Latest Posts by angrykeese - Page 3

How I learned to write smarter, not harder

(aka, how to write when you're hella ADHD lol)

A reader commented on my current long fic asking how I write so well. I replied with an essay of my honestly pretty non-standard writing advice (that they probably didn't actually want lol) Now I'm gonna share it with you guys and hopefully there's a few of you out there who will benefit from my past mistakes and find some useful advice in here. XD Since I started doing this stuff, which are all pretty easy changes to absorb into your process if you want to try them, I now almost never get writer's block.

The text of the original reply is indented, and I've added some additional commentary to expand upon and clarify some of the concepts.

As for writing well, I usually attribute it to the fact that I spent roughly four years in my late teens/early 20s writing text roleplay with a friend for hours every single day. Aside from the constant practice that provided, having a live audience immediately reacting to everything I wrote made me think a lot about how to make as many sentences as possible have maximum impact so that I could get that kind of fun reaction. (Which is another reason why comments like yours are so valuable to fanfic writers! <3) The other factors that have improved my writing are thus: 1. Writing nonlinearly. I used to write a whole story in order, from the first sentence onward. If there was a part I was excited to write, I slogged through everything to get there, thinking that it would be my reward once I finished everything that led up to that. It never worked. XD It was miserable. By the time I got to the part I wanted to write, I had beaten the scene to death in my head imagining all the ways I could write it, and it a) no longer interested me and b) could not live up to my expectations because I couldn't remember all my ideas I'd had for writing it. The scene came out mediocre and so did everything leading up to it. Since then, I learned through working on VN writing (I co-own a game studio and we have some visual novels that I write for) that I don't have to write linearly. If I'm inspired to write a scene, I just write it immediately. It usually comes out pretty good even in a first draft! But then I also have it for if I get more ideas for that scene later, and I can just edit them in. The scenes come out MUCH stronger because of this. And you know what else I discovered? Those scenes I slogged through before weren't scenes I had no inspiration for, I just didn't have any inspiration for them in that moment! I can't tell you how many times there was a scene I had no interest in writing, and then a week later I'd get struck by the perfect inspiration for it! Those are scenes I would have done a very mediocre job on, and now they can be some of the most powerful scenes because I gave them time to marinate. Inspiration isn't always linear, so writing doesn't have to be either!

Some people are the type that joyfully write linearly. I have a friend like this--she picks up the characters and just continues playing out the next scene. Her story progresses through the entire day-by-day lives of the characters; it never timeskips more than a few hours. She started writing and posting just eight months ago, she's about an eighth of the way through her planned fic timeline, and the content she has so far posted to AO3 for it is already 450,000 words long. But most of us are normal humans. We're not, for the most part, wired to create linearly. We consume linearly, we experience linearly, so we assume we must also create linearly. But actually, a lot of us really suffer from trying to force ourselves to create this way, and we might not even realize it. If you're the kind of person who thinks you need to carrot-on-a-stick yourself into writing by saving the fun part for when you finally write everything that happens before it: Stop. You're probably not a linear writer. You're making yourself suffer for no reason and your writing is probably suffering for it. At least give nonlinear writing a try before you assume you can't write if you're not baiting or forcing yourself into it!! Remember: Writing is fun. You do this because it's fun, because it's your hobby. If you're miserable 80% of the time you're doing it, you're probably doing it wrong!

2. Rereading my own work. I used to hate reading my own work. I wouldn't even edit it usually. I would write it and slap it online and try not to look at it again. XD Writing nonlinearly forced me to start rereading because I needed to make sure scenes connected together naturally and it also made it easier to get into the headspace of the story to keep writing and fill in the blanks and get new inspiration. Doing this built the editing process into my writing process--I would read a scene to get back in the headspace, dislike what I had written, and just clean it up on the fly. I still never ever sit down to 'edit' my work. I just reread it to prep for writing and it ends up editing itself. Many many scenes in this fic I have read probably a dozen times or more! (And now, I can actually reread my own work for enjoyment!) Another thing I found from doing this that it became easy to see patterns and themes in my work and strengthen them. Foreshadowing became easy. Setting up for jokes or plot points became easy. I didn't have to plan out my story in advance or write an outline, because the scenes themselves because a sort of living outline on their own. (Yes, despite all the foreshadowing and recurring thematic elements and secret hidden meanings sprinkled throughout this story, it actually never had an outline or a plan for any of that. It's all a natural byproduct of writing nonlinearly and rereading.)

Unpopular writing opinion time: You don't need to make a detailed outline.

Some people thrive on having an outline and planning out every detail before they sit down to write. But I know for a lot of us, we don't know how to write an outline or how to use it once we've written it. The idea of making one is daunting, and the advice that it's the only way to write or beat writer's block is demoralizing. So let me explain how I approach "outlining" which isn't really outlining at all.

I write in a Notion table, where every scene is a separate table entry and the scene is written in the page inside that entry. I do this because it makes writing nonlinearly VASTLY more intuitive and straightforward than writing in a single document. (If you're familiar with Notion, this probably makes perfect sense to you. If you're not, imagine something a little like a more contained Google Sheets, but every row has a title cell that opens into a unique Google Doc when you click on it. And it's not as slow and clunky as the Google suite lol) (Edit from the future: I answered an ask with more explanation on how I use Notion for non-linear writing here.) When I sit down to begin a new fic idea, I make a quick entry in the table for every scene I already know I'll want or need, with the entries titled with a couple words or a sentence that describes what will be in that scene so I'll remember it later. Basically, it's the most absolute bare-bones skeleton of what I vaguely know will probably happen in the story.

Then I start writing, wherever I want in the list. As I write, ideas for new scenes and new connections and themes will emerge over time, and I'll just slot them in between the original entries wherever they naturally fit, rearranging as necessary, so that I won't forget about them later when I'm ready to write them. As an example, my current long fic started with a list of roughly 35 scenes that I knew I wanted or needed, for a fic that will probably be around 100k words (which I didn't know at the time haha). As of this writing, it has expanded to 129 scenes. And since I write them directly in the page entries for the table, the fic is actually its own outline, without any additional effort on my part. As I said in the comment reply--a living outline!

This also made it easier to let go of the notion that I had to write something exactly right the first time. (People always say you should do this, but how many of us do? It's harder than it sounds! I didn't want to commit to editing later! I didn't want to reread my work! XD) I know I'm going to edit it naturally anyway, so I can feel okay giving myself permission to just write it approximately right and I can fix it later. And what I found from that was that sometimes what I believed was kind of meh when I wrote it was actually totally fine when I read it later! Sometimes the internal critic is actually wrong. 3. Marinating in the headspace of the story. For the first two months I worked on [fic], I did not consume any media other than [fandom the fic is in]. I didn't watch, read, or play anything else. Not even mobile games. (And there wasn't really much fan content for [fandom] to consume either. Still isn't, really. XD) This basically forced me to treat writing my story as my only source of entertainment, and kept me from getting distracted or inspired to write other ideas and abandon this one.

As an aside, I don't think this is a necessary step for writing, but if you really want to be productive in a short burst, I do highly recommend going on a media consumption hiatus. Not forever, obviously! Consuming media is a valuable tool for new inspiration, and reading other's work (both good and bad, as long as you think critically to identify the differences!) is an invaluable resource for improving your writing.

When I write, I usually lay down, close my eyes, and play the scene I'm interested in writing in my head. I even take a ten-minute nap now and then during this process. (I find being in a state of partial drowsiness, but not outright sleepiness, makes writing easier and better. Sleep helps the brain process and make connections!) Then I roll over to the laptop next to me and type up whatever I felt like worked for the scene. This may mean I write half a sentence at a time between intervals of closed-eye-time XD

People always say if you're stuck, you need to outline.

What they actually mean by that (whether they realize it or not) is that if you're stuck, you need to brainstorm. You need to marinate. You don't need to plan what you're doing, you just need to give yourself time to think about it!

What's another framing for brainstorming for your fic? Fantasizing about it! Planning is work, but fantasizing isn't.

You're already fantasizing about it, right? That's why you're writing it. Just direct that effort toward the scenes you're trying to write next! Close your eyes, lay back, and fantasize what the characters do and how they react.

And then quickly note down your inspirations so you don't forget, haha.

And if a scene is so boring to you that even fantasizing about it sucks--it's probably a bad scene.

If it's boring to write, it's going to be boring to read. Ask yourself why you wanted that scene. Is it even necessary? Can you cut it? Can you replace it with a different scene that serves the same purpose but approaches the problem from a different angle? If you can't remove the troublesome scene, what can you change about it that would make it interesting or exciting for you to write?

And I can't write sitting up to save my damn life. It's like my brain just stops working if I have to sit in a chair and stare at a computer screen. I need to be able to lie down, even if I don't use it! Talking walks and swinging in a hammock are also fantastic places to get scene ideas worked out, because the rhythmic motion also helps our brain process. It's just a little harder to work on a laptop in those scenarios. XD

In conclusion: Writing nonlinearly is an amazing tool for kicking writer's block to the curb. There's almost always some scene you'll want to write. If there isn't, you need to re-read or marinate.

Or you need to use the bathroom, eat something, or sleep. XD Seriously, if you're that stuck, assess your current physical condition. You might just be unable to focus because you're uncomfortable and you haven't realized it yet.

Anyway! I hope that was helpful, or at least interesting! XD Sorry again for the text wall. (I think this is the longest comment reply I've ever written!)

And same to you guys on tumblr--I hope this was helpful or at least interesting. XD Reblogs appreciated if so! (Maybe it'll help someone else!)

"you're the writer, you control how the story goes" no not really. i wrote the first sentence and then my characters said "WE WILL TAKE IT FROM HERE" and promptly swerved into an electrical fence.

10/3/24 URGENT, please RB

so i literally have 2 days to make 500 dollars and needless to say, that's not possible no matter how hard i work. being the only one able to work with my husband's heart problems and my chronic pain i'm just in constant pain.

i know these posts haven't really been working lately, but i'm so desperate...

paypal: the50foottaco@ymail.com

venmo: kashebu

any amount at all helps so much in taking care of my family while everything rests on my shoulders. tysm in advance

0 / 200

Americans really really need to be less paranoid and more capable of tolerating minor discomfort in public. Not everyone is a pervert/rapist/strangler/fiend. In fact, very few people are. Treating every violation of normal order as though it is a threat is why people are getting shot for turning around in a stranger's driveway. This happens within the frameworks of basically every ideology present in American culture. It is an American illness. If your vision of the world doesn't have room for saying "I'm sure it's nothing" then you really gotta work some shit out.

please can we do inbox trick-or-treating this year. can we make that a thing on tumblr. please please please please please

refseek.com

www.worldcat.org/

link.springer.com

http://bioline.org.br/

repec.org

science.gov

pdfdrive.com

so what's the take on epstein 5 years out. did he really do it?

You know, a Minecraft Movie could have been a literal masterpiece if you had the right mindset to do it, and I'm not joking. I feel like nowadays studios are afraid of being genuine like a teen is afraid of being genuine. If a movie suddenly gets too excited about something, it needs to put it down so it doesn't sound "lame" or "cringe". You cannot be honest, and you cannot show love or absurdity without pointing out that it's stupid because you think OTHERS will believe it's stupid. So please bear with me:

Currently we have only a teaser trailer, it looks bad, it puts itself down, it's afraid of being genuine, it somehow managed to whitewash Steve (again), and I doubt that it will use things like the End Poem or how it feels to play Minecraft for its themes and story. I hope that I'm wrong, but I'm very cynical. So, let's think about it together.

Minecraft Movie. I saw a post suggesting stop-motion animation for it, and, honestly, it feels perfect, just like stylized 3D animation. Live action actors do not work with how Minecraft looks, and that's okay. Let's do an animated movie.

The plot. There's so, so many possibilities, but the beauty of making a Minecraft animated movie is that you won't ever be able to tackle all the possibilities it brings to the table. The community has made so many stories for the game, so we might as well just think of an "official" movie as a homage to the game and its community. We are adapting the way Minecraft feels.

End Poem, one of the most beautiful things I have ever read. Let's take that and put it in the movie, simple as that. You can only find it by defeating the Ender Dragon, so this will be how our movie ends. If we want it to end like this, then the objective of our protagonists must be to defeat the dragon.

Let's have Steve as our protagonist - not a whitewashed version, just Steve with his actual skin color left just the way it is. He'll represent us as players for our hypothetical movie. Have him wake up in an unknown world, not knowing why he's there. Just like how the game was all the way back in 2009, he's alone in a very lonely and foggy world. We follow him trying to look for other people, and then he has to survive his first night. This first part is both whimsical and a bit scary, because that's how many players felt when they first started it when they were kids, aallllll the way back.

Steve survives his first night. He's horrified, and then he realizes that he'll have to do it again. He doesn't know the "rules" of this world, but he's figuring them out, and the idea of "rules" and "what to do" will be important. Because, at its core, Minecraft doesn't have that many rules. It has no actual objective. You can do whatever you want, and this will be very (very) important.

Steve ends up building a small base with wood. Survives a bit more, and then, someway, somehow, he finds Alex. While he's more careful around things and very thoughtful on how and what to build, Alex is more of an adventurer, following the little tidbits of personality we see from them during Minecraft trailers. They're happy to know that they aren't alone, and we follow them build a very strong friendship and teach each other new things, just like how it is playing Minecraft in real life. They find a village, and find out that maybe they can leave this world, or at least find some answers, if they defeat the Ender Dragon.

From there, we have a good objective. The two continue progressing, and their base ends up becoming a castle, because who didn't want to build a castle when they were kids? And the world seems progressively more alive thanks to their interference on it, thanks to them helping the villagers, thanks to them being the players that they are. If you want more conflict, just add the pillagers as well.

Eventually, Steve and Alex have an argument about their points of view. They both want to know what's going on, but their way of doing things are different, and they care a LOT about each other, they're best friends, but who is doing things the "right" way? I don't like the idea of them separating because that happens in way too many movies. I want to see these two stick together, but their insistence on trying to do it "correctly" ends up putting them in a lot of trouble because they can't cooperate anymore. Y'know. How people fight and argue about a "correct" way of playing the game. How we as players miss old Minecraft - or do we? Do we miss the simplicity of older times, or do we miss our childhood creativity and willigness to do whatever comes to mind?

Anyways. A good alternative to this conflict would be either Alex or Steve - I'm leaning more towards Steve - being hesitant at completing the End Portal. He doesn't want to end his "dream", he doesn't want answers or to escape this world (aka leave good memories behind), he wants to stay there, but Alex knows that they can't be like this forever, even if she wants to stay. Regardless, they eventually come to a mutual understanding, and, TOGETHER, they go and fight the Ender Dragon. They win, and then the End Poem happens.

The fight against the dragon wasn't the ending; the realization that there are, indeed, no rules to put them down, or that they HAVE to leave everything behind, is the ending. They hear the poem while sitting next to each other. The world changed because of them, and sometimes it was for the worse, and sometimes it was for the better, but it did become much kinder, and they weren't alone. They don't HAVE to be. Just like how it actually happened in the actual game, through the 15 YEARS since it started to exist, and oh my God it's been 15 years already?! Oh my God-

Anyways. Movie ends with Alex and Steve having a lighthearted argument over what to build next. Steve wants another castle, Alex says that she has amazing ideas for something she's calling a "mob farm", and "trust me, it'll make our lives SO MUCH easier". And they're just being silly, because there are no rules.

Anyways thanks for reading this post, feel free to add your own things to it! Just had to get it out of my chest.

I literally just woke up from a dream where chapter 5 was already out

It has begun

I think everyone knows intellectually that marginalized people can be racists, sexists, fascists, or all-around assholes and that non-white, non-Christian societies can be just as brutal, fucked-up, or oppressive as the countries in which we live, but I don't think, until recently, that a lot of people on Tumblr actually really *believed* this.

Men will literally study Paracelsus, translate 1600s alchemical texts and distill potions for melancholy before going to therapy

the most disturbing trend in online leftism is outright hostility towards any kind of community building tools and forgiveness whatsoever.

really helpful technique ^ once you know how to divide by halves and thirds it makes drawing evenly spaced things in perspective waaay easier:

Oh. Oh….

here's a random word generator--whatever word it gives you is now the thing you are the deity of

weirdest art trick i have is that sketching limbs is easier and neater if you slice em at the joints instead of using those little circles

Posting some progress on my BOTW landscape! Thanks for looking :)

Minecraft Steve is kinda a cosmic horror if you think about it.

Terraforming can be a big part of the game and most people do it to achieve a more “natural” look. The generated landscape follows the minecraft universe’s “rules” and you’re essentially reshaping the world to be more like your universe (real life)

Those giant hyper realistic mountain builds is essentially an entity (us) outside the minecraft universe completely rearranging the shape of the world to be more “natural” to it.

Like you know what a tree looks like but imagine it being remade by something outside your universe to look familiar to their universe which is beyond your comprehension.

That’s what happens when the player makes custom trees and it goes from this to this.

biggest mindfuck is the fact that it can be so so difficult to tell the difference between when it's time for "do it bored/scared/stupid but by jove just do it" and when it's time for "if it sucks hit the bricks"

Fun fact about the early Catholic church is that, despite spending generations being persecuted by the Roman empire, it took less than 15 years under Theodosius I to go from “the empire is Catholic now” to “and also every other religion is banned.” You can literally read St. Augustine move from “state religious persecution is unacceptable” to “state religious persecution is cool actually” over his lifetime as Catholicism came to power. I’m sure there’s no broader lessons to be learned there

New In Stars and Time sequel idea just dropped.

I love how dorky the nomai are. They're this ancient, stupidly advanced civilisation so you'd expect them to be all high and mighty, yet you get lines like:

"Also I very much wanted to make a model"

"Hypothesis: there can exist too much lava"

"Science compels us to explode the sun"

"i had straight As in high school i don't understand why college is so hard" get tested for adhd. if you were tested as a kid and they didn't diagnose you it was cause your grades were good then but you've since lost the routine and structure in hs that kept you on top of everything so go get retested. go get tested for adhd. go

for the love of god, do not use chores to punish your kids!!!! it's just going to make them struggle deeply to keep their houses tidy as adults since you made them associate necessary chores with punishment and suffering, and it's going to take years of therapy to undo. don't use chores as punishments!!!

i know it's scary but i think sincere fans of indie stuff should try to leave thoughtful feedback on things they like more often because while you keep that kind thought locked up in your head the author IS going to be hearing from total randos accusing them of fetishizing disney characters because their oc has the same name as an aristocat

I used to hate it when people said the trick was to just do it until ‘do it scared’ started going around, because that’s truly it. Life didn’t start changing until I applied for jobs with one hand in front of my eyes and a trembling hand navigating my computer mouse. Or until I said everything on my mind (in moderation) with my fists clenched and my legs weak. Or until I refused to accept that I’d ‘just’ be shy forever while also kind of being nauseous at the idea of trying to be the opposite. Two things can coexist and that’s exactly the point of believing that you can do anything.

I know this is the Anti Small Talk Website but small talk is one of the most effective social glues out there for getting to know people and forming friendships with them.

When I was just starting out at a job right after college I had a coworker who I thought was the nicest person alive and after a few weeks I realized this was just because she consistently asked other people things like, "How ya doing? Whatcha having for lunch? Got any weekend plans? Seen any good movies lately?" instead of politely ignoring everyone around her.

oooh have you ever done a post about the ridiculous mandatory twist endings in old sci-fi and horror comics? Like when the guy at the end would be like "I saved the Earth from Martians because I am in fact a Vensuvian who has sworn to protect our sister planet!" with no build up whatsoever.

Yeah, that is a good question - why do some scifi twist endings fail?

As a teenager obsessed with Rod Serling and the Twilight Zone, I bought every single one of Rod Serling’s guides to writing. I wanted to know what he knew.

The reason that Rod Serling’s twist endings work is because they “answer the question” that the story raised in the first place. They are connected to the very clear reason to even tell the story at all. Rod’s story structures were all about starting off with a question, the way he did in his script for Planet of the Apes (yes, Rod Serling wrote the script for Planet of the Apes, which makes sense, since it feels like a Twilight Zone episode): “is mankind inherently violent and self-destructive?” The plot of Planet of the Apes argues the point back and forth, and finally, we get an answer to the question: the Planet of the Apes was earth, after we destroyed ourselves. The reason the ending has “oomph” is because it answers the question that the story asked. 

My friend and fellow Rod Serling fan Brian McDonald wrote an article about this where he explains everything beautifully. Check it out. His articles are all worth reading and he’s one of the most intelligent guys I’ve run into if you want to know how to be a better writer.

According to Rod Serling, every story has three parts: proposal, argument, and conclusion. Proposal is where you express the idea the story will go over, like, “are humans violent and self destructive?” Argument is where the characters go back and forth on this, and conclusion is where you answer the question the story raised in a definitive and clear fashion. 

The reason that a lot of twist endings like those of M. Night Shyamalan’s and a lot of the 1950s horror comics fail is that they’re just a thing that happens instead of being connected to the theme of the story. 

One of the most effective and memorable “final panels” in old scifi comics is EC Comics’ “Judgment Day,” where an astronaut from an enlightened earth visits a backward planet divided between orange and blue robots, where one group has more rights than the other. The point of the story is “is prejudice permanent, and will things ever get better?” And in the final panel, the astronaut from earth takes his helmet off and reveals he is a black man, answering the question the story raised. 

I’ve been a half life fan since I was a kid in the 2000s and I have never once had any issue with skibidi toilet (never even watched it tbh). On the contrary, I am so excited for kids growing up with it to find Half Life, and have to grapple with feeling fear and intrigue over the skibidi toilet guy. Like I want to see it so badly. I want to see them wrestling with the cognitive dissonance of what the gman actually is compared to how they were introduced to him

its so weird to me that skibidi is like popular among young kids like. so much of watching it is in the particularities of the source engine for me its. holy shit is that OLD DIRTY CONCRETE TEXTURE from the hit video games Half Life 2 And Garys Mod. holy shit is that 'sound of metal scraping' from the hit video game Half Life 2 WOAH that's Corrugated Metal Physics Object from my friend Garret Modular. which makes me really wanna see the reverse right like... somebody who's been huge into skibidi toilet doing a blind playthrough of hl2 and being woah its the fucking post apocalyptic toilet like from skibidi

probably my most powerful interpersonal communication hack is to, whenever possible, ask either/or questions rather than yes/no questions

for example, when chatting with coworkers, i’ll often ask if they have any fun weekend plans. but let’s be real - we all feel like friendless losers when someone asks that question and we go “uhhhhh… no.” so instead, i phrase it as “so, do you have anything fun planned over the weekend, or are you just going to enjoy having some time to relax?”

phrased like this, there’s rarely any awkwardness. you’ve presented two options & given both equally positive connotations, so your conversational partner has an automatic “out,” so to speak

but it works for higher stakes conversations too!!!! my mom was saying this weekend how she and her neighbor both like walking around the neighborhood & that she wanted to suggest they take a walk together sometime, but was worried about how to approach the conversation

so i said “how about you just say ‘i’ve noticed we both like taking walks! would you be interested in going for one together, or do you use walks for some precious alone time?’”

now Walking Neighbor has an automatic “get out of jail free card” if she wants to say no!!!! which means my mom doesn’t have to worry about the conversation being uncomfortable, because she’s set it up to go smoothly

either/or questions rather than yes/no questions. it is really like magic