to tell. Also checking I left appropriate threads for the next book in the series.
Inconsistencies, plot holes, added or removal of worldbuilding as neccesary
One pass for clarity (Amanda calls it readability in her version), this includes sorting out my adverbs, passive voice, and echoing of words. I also check for my personal crutch words in this phase.
Then it goes through grammarly for a basic grammar check, because that's something I'm terrible at.
And finally that chapter gets copied into a 3rd Googledoc and has their basic spellchecked go over it.
(Then pick up the next chapter and rinse/repeat)
That final, 3rd, googledoc, was then the version I sent to my professional editor (who then sent be back over 1,000 notes to fix)
Technically all those passes are 2nd and 3rd and 4th drafts, but I just call them my "Self Editing" stage because it's not a compelte new draft from the ground up.
Darkling, on the other hand. Phew. Yeah. That's going to need a from-the-ground-up rework. I'm trying to keep looking on the bright side though, because (A) I know it's going to drastically improve the draft, and (B) I also know that my typing speed for new words (first draft) is about 18 WMP, but my transcribing speed is around 65wmp, so I'm hoping draft 2 is going to be something I can fly through.
Fingers crossed, eh?! :D
hi I disagree with everyone above, so I'll toss this out there.
"you don't have to rewrite it" is true. you don't have to do anything. however, rewriting it can help you massively improve a work in ways that none of the other suggestions above can do.
of course, it depends on your goals and your personal writing processes and styles, and if you really don't want to rewrite and you think the suggestions above are going to work for you, that's totally fine. but if you want an explanation from someone who used to be adamantly "I don't need to rewrite this, I just need to revise it" and is now firmly "everything needs at least one full rewrite," let me know.
(I'm at work rn and don't have time to type out a usable explanation, and I will probably forget unless someone explicitly reminds me, so this is very much "I'll write it up if you actually want it")
@unbearable-lightness-of-ink
I'm gonna chime straight in and say; If you have time PLEASE add your advice/process too!
Everyone writes differently and what works for me may utterly destroy someone elses manuscript, so I do think an alterantive perspective on a drafting process could help either OP or someone else who reads this.
No pressure of course, as I know you've said you're at work, but if you feel so inclined, I'd definitely be interested in reading your process <3
(How other writers work, and draft, and edit, it endlessly fascinating to me! For me, personally, my outline usually acts as my zero draft, so my "first draft" is usually incredibly clean, at least in terms of plot/structure. Darkling is introducing a whole new process for me so I'm excited to see how you handle full rewrites as someone who has never done one before!)
Okay hi hello it’s me again back to talk about rewriting and revising. This is going to be an essay because I'm chronically incapable of saying anything concisely at the first shot, and while i’m going to try to be really orderly about it, this is a post on tumblr dot com, so I will not be fully rewriting it. (which, idk, does that undermine my opinion?)
I’m also going to reference some of the earlier responses I saw, because I led with “I disagree with everyone,” so I feel like it would be cowardly of me not to specify what I disagree with. I want to add that I've been told I present my opinions forcefully, such that people sometimes feel that I’m combative or trying to force them to agree with me if they can't mount an adequate defence for their opinions. I haven’t figured out what causes this phenomenon (it may be my tone of voice? In which case hopefully it doesn’t translate into my writing?) but would like to state for the record that I am not trying to say anything bad about the people whose opinions I disagree with, nor am I trying to say that my opinions are The Right Ones. Feel free to find my processes and opinions diametrically wrong for you.
Because I’m neurodivergent as hell, I’m also going to give definitions so that, agree or disagree, we’re at least referring to the same things:
I’m going to use the word “rewrite” to refer to writing out a thing completely from scratch, with or without referencing an earlier iteration.
I’m using it in contrast to the word “revising,” by which I mean making changes within an existing document (even if those changes involve writing new content in that document).
By “draft” I mean an individual iteration of a document, which could be rewritten or revised.
I’m using “pass” to refer to a complete rewrite or revision where you go through the entire document to make a specific type of change. (So a pass generally results in a new draft, though obviously this gets more and more vague the closer you get to a final draft, and different writers feel different ways about what they consider a complete pass or a new draft, and that’s totally fine; I’ll probably be a bit vague in here too).
So rewriting. I used to hate it (and refuse to do it) because why would I bother typing out everything all over again when it was structurally fine and I could save time by just making changes within the thing? (Isn’t the whole point of word processing programmes that I can click and drag and copy and paste and ctrl+z?) At some point I read an article about it that convinced me to give it a try, and you would not believe the difference I saw in the quality of my rewrite—and I mean both “the rewrite was significantly better than the previous draft” and “the quality of the editing pass was significantly better than any revision I had ever done before.” There are a few reasons, I think, that rewriting is so much more effective than revising as a first step:
You don’t have anything to lose. You’re working in a clean document, not directly changing anything in your previous draft, so you have the freedom to make drastic changes if you want to, or to skip sections, rearrange them, completely reword things, play with the vibes—it’s all completely free of consequences, because you aren’t touching your source material.
Your brain is in creative mode, not critical mode. Even though you’re referencing your previous draft, the act of typing it up fresh helps you stay in that creative headspace, so changes feel like new growth and fresh art rather than, idk, trying to cut apart something you love. It feels inherently productive rather than destructive, so it doesn’t get stale.
It's easier to find issues while writing. When you reread the thing you wrote, you know what you expect, and the fact that the words are already composed together on the page makes it feel like a solid extant thing; you’re predisposed to read it as correct. (Think about how easy it is to fill in a missing word in a sentence or not to notice “the the” in the middle of a line.) Rewriting forces you to notice and consider every part of your draft, and you find yourself instinctively fixing or improving things that you wouldn’t have picked out as imperfect in a revision and therefore wouldn’t have thought to change.
You're more aware of the content. Your memory encodes it differently when you're rewriting than when you're drafting or revising, which means you’re more likely to see structural or pacing issues. It’s much easier to notice that you forgot to explain a thing if you reach dialogue about it and realise you’ve never typed the word yet. It’s easier to catch the same phrase repeated in every other page if you’re getting tired of retyping it, or to notice that there’s a big inconsistency if you have to physically write out its context. This is kind of a larger-scale version of the last bullet point—your brain is more likely to fill in the gaps for you when you’re just reading looking for things to change.
So fundamentally, I don’t think the earlier answers have bad advice, I just think they’re missing something; they’re giving you some good next steps, but they won’t do what a rewrite will. Here are my specific thoughts about them:
@amandacanwrite says that “rewrites are for major structural issues,” but I’ve found that one of the most significant things that rewriting does for me is making the voice, tone, and themes much more consistent—and this is in part because a rewrite by definition must go through the entire thing, word by word. It’s like rolling paint across the whole wall instead of trying to find every spot that needs a touch-up and paint over them individually. (Are my metaphors getting dumb? It’s midnight.)
@author-a-holmes points out that “MOST of the time a manuscript doesn’t need a complete overhaul,” which I don’t disagree with as a statement without context. However, I think that it’s a big mistake to conflate “overhaul” with “rewrite.” Rewriting doesn’t have to mean making huge changes; you might rewrite something and discover as you go that it’s in really good shape and that most of your rewriting process is just copying down stuff that you really do still like (which is honestly such a nice experience), but the point is that you look closely at is as you go. You keep your words, not because they’re there by default and you didn’t notice anything wrong with them, but because you evaluated them and found that they were worth actively rewriting to keep.
The description of editing chapter by chapter sounds like a really great process for a much later draft, after you no longer need the context of the whole story; but you can’t address big-picture plot structure, pacing, etc. when you’re looking at a single chapter out of context. You have to do something before the chapter-by-chapter revisions or you’ll wind up with something that’s still disjointed, badly paced, or whatever else your first draft is, because you polished each piece but didn’t step back to see how they all look together. (To be clear I’m not sure based on that post whether you’re saying you do all of those bullet points for each chapter in isolation or whether the chapter-by-chapter part is a separate note; I read them as sequential but if that’s not what you mean, apologies for misinterpreting. I might try the individual chapter thing for my next pass on Haven.)
With all of that in mind, I’ll outline my general process. The order you do some of these passes in or the number of different things you include in a pass might vary, and you might do some of them multiple times (circling back to the plot hole fixing step is my sisyphean eternity). The key thing is that multiple passes are essential, because, to give you another completely un-researched metaphor, you have to dig a gem out of the dirt and clean it off before you can cut and polish it.
1. Round off the first draft. In my rough draft, I don’t go back to make changes earlier in the draft unless absolutely necessary; instead, I leave myself comments to check on afterward. Some of these are later-draft-me problems, but some of them are things I should fix before I consider my first draft done, like “add the transition here” or “let’s change the way this magical item works—go back and fix earlier references to it.” I try to run back over the draft and catch all of the comments that I can do immediately while I’m still riding the high of having finished and before I start forgetting what I’ve written.
2. Leave it to cool. I thought this was standard writing advice, but I’ve discovered many people haven’t been told this, so I’ll bring it up here: don’t start editing immediately! You’re still too close to accurately assess the thing you’ve written. You can’t tell which pieces might be confusing or missing, you’re still saturated in the vibe you wanted to convey so you’re unlikely to sense where the tone falters, and you’re still in that post-creation euphoria. Studies have shown that people assign higher value to their own creations than to creations by other people (even if they're of the same or even greater quality, objectively). That isn’t to say you should devalue your work but that when it’s freshly finished and you're still immersed in the aches and efforts that went into it and it still feels so near your heart you can almost taste it... you’re in no state to make useful judgments about its quality. So set it aside for a while. Leave next-draft-you loads of comments, then close that document and pick up some other project for a while. After a few months (I aim for a minimum of three), when you’ve forgotten some of it, when it doesn’t feel so precious and raw, when you don’t have every line etched in your working memory—then take it back out. Get a comfy workspace, get a snack, and get to work.
3. Rewrite. Create a new document—not a new section of your document, but a completely new file. I use scrivener, so I create a new scrivener project.
Open your rough draft on half your screen, open the blank document on the other half, and start writing.
Don’t reread your draft first—you want completely fresh eyes on it.
You’re allowed to diverge as far as you want from the rough draft or copy it as exactly as you like, but you’re not allowed to touch your rough draft document itself. Everything goes in your rewritten draft.
If you know large changes you want to make already, like rearranging some scenes or adding a chapter, do that on the rewrite if you can. It's easier to make the transitions work at this stage than later. Also, later if you cut and paste pieces, you might not notice things that don't work around them. If your adjustments reveal a metaphorical crack in the foundation, you want to discover it during the rewrite, not several passes into revisions. This is where I often find that my rewrite splits off a bit from the original, because I'll realise that something seems off, and I'll write myself into a better space.
Take notes as you go. Do whatever else helps you keep rewriting without getting bogged down in complicated fixes that you'll do in a later pass. I sometimes wind up creating an outline as I rewrite to better visualise the order of the scenes or the cause and effect. I often start colour-coding as I go, especially if I start to feel like the pacing is funny (for me it’s often coding something like dialogue-heavy vs action-heavy scenes so I can see the balance, or flagging every scene that includes a certain repeating piece of foreshadowing so I can see whether I’m spacing it out or whatever).
This is also a good opportunity to list specific details to check in later passes, especially recurring issues. For example, this is often where I start making a list of terms I might be overusing so I can check for them later (it is not worth trying to fix them all in the rewrite, because you’re going to need several more passes in which you might significantly change or cut those sentences anyway). This is often the pass where I notice things like inconsistent voice in a character’s dialogue, technical details I need to research, significant pacing issues, imbalances (such as a lot more chapters in one character’s POV than another’s or certain settings being significantly more detailed than others). The things you can and want to fix on the rewrite, fix as you go. Other things you'll plan to come back to. Leaving yourself lots of comments in the rewrite gives you a starting point for subsequent passes.
4. Fill plot holes, reorder scenes, and add missing stuff. Your notes from the rewrite should be really helpful at this point. This is the structural pass where you fix the big issues you saw on the rewrite but didn’t let yourself get bogged down in. This is the part where you move whole chunks because they’re in the wrong order or the pacing is funky. If you left yourself “add a transition here” types of notes, this is the time to add the transition (or to decide, as I often do, that a transition isn’t actually needed).
5. Time travel aka chronology aka “how the fuck did they to all those things before sunset?” I’m awful at remembering how long anything has been while I’m drafting, so I take a pass to go through and check all the references to passage of time to make sure they make sense, both for stuff like how much has happened in a given time and for having accurate references (if the narration says “three days ago," i better not have had five sunset scenes). Sometimes I make a little calendar to be sure things actually fit into the time I’ve written. I might have to repeat the plot holes pass after this. This can also be an opportunity to fix pacing issues by adjusting the in-story time that passes between events. I once took a story that was set over the course of two weeks and that felt kind of rambly and decided to see how few days I could get the events to fit in—I wound up shortening the timespan to six days, and let me tell you—that did miracles for the sense of urgency in the pacing.
6. Vibe checks. This is a series of passes, because for each pass you have to pick one or two things to focus on, and then you only fix those things through the pass. This helps you be consistent. For example, I have two main characters with significantly different dialogue styles and body language, and it’s easy to get them wrong when I’m bouncing back and forth, so I took one pass where I looked at every one of Helen’s lines and movements and fixed all of them, and I did nothing else. That way I got into the right tone for her and stayed there all through. Then I did another pass for her partner. Things you might need to look at in vibe check passes also include descriptions of settings, key themes, important pieces of intentional foreshadowing or clue-leaving, the weather, etc. Anything that needs to be tonally consistent from start to finish—this is the time to check on it.
7. Cuts. I put this off until after the other stuff because it can be hard to tell what does or doesn’t contribute to the story before you have the structure, pacing, voice, etc. smoothed out. Sometimes I have notes about what I might cut (from earlier passes). Sometimes this involves sending it to a friend to read before I actually remove anything—often I do that if I don’t feel sure about what I think needs to be cut or if I really don’t want to cut it (having someone else independently tell me that scene isn’t earning its place helps me feel more secure about it). I’m wordy (can you tell?) and always have way too many words in a novel, so a cut pass is essential for me. I might do separate cut passes for larger stuff (like cutting whole paragraphs or scenes) and for smaller stuff (like individual words or sentences).
8. Making it pretty. This is the revision pass that a lot of people really like—reading through and tinkering with the wording, playing with individual sentences, deciding whether the right word really is lightning or lightning bug (thanks, Mark Twain)… I like this pass, anyway. You’re being productive but you also get to just kind of reread the thing. This is also a good spot to do continuity checks that you can't use ctrl+F for, if you didn't do that during your vibe checks, and to have a general eye out for stuff that seems off. I recommend some time before this pass so that you have fresher eyes.
9. Ctrl+F fixes. This is the part where you check how frequently you actually reuse the phrase “took a deep breath” (callout post for me), remove or replace every other use of the word “just” (callout post again for me), double check that you really did fix every instance of that name you kept changing your mind about, and otherwise clean up things that you know are recurring issues for you, personally. I have a list of my pet phrases to check for, as well as a list of my most common weird typos or misspellings, words with British vs American spellings (I’m woefully inconsistent), etc. Ctrl+F your way through for each thing so that you don’t have to remember 15 individual foibles and idiosyncrasies to look out for while proofreading.
10. Proofread. If I’m being paid, I go bottom to top, which is like. The Correct Way To Proofread according to at least one of my professors in an editing class in university, but with a novel, I read top to bottom. It is, again, a nice little treat for me to feel productive (I’m proofreading!) while mostly just enjoying rereading my thing.
11. Send it to someone. I’m likely to have done this at least once earlier in the process, but I absolutely send it to someone at this point. Then, based on their feedback, I repeat passes as needed.
It’s not a fast process, and depending on your goals, your writing style, the way your brain processes information, etc., it might not work for you. One thing i thought was normal but that I have discovered isn't universal is that I think best while typing—I find what I say as I go, and I am always more likely to sort something out effectively if I'm putting it on a screen and writing it out as I go. But that isn't the only thing that makes rewriting a great strategy for me, and if you haven’t rewritten at all ever, I highly recommend you try it, just once, to see if it helps you.
most annoying breed of author is actually someone who doesn’t respect a genre and sets out to subvert it.
I don’t think you’re ‘subverting’ anything just by stripping a genre of its classic modes of storytelling, sorry. yeah, you could just admit you thought that that specific subset of storytelling had nothing useful to say. you should probably shut up while you’re at it too, yeah.
You have to engage with and show you understand the tropes and genre involved before you can attempt to do anything interesting with them. "What if this lady stabs people" is admittedly great but there is a reason cinderella doesn't usually stab people in the more traditional versions, and the answer is more than just misogyny.

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trying to write a fic but i get frustrated bc i dont write like a 50+ years of experience in writing nobel in literature winner writer
"and then they kiss... sloppy style" hmmm but it doesn’t sound as good as gabriel garcia marquez does it?
Listen to your elders
So last week I posted abut the importance of downloading your fic. And then three days later AO3 went down for 24 hours. No one was more weirded out by this than I was. But while y’all were acting like the library at Alexandria was on fire I was reading my download fic and editing chapter eight of Buck, Rogers, and the 21st Century. And also thinking about what I could do to be helpful when the crisis was actually over.
So first off, I’m going to repeat that if you’re going to bookmark a fic, you really need to also download the fic and back it up in a safe place. I just do it automatically now and it’s a good habit to get into.
But let’s talk about some other scenarios. Last October I lost power for over a week after hurricane Ian. Apart from not having internet or A/C I did find plenty to do, I collect books so I had plenty to read, but maybe, unlike me, your favorite comfort reads aren’t sitting on a bookshelf. So let’s do something about that, shall we?
In olden times many long years ago around 1995 we printed off a lot of fic. It was mostly SOP to print a fic you planned to reread and stick it in a three ring binder. And that’s totally valid today too, but you can also make a very nice paperback with a minimum amount of skill and materials.
Let’s start with the download; Go to Ao3 and select your fic, we’ll be working with one of mine. This method works best with one shots, long fic tends to need a more complicated approach. Get yourself an HTML download
Open up the HTML download and select all then copy paste into any word processor. Set the page to landscape and two columns, then change the font to something you find easy to read, this is your book, no judgement. This is all you have to do for layout but I like to play a little bit. I move all the meta, summary, notes to the end and pick out a fun font for the title:
No time like the present to do a quick proofread. Congratulations, you’ve just created your first typeset. On to the fun part.
Now you’re going to need some materials: 8.5x11in paper ruler one sheet of 12x12 medium card stock (60-80lb) scissors pencil pen or fine tip marker sheet of wax paper white glue two binder clips 2 heavy books or 1 brick butter knife
You’ll also need a printer, if you’re in the US there is almost a 100% chance your local library has a printer you can use if you don’t have your own. None of these materials are expensive and you can literally use cheap copy paper and Elmers glue.
Print your text block, one page per side. Fold the first page in half so that the blank side is inside and the printed side out:
use the butter knife to crease the edge. Repeat on all the sheets. When you’ve finished, stack them up with the raw edge on the left and the folded edge on the right. I used standard copy paper, because you’re only printing on one side there’s no bleed to worry about. Take the text block and line everything up. Use the binder clips to hold the raw edge in place.
Wrap the text block in the wax paper so that the raw edge and binder clips are facing out. I’m going to use my home built book press but you don’t need one, a brick or a couple of books or anything else heavy will work fine.
Once the text block is anchored down, take off he binder clips and get out the glue.
You can use a brush but you don’t need one, smear some glue on that raw edge.
Go make a margarita, watch The Mandalorian, call your mother. Don’t come back for at least an hour
In an hour smear some more glue on there and shift your brick forward so that the whole book is covered. This keeps the paper from warping. While glue part 2 is drying we’ll do the cover. Get out your 12x12 cardstock
Mark the cardstock off at 8.5 inches and cut it. Measure in 5.5 inches from the left and put in a score line with the butter knife (the back edge not the sharp edge)
Carefully fold the score line, this is your front cover. You have some options for the cover title, you can use a cutting machine like a cricut if you have one, you can print out a title on the computer and use carbon paper to transfer the text to the cardstock. I was in a mood so I just freehanded that beoch. Pencil first then in pen.
Take your text block out from under your brick. Line it up against the score mark and mark the second score on the other side of the spine
Fold the score and glue the textblock into the cover at the spine. Once the glue dries up mark the back cover with the pencil and then trim the back cover to fit with your scissors.
Voila:
I’m going to put this baby on the shelf next to the Silmarillion.
The whole process, not counting drying time, took less than an hour.
If you want to make a book of a longer fic, I recommend Renegade Publishing, they have a ton of resources for fan-binders.
I love planing out my ideas in great detail but when it comes to actually writing the story it’s like pulling teeth. It goes from being fun and interesting to being nothing more than a dull chore. I’ve tried planning less to see if having some things unknown might help, but that didn’t work. I could spend forever writing and rewriting my ideas and making changes to them. But when I try to write an actual story it’s like I physically can’t. What should I do?
Details Planned But Unable to Write
If you have the details of your story planned out but still aren't able to write it, it's probable that one of the following things is happening. See if any of these strike a chord with you...
1 - Details and Plot Are Not the Same - Sometimes writers say they have all the details in their story planned out, but what they actually mean is they've fleshed out character and setting details, maybe even backstory and some general scene ideas, but they couldn't tell you what the story's conflict is, what the inciting incident is, what goal the protagonist is pursuing and why, what's at stake, or what the major plot points of the story are. No matter how detailed your story is in terms of characters, setting, backstory, and even general ideas about scenes, if you don't have a conflict to tie them all together, you don't really have a story. You just have details. A plot can't be moved forward if it doesn't exist, and if you don't have a conflict, goals and motivation, stakes, an antagonistic force and obstacles, etc., you don't have a plot. Solution: take some time learning about Goals and Conflict, Plot Driven vs Character Driven Stories, Basic Story Structure, and How to Move a Story Forward.
2 - You Lost Interest in the Story - If you have your story properly plotted in addition to having the details fleshed out, and you're still unable to write, it could be that you've simply lost interest in the story. This can happen when we spend a lot of time on a story, especially if we spend a lot of time fleshing things out. Solution: Guide: How to Rekindle Your Motivation to Write, Getting Unstuck: Motivation Beyond Mood Boards & Playlists, Getting Excited About Your Story Again
3 - Something in the Story Isn't Working - Imagine someone riding a horse and they come to a rickety old bridge, but the horse balks and refuses to cross. The horse may just be stubborn, but it's quite possible it's picking up sensory information its rider can't... creaks and groans the rider can't hear, a worrisome tilt or sway the rider can't perceive... If you sit down to write your well planned out story and can't, the same thing could be happening with your gut instinct. Like the horse that doesn't want to cross the bridge because it senses danger, something inside you is saying "this story doesn't work" and isn't excited to get involved. Solution: Read through your outline or plan and see if you can spot the problem. Maybe the character's goal doesn't make sense with the events of the story. Maybe the antagonistic force isn't doing enough to oppose the protagonist. Maybe the character arc is out-of-sync with the events of the story. If nothing else, talk it through with a trusted writer friend to see if they have any thoughts. Sometimes just hearing the questions they have about the story can be enough to highlight what isn't working.
4 - Life Stuff Is Getting in the Way - Even if your story is well fleshed out and thoroughly plotted, and everything works and you're excited about writing, there can be other things going on in your life that stand in your way. If you're putting too much pressure on yourself to write or reach certain writing goals, it makes writing feel stressful and our brains are wired to avoid stressful things. It could be that you're not feeling well physically or mentally. You could be distracted by other things you want to write or do. You could just be too busy with other things to really get into it. Or you could just be not in the mood to write. Solution: Try to pinpoint what's getting in the way and see if there's a work around. For example, if you think writing has become stressful and that's why you're avoiding it, figure out what you can do to make it fun again. Or, if you think you're just not in the mood to write, figure out some things you could do that would put you in the mood to write.
5 - Fear Is Getting in the Way - Details are easy, writing is hard. No matter how much planning and plotting you've done, actually putting those details into coherent words in a way that is compelling and well-paced--that's not so easy. And, the tough reality is that until you've had a lot of writing experience, your writing probably isn't as good as you want it to be. You want it to be good, and you know what would qualify as good, but you're just not able to produce that quality yet. And the only way to get your writing quality to that level is to let yourself write things that aren't as good as you want them to be. You have to write a lot of "just okay" stuff before you can write "really great" stuff. AND THAT'S SCARY!!! And--that's not even the only thing that can cause fear for writers. Maybe you have written a lot and your writing is where you want it to be, but maybe your fear is with the next step... sharing it with others. Maybe you're afraid others won't enjoy it as much as you want them to. Solution: figure out what's causing the fear, whether it's quality-related or next step related, then try to push through it. Remind yourself that writing not great stuff is part of the process. Remind yourself that sharing with others is part of the process (usually, unless you're writing for yourself.) Have a spin through the bottom half of my Motivation master list for other fears and solutions.
I hope that helps!
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I’ve been writing seriously for over 30 years and love to share what I’ve learned. Have a writing question? My inbox is always open!
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Medicposting published a post on Ko-fi.com
Medicposting published a post on Ko-fi.com
Medicposting published a post on Ko-fi.com
Medicposting published a post on Ko-fi.com
Medicposting published a post on Ko-fi.com
Medicposting published a post on Ko-fi.com
Medicposting published a post on Ko-fi.com
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basic things you should know about your main characters
how is their relationship with their family
what are their beliefs, if they have any
what is their motivation (preferably something unrelated to their love interest/romantic feelings)
who were they raised to be vs. who they became/are becoming
what are their plans for the future, if they have any
how they feel about themselves and how it affects their behaviour
how do they feel about things they cannot control
and last but not least: Why is This Character the Protagonist??

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Good stuff.
Guys, I edit professionally. This list is legit. Incorporating these suggestions before you hire an editor will save you A LOT of money. Even if you did these and nothing else, you’d see significant overall improvement in your work.
That said, you don’t have to overthink these things when you’re writing a first draft. If you write, “she said angrily” in a first draft, you can always revisit the phrasing in a second draft. I mention this because overthinking style can lead to a loss of momentum, and losing momentum is why so many people never finish a draft. Give yourself permission to write fast, write messy or ugly, and edit your draft into beauty later.
@Fanfic writers:
My friend send me this link, is a series on a profile on Ao3 (tumblr) that has different tutorials to insert things to fanfics via html code, I thought I would share bc it’s really cool
Lists of tutorials:
How to make images fit in mobile browsers
This is a tutorial/live example on how to make large images fit on mobile browsers but remain normal size on desktop browsers.
How to mimic letters, fliers, and stationery without using images
This is a tutorial/live example on how to mimic the look of letters, fliers, and stationery (as well as other forms of written media) without using images. For all your epistolary fic needs.
How to make a “choose your own adventure” Fic
This is a tutorial/live example on how to create a "Choose Your Own Adventure" fic. While this has been explained before (see here), this particular tutorial shows you how to use a work skin to hide the next parts from the reader until they click through to get to them.
How to make linked footnotes on Ao3
This is a live example of how an author can create linked footnotes in their work with only a little bit of HTML and no workskins required. This is best viewed by clicking "Entire Work". While I've included the actual coding in bold and italic once you click "Hide Creator's Style", there's a more detailed explanation here.
How to change text on Ao3 when the cursor is hovering over it (or clicked on mobile)
This a tutorial/live example on how to have text change or appear once a cursor is hovering over it. Helpful for pop-up spoilers, language translations, quick author's notes, etc.
How to mimic author’s notes and Kudos/Comment buttons
Anonymous on tumblr: do you have a skin that would mimic the author’s notes and review/kudos buttons section from the end of a fic? the desired effect being that the fic could go on after the “end” of the fic, so after the author’s notes and review/kudos buttons
Here's a tutorial/live example to do just that, with some of the buttons actually functioning. I'll explain more inside!
How to wrap text around images
This is a tutorial/live example on how to align images to the left or right of the screen and have text wrap around them.
How to mimic email windows
This is a tutorial/live example on how to mimic email windows on AO3 without the need to use images.
How to make ios text messages on Ao3
This is a tutorial/live example on how to mimic iOS text messages on AO3 without the need to use images. There's also a chapter on how to have emojis displayed on AO3 as well.
How to make Customized page deviders
Bored with the default page dividers? This is a tutorial/live example on how customize your page dividers with no images needed (though I do show you how you could use images if you wanted to do such a thing).
How to make invisible text (That can be highlighted)
This is a live example how to make invisible text that can only be seen by highlighting the text. Tutorial is included in text, and you can always leave comments about questions you may have.
MOBILE USERS: Sadly, this probably won't work for you, since highlighting in a mobile browser is different than web. I've tried correcting this, but have yet to find a solution.
How to make a rounded playlist
Original coding and design is from layouttest. I make no claims for it, just tweaked it so it will work on AO3.
How to create notebook lined paper on Ao3
This is a live example of my AO3 skin that allows the author to recreate the look of lined notebook paper in their work. To learn more about it, you can find the tutorial here.
Sticky notes on Ao3 without using images
This is a live example of my AO3 skin that allows the author to recreate the look of sticky notes (aka Post-Its) in their fic. To learn more about it, you can find the tutorial here.
How to make deadpool’s thinking thinking boxes on Ao3
This is a live example of my AO3 skin that allows the author to recreate the look of Deadpool's thinking boxes in their fic. To learn more about it, you can find the tutorial here.
How to make newspaper articles on Ao3
This is a live example of my AO3 skin that allows the author to recreate the look of a newspaper article in their work. To learn more about it, you can find the tutorial here.
This is really useful and I'll always reblog it.