Gothic--vampyre - Regina R. Vespertine - Tumblr Blog

I wanna ask for feedback on my fics so far, but like, I know it's basically just the prologues for a few and the Mangst 2024 potential spoilers. Like, I'll be totally honest, the stuff I'm writing for that is either not going to happen exactly as is (way more embelishing type thing) or at all. It's more just to learn my characters.

Anyway, I've said it before and probably won't be the last time I do, but I'm always insecure about my writing. It's probably why I fiddle with it to death instead of making progress in sharing it. And why it's one of the first things I drop when I burn out, even when I love it.

If you've liked my stuff and interacted with it, thank you for that. It's helped me still keep writing, even if it's been really slow progress as my doctor and I sort out my migraines in the midst of summer at work with holiday and busy days.

Additional note: the Sapphic Romeo and Juliet-inspired angels/demons story will probably be on my other blog I've put up ( @bilightningwriter-writing ). It'll probably be more angst than whump based on how planning has been going. I'll make an official post whenever I get it going.

Just looked at a blog where the header description said 'sometimes I reblog posts I like so I don't forget them'.

And I feel like that, right there, explains so much about how the site has changed in the last few months.

People now think reblogging is an unusual behaviour, rather than a default.

Tumblr newbies, please, for the love of baby Jesus, reblog the posts you like. That is the whole reason the site exists - for you to collect all your shiny fandom objects in a single space. Which you can organize to your heart's content. Or not organize at all, if that's your jam.

Our blogs are intended to be collections of posts, not collections of likes.

Brain Curd #90

Brain Curds are lightly edited flash fiction - practically first drafts - posted daily and sometimes written with the express intention of being terrible… but, you know, in an endearing way. Please enjoy.

Wait up, detective! You'll want to read part one first.

The precinct was dark and empty. Quiet. All the rank and file cops were either off duty or out on patrol, no doubt harassing teenagers who dared to loiter. Detective McGuire cared about one thing and one thing only: putting murderers behind bars where they couldn’t make new victims.

He scoured all police reports from the area surrounding Andrew Jackson High School. Somehow, it had gone under his radar, but this place was a hotbed of activity. Five missing persons cases in the last three months - three of which lined up with his three John and Jane Does - and a particularly gruesome case of a girl given a lobotomy. It was enough to send chills down his spine. He took a swig of whiskey to calm his nerves.

Was this headless chick part of the pattern? McGuire wasn’t sure. It would seem to indicate advanced knowledge of human anatomy to be able to remove part of a person’s brain and leave them breathing afterwards, but it was unlike the other cases. There was no careful stitching and the victim was left alive. Still, it was the best lead he could find.

He lowered the brim of his hat and laid back in his chair. Sleep wouldn’t come easy to him - it never did. But no matter what, in six hours, he was going to start getting answers.

10 Ways to Add Sizzle to Your Boring Writing

Writing that sizzles captures the reader's attention and keeps them engaged from start to finish. Whether you're an experienced writer or just starting out, there are several techniques you can use to make your writing more exciting and dynamic. Here are ten detailed ways to add sizzle to your boring writing:

1. Use Vivid Descriptions

Vivid descriptions bring your writing to life by creating a rich, immersive experience for the reader. Instead of relying on generic or bland language, use specific details that appeal to the senses. Describe how things look, sound, smell, taste, and feel to paint a vivid picture.

In Detail:

Visual Descriptions: Use color, shape, and size to create a mental image. Instead of saying "The car was old," say "The rusty, olive-green car wheezed as it pulled into the driveway."

Sound Descriptions: Incorporate onomatopoeia and detailed sound descriptions. Instead of "The music was loud," say "The bass thumped, and the high notes pierced through the night air."

Smell and Taste Descriptions: Use sensory language. Instead of "The food was good," say "The aroma of roasted garlic and herbs filled the room, and the first bite was a burst of savory flavors."

2. Show, Don't Tell

"Show, don't tell" is a fundamental writing principle that means revealing information through actions, thoughts, dialogue, and sensory details rather than straightforward exposition. This approach makes your writing more engaging and allows readers to experience the story.

In Detail:

Actions Over Exposition: Instead of telling the reader "Jane was scared," show her fear through her actions: "Jane's hands trembled as she fumbled with the lock, her breath coming in shallow gasps."

Dialogue: Use conversations to reveal character traits and emotions. Instead of "John was angry," show his anger through his words and tone: "John's voice was a low growl as he said, 'I can't believe you did this.'"

Internal Thoughts: Reveal characters' inner worlds. Instead of "Emma felt relieved," show her relief: "Emma let out a long breath she didn't realize she was holding and sank into the chair, a smile tugging at her lips."

3. Create Relatable Characters

Relatable characters are crucial for keeping readers invested in your story. Characters should have depth, including strengths, weaknesses, desires, and fears. When readers see aspects of themselves in your characters, they're more likely to care about their journeys.

In Detail:

Character Flaws: Give your characters realistic flaws. A perfect character can be boring and unrelatable. Show how these flaws impact their decisions and relationships.

Character Arcs: Ensure your characters grow and change throughout the story. A well-crafted character arc can turn a good story into a great one.

Background and Motivations: Provide backstories and motivations. Why does your character act the way they do? What drives them? This adds depth and makes them more three-dimensional.

4. Add Dialogue

Dialogue can break up large blocks of text and make your writing more dynamic. It reveals character, advances the plot, and provides opportunities for conflict and resolution. Ensure your dialogue sounds natural and serves a purpose.

In Detail:

Natural Speech: Write dialogue that sounds like real conversation, complete with interruptions, pauses, and colloquial language. Avoid overly formal or stilted speech.

Purposeful Dialogue: Every line of dialogue should have a purpose, whether it's revealing character, advancing the plot, or building tension. Avoid filler conversations that don't add to the story.

Subtext: Use subtext to add depth. Characters might say one thing but mean another, revealing their true feelings through what they don't say directly.

5. Use Strong Verbs

Strong verbs make your writing more vivid and energetic. They convey action and emotion effectively, making your sentences more powerful and engaging.

In Detail:

Action Verbs: Choose verbs that show precise actions. Instead of "She went to the store," say "She dashed to the store."

Avoid Weak Verbs: Replace weak verbs and verb phrases with stronger alternatives. Instead of "He was walking," say "He strode."

Emotionally Charged Verbs: Use verbs that convey specific emotions. Instead of "She was sad," say "She wept."

6. Vary Sentence Structure

Varying sentence structure keeps your writing interesting and prevents it from becoming monotonous. Mix short, punchy sentences with longer, more complex ones to create a rhythm that engages readers.

In Detail:

Short Sentences for Impact: Use short sentences to create tension, urgency, or emphasize a point. "He stopped. Listened. Nothing."

Complex Sentences for Detail: Use longer sentences to provide detailed descriptions or explain complex ideas. "As the sun set behind the mountains, the sky transformed into a canvas of oranges, pinks, and purples, casting a warm glow over the serene landscape."

Combine Different Structures: Mix simple, compound, and complex sentences to maintain a natural flow. Avoid repetitive patterns that can make your writing feel flat.

7. Introduce Conflict

Conflict is the driving force of any story. It creates tension and keeps readers invested in the outcome. Without conflict, your story can become stagnant and uninteresting.

In Detail:

Internal Conflict: Characters should struggle with internal dilemmas, fears, and desires. This adds depth and relatability.

External Conflict: Introduce obstacles and challenges that characters must overcome. This can be other characters, societal pressures, or natural forces.

Resolution: Show how conflicts are resolved, leading to character growth and plot progression. Ensure resolutions feel earned and satisfying.

8. Use Metaphors and Similes

Metaphors and similes add creativity and depth to your writing. They help readers understand complex ideas and emotions by comparing them to familiar experiences.

In Detail:

Metaphors: Directly state that one thing is another to highlight similarities. "Time is a thief."

Similes: Use "like" or "as" to make comparisons. "Her smile was like sunshine on a rainy day."

Avoid Clichés: Create original comparisons rather than relying on overused phrases. Instead of "busy as a bee," find a fresh analogy.

9. Create Suspense

Suspense keeps readers on the edge of their seats, eager to find out what happens next. Use foreshadowing, cliffhangers, and unanswered questions to build tension and anticipation.

In Detail:

Foreshadowing: Drop subtle hints about future events. This creates anticipation and a sense of inevitability.

Cliffhangers: End chapters or sections with unresolved tension or unanswered questions to compel readers to keep going.

Pacing: Control the pace of your story to build suspense. Slow down for crucial moments and speed up during action scenes.

10. Edit Ruthlessly

Great writing often emerges during the editing process. Be willing to cut unnecessary words, tighten your prose, and refine your sentences. Editing improves clarity, pace, and overall readability.

In Detail:

Cut Redundancies: Remove unnecessary words and repetitive phrases. "In my opinion, I think" can be reduced to "I think."

Focus on Clarity: Ensure each sentence conveys its intended meaning clearly and concisely.

Proofread: Check for grammar, punctuation, and spelling errors. A polished manuscript reflects professionalism and attention to detail.

Any good dailouge or propts for people who openly admit that they've never had people care about them, so why care about themselves?

"No one has ever cared about me."

"Why should I care about myself when no one else does?"

"I've always felt invisible to everyone."

"What's the point of caring when no one notices?"

"I've never had anyone show they care about me."

"It feels like I’m completely alone in this world.“

"I don’t see any reason to keep trying."

"Every day feels pointless because no one cares."

"Sometimes, I wonder if anyone would notice if I disappeared."

"No one ever asks how I’m doing."

"Caring about myself feels useless when no one else does."

"It’s hard to care about myself when I feel so alone."

"I've never been a priority to anyone."

"I don't think anyone would care if I stopped trying."

Tension in Dark Fiction

Tension vs. Suspense

Tension makes the reader care, while suspense makes the reader want to move on.

Tension relates mostly to relationships between characters and the situation in which the MC is in. Suspense is mostly about what would happen next.

Goal

The stakes rise and readers will root for your MC if you give them a specific goal. Give them something to lose - whether it's their life, their professional life, or their loved one.

State the goal clearly and more than once in the beginning (phrased differently) to get your reader invested.

Raising the Stakes

Once you have a clear goal, place large and overwhelming obstacles in between the goal and the MC.

With each move your MC makes, give them consequences that'll prevent them from going back on their decision.

Conflicts Among Characters

If you struggle to put your characters in conflict, play around with their goals.

If character A achieves their goal, Character B won't be able to achieve theirs.

Character A's goal is to harm/kill Character B - or at least, it's a necessary step towards their final goal

Character A and Character B disagree on how their objectives should be met.

Peaks and Troughs

If you keep the tension consistently high, your readers will eventually tire of the intense emotions being described.

On a scale of 1 -10, you'll only have 2-3 scenes with 10 points.

For fast-paced commercial fiction, you'd want to keep the tension at 3-4 points, drive it up to hit 9-10, then fall back to around 5 before introducing the next stage of conflict.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* . ───

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💎Before you ask, check out my masterpost part 1 and part 2 

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Me omw to give more angst to my ocs

Argument-Ending Sentences That Evoke Strong Emotions:

"So this is who you really are?"

"I can't believe I ever trusted you."

"You were never there when it mattered."

"This is the last time you let me down."

"I guess we were never meant to be."

"Just go, I can't even look at you right now."

"I've given you so many chances, no more."

"Everything you said was just a lie, wasn't it?"

"You think you're right, but you're just alone."

"I'm done trying to make this work."

"You've shown me enough; it's over."

"Keep your excuses to yourself, I'm done listening."

"You chose this, remember that."

"I'm not wasting another minute on you."

"Forget my number, we're through."

How to Write REALISTIC and SMOOTH Dialogue

In a story, dialogue is quite important, it helps the readers paint a picture of what's happening and the characters themselves. However, it can be difficult to avoid the unnaturalness and choppiness that comes with a lack of experience. But luckily, I have put together A LOT of advice on how you can get over that rockiness and improve!

*** KEEPING YOUR DIALOGUE REALISTIC, AND PACING ***

>> Keep your characters in character:

Dialogue is a remarkably quick way for readers to determine your character's personality. Thus, you want their speech patterns to remain fairly consistent so the audience won't get confused. If your character is more serious, then they will use less slang and perhaps a more impressive vocabulary. If your character is more relaxed, they will use more slang and compress the words. (such as "dunno," "kay," "y'know," etc.)

Basically, you want their tone to match their traits so the way that they talk is more realistic and personlized to themselves. If the way all your characters speak is the same, there's something wrong. A strong tip is to put yourself in your character's shoes and imagine how they would respond!

>> Take the situation into consideration:

This is another part of keeping your characters in, well, character. Different emotional situations will have a different effect on separate people, so make sure that you have an idea of how your character will act during stressful, irritating, and sad times.

If your character is normally cold, they will struggle if it comes to comforting other people because they have less experience in that field.

>> Don't take too long with their words:

Unlike when narrating something, most people talk just to get the idea across. They will be more specific and quicker with what they say. (This excludes any character who likes to talk a lot.) Unless it's on purpose, they won't dance around the topic. Think of when you casually chat with your friends; you're pretty unlikely to use certain words and/or phrases that might be common to use while narrating.

If you want to explain something complicated, instead of writing out a paragraph of just one person talking, use a question-and-answer prompt! This is where another character continuously asks related questions that get answered by another person, so you can indirectly reveal your explanation.

*** HOW TO WRITE A SMOOTHER CONVERSATION AND DIALOGUE TAGS***

>> Having a variety of dialogue tags:

This is a pretty basic thing to look out for if you're new to writing conversations. Using words like "said," every other sentence can easily make it feel choppy and robotic. Instead, use words like "murmured," "smirked," etc. to paint some emotion into their words. Additionally, vary the location of the dialogue tags! They don't all have to go after the statement, you can include something in the beginning or even the middle, too!

Examples:

Beginning - She tilted her head, "What are you talking about?"

Middle - "Oh," he blinked, "I actually never thought about that."

End - "Wait up!" She exclaimed loudly, waving her hands around.

>> Using no dialogue tags to create a smooth conversation:

Having too many tags can also overwhelm your reader--remember, sentence variety is a crucial part of writing--so you can always drop them if they're unneeded. This applies when your characters (two is the suggested amount) are talking back and forth in a pattern straightforward enough for the reader to understand who's talking without it having to be labeled.

Dropping dialogue tags in these moments can create a smoother atmosphere during the conversation because the reader only has to focus on the talking present.

*** USING SLANG, STUTTERS, FILLER WORDS, AND PAUSES ***

Human speech is often not perfect; when talking, we often make mistakes such as filler words, grammatically incorrect phrases, etc. Hence, for more natural-sounding dialogue, it's important to incorporate some of these.

>> Pauses and stutters:

When reading dialogue, we read it at a steady pace unless it's written otherwise. However, that steady pace can soon get too robotic and too smooth. Luckily, there are several ways to change this! You can use dialogue tags, (ex: she quickly spoke) commas, and ellipsis (...). These are often integrated when the character is hesitant, nervous, answering something, or when they need to admit something. The same idea applies to stutters--they're mainly used to demonstrate anxiousness, which can be found in varying situations.

>> Filler words and slang:

Filler words can really just be used where you see fit. They may be used in the situations I previously mentioned (because it shows someone stumbling over their words) but it's ultimately up to you!

Slang, just like everything else, should not be used too often, or it will seem forced and exaggerated. The point is to sound natural, and increasing amounts of repetitiveness can ruin it. It's also important to remember that in real life, our conversations move slower; when someone speaks, another person usually doesn't respond quite literally, right after. However, in writing, dialogue can actually often seem that way, which is why using tags and these imperfections of speech is pivotal for building a realistic conversation!

*** CONCLUSION ***

Lastly, a key point when writing dialogue is to ALWAYS read the conversations! Whether it be in your head or out loud, it can often help you catch anything that seems off! Additionally, like I mentioned at the very beginning, write dialogue from your character's perspective! Imagine yourself as them and how they/you would talk. Try to keep your dialogue tags, sentences, and word use varied to create a natural conversation!

If you were struggling before, I hope that this (extra) long guide was able to really offer you some insight and useful tips! If you read this far, thank you!

Happy writing~

3hks <3

Hiya twumblr, doodled this li’l chirper 🦤

Gay enemies-to-lovers but they're petty as fuck so when one kills the other's prey, the other throws him out naked.

My top tips for writers:

Drink water

Sleep

Stretch your back

Go outside

Cry

Trust me. You'll feel better your writing. At least a little.

BRO I WAS JUST LOOKING FOR ART REFERENCES

Tumblr is so confusing y'all. How do you incredible writers go on yapping out amazing ass pov excerpts, like do you just randomly show up one day and be like "Hey look at what I wrote"??? And people just slurp your writing up???

Y'all are Tumblr writing god wtf???

*hypnotizes you* write your book write your book write your book

Usually it’s video games instead of music but this is pretty much accurate hehe

20 words to consider editing out of your novel

Very

Really

Just

Actually

Literally

Basically

Quite

Somewhat

Kind of

Sort of

In order to

In fact

That

Then

So

Well

Anyway

However

Nevertheless

Moreover

Removing or rephrasing these words can help tighten your writing and improve clarity.

Could you give us some synonyms for big. I know there's giant, huge and massive but I want to see something new

Words to Use Instead Of..."Big"

sizeable

colossal

mammoth

vast

tremendous

monumental

towering

gargantuan

megalithic

outsize

cosmic

massy

ginormous

brawny

stupendous

jumbo

lofty

mega

monstrous

elephantine

titantic

hulking

extensive

humongous

supersize

exorbitant

A helpful suggestion: https://onelook.com/thesaurus/?s=%3Abig (words related to big)

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💎If you like my blog, buy me a coffee☕ and find me on instagram!

The princess was cursed that her first husband will die a tragic death. The princess decided to have a wife instead.the person who put the curse on her did not check this would happen

STOP BEING SELF CONSCIOUS ABOUT YOUR CREATIONS STOP SECOND GUESSING WHAT YOU REALLY WANNA DO STOP DEBATING IT'S WORTH. LET YOUR ART SERVE YOU INSTEAD OF THE OTHER WAY AROUND