#writing rambles

I'm serious. Please write it. If you need a sign to start, continue, or whatever is inbetween, this is it. Go do it.

I spent the past couple weeks indulging myself in some BookTok recommendations. While some were indeed good (Kings of Sin, my beloved), some were just...I don't need to finish my sentence there.

I DNF'd some books for the first time since I read Lord of the Flies (sorry Golding, you put me to sleep with your descriptions) and I powered through others in hopes that they would eventually get better. The general consensus I ended up getting was that I could not understand for the fucking life of me how these books got published. The writing in some of them was no better than that of a 2010s teen writing Maximum Ride fic on Wattpad for the first time, with the characterization abysmal enough to match.

I don't want to knock any specific author or book here, because I will concede one thing: they finished their books. They got them published. They're successful. For that, I commend them, because I'm still on my way there myself and I can't take that away from them. Jolly good show.

But that brings me to my point: if they can do it, YOU absolutely can do it too.

If some of these Amazon and NYT bestsellers can have prose on a Wattpad level with characters that have enough poorly-written cognitive dissonance to make Deadpool or Walter White jealous, your fleshed out, deeply intuitive, and remarkably creative epic can sit right alongside them no problem. Whether you're writing the next GoT or a romantic slice-of-life, there is a not a goddamn thing on this planet stopping you from rolling up with the big dogs.

If these guys can do it, so can you.

So, stop telling yourself you can't. Stop letting other people tell you you can't. Stop comparing yourself to these authors who, respectfully and bluntly, can't write for shit (or at least need to fire their fucking editors, good lord).

WRITE YOUR DAMN BOOK. PLEASE. WE NEED IT.

Remove the fluff

Don’t over explain

Trust the reader more, so don’t explain something again a sentence or paragraph later.

At the time, and sometimes now, I wonder if it was a little picky. But then, I find myself trying to make sure I’ve done just that. And to be fair, maybe I’ve missed points where I do - I’m trying to get used to drafts are drafts, they don’t need to be perfect.

But when I read my writing back and I found I have solved one of these, I feel a little thrill that I caught it almost as if the teacher is nodding their approval.

Anyone can point at a comfort character and say "they are trans" because I relate to them.

I get it. I understand that and I have not problem with that.

My questions from there is "when do you think they started transitioning? Does their family know? Who do they get support from? Medical or non-medical? How does this effect their romantic relationship? Do they have insecurities with their partner?"

I wanna know who they are to you I want more then just a label because I know how it feels to be labled. It like being divorced from your identity because while people acknowledge what you are, they don't want to hear about it.

I'm not saying labels are bad, what I'm saying is that i want more then just labels.

I have labels. We all do. But we are more then that and the character we love and care about should have that sort of writing as well. Because somewhere there is someone reading it and they are wondering if they have a place where they feel truly acknowledged as something more then just a label. That their culture, sexuality or identity are more then just character tokens to be tacked on and off whenever.