katie

@sarah-h

Character arcs should be theme based. Let me give an example. In one of my current works, the theme is loyalty/treachery. In this story, I have two characters who unexpectedly betray the same household. Both of them start off seeming very loyal, but along the way, there are certain hints that their ultimate loyalties are to themselves.…[Read more]

@warrioroftherealm

Emotional scenes begin far before the actual scene in most instances. We know this to be true in our own lives. Let’s take a look at this.

Scene 1: Random girl smacks guy in face.
That’s a little bit hurtful.

Scene 2: Girlfriend smacks guy in face.
Much more hurtful.

Scene 3: Girlfriend who guy has been trying all week to…[Read more]

This is funny. Anyone like me?

Well well well. That was fun. Obviously wrong.

How-how-Cout-Cristo-week?????????

For comparison, it took me several months to finish The Count of Monte Cristo. I read silently only just barely faster than I read aloud (though I do read aloud pretty fast.)

Sorry to debunk your theory @Daeus, but I read the Count of Monte Cristo in a week, total, and I could spend five hours right now going over it with you point by point, twist by twist, arc by arc, concept by concept. 😀
I’ve always been this way— well, ever since I learned how to read, which was pretty late due to some vision complications. I…[Read more]

Ah, a poet poet poet. As to this forum, it is like the pine covered mountain tops in which the eagles nest. Scouts gaze from on it. They say, “There, the beryl lakes, smiling like enchanting eyes. There the scattered villages: Thatched castled kinsman love. There the secret wilderness, waiting waiting waiting us to come.”

Needless to say, that is…[Read more]

Welcome to the forum, Cahndida Serkhaman Stardust Galadriel! 😉 I love singing too, and archery, though I don’t do that as much as I would like. 🙂

Important forum abbreviations to know are as follows:
WIP: work in progress
POV: point of view
MC: main character

Also, if you want a particular person to answer you or see your post, you can tag…[Read more]

Yes, definitely @Daeus. 🙂

Another thing I find helpful is to visualize your character in your mind. I mean an actual picture. The face is the most important part. Sometimes you will have only a vague idea of what your character is like, but when you look at their face, you see so much more than you knew was there.

No problem @sarah-h! 😀 The list I gave you is just to help ‘humanize’ your characters in your mind— if you can think about them as living, breathing, complex… er… problems, that’s half the battle. 😉

Does a character have to have a major flaw to be relatable and realistic? No. In fact if you think about it, there’s not a majority or…[Read more]

@Sararh-h

That’s a great conundrum to ponder (I just wanted to say conundrum). Of course, the harsh fact about history is that we must come to conclusions. Do we commend or condemn the Yankees for the Confederates, the Loyalists or the Roundheads, the Crusaders or the Turks (and in what ways and to what degrees)? Do we call the New Deal socialism…[Read more]

That’s a very good question, @sarah-h! And unfortunately, I don’t think I have a concrete answer to lay out in so many rules and statistics.
You can tell you’re missing something— that’s very good, that’s an enormous start. Now to figure out what that something is. 😉 😛

I think one of the things that makes this conversation so difficult to…[Read more]

EXACTLY. Both of you. 😀 Both very astute observations.

Normally I wouldn’t use that word… (astute)… but I think I can on a forum of writers who will actually know what it means. 😉

@kate-flournoy

Oh yeah, I get you. Writing is like a solution in an equation. The variables are what your are thinking in your brain. Change your mindset and you have changed your writing whether you like it or not.

Soggy pancakes.

I think… I just lost my appetite.

And indeed, @Daeus, that is the logical progression of the argument I’m making— with him, (you and I apparently both know who him is 😉 😛 ) because I couldn’t see him as anything other than noble, I couldn’t sense him feeling anything other than noble. I mean, it was there a little bit, but…[Read more]

“There are only a few things that make me angry. One of them is being called boring. And you know? It really irks me when people say they never liked me (and still don’t) but they really look forward to meeting me. Like I’ll somehow be different? And how come they dislike me anyways? It just really gets me angry.

“But you know, the one thing that…[Read more]

@kate-flournoy

Wait … *blows nose*

Ok, much better.

Actually, I have to say, you’re wrong. He’s not perfectly inhuman. He isn’t what he could be, but you very much overstate things. The fact is, faultiness is not the thing that most makes a character come alive. The thing that most makes a character come alive is feeling. The character must…[Read more]

The first one made me shudder. The last one was pure inspiration.

@Daeus