Looking back on my old post, art and content that I’ve posted on here and that I’ve made has really put into perspective how lazy and naive I was. 😅
I don’t plan on writing creatively for a long time and if I do it’ll be in short nonsensical burst.
I plan to post a lil of my art here, but after quarantine closed schools and kept me from my senior year all my skills have plummeted. So I suck at all the things rn.
I don’t think I’ll post anything with my ukulele unless something interesting happens somehow.
And if anyone cared most of AM Prodigies has drifted far far away. There was a lot of drama heartbreak and bad decisions on all parties but to some it up we are no more. Now and forever.
Back to my writing I want to learn how to make a cohesive and real story before I pick up a pen again. Which is why I’m starting with journalism I guess.
lol imagine if i told my family i was seeing someone and they invited me to bring them home next time i visit so you volunteered to be my fake date and then we accidentally fell in love for real would that be fucked up or what
hexglyphs
and, like, imagine if you volunteered because you were actually secretly pining for me the entire time but you valued our friendship too much to put it at risk if i rejected you but you realise that you won’t be able to go back to just being friends now that you’ve experienced what a romantic relationship with me would be like how crazy would that be haha
hexglyphs
i’m just saying, imagine if i also secretly had a crush on you but i was afraid to tell you because you’d think it was just an act to maintain the charade for my family or that i was fucking with you and it’d ruin our friendship wouldn’t that be silly lmao
you know why I like redemption narratives? because a redemption narrative says: no matter how broken or wrong or bad or stupid or ridiculous or harmful or sad or terrible, you can atone.
there is still a road back. it might be rocky and steep, complicated and messy. walking it may take all your life. you may lose your foothold, slip and fall back into the abyss, but the wall is still there. the ascent is still there. hard is not the same as impossible.
you are never too far gone. you are never beyond saving.
Redemption does not mean: no matter how wrong or bad or harmful or terrible you are, if you suffer enough then everybody will/should forgive you and love you and accept you.
Redemption means: no matter how wrong or bad or harmful or terrible you are, you can stop being that. you can be better.
(and yes, the process of making yourself be better will be arduous and painful, but the pain is not the point; the pain is not punishment; the pain is not there to make you pitiable and therefore forgivable. the pain is incidental. any pity anyone feels for you is also incidental. the point is to stop being terrible.)
5 ways to increase/decrease suspense in your writing
Suspense is one of the trickier parts of writing to manage effectively because, as the author, you can’t experience your story the way a reader does. If you don’t have enough suspense, it can be difficult to keep your readers interested. If you have too much, frustrated and stressed-out readers might throw your book against the wall. Too much suspense can even backfire - if you try to keep your readers constantly on edge, they can stop taking things seriously and the end result is as though you never included any suspense at all.
So how can you tell if you’ve reached the right balance? Unfortunately, I can’t answer that for you. Some things really do require feedback from honest and insightful readers. Once you have that feedback, however, there are easy tricks to adjusting the level of suspense without a drastic re-write. Here are my five favorite methods.
Promises and Payoffs
INCREASE SUSPENSE by promising something huge and then giving your reader something unexpected. To borrow an example from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, imagine a teenage boy and girl sneaking into an empty building. Everything from the costumes to the lighting is designed to make you uneasy about the girl’s safety but, in the end, she’s the vampire. Give the audience something sensational and they won’t be disappointed that you didn’t deliver on what you originally promised.
DECREASE SUSPENSE by promising less than you plan to deliver. For example, if you plan to kill off a character as they walk through a dark alley, let them worry about being mugged rather than murdered. Not only is it less suspenseful, the payoff is more shocking.
Characters are Crucial
INCREASE SUSPENSE by shifting the focus to a character who’s more involved in the action or one who has more at stake. Even if you have a single POV character, another can come in and demand that character’s attention, along with the readers’.
DECREASE SUSPENSE by focusing on a character who’s more concerned with a secondary goal. Subplots are a fantastic way to give your readers some room to breathe.
Calm vs. Chaos
INCREASE SUSPENSE by cutting back on the action. Suspense flourishes in the quiet moments when your characters have time to think and to anticipate what may be in store for them.
DECREASE SUSPENSE by giving your characters a big, exciting mess to deal with. Even when that mess causes more problems and puts more pressure on your characters in the long run, you’ve still created an oasis where both they and the readers are too distracted to worry about how the big picture will pan out.
Devil’s in the Details
INCREASE SUSPENSE by concentrating on the details of the setting. Horror movies are great at this - every creak of a door, every shadow across a wall keeps the audience immersed in the experience and tense with anticipation.
DECREASE SUSPENSE by breaking the “show, don’t tell” rule and allow exposition to help you move things along. You don’t need to take readers through every aspect of your story in excruciating detail. It’s okay to gloss over some things and it helps readers relax because they know you’re not going to be springing any surprises on them just yet.
Ticking Time-Bomb
INCREASE SUSPENSE by imposing a deadline that your characters struggle to meet. It’s one of the oldest and most obvious tricks in the book, but very effective.
DECREASE SUSPENSE by allowing your characters to believe that the deadline has been met or pushed back. If they (and the readers) believe that they’ve accomplished their goal or bought themselves more time, it relieves pressure and allows everyone to relax until the truth’s revealed.
video game: everything in the world is garbage and love isnt real. your choices dont matter in the long run. people die. uuuuuuuUUUUUUUUUU
me whos depressed but plays games for fun:
exigetspersonal
Undertale: Just because the world is hard, doesn’t mean you should let it kill the softness in you. Sometimes you make mistakes that can’t be forgiven by those you’ve hurt, but if they really want to, even the worst person can change for the better. Everything you do to show you care for others comes back to you in the end. Someone out there really cares about you.
My depressed ass:
ok but what if like. werewolves transform under the full moon but theres just this one and by day hes a big tough guy and then when he transforms hes a tiny dog. just fucking. just fucking turns into the tiniest, fluffiest dog
I hate this, because almost no one knows it. No one tells kids with curly hair how to actually take care of their hair.
You can’t treat curly hair like straight hair and expect the same results! You can’t! It doesn’t work! Curly hair gets its own routine!
Okay, look, here’s the deal.
Your curls are… curls. They are MEANT to go together into a GROUP. They are not like straight hair which just hands out in one big… thing. Curls have groups.
By BRUSHING it, you are splitting those good-curl groups into separate strands, which, on their own, are STILL trying their goddamned best to curl, but now that they are away from their friends, they are only clinging haphazardly to each other as best as they can and creating tangles!
Here’s what brushed curly hair looks like:
Here’s what well-treated curly hair that has CURL-FRIENDS is supposed to look like (curl size may vary):
See how the curl is NOT only one strand of hair? It’s a whole group!
You know how you get those nice curls?
STOP BRUSHING.Give your curls back their curl-friends!
Okay, here’s the deal - you sit down. You look at this chart. Figure out your type of curl. (guesstimate)
And now you go to this website and you read about what curly hair actually needs to thrive, and you change your routine, and you promise me that you will NEVER disappoint your curls like that again!!!!
Basics:
1) Curly hair is damaged by heat, lack of moisture, and sulfates in shampoo.
- No blowdrying - use a cotton towel or t-shirt to scrunch your hair and get extra moisture out, and allow to air-dry
- Turn down the shower temp while washing hair. I mean it.
- Try to find a better shampoo.
2) Curly hair NEEDS moisture, and it NEEDS leave-in conditioner.
- Use lots of conditioner.
- Use leave-in conditioner
- Try to use water spray over chemical setting sprays.
3) Curly hair does not need to be brushed, only combed with a wide-tooth comb.
- Comb the hair through with your fingers while in the shower and detangle while you have conditioner in.
- Comb again with a wide-toothed comb after the shower if needed
- If you need to, use a twist of some sort to keep hair out of the way, but don’t squeeze it too much - give it room to breathe!
More tips from smarter people probably exist but that’s the basic stuff.
