Log in
Avatar

Lennox Elysian

@literarylennox

*all about writing*
Posts
literarylennox
semblanche

40 Questions — Meme for Fic Writers

  1. Describe your comfort zone—a typical you-fic.
  2. Is there a trope you’ve yet to try your hand at, but really want to?
  3. Is there a trope you wouldn’t touch with a ten foot pole?
  4. How many fic ideas are you nurturing right now? Care to share one of them?
  5. Share one of your strengths.
  6. Share one of your weaknesses.
  7. Share a snippet from one of your favorite pieces of prose you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.
  8. Share a snippet from one of your favorite dialogue scenes you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.
  9. Which fic has been the hardest to write?
  10. Which fic has been the easiest to write?
  11. Is writing your passion or just a fun hobby?
  12. Is there an episode above all others that inspires you just a little bit more?
  13. What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever come across?
  14. What’s the worst writing advice you’ve ever come across?
  15. If you could choose one of your fics to be filmed, which would you choose?
  16. If you only could write one pairing for the rest of your life, which pairing would it be?
  17. Do you write your story from start to finish, or do you write the scenes out of order?
  18. Do you use any tools, like worksheets or outlines?
  19. Stephen King once said that his muse is a man who lives in the basement. Do you have a muse?
  20. Describe your perfect writing conditions.
  21. How many times do you usually revise your fic/chapter before posting?
  22. Choose a passage from one of your earlier fics and edit it into your current writing style. (Person sending the ask is free to make suggestions).
  23. If you were to revise one of your older fics from start to finish, which would it be and why?
  24. Have you ever deleted one of your published fics?
  25. What do you look for in a beta?
  26. Do you beta yourself? If so, what kind of beta are you?
  27. How do you feel about collaborations?
  28. Share three of your favorite fic writers and why you like them so much.
  29. If you could write the sequel (or prequel) to any fic out there not written by yourself, which would you choose?
  30. Do you accept prompts?
  31. Do you take liberties with canon or are you very strict about your fic being canon compliant?
  32. How do you feel about smut?
  33. How do you feel about crack?
  34. What are your thoughts on non-con and dub-con?
  35. Would you ever kill off a canon character?
  36. Which is your favorite site to post fic?
  37. Talk about your current wips.
  38. Talk about a review that made your day.
  39. Do you ever get rude reviews and how do you deal with them?
  40. Write an alternative ending to [insert fic title] (or just the summary of one).
literarylennox
thewriteblrarchives
Avatar
pitofghosts

worldbuilding tips

  • populations and peoples don’t just suddenly change at a border marker. cultures interact and blend.
  • there are usually a multitude of cultures in one place, and religions often have different factions within them
  • what are the differences between the upper and lower classes? is there a lower class? what system is used? fuedalism? capitalism? communism?
  • how does your society view and deal with poverty?
  • think about the diaspora. invent a large population of immigrants. why are they there? how long have they lived there? how does their culture now differentiate from their homeland?
  • languages. is there a global lingua franca (a language that people use to speak internationally. historically this has been latin and french, and right now, english)? if so, why That One? are there smaller lingua francas within different nations?
  • a large country will almost always have smaller languages within it. put some in. you don’t even have to name them, just have someone mention that they often have to translate for their parents
  • the lingua franca will usually be the language of the majority, but not always. if a particular ethnic group has control of the government, and therefor education, then that language will probably become more widespread. although sometimes there are “official languages” and “daily languages”
  • i could write a whole other post about languages honestly
  • what things do different cultures see as beautiful? is it eyes? hair? what parts of the body are considered scandalous. are the bodies of men and women seen differently? how do people feel about breasts?
  • how is makeup used? is it daily? is it ceremonial? do different colours and patterns have meanings or is purely for aesthetic? is it seen as gendered?
  • basically just don’t take everything in your culture as the “norm.” there is no norm. the world is weird.
  • learn about other cultures in our own world. please.
literarylennox
thewriteblrarchives
Avatar
theworstassassinever

Writing Masterpost

Character Help

Dialogue

General Help

Plotting

Prompts and Ideas

Research

Revision

Setting

Sounds to listen to whilst writing

Tools

literarylennox
h-brook-writes

if we want to call ourselves writers we have to submit to the mortifying ordeal of actually writing 

Avatar
nikkoliferous

fuck you

let’s calm down and go write a few words maybe

literarylennox
goodmangreenfeld
Avatar
andercas

I feel like when you’re writing, organizing chapters and dialogue is easy

but jfc, the amount of time it takes to constantly keep people moving and make sure they’re in the right spaces and trying to come up with wording for it is always such a shock. 

Like, fuck, I made you pick up a coffee cup, you need to put it down at some point. also I can’t remember what I dressed you in, can you push up your sleeves? I don’t remember if you even have your shirt on.

and YOU. YOU OVER THERE, you got out of your chair earlier, but did you come back yet? Are you coming back? Where did you even go and why’d you get up? Fuck, I can’t make you sit down again already, you just stood up, go…over there. go get more coffee. Did you bring your mug with you? fine. bring the pot to the table and—wait, wasn’t the coffee pot already over here? shit, hold on, I need to go back and re-read and re-write

literarylennox
goodmangreenfeld
Avatar
promptsgalore

Write a character’s life story by writing one paragraph for each year of their life. Challenge yourself to shift perspectives throughout the piece to add depth and intrigue. 

literarylennox
goodmangreenfeld
Avatar
lizard-is-writing

How to Plot A Complex Novel in One Day (It WILL take all day)

Now first, I have to say, that the plot you’re able to come up with in one day is not going to be without its flaws, but coming up with it all at once, the entire story unfolds right in front of you and makes you want to keep going with it. So, where to begin? 

  • What is your premise and basic plot? Pick your plot. I recommend just pulling one from this list. No plots are “original” so making yours interesting and complicated will easily distract from that fact, that and interesting characters. Characters will be something for you to work on another day, because this is plotting day. You’ll want the main plot to be fairly straight forward, because a confusing main plot will doom you if you want subplots. 
  • Decide who the characters will be. They don’t have to have names at this point. You don’t even need to know who they are other than why they have to be in the story. The more characters there are the more complicated the plot will be. If you intend to have more than one subplot, then you’ll want more characters. Multiple interconnected subplots will give the illusion that the story is very complicated and will give the reader a lot of different things to look at at all times. It also gives you the chance to develop many side characters. The plot I worked out yesterday had 13 characters, all were necessary. Decide their “roles” don’t bother with much else. This seems shallow, but this is plot. Plot is shallow. 
  • Now, decide what drives each character. Why specifically are they in this story? You can make this up. You don’t even know these characters yet. Just so long as everyone has their own motivations, you’re in the clear. 
  • What aren’t these characters giving away right off the bat? Give them a secret! It doesn’t have to be something that they are actively lying about or trying to hide, just find something that perhaps ties them into the plot or subplot. This is a moment to dig into subplot. This does not need to be at all connected to their drive to be present in the story.  Decide who is in love with who, what did this person do in the 70’s that’s coming back to bite them today, and what continues to haunt what-his-face to this very day. This is where you start to see the characters take shape. Don’t worry much about who they are or what they look like, just focus on what they’re doing to the story. 
  • What is going to change these characters? Now this will take some thinking. Everyone wants at least a few of the characters to come out changed by the end of the story, so think, how will they be different as a result of the plot/subplot? It might not be plot that changes them, but if you have a lot of characters, a few changes that are worked into the bones of the plot might help you.
  • Now list out the major events of the novel with subplot in chronological order. This will be your timeline. Especially list the historical things that you want to exist in backstory. List everything you can think of. Think about where the story is going. At this point, you likely haven’t focused too much on the main plot, yeah, it’s there, but now really focus on the rising actions, how this main plot builds its conflict, then the climactic moment. Make sure you get all of that in there. This might take a few hours. 
  • Decide where to start writing. This part will take a LOT of thinking. It’s hard! But now that you’ve got the timeline, pick an interesting point to begin at. Something with action. Something relevant. Preferably not at the beginning of your timeline - you want to have huge reveals later on where these important things that happened prior are exposed. This is the point where you think about what information should come out when. This will be a revision of your last list, except instead of being chronological, it exists to build tension. 
  • Once you’ve gotten the second list done, you’ve got a plot. Does it need work? Probably. But with that said, at this point you probably have no idea who half your characters are. Save that for tomorrow, that too will be a lot of work. 

After you’ve plotted the loose structure of your novel from this, see my next post to work on character!