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How To Fucking Write: a guide by fairyhaos

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SLOW BURNS

hi gays and gals! "how to fucking write" is back, with yet more advice and tips for everyone ^^ please feel free to send me an ask if there's something you want me to talk about or if you want to be added to the taglist! and as always, please reblog if you find this helpful :)

# - HOW TO SLOW BURN.

.. bullet point one : word count .

putting this here because i have one thing to say about this.

word count doesn't matter.

you don't have to have over 50k words or some shit in order to write a really, really good slow burn. similarly, you can't just the quality of a slow burn—or a story in general—by its word count.

yes, maybe stories with higher word counts tend to be better slow burns, but that's not because of the word count. it's because of what they do with the words.

so if you've finished writing your story and you're happy with it and it doesn't feel rushed, doesn't feel too slow, and it doesn't mess up the relationship development, that's it. don't try to add words just because it's not "long enough".

word count doesn't matter.

(that being said though, there have to be enough words for it to actually be a slow burn, but. that's a given.)

.. bullet point two : plan .

now i know that there are people who don't like planning, or their writing style means that they feel more comfortable with just winging it and throwing words at the paper.

however, for a really good, well-paced slow burn, it's really really important for you to create a plan.

it doesn't have to include everything! it doesn't need to be an exhaustive breakdown of all the scenes you're going to put into the story, but you need to know vaguely what's going to happen, and how you want your characters to act.

because slow burn is a leadup to a relationship, right? it's about relationship building. their relationship is a castle, and you need to know what your castle is gonna look like before you start haphazardly slapping bricks on top of each other.

plan the milestones you want their relationship to reach. think about what scenes you want to use that will signpost the gradual change in their relationship (more on signposts down below).

think about how you want the slow burn to reach its climax, and also when.

what will that climax be? will it be the realisation of feelings? will it be the confession? maybe a rejection of confession?

all of that can be figured out when you plan. having the climax in mind and having the ending in mind are things i will always advocate for when it comes to writing.

especially with slow burns. because it's all about that heart-wrenching climax, isn't it? when someone blurts out their emotions, and there are tears and shaky whispers and it makes you want to scream because feels.

planning helps with coherency, too. helps everything flow more naturally and make the slow burn overall feel more well thought-out and more impactful.

plus, i dunno about you guys but planning out how shit's gonna go down and cackling over how you're going to make your readers cry with every single almost confession scene and every single mutual pining part is just the most incredible thing in the world.

.. bullet point three : signposts

i mentioned this above, but having signpost scenes that you and your readers can use to identify milestones in the characters' relationship is very, very important.

for example, a very simple set of milestones would be:

the scene wherein X falls for Y

a scene wherein X almost spills their feelings to Y

the situation wherein Y suddenly realises their own feelings for X

a scene where they feel like they're about to lose each other

something that makes someone confess

it's horribly simple, and very vague, but these are the basic milestones that most slow burns will use to influence their characters' relationships.

but nevertheless, do you see how each of these scenes are important?

how all of them help the relationship progress? build up the slow burn, until it finally reaches its peak?

of course, the story would probably include more than just these scenes. if it's a good story, then of course it will.

but these are the most important, and recognising what your important scenes are, and making sure that you know how many you're putting in and in what way they influence the plot is very key to writing slow burns.

.. bullet point four : motive

this is perhaps not a very necessary bullet point, but if you wanna go all-in with your slow burn and make it knock-out spectacular, then i suggest that you think on this bullet point for a while.

why aren't your characters together right now?

---is the question you should be asking yourself to make it a really stellar slow burn.

why can't your characters confess? why can't they realise their feelings? what is stopping them from simply going from being friends to realising they're in love and then confessing?

your characters need a motive.

often, that motive is really simple. there's a whole bunch that are commonly used but, if you do it well, then it'll be as hard-hitting as if it's something no one could have ever predicted.

are they not together because they...

...used to be enemies? have been friends for too long? don't know whether they're really in love or if it's just a fluke?

maybe they don't believe in love. maybe they're loving someone who they think will never love them back. maybe they don't even realise they're in love.

the beauty of it all is that you get to choose. you get to pick your own dilemmas for your characters, and write about their messy path to realisation, through their slow burn, while untangling all their emotions throughout their journey.

slow burn is about feelings, after all. make those feelings complex. truly think in your character's thoughts, just for a moment, and think about how it would feel to be in that situation. think about how they'd react. what they'd do.

and also what's holding them back.

motives make everything even more deliciously painful. you can truly sympathise with the characters' relationship progression then, and can really get readers invested as they try to see how the characters overcome their struggles.

besides. don't we all love when X shouldn't love Y but they're going to love them anyway?

... and that's it ! if anyone has anything else they want advice on (how to structure, how to write dialogue, how to plan etc) then just shoot me an ask, because i'd love to help however i can :)

tagging (comment/send ask to be added!): @mesanthropi @stqrrgirle @weird-bookworm @eternalgyu @blue-jisungs @yumilovesloona @the-nightfox-nest @lvlystars @anemoiant

How To Fucking Write: a guide by fairyhaos

this post details:

ENEMIES TO LOVERS

hi gays and gals! "how to fucking write" is back after a longgg hiatus ^^ this time we're discussing enemies to lovers which is, i think, a universally loved trope! please do send an ask if you have any requests for what i should write advice for next, and do reblog this post if it was helpful for you :)

# - HOW TO WRITE ENEMIES TO LOVERS.

.. bullet point one : choose your e2l

the most important thing when starting is figuring out what type of enemies to lovers you’re writing about. this is mostly semantics: lots of writers/ advice givers will tell you that there’s only one real enemies to lovers (when they’re literally enemies) but personally, i believe that “enemies” can be used as an umbrella term for loads of different relationships.

figure out what kind of “enemies” your characters are. this is by no means an extensive list, but enemies to lovers can include:

literal fighting enemies

(academic) rivals

2 people who snipe at each other a lot

betrayed(????) by one another

…and many other types.

figuring out in which way they’re enemies helps write out their dynamic, and also setting. 

for example, you’ll often see type #1 used in historical, fantasy, battle or mafia settings, where there will be two “sides”, either due to family feuds, country/ kingdom feuds, etc., so their dynamic often feels more serious and more emotionally charged due to history and/or ancestral beliefs that they’ve grown up with.

it’s often seen as the “truest” form of enemies to lovers, because the characters interact with the intention to genuinely hurt each other. this will therefore affect the way you write them, since it has to seem like there is genuine, mutual animosity between them.

example : [court of lies on ao3] — taegyu, enemies to lovers

(holy fuck this is such a bad example but) as you can see, enemies to lovers works well within historical settings, since themes of betrayal, bloodshed and battles lends itself nicely to the trope.

knowledge of how to write fight scenes can be quite useful (fightwrite.net helped a lot with writing mine), along with making sure that dialogue uses action tags that showcase the characters’ emotions. 

type #2, on the other hand, most likely takes place in universities, high schools, and sometimes in offices, where academics are important and it’s less about trying to hurt one another, and more about being royally pissed off by the other person’s presence.

there are certain nuances to how the characters interact depending on what kind of enemies to lovers situation they’re in, which is why it’s important to figure that out first.

.. bullet point two : figure out the why .

next, try to find out the why. why are they enemies? 

it is imperative that you explain their situation to the readers and make them understand why the characters are enemies, and most importantly, why they can’t get together right now. enemies to lovers often goes hand-in-hand with slow burns for exactly this reason.

are they enemies due to clashing beliefs? a certain incident that happened between them, or to someone they know? maybe it’s just repressed feelings?

for every type of enemies to lovers, and for their subsequent settings, there’s often a set list of reasons that most writers use to explain why they’re enemies. 

historical settings often have some sort of feud taking place, or a betrayal. academic rivals focus on, well, academics, but social factors of popularity are often used. and “enemies” who snipe at each other often have very superficial reasons that they dislike one another, such as a bad first meeting or a misguided impression of personality.

the reason doesn’t particularly have to be something as dark and deep as convoluted morals or someone killed someone else’s father. they still need to overcome their enemy relationship and become lovers, after all.

but having a reason helps your readers feel more comfortable that the story will go somewhere and that there truly is an obstacle that’s preventing your characters from getting together at the very beginning. and if that reason is an interesting one, then… well, all the better, i suppose.

.. bullet point three : the friends part

for a good enemies to lovers that has your readers truly invested in the story, the lovers potential has to be there too, even when they’re enemies.

the characters also have to have respect for each other, above all else. if the situation becomes dire, they need to be able to understand one another’s views and work together, or at least recognise that they share some ideas and have moments where they get along.

this will a) make the transition from enemies into lovers more natural and b) create the tension that makes e2l so popular.

the best ways to show these moments are by having scenes where the characters have no choice but to work together, and in that time, begrudgingly admit that the other person isn’t as bad as they first thought.

it could be a group project, them fighting for the same cause for once (against a corrupt/ unfair policy), having to get along briefly due to mutual friends, or any situation where they have to act amicably for once and, most importantly, learn a little about one another in the process.

okay, but yena, how can i write those scenes? what can i do to create that tension?

describe certain actions, mannerisms, and the way that they speak to each other that showcase acceptance and positive emotions. this can come in the form of:

lingering eye contact

them agreeing on something

smiles!!!! 

a pleasantly surprised inner monologue 

dialogue being more lighthearted

A doing something for B without being asked

(this is extra hard mode but) creating an inside joke

…and whilst it is a little shallow, an acknowledgement of the other person’s attractiveness always works really well, too.

example : [my other e2l taegyu fic on ao3]

as a rivals to lovers fic, their dynamic already started off more playful than in the other example i showed, but you can see that their conversation is more teasing, as they become more comfortable with talking to each other normally.

the term “enemies to lovers” always felt a little weird to me, because it’s important to remember that it’s often more like “enemies to friends to lovers”, because the characters need to develop a liking of one another first before they can think of themselves in a romantic relationship.

.. bullet point four : the oh moment

why do they become lovers in the end? 

what is the tipping point? what makes a character realise that they’ve fallen for someone they once believed to be their mortal enemy? do their feelings hit them all at once, or is it a slow build up? and what are they going to do about it?

enemies to lovers lends itself very nicely to the feelings-hit-me-like-a-truck trope and the iconic oh moment. writing the inner monologue is a good way to showcase the exact momene the penny drops. for example, i have a loose “formula” that i like to use when writing oh moments (whether they’re in e2l fics or not):

[dialogue/ action of B as A watches them]

[inner monologue of A showcasing fondness for that action]

[inner monologue of A recognising how their feelings changed over time]

[action from B that solidifies overwhelming fondness and has A surprised by their feelings]

[the oh / oh no moment as the penny drops and A realises what this means]

this is by no means the only way to write out a “feelings realisation” scene, but it works very well, because the inner monologue can use varying sentence structures and a bunch of metaphors and figurative language to build anticipation.

example [venus and sun on ao3] — seoksoo, friends to lovers

this extract essentially follows the outline i described, and seokmin’s acknowledgement of joshua as sweet refers to how he had previously known little about him, merely referring to him as “nice” before their relationship gradually built up to that moment.

for a really effective oh moment, the characters need to have a chance to reflect on how their relationship has developed. they need to be able to notice their growth and draw their own conclusion from there.

.. bullet point five : be careful . 

finally, some precautions.

with enemies to lovers, the whole attraction is the tension between the characters, the original animosity that is actually hiding their repressed feelings. but they still have to fall in love at the end, despite what they put each other through.

do not make them do something that they can’t take back.

this is quite important with enemies that physically fight each other. giving near-fatal injuries, or paralysing or physically disabling them (again, fightwrite.net is useful in giving info in this) is definitely not good lover-material. 

unless the injuries were given when the character was (maybe magically) influenced by someone else, or your characters are traumatised enough to be able to accept each other despite everything, then it’s a good idea to stay away from severe injuries that they inflict on the other and focus more on tense dialogue and opposing beliefs.

however, it’s still equally as important to be careful with emotional hurt that characters cause one another too. don’t make a betrayal too unforgivable. 

as a writer, you have to be empathetic: think from your character’s point of view. constantly ask yourself if character A will be able to forgive character B if they do something. ask if they can still fall in love with character B if they hurt them in some way.

if they can’t, then you know you’ve gone too far, and you need to dial it back.

and as a somewhat obvious but still just as important sidenote: e2l based on stockholm syndrome (captor x captive situations) or bullying to lovers is never okay. the power imbalance along with the trauma that can be developed from that means that it is not a healthy, viable, good relationship in the slightest.

never have your characters do something that you’d feel uncomfortable being the receiving end of. they’re meant to be lovers, remember? even when they’re not there yet, the characters should still treat each other with respect.

…unless, of course, you’re looking to write a somewhat toxic/ unhealthy relationship. in which case, by all means.

... and that's it ! if anyone has anything else to askt hen just shoot me ask, because i'd love to help however i can :)

taglist (send ask to be added!): @mesanthropi @stqrrgirle @weird-bookworm @blue-jisungs @eternalgyu @yumilovesloona @lvlystars @luvjoshuahong @kikohao @maesvtr0 @cxffecoupx @bleepbloopbeee