Scribbled Fiction

*inhales* *long sigh* *opens eyes* I need you to understand something. Not all farms are Old Macdonald. I've lived on farms for a good part of my fairly short life. The first one was a much more active farm, with a lot more animals (which I lived on from probably around age 7 to age 9, but I remember it clearly), and the other is the one I still live on and have for all five of my teenage years. I've had a variety of experiences from these two farms and other ones I've visited, and I feel like I should tell people what it's like so that they can represent us the way we deserve. So, just like my post on writing realistic moving, I'm going to make a pretty little numbered list with some things to remember if your character lives on a farm. 1. Farms are not all the same. Farm people in books and movies are all the same: They get up at four in the morning, put on their denim overalls and brown boots, and go milk the cow. Then it's weed the fields, ga...

Photo by  Антон Воробьев on Unsplash Look look! Another series! It'll probably be pretty short since I can only think of fantasy, sci-fi, and realistic fiction to involve in a series about underused creatures, but if you have another genre I could do, please comment and tell me because I would LOVE to expand this series! It is one of my favorite things in the world to think outside the box and do things that other people haven't done yet. And using creatures that no one else has used yet has been a big deal for me ever since I started writing. Heck, people didn't use the internet a ton just yet, so I would go fishing through the dictionary and encyclopedia to find a creature no one had used yet so I could use it. Or other times I would just make up something weird and give it a name.  Here's a list of the fantasy creatures/animals you've probably heard of, written about, and/or read about. Elves (one of the most common tropes, but how I love them) Fai...

Creating characters is hard enough. But there are so many more problems you can hit, even after you've finished putting your cast of characters together. Since this is such a depressing subject for everyone involved, let's at least make it funny, shall we? Nobody will ever know what all these obscure facts are that I write. . . let alone care. *sheds a silent tear* I just made that character exactly like the other one.  Just give the one brown eyes and the other one blue eyes. BECAUSE EVERYONE LOOKS AT THE EYES DON'T THEY. DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHAT COLOR YOUR BEST FRIENDS EYES ARE NO YOU DON'T SO STOP TALKING ABOUT THE EYE COLOR. Excuse me. Is this character too mean? If you think he is, he probably is. He's probably taking yarn from kittens and lollipops from infants when you're not looking, cold-hearted monster that he is. Where are these characters' parents?  I feel like this speaks for itself. Wow, this character is not likable at all. Quick,...

NaNoWriMo is for survivors, y'all. I know it's more about the challenge than about winning, but I'm competitive. I want to win . Of course, this year will be a little different from the previous two years for me, because now I have a job to dodge while trying to accomplish my 1.6k every day... (gif of widening freaking out eyes here) ...but it'll be fine. It'll all be great. I'll just not do anything else besides work, sleep, eat, and NANOOOOOOO for 30 days, and all will be accomplished. But in the name of all that's writing, I want to give my NaNoWriMo buddies a guide to surviving this trial. And to make it easier on all of us, I'm going to give you my tips in the order one would use them. I mean, if you used all of them. Which I don't expect you to, but hey, it'd be cool. Let the idea stew in your mind. Think waaaaay ahead about what you want to do in November. Come up with the idea, then just let it sit for a while. It'll boun...

BEWARE! THIS POST CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR THE MOVIES MONSTERS UNIVERSITY AND RISE OF THE GUARDIANS. I'M SORRY IF I RUIN ANYTHING FOR YOU. This idea just occurred to me the other day because when I started trying to use real plot, I couldn't find a simple explanation of the plot points all in one place. I had to go back and forth between two or three blog posts at once, trying to figure it out. So now, for all my people who are trying to puzzle through the concept of plot points, here you go. This is for you. Overview If you don't get all of this the first time through, that's okay. I'll try to write it so that it's easy to understand the first time through, but if it doesn't make sense, just go through it again. There's no shame in re-reading it for clarity. Also, you know how I love to include gifs in my posts, but this will probably be hard enough to comprehend, so I don't think anyone wants the added distraction of gifs. So any added humor...