Describing Faces

Hair, eyes, defining feature. That’s it for most characters, unless you’re describing a romantic interest or the main character has some reason to describe their face in detail (say, in relation to their self-esteem).

What a defining facial feature is:

What a defining facial feature is not:

This is not to imply you shouldn’t mention race, but it shouldn’t be a defining physical feature when talking about someone’s face. That doesn’t mean you can’t describe someone’s facial features because they’re really common for a group of people, but a character isn’t an anonymous person standing in a crowd - a character should stand out and be defined, even if they play a minor role. Hone in your description skills to really capture somebody in quick sentences; that’ll help to get them to stick in the readers mind.

*(I have only seen this done once because it was plot relevant - an international adoptee being revealed that she was actually biracial. In all other uses I’ve seen, it was pointless and irritating to see. Unless it is plot relevant, leave the medical-sounding terms at the door.)

By LabradoriteKing on Pinterest

A handy guide for your Jewellers and Gem Cutters.

I accept payment in trillion-cut black diamonds.

Chop chop.

Useful!

this is not a tutorial this is just me rambling

love this!

also how culture works

How to create an atmosphere: Supermarket

Sight

Hearing

Touch

Smell

Taste

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Here is a free pdf of the players handbook

Here is a free pdf of xanathars guide to everything

Here is a free pdf to monsters manual

Here is a free pdf to tashas cauldron of everything

Here is a free pdf to dungeon master’s guide

Here is a free pdf to volo’s guide to monsters

Here is a free pdf of mordenkainen’s tomb of foes

For all your dnd purposes

Here’s a site that has literally every official (and most UA) dnd stuff

including the books and campaigns

and you can add homebrew

Hey rb this!!!

Guys don’t share this kinda thing people may use it to get access to the dnd source books for free instead of paying for them. This is extremely dangerous for the flawless company that wizards of the coast is.

I bought the book for my birthday, but I like to have the actual book in my hand. Still cost too much, but I’ll still be able to save money on the other bits.

I spy, with my little eye, a photo that was faked by an AI image generator! Can you spot the clues?

FB is turning into a parade of fake AI images churned out by click-farming pages. More misinformation is on the way. Learn some tricks for spotting AI photos!

The symbolism of flowers

Flowers have a long history of symbolism that you can incorporate into your writing to give subtext.

Symbolism varies between cultures and customs, and these particular examples come from Victorian Era Britain. You'll find examples of this symbolism in many well-known novels of the era!

Always loved flower language

Good Traits Gone Bad

Exploring good traits gone bad in a novel can add depth and complexity to your characters. Here are a few examples of good traits that can take a negative turn:

1. Empathy turning into manipulation: A character with a strong sense of empathy may use it to manipulate others' emotions and gain an advantage.

2. Confidence becoming arrogance: Excessive confidence can lead to arrogance, where a character belittles others and dismisses their opinions.

3. Ambition turning into obsession: A character's ambition can transform into an unhealthy obsession, causing them to prioritize success at any cost, including sacrificing relationships and moral values.

4. Loyalty becoming blind devotion: Initially loyal, a character may become blindly devoted to a cause or person, disregarding their own well-being and critical thinking.

5. Courage turning into recklessness: A character's courage can morph into reckless behavior, endangering themselves and others due to an overestimation of their abilities.

6. Determination becoming stubbornness: Excessive determination can lead to stubbornness, where a character refuses to consider alternative perspectives or change their course of action, even when it's detrimental.

7. Optimism becoming naivety: Unwavering optimism can transform into naivety, causing a character to overlook dangers or be easily deceived.

8. Protectiveness turning into possessiveness: A character's protective nature can evolve into possessiveness, where they become overly controlling and jealous in relationships.

9. Altruism becoming self-neglect: A character's selflessness may lead to neglecting their own needs and well-being, to the point of self-sacrifice and burnout.

10. Honesty becoming brutal bluntness: A character's commitment to honesty can turn into brutal bluntness, hurting others with harsh and tactless remarks.

These examples demonstrate how even admirable traits can have negative consequences when taken to extremes or used improperly. By exploring the complexities of these traits, you can create compelling and multi-dimensional characters in your novel.

Happy writing!

I want to write a book called “your character dies in the woods” that details all the pitfalls and dangers of being out on the road & in the wild for people without outdoors/wilderness experience bc I cannot keep reading narratives brush over life threatening conditions like nothing is happening.

I just read a book by one of my favorite authors whose plots are essentially airtight, but the MC was walking on a country road on a cold winter night and she was knocked down and fell into a drainage ditch covered in ice, broke through and got covered in icy mud and water.

Then she had a “miserable” 3 more miles to walk to the inn.

Babes she would not MAKE it to that inn.

Are there any other particularly egregious examples?

This book already exists, sort of! Or at least, it’s a biology textbook but I bought it for writing purposes:

It starts with a chapter about freezing to death, and it is without a doubt the scariest thing I’ve read in years (and I read a lot of horror fiction).

This book can be downloaded for free on Researchgate, posted there by the author himself:

The Biology of Human Survival: Life and Death in Extreme Environments

When you write a book like American Gods you make friends with your doctor and ask him lots of questions about surviving Wisconsin Winters, plunges into cold water and the like.

Greetings bugs and worms!

This comic is a little different than what I usually do but I worked real hard on it—Maybe I'll make more infographic stuff in the future this ended up being fun. Hope you learned something new :)

If you are still curious and want to learn more about OCD, you can visit the International OCD Foundation's website. I also recommend this amazing TED ED video "Starving The Monster", which was my first introduction to the disorder and this video by John Green about his own experience with OCD.

The IOCDF's website can also help you find support groups, therapy, and has lots of online guides and resources as well if you or a loved one is struggling with the disorder. It is very comprehensive!

Reblog to teach your followers about OCD

(But also not reblogging doesn't make you evil, silly goose)

Oh please, please spread information about this. It's so goddamn important.

I was diagnosed with OCD in December 2021, and it was a living hell. It's nothing like the pop culture representation of it. It was, without question, the worst experience of my life. OCD is a nightmare to have.

Those feelings you have when something horrible happens? Imagine having those feelings day in and day out, because in your mind, those horrible things are being constantly thought about as a very real threat. Your mind tells you to do the compulsion, or they'll come true.

The compulsions aren't something we like doing. The comic is so right about this. You could be rearranging your room a hundred times to get it exactly right because it makes you happy, and still not have OCD. The compulsions are born out of fear, that started rational and then devolved into things that don't make sense at all.

Because I was a psychology student and I'm someone who pays close attention to my mental state, I noticed the horrifying change in my behaviour and forced my family to take me to see a psychologist within a couple of months of symptom onset.

It's been more than two years of medication and therapy, and the OCD doesn't paralyse me anymore the way it used to. Most days, I barely remember it's there, sleeping in my brain and dormant. Treatment is possible, and I'm proof of it.

This is because I saw something was wrong and got help.

But even being a psychology student, until I got the diagnosis, I didn't even consider it might be OCD. I just knew something was off.

Why didn't I think of OCD? Because of the sheer volume of misinformation that's spread about this disorder.

I don't want other OCD sufferers to not seek help simply because of this popular misunderstanding about what the disorder is. So yeah. Please go through the comic, it explains it wonderfully.

🦀 Kudos Crab 🦀

If you are scrolling and see Kudos Crab, your fics will be blessed!

You will get good comments and kudos!

You will beat your writers block!

GO AND WRITE!

crab kudos rave

first image is of a tiny crab holding up a pin with the word KUDOS next to the AO3 logo. second image described in alt text

becoming an adult cheat sheet!

Writing Strong Opening Lines

This is the kind of information your first line should provide:

Types of Novel Openings

2. Dialogue

3. Raw Emotion

4. Look-back Hook

5. Attitude

6. Prologues - entice the reader to move to chapter 1

If you like my blog, buy me a coffee! ☕

As of today 14028 Aziraphale/Crowley fanfics have been posted on ao3 since the release of season two

Which means that on average 77.5 fanfics are being published per day

That’s 3.23 fanfics per hour

0.05 fanfics per minute

So in conclusion:

Every twenty minutes a new Aziraphale/Crowley fanfic is being written

Good! They haven't even started filming S3!

That is the most insane thing I've heard this week

And also the 20 minute thing is an underestimate, for sure. How many are being written and the author is waiting to post until they've finished. How many have been started and the author has just kept them for themselves. HOW MANY ARE WRITTEN ON TUMBLR. HOW MANY ARE JUST SHARED WITH THE AUTHOR'S FRIENDS.

I cannot wrap my head around this, in a great way

So I did a lot of math and the numbers are crazy. As of two weeks ago when I pulled the numbers:

In the time it took you to read this post thread, nearly a thousand words of good omens fanfiction were written somewhere in the world.

Data is under the cut if you're interested:) >more stuff like this<

power signalling

Kneeling.

Personal space.

Eye contact.

More generally, Attention.

Codified status behaviours.

Non-verbal threats.

Conversely, de-escalation and surrender.

Alternately, deliberately showing "vulnerability" to demonstrate how little of a threat you consider the other person.

Signs of fear.

Offer of or requests for help.

credit:@just-horrible-things // @whetstonefires suggests:

A character can vastly expand their area of influence by laying a hand on a table, for example. If you're standing on opposite sides of a large table, and one of you puts your hand down, that can symbolically take you up into the other party's personal space in a much subtler and more deniable way than actually getting up in their face.

This can be used equally well to convey affection or threat.

This is an excellent post! And absolutely critical if you want to hone your showing-instead-of-telling.

Also, @ my writing followers, if you aren't aware of the Emotional Thesaurus - I recommend it, it's a good tool to get inspiration for writing specific emotions when you want to amplify your writing. There's a series of other Thesauruses by them too, but I find I go back to this one most.