IRON AND GOLD - a wip intro

Berlin, 1923. Renowned journalist and socialite Philipp von Oldenmarck is found dead under mysterious circumstances. Police rule it to be an accident, but Alexander, his older brother, is unconvinced.

He decides to employ the services of August Bayer, a war veteran turned private detective known equally for his immeasurable skill and his stern demeanor. However, the case is not as simple as it seems. And as the secrets behind Philipp’s death unravel, August and Alexander start to question everything, even themselves.

(characters under the cut)

I’m not saying people should do this but I do believe more people should write AUs of their stories if they’re already wanting to write more for the same characters. They’re fun, stress-free, offer accidental development of characters, and you don’t have to worry about finishing them at all and you also get to see your, like, contemporary story characters as pirates or something.

Look, if I introduced a WIP on here excitedly and then promptly never mentioned it again, it doesn’t mean I’m not working on it, it means I’m slowly rotating it in my mind like a rotisserie chicken and then went out to the grocery store to buy several other rotisserie chickens while I wait for it to cook and then slowly started rotating those rotisserie chickens and repeat

need to write but I don’t have a brain

I’m amassing a legion of brainless writers

Just remember: If all writing fiction ever does is keep you from losing your goddamn mind during this pandemic, it has served you well and needs no other justification for consuming hours upon hours of your time. It does not need to be good. It does not need to be finished. It does not need to get published or praised. It only needs to soothe you, to hold you, to occupy your mind, to amuse you, to tether you to this world, to keep you from going mad, to keep you company, to keep you alive.

“I’m finally going to write! I have a great idea!”

LAUGHS LOUDLY

OK but like… first sentences don’t have to be there forever. I cannot begin to count the number of times I’ve started a story like:

And just write the ideas down until the story starts to shape itself. Then when you’re ready, go back and delete everything before the point where the story actually starts. 

Writing yourself into an idea is a time-honoured technique, and it works. 

good advice

I’ve legitimately just started at the moment that I really wanted to write, no matter how simple or how “in the middle of things” it was. Usually the beginning would write itself later.

I can vouch that ‘just start describing what’s going to happen and when it starts becoming actual writing, go back and delete the silliness’ works for things like essays too.

Starting however it works for you… works. :)

…Just make sure you keep going.

The most important writing lesson I ever learned was not in a screenwriting class, but a fiction class.

This was senior year of college.  Most of us had already been accepted into grad school of some sort. We felt powerful, we felt talented, and most of all, we felt artistic.

It was the advanced fiction workshop, and we did an entire round of workshops with everyone’s best stories, their most advanced work, their most polished pieces. It was very technical and, most of all, very artistic.

IE: They were boring pieces of pretentious crap.

Now the teacher was either a genius OR was tired of our shit, and decided to give us a challenge.  Flash fiction, he said. Write something as quickly as possible.  Make it stupid.  Make it not mean a thing, just be a quick little blast of words. 

And, of course, we all got stupid.  Little one and two pages of prose without the barriers that it must be good. Little flashes of characters, little bits of scenarios.

And they were electric.  All of them. So interesting, so vivid, not held back by the need to write important things or artistic things. 

One sticks in my mind even today.  The guys original piece was a thinky, thoughtful piece relating the breaking up of threesomes to volcanoes and uncontrolled eruptions that was just annoying to read. But his flash fiction was this three page bit about a homeless man who stole a truck full of coca cola and had to bribe people to drink the soda so he could return the cans to recycling so he could afford one night with the prostitute he loved.

It was funny, it was heartfelt, and it was so, so, so well written.

And just that one little bit of advice, the write something short and stupid, changed a ton of people’s writing styles for the better.

It was amazing. So go.  Go write something small.  Go write something that’s not artistic.  Go write something stupid. Go have fun.

Stupidity is, on occasion, a true thing of beauty

Write something stupid

sometimes i write really pretty sentences.

other times i feel like i need to apologise to the english language

I think the english language should also apologize to me, tbh

writing is just

how to make yourself write if you don’t know where to start

1. don’t expect too much of yourself

2. write down whatever you know about your idea

3. don’t format it to make it look pretty

4. use paragraphs whenever you get a new idea

5. don’t read back on what you’ve written before

6. if it helps, set your font color to white or light gray

7. don’t skip around. when you have a new idea, it goes on the end of the document

8. write sample dialogue if you have any

9. link to resources you find while googling

10. don’t delete anything. if you want to disregard something, use strikethrough

— Douglas Adams (via writingdotcoffee)

more male characters being kissed on the forehead!!! this has been a psa!!!!

The problem with people being able to read the books you’ve written, is that when they talk to you in person they expect you to say writery things.

I don’t know how to explain that my mouth and my fingertips have vastly different vocabularies.

Oh, man. Hard truth here. 😂 😂 😂

Hey, academics. The start of the academic year is rolling around, so I would like to remind you all to look after yourselves. Prioritise your well-being this year and remember that you’re valued. 

P.S. You don’t have to write every day to be a writer. Lots of us take breaks. We squeeze in a month or two of daily writing and then take a few months off. Some of us only write in the summer. Or on weekends. It’s all okay. Do you.