hiatus

THIEF OF STARS // A WIP INTRO

steal the sky; free your heart.

— GENRE: high fantasy — TARGET AUDIENCE: YA — TRIGGER WARNINGS: none — THEMES & TROPES: heist | friendship | betrayal & forgiveness | family | chasing dreams — PROJECTED LENGTH: 55K

The Starchaser Heist is the most well-known—and only—heist in the Qixian Empire’s history. Most notably, it failed. Seven jewels, better known as the Stars of the Empire, can grant the worthy a total of eight blessings of magic, and one person wanted them all to himself. Only, he got caught.

Ying Ai-sa has no such plans. She will recreate the Starchaser Heist, and she’ll succeed. There is no room for failure in her journey to the history books, and she will do whatever it takes to steal all the Stars. The safes’ puzzles, they say, can only be solved by the creator himself, but Ai-sa knows her fingers will be enough. They’ll have to be, if she wants to be known as the girl who stole the stars of the Empire.

Yang Qiu-yan, the Princess of the Empire, beloved of the family and the people, has been missing for over three years and presumed dead. Taking on the name of Yu-jia and becoming Ai-sa’s best friend, she finds herself safe from everyone else. That is, until someone swears on his family name and honour that he saw her—hair dyed, height altered, clothes simple—on the streets. How long will it take for her secret to be revealed fully under the spotlight, and will Ai-sa still forgive her for a friendship built on lies?

Seven jewels. One thief. The grandest heist in history.

Just about every writer out there has several go-to websites that they use when it comes to their writing. Be it for creativity, writer’s block, to put you in the mood or general writing help. These are mine and I listed them in hopes that you’ll find something that you’ll like or will find something useful for you. I’ve also included some websites that sound interesting.

Spelling & Grammar

Grammar Girl — Grammar Girl’s famous Quick and Dirty Tips (delivered via blog or podcast) will help you keep your creative writing error free.

The Owl — is Purdue University’s Online Writing Lab (OWL) it’s a great resource for grammar guides, style tips and other information that can help with your writing, especially academics.

Tip of My Tongue — have you ever had trouble of thinking of a specific word that you can’t remember what it is? Well, this site will help you narrow down your thoughts and find that word you’ve been looking for. It can be extremely frustrating when you have to stop writing because you get a stuck on a word, so this should help cut that down. 

Free Rice – is a great way to test your vocabulary knowledge. What’s even better about this site is that with every correct answer, they donate 10 grains of rice to the United Nations World Food Program. So, please disable your adblock since they use the ads on the site to generate the money to buy the rice.

HyperGrammar — the University of Ottawa offers up a one-stop guide for proper spelling, structure, and punctuation on this site.

AutoCrit — the AutoCrit Editing Wizard can check writing for grammar errors, clichés and other no-no’s. It also provides a number of other writing resources as well.

Writer’s Digest — learn how to improve your writing, find an agent, and even get published with the help of the varied blogs on this site.

Syntaxis — it allows you to test your knowledge of grammar with a ten-question quiz. The questions change every time you take the quiz so users are sure to be challenged each time around. It definitely helps writers know if there’s something that they need to brush up on.

Word Frequency Counter — this counter allows you to count the frequency usage of each word in your text.

Tools

Copyscape — is a free service that you can use to learn if anyone has plagiarized your work. It’s pretty useful for those that want to check for fanfiction plagiarism.

Write or Die —  is an application for Windows, Mac and Linux which aims to eliminate writer’s block by providing consequences for procrastination.

Written? Kitten! — is just like Write of Die, but it’s a kinder version. They use positive reinforcement, so everytime you reach a goal they reward you with an adorable picture of a kitten.

Information & Data

RefDesk — it has an enormous collection of reference materials, searchable databases and other great resources that can’t be found anywhere else. It’s great to use when you need to find something and check your facts.

Bib Me — it makes it easy to create citations, build bibliographies and acknowledge other people’s work. This is definitely something that academics will love. It’s basically a bibliography generator that automatically fills in a works cited page in MLA, APA, Chicago or Turbian formats.

Internet Public Library — this online library is full of resources that are free for anyone to use, from newspaper and magazine articles to special collections.

The Library of Congress — if you’re looking for primary documents and information, the Library of Congress is a great place to start. It has millions of items in its archives, many of which are accessible right from the website.

Social Security Administration: Popular Baby Names — is the most accurate list of popular names from 1879 to the present. If your character is from America and you need a name for them, this gives you a accurate list of names, just pick the state or decade that your character is from.

WebMD — is a handy medical database loaded with information. It’s not a substitute for a doctor, but can give you a lot of good information on diseases, symptoms, treatments, etc.

Google Scholar - is an online, freely accessible search engine that lets users look for both physical and digital copies of articles. It searches a wide variety of sources, including academic publishers, universities, and preprint depositories and so on. While Google Scholar does search for print and online scholarly information, it is important to understand that the resource is not a database.

The Old Farmer’s Almanac — this classic almanac offers yearly information on astronomical events, weather conditions and forecasts, recipes, and gardening tips.

State Health Facts — Kaiser Family Foundation provides this database, full of health facts on a state-by-state basis that address everything from medicare to women’s health.

U.S. Census Bureau — Learn more about the trends and demographics of America with information drawn from the Census Bureau’s online site.

Wikipedia — this shouldn’t be used as your sole source, but it can be a great way to get basic information and find out where to look for additional references.

Finding Data on the Internet — a great site that list links that can tell you where you can find the inflation rate, crime statistics, and other data.

Word References

RhymeZone — whether you’re writing poetry, songs, or something else entirely, you can get help rhyming words with this site.

Acronym Finder — with more than 565,000 human-edited entries, Acronym Finder is the world’s largest and most comprehensive dictionary of acronyms, abbreviations, and initials.

Symbols.com — is a unique online encyclopedia that contains everything about symbols, signs, flags and glyphs arranged by categories such as culture, country, religion, and more. 

OneLook Reverse Dictionary — is a dictionary that lets you describe a concept and get back a list of words and phrases related to that concept. Your description can be a few words, a sentence, a question, or even just a single word. 

The Alternative Dictionaries — is a site that you can look up slang words in all types of languages, including Egyptian Arabic, Cherokee, Cantonese, Norwegian and many, many others.

Online Etymology Dictionary — it gives you the history and derivation of any word. Etymologies are not definitions; they’re explanations of what our words meant and how they sounded 600 or 2,000 years ago.

MediLexicon — is a comprehensive dictionary of medical, pharmaceutical, biomedical, and health care abbreviations and acronyms.

Merriam Webster Online – the online version of the classic dictionary also provides a thesaurus and a medical dictionary.

Multilingual Dictionary – that translate whatever you need from 30 different languages with this easy-to-use site.

Writing Software

Open Office — why pay for Microsoft products when you can create free documents with Open Office? This open source software provides similar tools to the Microsoft Office Suite, including spreadsheets, a word processor, the ability to create multimedia presentations, and more.

LibreOffice — is a free and open source office suite. It was forked from OpenOffice.org in 2010, which was an open-sourced version of the earlier StarOffice. The LibreOffice suite comprises programs to do word processing, spreadsheets, slideshows, diagrams and drawings, maintain databases, and compose math formula.

Scrivener — is not a free program, but it’s certainly a very popular one. It’s great for organizing research, planning drafts, and writing novels, articles, short stories, and even screenplays.

OmmWriter — is a free simple text processor that gives you a distraction free environment. So you can focus only on your writing without being tempted or distracted by other programs on your computer.

Evernote — is a free app for your smartphone and computer that stores everything you could possibly imagine losing track of, like a boarding pass, receipt, article you want to read, to do list, or even a simple typed note. The app works brilliantly, keeping everything in sync between your computer, smartphone, or tablet. It’s definitely a useful app for writers when you have ideas on the go.

Storybook — this open source software can make it easier to manage your plotlines, characters, data, and other critical information while penning a novel.

Script Frenzy — scriptwriters will appreciate this software. It offers an easy layout that helps outline plots as well as providing storyboard features, index cards, and even sound and photo integration.

Creativity, Fun & Miscellaneous

National Novel Writing Month — is one of the most well-known writing challenges in the writing community, National Novel Writing Month pushes you to write 50,000 words in 30 days (for the whole month of November).

WritingFix — a fun site that creates writing prompts on the spot. The site currently has several options—prompts for right-brained people, for left-brained people, for kids—and is working to add prompts on classic literature, music and more.

Creative Writing Prompts — the site is exactly what it says. They have 100+ and more, of prompts that you can choose from.

My Fonts — is the world’s largest collection of fonts. You can even upload an image containing a font that you like, and this tells you what it is.

Story Starters — this website offers over one trillion randomly generated story starters for creative writers.

The Gutenberg Project — this site is perfect for those who like to read and/or have an ereader. There’s over 33,000 ebooks you can download for free. 

The Imagination Prompt Generator — Click through the prompts to generate different ideas in response to questions like “Is there a God?” and “If your tears could speak to you, what would they say?”

The Phrase Finder – this handy site helps you hunt down famous phrases, along with their origins. It also offers a phrase thesaurus that can help you create headlines, lyrics, and much more.

Storybird – this site allows you to write a picture book. They provided the gorgeous artwork and you create the story for it, or just read the stories that others have created.

Language Is a Virus — the automatic prompt generator on this site can provide writers with an endless number of creative writing prompts. Other resources include writing exercises and information on dozens of different authors.

Background Noise/Music

SimplyNoise — a free white noise sounds that you can use to drown out everything around you and help you focus on your writing.

Rainy Mood — from the same founders of Simply Noise, this website offers the pleasant sound of rain and thunderstorms. There’s a slide volume control, which you can increase the intensity of the noise (gentle shower to heavy storm), thunder mode (often, few, rare), oscillation button, and a sleep timer. 

Coffitivity — a site that provides three background noises: Morning Murmur (a gentle hum), Lunchtime Lounge (bustling chatter), and University Undertones (campus cafe). A pause button is provided whenever you need a bladder break, and a sliding volume control to give you the freedom to find the perfect level for your needs and moods. It’s also available as an android app, iOS app, and for Mac desktop.

Rainy Cafe — it provides background chatter in coffee shops (similar to Coffitivity) AND the sound of rain (similar to Simply Rain). There’s also individual volume and on/off control for each sound category.

Editing Software:

StyleWriter 4 is fantastic. It’s an add-on for Microsoft word and has a 14-day trial period. It goes through your text, picks out “glue words”, misspellings, long sentences, homonyms, passive tense, shows your reading grade level, and more.

Editminion *FREE* checks for adverbs, weak words, passive voice, cliches, and homonyms among other things.

Pro Writing Aid is another online editor. It is mostly free, but offers more features if you pay.

AutoCrit offers free analysis for under 500 words, otherwise you have to pay for more text and more editing features.

Paper Rater offers a free service for editing, but it is designed for essays.

Formatting Checklist: This follows the general guide of formatting a manuscript in Microsoft word. However, some literary agents and editors have their own requirements.

Under the paragraph option, change the special indentation to first line at .5". Change to document to double spaced.

There should be no spaces between paragraphs.

When showing a scene break, center # on a blank line.

Font should be easy to read. Courier New and Times New Roman are preferred at size 12.

All margins should be 1".

Start chapters on a new page and put the chapter title 1/3 down the page. Write the chapter like so: CHAPTER ONE - CHAPTER TITLE. Press return 4 - 6 times before starting the text of the chapter.

For the header, put YOUR NAME/BOOK TITLE/PAGE NUMBER in the upper right-hand corner. Start this header on the first page of the first chapter.

The cover page of your manuscript should have your name, word count, and contact information in the upper left-hand corner.

The title on the cover page should be in all caps. Your name should be underneath in all caps. If you use a pen name, write YOUR REAL NAME (WRITING AS PEN NAME).

At the end of the manuscript, start a new page and write END.

Self-Editing Checklist:

Spelling:

If you are using Microsoft word for your word processor, use the spell check. After that, go through the manuscript line by line to make sure everything is spelled right. You may have used “form” instead of “from” and skipped it because Microsoft word did not see it as misspelled.

Printing out your work or viewing it in another way (such as a pdf on an ereader) helps find these mistakes.

Beta readers can find what you missed as well.

Use editing software to check homonyms or look up a list of homonyms and find them in your document using ctrl + f. Check these words to make sure you used the right spelling.

Grammar and Style:

First use Microsoft word’s grammar checker, but be aware that it is not always right. Check grammar girl if you are unsure.

For dialogue, you can always pick up a professionally published book and look at how the dialogue tags are used, where commas are placed, and when other punctuation is used.

If you’re in school and your English teacher isn’t too busy, have them take a look at it.

Look out for prepositions. Most of the time, you can omit these words and the sentence will still make sense. Beginner writers use a lot of these in their writing and it slows the flow.

Check for adverbs. You’d be surprised at how many you use in your writing, sometimes up to five a page. Using a few in narration is okay, but only a few. Delete adverbs you find, especially those that end in “-ly”, and rewrite the sentences in necessary.

Delete gerunds and forms of “to be” if writing in past tense. Instead of “were running”, write “ran”.

Check subject-verb agreement.

Use correct dialogue tags. People don’t bark their words. They shout.

Two digit numbers should be written as words (twenty-seven) while numbers with more than two digits should be written with numbers (123).

Avoid passive verbs.

Vary sentence length.

Show with the five senses rather than telling.

Most of the time, you can delete the word “that”.

Avoid using “unique” or “significant” words too often.

Consistency:

Make sure all your font is the same size and type.

Make sure you have no plot holes. Use the comment feature in Microsoft Word to track these plots.

Make sure your time line is consistent.

The tone should fit the scene.

There should be one POV per scene. Unless you’re a brilliant writer and can pull off third person omniscient.

Verb tense should be consistent.

Keep track of the details you release of people, places, and things. The reader will remember if in one chapter you say your protagonist has blue eyes and in another you say green.

Pacing:

The whole book should flow in and out of fast paced scenes to keep your reader interested and slow scenes to give them a break.

The middle should not “sag”.

Sentences should flow smoothly.

Plot:

Keep track of all your plots and sub-plots. Readers will remember them.

There should be a beginning, middle, and end.

Is the initial problem at the beginning of the manuscript?

There should be at least one antagonist. This does no have to be a person.

Is there enough conflict?

There should be a resolution.

All scenes should have something to do with plot.

The climax should be the most exciting part.

Character:

The protagonist should change by the end of the book.

Make sure all characters who come in contact with one another have some kind of relationship, whether good or bad.

Characters must have motivation for everything.

The protagonist must want something right from the start of the conflict.

The protagonist needs to be captivating. The readers wants to root for the protagonist. This does not mean the protagonist needs to be likable all the time.

The readers likes to relate to characters. Make sure your characters are diverse enough that readers can identify with one.

Know who your protagonist is. The main character is not always the same. For example, Nick in The Great Gatsby is the main character, but Jay Gatsby is the protagonist. This is important to know while writing your query letter.

If you can delete a minor character from a scene and nothing changes, then delete that character.

Sometimes you can make two minor characters one without losing any essential parts of the story. If you can, do this.

All characters react and act.

Each character has his or her own life.

Dialogue:

Dialogue should be believable. Read it out loud.

Don’t go overboard with phonetic spelling if a character has an accent.

Dialogue should be informal and natural. It does not have to be grammatically correct.

Prose:

Avoid purple prose. I’ve never met anyone with “emerald eyes” or “hair of fire” (except for the Flame Princess).

Don’t use too many adjectives.

Avoid cliches.

Other:

Don’t info dump. Pace information through dialogue and narration.

The first sentence should spark interest, or at least the first three. If it does, the first paragraph should be the same. And the first 250 words. The goal is to get the reader past the first page.

Let your story rest. When you’re ready to edit, start at the end. Writers tend to get lazy at the end of their story whether they are writing it for the first time or revising it after revising the rest of the story.

thinking

— Lilah E.

authorsnet is back for its second event! for this month, we would like our members to write a piece about the folklore within their wips. you can interpret this prompt however you like, and don't forget to be creative with it!

to join:

reblog this post

post a snippet of any bit of folklore from your wip!

caption your creations with:  “ @authorsnet ​ event 02: folklore—  [ snippet ] ”

tag your creations with #authorsnet

welp this took me so darn long-

thank you so much for the tag @47crayons, @kahaaniyaa, and @the-writing-avocado!!

She took in a deep breath, fell to the ground on her knees and prayed for the first in her life, looked up to the endless blue sky riddled with white and whispered, “Help me survive through this and I will emerge a phoenix, help me”, she croaked, her throat parched since the last glass of water she had had.

And she heard a loud yell, a sound that she had heard so many times in her life, she racked her brain to remember what it was but what resounded was an unnerving voice calling her out till she pressed her palms to her ears and howled.

This is from a secret wip Lady L has not announced yet mwuhahahahaha (it’s called ‘Ivy House’ if you’re curious)

— house of the gargoyles: a mood board

aesthetic: sun-warmed statues + hands stained with charcoal, ink, paint, and blood + ivy creeping across carved facades + stretching your own canvas because it's cheaper + the nocturnal life of a college student + the window seat piled high with pillows and blankets + too many lines on a drawing board + old, weathered buildings with timeless insides + books piled on the floor + chisels blunt with the evidence of good use + stained glass windows with patterns too intricate to make sense of + a collection of old coins given to you by strangers + new moons

thank you so much for 100 followers!! <333 i didn't expect it this quick so i have nothing planned, but if any of you have any ideas for what i should do, i would love to hear it!! just shoot me an ask or a dm!! thank you again :D

taglists —

general: @childhoodlovers @moll-ifluous @svpphicwrites @veneritia

house of the gargoyles: @drippingmoon @imjustalonesomewriteblr @kahaaniyaa @macabretypewriter @radley-writes

thank you for the tag @magnoliaash! And sorry I took a moment to do this, School and Life happened and got in the way

rules : make one of those pyramid memes but specific to your ocs!

I decided to focus on the characters from Lotus on the River, so here are the needs of Jahzara, Jophiel, Adarian and Eleander (yeah I included him because he's my darling, I just couldn't help myself)

JAHZARA (bf refers to Adarian of course) :

JOPHIEL :

ADARIAN (gf refers to the love of his life Jahzara darling) :

ELEANDER :

I'll tag @akindofmagictoo, @ashen-crest, @vellichor-virgo, @drippingmoon, @writeblrfantasy and @ambsthom, and anyone who wants! Consider yourself tagged!

Blank template under the cut, have fun :D along with the taglist for Lotus on the River (figured I might as well put it)

—  ATLAS AND ATHENA

genre: new adult / urban fantasy

pov: third person, present tense

themes + tropes: rivals to lovers, forced proximity, found family, war and rebellion, betrayal, very unreliable narrator, masks and the people that see through them, anti-heroes, grief, angels and wings and flying, complicated family dynamics, conspiracy theories, identity reveal, working through trauma, undercover shenanigins, spies and double agents, everyone has a motive and a side to the story.

status: outlining, first draft

wip page | wip tag

— SYNOPSIS:

an angel falls out of the sky. 

a girl is shot in the stomach.

a spy goes to an auction.

when a mission goes abruptly sideways, nina rhodes, agent and sharpshooter for the ambigiously named agency — a network of spies and espionage working on both sides of the law; good and evil, mortal and divine — is partnered with atticus sideris, archangel and member of the elite, dangerous themis guard, dedicated to preserving the order of the divine realm.

an order that is in jeopardy. ages ago, in centuries lost to the clutches of time, the divide between mortal and angel was impenetrable. eventually, over thousands of years, the bloodlines mixed, and angelic divinity seeped into the mortal realm, enough so that most ‘mortals’ have at least a modicum of divinity. archangels, those angels entirely pureblooded, live within the Aether, the divine realm literally above the mortals, with their own rule of law and a reaffirmed boundary.

a human rebellion was had. 

a truce was formed. 

the flames were not smothered. 

now, ten years after one of the greatest terror attacks on record, a human bringing down three of the infamous themis guard, someone is producing divine weapons, able to harm archangels, for mortal use. the issue — divinity makes mortals feral. combine that with a bioengineering company looking to genetically alter mortals to carry more divinity, and a second war is on the verge of erupting.

nina and atticus, mortal and archangel, are assigned to a task force to dismantle the weapons smuggling ring. but when nina unwillingly finds herself the target of another investigation, and atticus helpless to reveal the truth, they have to work backwards, finding the connection to themselves and their team, even as they try to keep their truths from each other.

— CHARACTERS:

nina “athena” rhodes. mortal. 24. sharpshooter turned spy. empathetic, bright, neurotic, stubborn, analytical.

atticus “atlas” sideris. archangel. immortal. commander. surly, reserved, loyal, protective, tormented.

manon moreau-popova. mortal. 25. assassin. cold, cunning, defensive, callous, evasive.

ismena dhaniels. archangel. immortal. enforcer. brave, afraid, passionate, intuitive, blunt.

reuel kovac. mortal. 27. liar. vindictive, relentless, charming, rash, self-serving.

taglist below the cut, ask to be +/-

— house of the gargoyles: a wip intro

❝ there's history in stone. memories. stone watches, bearing silent witness to so much. you can feel the past in every groove and rough patch. it's imbued with life in that way. ❞

type: novel, standalone

genre(s): gothic horror, dark fantasy, campus novel, new adult

word count goal: 95k

p.o.v: third person

themes & tropes: enemies to lovers, monster romance, found family, grief, loss, coping, healing, what it means to be alive, the pursuit of knowledge as a holy act, architecture, art, religion vs. secularism, chaotic academia, gothic overtones, murder mystery, secret societies, wlw romance, diverse cast

warnings: violence, murder, blood, character death, religious trama

synopsis:

only one scholarship to attend the prestigious hallowell college of fine arts is awarded per year and vivienne langely is the lucky student. she's painfully aware of the eyes of everyone, students and faculty alike. sometimes she feels like even the gargoyles perched around campus are watching her.

seeking to hide away from the world for a while, she wanders up to the library: a converted church building high on the hill. there she finds hallowell's most guarded secrets. they promise to guard her too if she keeps them.

what's more, she's inducted into pygmalion, hallowell's very own secret society bent on unlocking the knowledge she's already discovered. and with statues going missing, students turning up dead, a campaign to save the gargoyles from removal, and finals to worry about, vivienne wonders if she can keep up. was attending art school really worth all of this?

wip tag(s): #houseofthegargoyleswip #hotg #gargoyleswip

taglists —

general: @childhoodlovers @moll-ifluous @svpphicwrites

house of the gargoyles: @macabretypewriter

[ veneritia ; writeblr re-introduction ]

Hello everyone! My name’s Maddie and I used to post as @anomaly00.  I’ve been on writeblr for a few years and have grown and changed a lot since I first started, which is why I’m starting over on a new blog! The old blog will still be up as an archive, but this will my primary blog and will still be writeblr-centric, just like the old one. The only difference is that I’m hoping this one will stay more organized and my original content more true to how they currently are, instead of it being a hodge podge of outdated information.

[ about me ]

18. She/Her. Filipino. consistently intp. virgo. tired university student. My love for learning history stems from my mom making me watch period dramas with her and constantly having me explain timeline of events (i’m far from a history buff though). I mostly write fantasy stories and I love worldbuilding. I am very into villainess manhuas and I will absolutely talk your ears off if you ask me about them.

One of my dreams is to have one of my wips printed with a dedication to my bff about how I did manage to finish this story before I was 90.

[ main wips ]

When Comes the Dawn |  Fenice vi Aetier, a ‘soulless’ princess and the estranged daughter of the emperor, ignites a dangerous successsion game between her and her half-brother, where losing means death and winning means an empire. But when the remnants of her father’s war rears its head, Fenice must ensure her victory — or else lose far more than just her head.

genre; na, high fantasy, court intrigue  

The Stars do not Bind Us |  Six, thirteen years old and born as the prophesized her, embarks on a quest where her victory is as assured as her death. Accompanying her is a strange man in the woods and the five voices inside her head.

genre; fantasy/adventure novella

[ people who wanted to be tagged for this ]