My Personal Character Files: The 6 Box Method

tried writing, ran out of ideas, please have this snippet until I conjure up motivation to finish it

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Looking for a random cause of death for a character? Click here.

Looking for a random city? Click here.

Looking for a random city that people have actually heard of? Click here.

Need a random surname for a character? Click here. (They also give prevalence by race, which is very helpful.)

Helpful writing tips for my friends.

Huevember -green

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Tips on Writing a Great Short Story

Weeks ago I was asked to do an article on short stories, specifically. What makes a short story great? And how is it different from writing a novel?

To be honest, writing a novel and writing a short story are very similar in many ways, and most of the techniques I’ve written about on my blog apply: creating complex characters, writing great dialogue, utilizing subtext, including hooks . . .

Sure, there are some exceptions, as always. You can find famous short stories that don’t really have complex characters, for example, but often such stories are really short stories–maybe by today’s standard, considered flash fiction. Here is a famous flash fiction story:

For sale: baby shoes, never worn

Does that really tell us much about the complexity of the characters? Not really. But it does still have great subtext.

So keep in mind that there are always exceptions when it comes to writing, but they are just that, exceptions.

So let’s got started.

Focus

One of the most important things about writing a short story is to keep it focused. Technically, novels should be focused too, but their focus has a broader range whereas short stories need to be narrower, like a flashlight beam compared to a laser beam. A common problem I’ve seen with newer writers is that they try to fit a novel-length concept into 50 pages. Problematic. Here are some ways to avoid that.

Limit Plotlines–In a novel, you will need a lot of plotlines to carry the story; if you don’t have that, a novel will start to feel repetitious since it lacks variety for so many pages. But in a short story, you need to limit your plotlines.  Many short stories really have one plotline, with two components working closely together: the outer journey and the inner journey. Think about the premise or main concept of your short story, and keep a laser-beam focus on that. Aim to go deep into the concept, not broad on the topic.

Limit Your Characters–In a short story, you’ll usually focus largely on one main character and that character’s arc. The more focal characters you include, the more length you typically add. Sure, you can write a story with more than one focal character–you might be able to get away with maybe two. If you have more than that though, usually the focal characters–while individuals–have the same goals and function as a unit. As opposed to most novels, where each focal (or viewpoint) character may have somewhat different goals and more of their own, individualized journeys. (Again, keep in mind that everything in this post is generally speaking).

A good word of advice that gets pushed around in the industry, related to character and plot, is that in a short story, you should specifically write about the most important event that happened in that character’s life. I don’t know that I agree with this 100%, but it’s a good thing to keep in mind when evaluating plot and character. Capture the most important event, which naturally means that it will be an event that changed the character.

Laser-Beam the Theme–Unfortunately, people still talk and treat theme like it’s this elusive animal–something wild and beautiful, but dangerous if caged. In reality, the more you understand about theme, the more intentional you can be about it. It’s only dangerous when you try to tame it improperly, because you don’t understand it. For a recap on how theme actually works, check out this post, “How to Write Your Story’s Theme”

Themes are fantastic for focusing stories (and especially in short stories that may seem to lack a feeling of … cohesion). And because a lot of people don’t understand how to do them, you can really stand out if you master the theme in your story. Theme is what makes a story feel timeless. It sticks with us after we are done, so we aren’t left closing the book and thinking, Well that was entertaining, time to get back to normal life! If you read five excellent stories, but only one of them has a powerful theme that changed you, guess which one you will think about long, long after you’ve finished it?

In a novel, you have room to explore a theme topic rather broadly. Consider all the ways the theme topics of mercy and justice are illustrated and explored in Les Mis. In a novel, you can also explore how the theme topic interacts with other theme topics, societies, and ideologies. In a short story, you are going to be more laser-focused. Take the classic fable of The Tortoise and The Hare–it stays laser-focused on really one illustration of the theme. It doesn’t go into, say how in some situations in the real world, getting a head start can have benefits. So focus in on a particular rendition or two (but probably no more than three) of your thematic statement.

Often the most famous and powerful short stories are so great because they say something profound in a small amount of space. In a way, it’s similar to poetry. Professional poetry isn’t actually about using beautiful words (which is what a lot of people who have never legit studied it seem to think)–it’s about capturing specific, significant ideas, concepts, and images, in a brief space, for maximum impact. Great short stories function in similar ways, except you have more room to develop a powerful thematic thread. It can be hard to impact a reader in such a short space with the characters and plot, but you can really hit them in the feels with the theme.

Keep reading

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Isn’t “complex, nuanced, morally gray villain” and “villain who is just evil with nothing more to it” a false dilemma?

I contend that villains don’t have to be morally gray to be complex. Your villains can have complex reasons for what they do, and internal conflicts, and still be completely vile. Their motivations can be nuanced and still be fundamentally twisted. Their internal conflicts can be between multiple awful, fucked up, selfish sides of themselves. Villains can be complicated by differing drives and motivations and viewpoints even if none of them are good.

Give me a villain who is like...for example, conflicted between killing his son to eliminate a threat to his power, and keeping him alive so he can continue to exercise his abusive, fucked up control and twist his son into what he wants. He’s stuck between hating his son and desiring him as a possession and puppet, but neither of his conflicting motivations are The Good One.

Give me a villain who has to choose between the ideology of the violent, corrupt organization that groomed and trained him and the desire to betray everyone, strike out on his own with no support, and begin his own genocidal terrorist group. There can be a lot of complicated, shifting emotions over this, but it’s far from being a battle between an evil path and a good path.

Idk. “purely, disgustingly evil villain” is not the same as “one dimensional villain”

Writing great friendships

Some of the best chemistry/relationships in fiction exist between characters who are/become friends. Here are some tips for making friendships come alive on the page:

1. Banter

One of the most interesting aspects of fictional friendships is the way the characters interact with each other whilst important plot points are occurring.

If your characters have easy banter, teasing one another without missing a beat and managing to bounce off each other even in the toughest circumstances, it will be clear to the reader that these two are/should be good friends.

Friends know each other well. They know the other’s character so well that they can easily find something to tease each other over. However, this also means knowing which topics are off-limits.

If you want to write a good, healthy friendship, your characters shouldn’t use humour/sarcasm as a way to hurt the other. It should be good-natured and understood as such from both sides.

Different friendships will have different types of chemistry. Some friends may tease each other with facial expressions. Others may already anticipate a snarky remark and counter it before it’s been spoken. Others will have physical ways of goofing around. 

Some friends might not tease each other at all. Banter isn’t necessary; it’s just a good way to make your characters come alive and make their friendship one that is loved by readers.

What’s important is chemistry - the way they automatically react to each other.

Think Sam and Dean in Supernatural or Juliette and Kenji in the Shatter Me series.

2. Mutual support 

Unless you purposefully want to write an unhealthy/toxic friendship, your characters should both be supportive of the other. 

This means that, even if one is the MC and the other the side-kick, both should be cognisant of the other’s feelings and problems, and should be considerate in this regard.

Few things will make your MC as likable as remembering to check in and be there for their best friend even when they are in the thick of a crisis.

You need to show your characters being vulnerable in front of each other and being supportive in ways that are tailored to the needs of each friend.

So, if one of the characters really responds to physical comfort, the other should know to give hugs/rub their back when they’re not feeling well. Similarly, if one of them doesn’t like being touched and responds to material comfort, have the other bring them ice cream and join them for a movie marathon. Whatever works for your characters.

What gets me every time is when a character is falling apart and won’t listen to/be consoled by anyone but their best friend (but this is just personal preference).

3. Knowing the other’s past/family life

This really only applies to characters who have been friends for quite a while.

Good friends know each other’s backstory - the highs and lows and mundane details. They know they layout of their family home and they probably know their family members well.

Friends will often talk about these things, only having to mention a few words for the other to know what they’re talking about i.e. “The ‘09 Thanksgiving disaster” or “You know how Uncle Fred is”

This will instantly make it clear that your characters are close and have come a long way together. 

Perhaps there are issues at home/trauma from the past that the other character will immediately understand. So, if one character appears with a black eye, their friend might know that the father was probably drunk the night before and got violent. Or if the character has a nightmare, the friend might know that it was about childhood abuse etc.

This can also apply to good things i.e. if one of the characters gets a nice note in their lunchbox, the other might know that their grandma is in town.

Whatever works for your story should be used to indicate the level of unspoken understanding the friends have.

4. Being protective

Few things will make your readers love a friendship more than the friends being fiercely protective of each other (in a healthy, non-territorial way).

Has someone hurt one of the characters? The other should be furious and want to exact revenge. Does someone say something demeaning to one of the friends? The other should defend them immediately and vehemently.

This can also take on a humorous twist if one of the characters starts dating someone. The friend can make extra sure that said date is sincere and promise to exact vengeance if their friend is hurt.

This can also be a great plot device, since it could explain why the MC’s best friend joins the quest/goes along on the journey. Perhaps this is the main plot point: a character seeking to protect/avenge their friend.

If you want to go in a toxic direction, this can be taken too far i.e. a friend who never lets the other spend time with anyone else/stalks the other/is patronising etc.

5.  Common interest(s)

Even if the two characters are vastly different, there should be something that keeps them together besides loyalty.

This is especially important for characters who become friends throughout the course of the novel.

This doesn’t have to mean that both of them go hiking every weekend or want to become pilots one day. It could be something small, like a love of cheesy movies or a shared taste in music. Maybe they both enjoy silence/don’t like other people. Maybe they are both social justice warriors, but for different causes. 

This could also be common characteristics instead of interests. Perhaps both are very ambitious/funny/social.

There should just be some factor that ignited the friendship and brings the two of them together.

This doesn’t necessarily have to be a big part of your story, but you should at least have it mentioned to make the friendship appear more authentic.

Reblog if you found these tips useful. Comment if you would like a Part 2. Follow me for similar content.

Writing Masterpost

Character Help

MBTI Personality Test

MBTI Personality Descriptions

123 Character Flaws

Character Trait Cheat Sheet

List of Personality Traits

Character Virtues And Vices

Underused Personalities

7 Rules For Picking Names

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Write Real People Generator

Types of Voice

55 Words to Describe Someone’s Voice

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Character Motivation

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More On Writing Characters Of Colour

Describing A Character’s Skin Colour

All Characters Talk The Same

Character Description

100 Character Development Questions

Character Development Questionnaire

30 Day Character Development Meme

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Character Development Through Hobbies

List Of Character Secrets - Part 1 - Part 2

Mysterious Characters

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Creating Believable Characters

Writing A Character Who Has Lost Someone Important

Writing A Drunk Character

Writing Manipulative Characters

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Writing Hitmen

Writing Indifferent Distance Characters

Writing Bitchy Characters

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Writing Child Characters

Writing Villains

Villain Archetypes

Writing Stalkers

Avoiding LGBTQ Stereotypes

Writing Homosexuals as a Heterosexual

Writing Males as a Female

Writing Convincing Male Characters

Writing Characters Of The Opposite Sex

Revealing A Characters Gender

The Roles Of Characters

Creating Fictional Characters From Scratch

Creating A Strong, Weak Character

Writing Characters Using Conflict And Backstory

Writing A Character Based On Yourself

Switching Up A ‘Too-Perfect’ Character

Help I Have A Mary-Sue!

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Begin A Novel

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Getting Out Of The Comfort Zone

A Guide To Writing Sci-Fi

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The Right Point Of View

Essential Story Ingredients

Writing Fantasy Masterpost

Five Rules For Thrillers

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Seven Steps To A Perfect Story

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Beginning and End, But No Middle!

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List Of Phobias - Part 1 (A - L) - Part 2 (M -  Z)

Psychology In Writing

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Ballet Terms

Torture Guide (Trigger Warning)

Sibling Abuse (Trigger Warning)

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Psychiatric Hospital

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Guide to writing smut

Post-Apocalyptic Cliches To Avoid

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Coffitivity

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Tip Of Your Tounge

Write Or Die

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WHAT THEY CALL GOD.

Cain sighs heavily, the cigarette held loosely between his fingers as he rests his forehead against my bare chest. “God, Dima,” he murmurs, his voice thick with self-loathing. “I fucking hate myself.” 

“Good,” I mumble, fumbling with the bottle of vodka. The bed is soft under me as I lift it up to my lips and take a long draught. My other arm goes around his shoulders and presses him to me. “You should. You’re a fucking asshole, Cain. You’re unlovable. No one loves you, and no one ever will. You’re lucky that I let you love me.” 

“I care for no man on earth, and no man on earth cares for me,” Cain quotes, almost dreamily, as he presses a kiss to my chest.

“Christ, I fucking hate you.”

taglist: @just-george-here​ @whorizcn​ @semblanche​ @emdrabbles​ @aepreall​ @sol-writes​ @agnodice-writes​ @farrradays​ @nallthatjazz​ @birdquils​ @latrantem​ @sunlight-and-starskies​ @vandorens​ @asherscribbles​ @romanticsrn​

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Hi! So I have never written anything but I have this idea for a book and don’t know how to start. What tips do you have for beginners?

Where to Go from Initial Book Idea

First, congratulations! It’s pretty exciting when you come up with your first book idea. :) <3Here are some things you can do to get started…

1. Write an in-depth summary of your idea to the extent that it’s fleshed out in your mind. Sometimes, while you’re writing this summary, you’ll be able to flesh out other things as you go. I will often put things in parenthesis if I’m not sure, like: And then the princess steals the guard’s sword and escapes into the corridor. (Maybe it’s not a sword but a dagger?) Which helps me keep track of things I’ll need to figure out in more detail later on.

2. Once you have your in-depth summary, you can start thinking about your protagonist, antagonist (or antagonistic force), and any other main characters. It can be helpful to get this sorted out at the beginning, because quite often your characters (and who they are) will inform the finer details of the story.

3. If you’re not familiar with story structure, now is a good time to take a look at it. Well developed stories follow a similar structure, though that structure can vary from story to story, and how people distill that structure into a template can vary as well. But understanding what that general structure is and seeing how different people lay it out can help you flesh out your own story. I talk about that more in this post. 

4. Next, it’s a good idea to outline your story. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy, but it’s handy to have a step-by-step guide to your story. You may also want to do a timeline, and if you have enough fleshed out, a scene list would be great, too.

5. By this point, you may also want to set up a physical story binder and/or a folder on your desktop where you can organize all of your story-related files.

6. Before you start writing your first draft, you might want to spend a little time doing research and looking for inspiration. This is a great time to put together inspiration boards (digital or physical), cast your characters, and start gathering notes about other important story elements (like setting, for example.) You might also want to do a map of your story world and/or setting, layouts of important buildings/structures, etc.

7. Now it’s time to write! Whether you call it your “zero draft,” “rough draft,” or your “first draft,” this draft is really just about getting the bare bones of your story on paper. You are not writing the final version of your story in one go, so this isn’t the time to worry about quality and perfection. This is where you dip your toes into your story’s world, get to know your characters, and hey–if you feel the urge to poke around in unexpected places or foray off the path to explore organic ideas, do it! In the very first draft of your story, you can do whatever you want!

8. Once you get your first draft completed, if you feel like you have a really strong first draft and there aren’t any structural edits you know you need to make, you can assemble a team of beta readers to get feedback. Or, if you did any of that poking around or foraying I mentioned, and if you know there are structural changes you want to make, do that in your second draft, and then you can send that to betas for feedback. At this point, you just keep editing, tightening up, revising, and polishing until you have your finished draft.

9. Sometime during this editing and revision phase, you’ll want to think about which publishing path you want to pursue: traditional or indie? Traditional publishing is where you find an agent (which doesn’t cost anything upfront, they get paid if and when they sell your manuscript) and they find a publisher for your story. Querying agents can take months or even years and there’s a lot of competition, but there are success stories every single day. Indie publishing, aka “self-publishing,” is a great path for those who want more control over their novel and publishing process. Hopefully by the time you get to the point of deciding between both routes, I’ll have a “traditional vs indie publishing” guide up for you. :)

Best of luck with your story! <3 

Weeds and ruins: I am still a flower

@flashfictionfridayofficial

“I always knew you were the weed of the family!” 

“Don’t you understand how you ruined everything for us?”

Usually my parents told me their criticism at least in pretty euphemisms. Maybe I had crossed a border by dropping out of university for the third time but I just couldn’t find the right programme.

“Please, believe me this time I really,” I swallowed my tears away, “I really tried my best.” 

“I don’t think your best is very good then,” my mother told me. My sister laughed a bit but I didn’t think it was funny. I actually didn’t believe she was really joking.

“So what is your plan now?” my sister asked. I didn’t know. “Are you going to an art school?” She had been telling me my whole life that I just should go to art school. But for art school you have to be good at art. I wasn’t good; I just really enjoyed it. My sister didn’t really know the difference between those because whenever she is enjoyed something she was also really good at it.

“Well, I haven’t really had time to draw or paint the last months so my chances to get accepted are… like, zero.”

“In my opinion it is not-” my father began but I already knew what was coming. We’d had this argument many times before. He thought art wasn’t a serious career. 

“I’m going for a walk,” I announced. Our home felt too cramped for my father’s anger, my mother’s disappointment, my sister’s hubris and my… everything.

“No. We have to talk about-” I slammed the door. I wasn’t ready to hear about all my mistakes again.

When I was outside I didn’t know where to go until I heard cheerful voices from the playground. It used to be one of my favourite places. The slide looked more dilapidated then I remembered though. The lawn wasn’t well maintained either. It was full of dandelions. Adults always thought they are a weed. 

“Whoo!”. Two boys went down the slide. The smaller one looked a bit scared but an elder lady, I think their grandma, catched them. Grandpa applauded. “Watch out, madame!” I dodged the ball that was coming my way. It landed in the bushes behind me. I picked it up and threw it back to the girls who were playing soccer. “Thank you so much, madame!” 

I sat down on the swing. It squeaked. I watched the children and their grandparents play. It made me sad to see this place turned into such a ruin but they didn’t seem to be bothered by the state of the playground at all.

“Do you want a dandelion?” one of the children handed me an overblown flower. I thanked her, my voice still sounding as if I was about to cry. 

“You have to blow it.” I did. “Make a wish,” she whispered. I wish....

The flower fluff flew away. I wish…

I wish everyone would realize that dandelions are not a weed. No, I wish everyone would know that even if a flower is blooming in a place where it doesn’t belong, it’s still a flower.

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