Baltimore Science Fiction Society

/ᐠ｡ꞈ｡ᐟ\: u like book? u want buy book? two dollar *falls asleep*

We've all been here. We've been guilty of at least ONE of these things. There's no shame in it. Embrace it, dear writer. EMBRACE. IT.

Buy lots of notebooks and shove them in the designated "Do-Not-Touch-Me" corner

Bonus points if the notebooks are fancy ones you got through Amazon Prime One-Day delivery on a whim because you're SOOOO SURREE this will help you be productive

Buy pens in every color, in every point size, because you never know which one you'll aboslutely NEED to write structure notes with

Buy lots and lots and lots (and lots!) of craft books that you have to read in order to know what you're doing

Bonus points if you feel like you need to read them all before you even *think* about writing a single thing

Watch a bunch of Youtube videos on writing until 2AM, or until you've sought validation via a complete stranger that you've poured hours of your life watching their content OR when you're sure you're through with your existential crisis

Fun Fact: None of those things go away

Be adamant that you will eventually finish your book *this year* but internally panic because you keep deleting and rewriting the first half of your story and you've yet to write past the Inciting Incident

Bonus points if you insist that you need to write it perfectly to be worth getting past Chapter 5

And that's it. My top 5 traits of being a succeful writer. Do you know any that I've missed? Let me know in the comments!

Literature is a textually transmitted disease, normally contracted in childhood. ~Jane Yolen

Last year, I read Isolate by L. E. Modesitt Jr, a gaslamp political fantasy about two security aides who protect a government councilor. This year (well, technically Christmas 2022 loll), I bought the sequel, Councilor – and I’m enjoying it so much that I had to draw some fanart for it! XDD

Here we have Councilor Obreduur in the middle (whom I imagine looks like Peter Cushing lmaoo), and his two security aides: the empath Avraal Ysella on the left, and Steffan Dekkard on the right. Steffan is an isolate, meaning he is invulnerable to empath attacks and senses.