;-; this journal is relevant. I also want to know u.u

With game design I've heard a number of stories about how the best way to handle it is to have the gameplay and art direction down and then make the story around and within those established parts.

As for the actual act of writing the best way is to just sit down and make yourself do it. Nothing is cemented until you put it down on the page, everything planned out in the future is still entirely up in the air and can be adjusted to fit accordingly. Maybe think of it like zipping it up.

As an addendum to that first point, it's hardly the only way to make a game, I just vaguely recall good results coming from that method, and the natural evolution and tight binding of the story with the gameplay makes for a more endearing final product.

Honestly? My characters aren't complete either. I'm sure most get to a place thats "ok" because the likelihood of actually having everything 100% ready is pretty low. Just have to go with the flow and decide where to start

Id love an answer too XD
I love creating and developing. But I lack a solid direction on how to bring it all together :/

I feel you with incomplete characters and always changing stuff up as you go ; 3; for me, I felt it best when I write down basic ideas, then very generically write a plot/my plan for the entire summary of the plot. Then I fit those things that I wanted in, and the rest just kinda comes out. Its ok and good if you come up with new stuff but it always comes with practice. I still get stumped every now and then :/

Have you given your characters needs and purposes? And is there an opposing force in this world? There's no good story if it's all butterflies and happiness.

I torture my characters plenty, and many of them do have a purpose. I just don't know how to tie those things into an overall, important story.

I'm not entirely sure what you should do, I just started forming a world about half a year ago and I started it with an utter destruction that's slowly eating away at the world. That might be something to think about. You can also give you're characters separate stories if you hadn't thought of doing that. Maybe even meeting up at some point.

I wish I could give you an answer. Sadly I have no idea myself so... crap.

I want to preface that I'm not a professional writer! I do write a lot for my day job and for fun though. Your mileage may vary with my techniques.

I really enjoy world building and it sounds like you do too. Layers and layers of interesting things that make up an awesome setting for the characters to exist in. That is a great talent to have! Please don't under value it.

At the same time, I also very rarely finished any stories. I do a lot better at it now though. Here are some tricks I use on myself:

1. I figure out a very loose "what story do I want to tell." For a recent one it was simple: Lina house sits for her friend.
2. Next I look at setting out a few major things I want to see happen. Following the same example: Lina meets Fischer. Lina meets Makeno. Lina talks to plants.
3. Then I just start writing towards those goals without "looking back." I just ramble forwards until I've achieved all the major points and reach the goal. If I look back I'll tweak myself into losing interest.

I'll usually have a friend read behind where I am and tweak here and there. Once I'm done and they are done I'll start from the beginning and work through it. Having a frame of reference for the entire story, it helps me tie it all together.

Hope that helps!

As a writer, sometimes I can have full fledged characters and have no idea what to do with a plot, and other times have a great plot but no characters to fill it with. What I learned from my writing classes though is that, good writing worries about well developed characters first and plot second. The plot shouldn't drive the story, the characters will.

Sometimes I find it hard to make plots with characters I have really well thought out. Sometimes I find it best to discover a character through the trial and error of writing a story. Sometimes, things happen in the plot that teach you a lot about the character. And then you can start over with all of that in mind.

Honestly, it's hard. I have a lot of trouble writing these days. It takes a ton of trial and error. Sometimes you gotta go through a few "bad plots" to find the well formed golden one. Being a writer isn't easy. I'm currently in the place where I hate everything I write too, and I can only hope that I'll eventually get to a place where I like writing again o3o

I run into the same issue concerning my characters. I have the roles they're supposed to play but, not a story to bring them together. I've futzed with a couple of character story projects. Tried to make them large and explain everything but, it's never worked. Characters are always in development and, that helps to create the story in my opinion. The more your character learns, feels, grows, it can reflect itself in the story. Here's something I've been trying to do. Write little short stories. Nothing grand but, just a moment in your character's life. Simple routine of their work day or, what it is like to live in their world. I've heard that as many projects you'll have succeed with writing, ten times more will be tossed into the garbage bin. I've spoken to a few writers and one they have suggested is to save your failures. Go back at a later date and take another look at them once you've felt more experienced. Maybe you can see something in the failed piece of work that you can salvage, or just read it for a laugh.

I hope this helps a little. I've been grinding my nose to keep writing more consistently after falling off the wagon for a little while. I'd be more than happy to talk with you more if you'd like.

You know, writing smaller stories like that might actually help. I wont need to fret so much on details, and it wont be used for anything important, so if it fails, oh well. I can use it to get into their heads. I will try this, thanks!

My pleasure :3

Hmmm hmmm... This is really hard, but for me, I get inspirations extremely randomly. Usually it is after I have seen a good movie or while reading a good book, but really, I cannot tell anything solid. When it is about a setting, I usually pick one character whose life I wish to explore more closely, and start building the writing momentum by writing about their every day life. Eating breakfast, waking up that kind of stuff. Another trick is to do something that occupies my body (like sneaking into a playground to swing) and just be there in silence, maybe listen to some music, and usually my brains begin working on their own. Once I get properly started, I start puking out text like a machine.

As for changing things, I get that a lot. I have several table-top roleplaying game projects running (and my friend as well), and we tend to revamp stuff like the rule system or setting almost once or twice year. There it is all about willpower to say no really. But yea, I am a flow writer mostly, so I really can't help with productivity. It is just something that comes through inspiration and proper mood, and those are some tricky bitches to forcefully conjure.

Don't I know it! That's how my art is. It either flows, or it doesn't. The only way to get it flowing again is to ignore it completely for awhile and then do a test run every now and then. I can't really apply that method to writing though, since I've never had a successful writing session! I do like the day to day mini stories though, so I'm definitely going to give that a shot and see where it takes me.

Honestly, as someone who writes a lot more than I let on sometimes, I find that my ideas solidify more when I talk to others about my ideas. If other people know what you are working on, then those things start to feel more tangible.

It is not always easy to talk to people about it, but it does really help in the long run. They can make suggestions or comments that help you become more confident right up until you genuinely want to share your ideas with everyone. The most well-established things that I have are the things that I talked to others about, and once you have a good place to start, things start to fall in place. It almost does not matter where you even start, as long as you take it and run.

Hope that helps. I am always happy to talk about writing, by the way. I am another one of those chronic world-makers.

This. So much this.

Although I've never fully written a story, ideas come and go and it's really hard to just put word to page when you have no idea of the direction you're going to take.

I don't recall which author it was that said it, but it was one that had created a very highly regarded novel that made its way to being taught/read in schools as a case study/model example of a good story with a beginning, a middle, an end with rising action, falling action, climax, etc. When asked about it, he said he wasn't thinking at all about making a good story or symbolism or his "message" or anything like that. When talking about it, he just said that he went into it writing a story about a regular guy who was thrown into an unusual, challenging situation and how he thought the character would deal with it and react to what was going on. His advice to others was to just write a story they'd be interested in reading themselves, more or less.

For some reason, that's what has stuck with me, since I had an epiphany when reading it - that for the most part writers don't think about deeper meaning when they write. That's left up to everyone else.

I hope this helps in the way that it helped me. Otherwise, I suggest just writing some vignettes for each character until something sticks and then rolling with it.

This is what I've learned after falling into the spiral of character/world creation and not getting out of it.

The first part of plot is a journey. The second part is a reason to go on it. The third part is something that stops you from getting there, or tries to. Depending on who you are, you can start with any of those as something to start the story, but one of the easier ones - for most people - is the thing in the way, because it can also be the reason to start the journey.

So, ask yourself. What can happen to your character in this world that can change their life, for worse to start with, for better by the end of it? Throw that conflict at people, and you'll start getting your ideas faster.

Plotting....

First you need to be willing to be mean to them.

Think of a terrible situation, put them in it, and then get them out of it. It doesn't have to be personal or even life threatening, but must be something they care about. And more importantly, you care about.

The key I have found to writing a compelling story, and I'm told that I do, is to write not to a "target audience" but to write to yourself. I firmly believe that if what I write does not move me, it will move no one else.

Next, don't write the great America novel, don't even worry about length. You are not aiming for a word count you are aiming for finished. Flash fiction (under 500 words) is fine as long as you present a conflict and it's resolution.

Write it though, finish it before you revise anything. Revise only twice, walk away. Don't worry about perfect, make the next one more perfect, make it finished. The "Perfect Monster" can destroy your creativity.

All that character detail, don't worry about it. By all means never give a litany of character trails.

Go back to the books you love, read them critically. Look at how the author handles the character, presents situations, and so forth. Tease out the craft.

Most important, write. Scenes sketches, little ditties. You didn't get good at art by buying the tools and immediately creating masterpieces. Writing is the same way. One becomes a writer by writing.

Something useful is a beta reader. Someone you trust to critique you work. A good relationship there can make you a better writer.

There's a major brain storming element here and the "teeny tiny dumb ass details" are what counts. Inspiration can come from any where and go anywhere, and knowing what to skip and what to follow is the hard part. Rather than try to answer the question of what is imagination, I'll give you some questions you can ask your self to help fill in details of a species to the extent necessary for a game or story. From the Pathfinder online rule book
Race Builder wrote:Step 1: Concept

A race is more than just a group of individuals with similar qualities and traits. A race is a collection of people with a shared history and cultural identity. While the race builder presents many options for creating new races, and it may be tempting to treat each section as a buffet of options to help you ferret out the most optimal choices for your character, it is generally more beneficial for your campaign world to conceptualize your race first. Before choosing options, consider answering some questions about your race and its culture. Answering these questions can aid you in making reasonable choices about the qualities and traits of your race so that it can better fit in the game world—rather than just being a collection of seemingly random options. Such questions might include the following.

Where does your race tend to live and why?
What does your race look like? How does the members' appearance help them adapt to their typical environment?
What is your race's history? Does it have a creation myth? Were there pivotal events in the race's history?
What kinds of relationships does your race have with other races? Does it have allies? Competitors? Enemies? Hated foes?

I think this is rather fitting for any character development, and not just custom races for table top RPGs.

It's much harder than people give it credit for. People have a tendency to underestimate writing, far moreso than other artforms. You can watch an art stream and easily see that it takes tons of practice and coordination to make a picture come together, but with writing? Most people say "Bah! I'm literate. I could do that!" It's usually not long before new writers run into a wall after thinking this and starting a new project. That wall can be made of lots of different things, but it will feel like an insurmountable barrier when you hit it. I'll give you what advice I can, but every wall is unique, just the way every writing style is unique. There's no magic bullet solution for everyone.

Not making progress: I write in pen. It's not because I shit gold and everything is perfect immediately, but because if I allow myself to go back through and edit things as I'm writing, I'd never get anywhere. I've spent hours polishing and editing and revising, then realized that I was out of time and I hadn't written a single thing!

Too much focus on characterization: It's great that you know every little detail about everyone and everything that you want to use in your story. Write all that down, BUT, and this part is important, DON'T write all that actually in your story. You'll get bogged down in it and end up with no plot. It's extremely helpful to have a reference guide for your world and characters to refer to as you write. That will make continuity errors much less frequent and give you answers to little quandaries that come up as you write. If you try to put ALL that detail in the story though, you'll start to wander. People will get bored after pages and pages of descriptions, too. So have the reference manual for your world handy when writing, and include information from it when it becomes relevant to the plot. That way the plot remains the focus of your work, and people will actually want the exposition you're about to give them, because you've presented a reason for why they should be interested in it.

Too much pressure: I'm quite confident in my writing skills, and even I would hate to be in your position right now. You've invested a lot in this and placed some high stakes on your success as a writer. That is an awful environment to write in, especially for one who is new to the craft. Stress is a creativity killer, big time. I don't know how to address your situation specifically, but your best chance at capturing a little creative spark is to take the pressure off. Sure, the starving artist is a well-known trope, but most people do their best work when they're not desperately hedging all of their bets on the success of their work, the terror of failure hanging over their heads the whole time. The first and most important part of getting into a creative mindset is that you relax. How badly you need this written and how desperately you want this to succeed are the absolute last things you want to have on your mind.

Teamwork and affectations from others: It's very distressing to me to see that what works very well for me achieves no results for you. When I watch a movie or read a story, or discuss someone else's work with them, I will often think "Oh yeah! That's the kind of story I want to write. I want something that will make people feel like this." It's good that you recognize that creativity does not pop into existence from a vacuum. You have to interact with people, consume the creativity of others, take the best bits of those things and make them your own. The novel that I'm writing now came from me working my way through a whole bunch of werewolf fiction and saying "You know, there are no stories that have a female werewolf protagonist and I really want one of those." My only recourse was to create such a thing! Looking at it from that perspective may or may not help you, but it's all I can think of. Usually the problem that new writers have is that they're sitting in a dark room staring at a blank piece of paper expecting ideas to just fall from the sky. You have a good amount of stimulation to work with, perhaps you just need to pay closer attention. Try carrying around a pocket notebook and a pen with you. That way, whenever a good idea strikes you, you can write it down for later before it gets away from you. You'd be surprised how many times the best idea you've ever had is completely forgotten moments later. Make sure you capture those little fireflies, the ideas that pop into your head while you're just going about your business, not thinking about writing at all. Often that's when the most clever and creative ideas will strike.

You're most correct about trying to destress before writing. I don't draw very well under stress, so it should be the same for any other creative outlet. My biggest issue right now is feeling like I'm a disappointment to my husband, so I should probably just talk to him and let him know that I'm not being useless. >> He's never said anything bad, only the occasional reminder that he wants to make a game, so there's no reason for me to feel this guilty about it, other than it's just part of my personality. So, I think I'll talk to him and actively try to stop worrying as much. That, coupled with some smaller writing exercises, should be a pretty good start. I've already got a new idea since posting this journal (actually, an older idea that just happens to go well with this plot line).

I like that idea. Have it out with him and let him know why you're having trouble. Don't think for a second that just because it's an emotional pressure and not a career or financial one that it won't affect your writing. If you care for him, as I'm sure you do, then that "I don't want to disappoint my husband" thought will weigh on your mind like a lead brick, and crush your creativity in so doing. Maybe think of some other way to get rolling on that game of yours, and give you time to work on your writing in a more comfortable, low-pressure environment. And by all means, chase that idea of yours! They never seem to stay long, so if you've got an idea then grab it. Hold on tight and be ready for the ride of your life!

I don't write so much as record. The characters tell me their stories and I am just their scribe. I often say that I think the only difference between a writer and a sociopath is that the writer keeps a written record of what the voices say.


Maybe see if you can hear them. Sit down, with no purpose and write what the character is doing, even if it's just making coffee.

After all every time Beth makes coffee the smell of it seems to draw Samamntha from across town, nose like a bloodhound on her even though she's a calico cat. Well they get into the gossip and then the snacks, but that reminds Sam she has shopping to do, not for food or snacks mind you , but general at the mall type of shopping. Hey, isn't that where the cute muskrat fellow works at the bookstore? His suggestions are always solid. And maybe Jen will come along, after all her kids are at the school for another few hours.

Free flow, likely a dew minutes. Writing is like your art, you have to start small, work on your skills, practice, practice, practice. The first results will likely not be epic, but you'll develop a foundation on which to build

What do you like? Pirate adventure? Sci Fi? Romance? Why not a swashbuckling space highwayman who falls not for the planet princess but for the cargo handler on that luxury liner he tries to rob? Maybe she likes the adventure and danger her current career does not have.

Give it time, because it takes time.

Summaries are different from stories. I used to be exactly the same, but I worked on it and it was a slow, gradual process and there are still several things like detailed descriptions that I really want to improve on. But one thing I highly recommend that I assure you can help is participating in this: http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/6246257/

It's a weekly exercise called the "Thursday Prompt". Every week  duroc posts a journal with a subject, sometimes a word and sometimes a phrase and the participants are given a week to write something, anything, using the given subject as a focal point of sorts. It doesn't have to be a large story, it doesn't even have to be a full story. The point of it is to get your brain working and get writers writing.

By the way, this invitation is not limited to to Ajna, anyone who wishes to participate please do so! Many of the regular participants are very helpful! I don't think you could be in better hands...or paws, as it were.

Awesome, I'll try to participate in that! The deadline is good, as it'll give me as excuse to sit down and actually do it before time runs out. Right now, I need to get my story done when I get it done. I have no deadline. Maybe a deadline is what I need!

Try writing a small scene, nothing big just a little scene of one of your characters interacting with their surroundings, here's an example of what I mean http://www.furaffinity.net/view/5644054/
Used to write a lot but I'm so out of practise, little "cutscenes" like that one are helping me ease back into writing larger pieces.

Start in the basics. What world are your characters in? What are your characters like?
What conflicts would your characters have in common. It takes a LOT of work to get plot to feel right.
If you ever want someone to bounce ideas off of, I'd love to help if I can! ^.^

I plan out what happens, and just write.
Anywhere there's a plot hole or something wrong I either change it or add in some stuffs :P

and... *fingers keyboard* type...
...
Hashtag so helpful.

(1) Be as absorbent as a sponge. Read, watch, and play tons of things in order to get ideas and inspiration. It gives you plenty of time to encounter realistic dialogue, settings, story, and other such things.

(2) Practice as much as possible. If you're trying to do something far more long-form in an overarching world, you definitely want to start small. The best way to go about such is to just tell small little snippets of story as much as you can. You can create an entirely new character, toss something together in a few thousand words just to get a feel for a concept you want to practice or a quick tale you want to tell, then pop it aside once you're done. The key is to FINISH it, though.

(3) The more you finish, the better off you will be. Having ideas is one thing, but bringing them to fruition is another. It's a long, complicated process at times, and you have to learn the conditions in which you can produce your best work, as well as test your own capabilities. The more you finish, the more you can openly receive useful critiques, whether you are self-evaluating or getting the opinions of others. From there you can springboard towards further practice and gradual improvement.

(4) Since you're going for something huge and all, might I suggest a large notebook to keep details and notes? Also consider buying a small pad that you can bring with you everywhere you go, or at least use a note-taking app on your smart phone. Inspiration can hit anywhere, you know, and you never know when a random situation or thought will strike you and it winds up being absolutely perfect.

(5) Be prepared to edit, edit, EDIT. You ~will~ get rid of things you otherwise love. You will cut things for brevity's sake, you will tear things apart to make something far more accessible. That doesn't mean the ideas are lost forever, or that they cannot be used elsewhere, but you have to get used to feeling like some of your best ideas just aren't working out. It lessens the sting, and your writing becomes all the more malleable. If you're open to useful critiques and suggestions, you should wind up in a much better place.

Hope some of these help!

husband? I must a missed that journal post...

the short answer is: I don't... not any more. I have not been inspired to write anything worth reading since before I joined FA over 6 years ago.
sure I comment on stuff, and "talk politics" here and there... but that's not WRITING. that's commentating, which is different.

I wish I could help but...

I you wanna actually have a dialogue about this, I'm on skype whenever.

Now I know that I'm really just tossing into the huge fray of advice here. But if you wanna write. What you need to do is just first and foremost. Get it out.

It's not about the details at first. It's not about the little things. You just plant your ass down and you express yourself through it, by getting out the core. Just putting it out there, everything gets refined later on in the processing, am I right? They don't just mine bars of gold.

You just get it out. You don't focus on the errors. You just get it out, explore yourself, mainly. You just start to touch, to feel every emotion and you just put it in to words. Strangely, it's more about finding yourself within it all than anything, capturing yourself and placing it for someone else to see.

I dunno if any of what I'm saying even makes sense to someone else, but I'm just saying what I know.

Keep at it.

I remember reading a tip for this stuff.

One way is to ask yourself "If I was to put character X in this situation, how would he act and what would the circumstances be?"

For example. "What if I were to put a cowardly but loyal wolf named thomas and a very brave Feline name Rachella in a robbery taking place? How would Thomas react? How would Rachella react? If Rachella were to react, would Thomas follow behind her in order to help his friend?"



Another way to do it is to think of a place and your characters doing something in that wworld. Try to describe what's happening in your imagination as well as you can do, it doesn't have to be good. What would happen at the end of that scene? Say Rachella was caught and held captive by one of the robbers but Thomas was hidden. How would he gain ot courage to save his friend, how would he fight? Perhaps he jumps from his hiding spot and manages to pounce the robber

I work best with music. Figure out what kind of music gets you pumped, and make a playlist. I only managed to get motivated and finish my last big project after making a playlist of metal music on grooveshark.

Being able to write comes from reading a lot. It's really that simple.

so much advice here...

I need to bookmark this journal.

I wont be deleting it for awhile, so feel free! Maybe archive it one way or another though, because I do clean out my journals fairly regularly.

I'm not much of a writer, but .. you speak of "completing a character".. Why count a character as completed? As people, we don't stop growing and changing, why should a story character?

As for a purpose.. What kind of place did this character come from? What happens in this place? What did they do to keep busy? Can this be expanded upon or related to another activity?

Just throwing things out there~
and if it seems I don't understand what you're writing this journal for, then well, pay no mind to me :p

Holy cow, you got tons of feedback on this... Well, let's see if I can add anything helpful! I'm an aspiring writer myself actually. I've got a couple examples of my stuff posted in my gallery, but nothing too major yet. As far as character "completion"... I don't think it's possible to feel that any given character is truly complete. It's more about finding some mix of traits and backstory that you are satisfied with. I know that most of my characters change to some extent on a regular basis. Now, as far as developing a plot...
I'm probably not going to be particularly helpful here. The way I do plot is pretty backwards from what most folks do. I tend to build the characters and the world around them in minute detail, then sort of just let everything play out in my head, with characters interacting and reacting they way they logically should (or illogically in many cases). While this technique has served me well so far, it does have its limitations. For example, you end up with ridiculously large brainstorming files. There are three principal species in my headworld. The foremost of these has a description file that's 24 pages long. I literally just took a week and wrote down every pertinent detail that I could possibly think of about how they interact between members of their own species, other species, how they live, where they live, social constructs, government, etc. I do something similar on a smaller scale when I'm developing individual characters as well. Since I tend to have trouble coming up with physical, visual designs, I'll put most of my effort into their personality: Who they are is shown through how they speak, act, and react rather than how they look. That notion eventually became so pivotal that I inadvertently integrated it into the society in the world. But anyway, I'm rambling. The thing is, it isn't easy. However, the process comes naturally to me, it's just a thing that happens when I'm in "the mood". I've always been that way though. Words come more naturally to me than do images. I think, though, one of the most critical aspects of getting a start is having some sort of personal connection to the character that you're writing (If that makes any sense). I tend to feel as though each and every character I write are part of myself in some way, reflecting some aspect of my personality, no matter how obscure that facet may be.

Wow, sorry about that. I kinda just brain barfed all over your comments section. I have a way of doing that when I'm not quite sure how to help: Just regurgitate any information that seems like it'll be important. :P I'd love to help in any way I can! Would you be comfortable with sending me a snippet of a story or chunk of something that you're working on? Not sure how much it'll help, but you never know! You can always PM me or even Skype me if you want. I'd absolutely love to help you really get going with writing! It is a bit ironic though... what you're describing with writing is almost word for word my situation with drawing.

For me as a writer, what really helps is my best friend. We bounce ideas off of each other until we come up with something that really seems to click in our minds. I help her as well. She gives me a character and a general idea and together we brainstorm. This usually goes on for hours at a time of us just blurting out random ideas, like "what if it went like this," or "maybe instead of that, this happens," and we go back and forth until we get something that feels concrete, then we either role play parts of the story, or just work up rough drafts back and forth. Building characters for us seems to be relatively easy at times then quiet difficult at other times. Eventually we come to a solid character and a story idea, but for us, it's always the journey in between, that our characters take, that always seem to bee the hardest.
We've known each other since middle school and we're practically fused into the others brain so we're almost two halves of the same person, her being able to have stronger thoughts in one part, while I can usually come up with the other.

Every writer works differently, but I'd suggest this book http://www.amazon.com/Mooring-Again...../dp/0131787853
I bought it for my creative writing class and still have it. It gives different ways to write, pov, characteristics and so on. I know that's pricy, but you're bound to find it for cheaper.

Well honestly, for me at least, I don't have very much of a problem with keeping characters aligned with a story. Though if you'd like I have some advice you could use. Such as brainstorming and creating the world before creating any characters, or you can have a character in mind and make the world focusing around him/her/it. Don't pay so much attention to making your character absolutely perfect, it's unrealistic and unappealing (If it's a divinity then that's a different situation). It's good to show that someone isn't invincible, that they have terrible weaknesses that they manage to overcome. It's a little clichéd, but it's something that happens in reality as well, even if it's on a small scale. Kind of like how homework was terribly hard when you were younger, but that amazing feeling you have when you accomplish it.

I don't write/type stories very much, in fact, my first fanfiction and what not was utterly terrible. Though I managed to stabilize myself. It's not much, but I hope this helps a little bit at least :P

most of my writing comes from my life experiences or dreams or things that have happened to friends or family. for me something a simple as going to the store and finding a crow's feather can turn into a poem or short story for me Though most of my work tends to be dark because I'm a Sifi horror writer. I give allot of credit for me wrighting to my 6th grade English teacher who introduced me to my favorite author Edgar Allen Poe when he read Tale Tale heart to the class and made the football boys scared but me no I was hooked! Sometimes you just need to sit back and let life direct you and when inspiration strikes pick up a pen . I have a bunch of rough outlines in my note pad I keep in my pocket.

The only advice I can give regarding writing would be to just relax and let the ideas flow. Take a character, write about his/her day to day life, mundane stuff. It gets the juices flowing. From there, add in an event, good or bad, but something that changes their daily regime dramatically. By now, you have an idea of what your character will be doing in this kind of situation. Ideas should be flowing by then as well, i.e. Interaction with other characters, Friends and Foes, Environmental reactions, or if you're really ambitious, political reactions.

There are no limits to what you can create except those limits you impose upon yourself as a writer. The same applies to your art. it's a creative world, yanno?

Another source of information, I've found, is  lei-lani <-- She is one of the coolest (and sexiest) greymuzzles I've ever met and she's been a writer longer than most of us have been alive. She's also had her own books published and is always open to new people talking to her.

It's pretty hard to give advice on writing, but all lay out how I started my first novel last year, and how I see things right now.

The biggest problem I had was that I didn't know where to start. I had a whole bunch of important characters and scenes, but nothing was in order at all. It was all just a bunch of flashes in my head; a certain character dying, the main character finding a key item that somehow affects the plot, the cities and the social structures within them. It was like I had scene 4, 17, 28, and a whole bunch of others without labels, but I had no idea what to do with them. So I started making notes out of desperation to makes sense of it all.

I ended up with maybe fifteen thousand words in a chaotic word document that looked like a schizophrenic person had just gone wild on it. There were individual words that I liked, then a really basic scene outlines, then maybe a few names, then lines that the characters would say at some point in the story, and any other odd idea that I thought I might use. I wrote it all down in a big slurry of chaos. But to me... it made some kind of perfect sense.

After that I had a sort of break down. I came to the realization that no amount of planning or note taking was going to get a story written. The only way to do that was to actually write the damn story, which I had no idea how to do.

I started anyway, and it was probably the most miserable few months of my life. I got the idea to begin the story with how the main character's parents met. I spent probably three months just trying to work my way through that first segment of the story, but I did it, and I ended up with seven thousand words of something that I was actually kind of proud of. After that I jumped into the main character's story where things started to go very strange for him. I just kept writing, constantly forcing myself to make some sort of progress each day, even when I had no idea were the story was going in the short term.

I made a point to write in what I saw as a finished, novel kind of format. No cutting corners or outlining. Everything I wrote was as close to finished as I could make it. That's what made sense to me. If I wanted to learn how to write a novel, then I was going to write in a way that a novel would look like. That’s how I was going to make myself learn to do things properly.

After a while (I think around the 30K mark) I realized that a lot of things weren't working. The way the main character came into the middle of the story didn't work with what I had imagined in my head. I also realized that the first segment I had written, all seven thousand words of it, just weren't needed. So I cut them... 7K out the window.

At that point I had a little three day existential meltdown, but I had wonderful flash of an idea that ended it, and the story started to wrap into a form that was closer to what my original feelings for it were. I was off again, writing everyday, and I just kept making progress.

I could keep going on about how things went after that, but I don't think it would help you with your problem that much. It was what happened to me around the 30k word count that I find really interesting, and probably the most helpful.

It was at that point that I started to see things very differently. When I read a book after that, I didn't see things in the same way I used to. I started to see all the story telling choices the writer was making. It was like a curtain had been lifted, and now I could see the inner working of a great machine that was incomprehensibly beautiful and complicated. It's this view that you need to get to, this is were I started to understand things much better.

You just have to start. It doesn't really matter where, you just have to find one little point that you can say, “Hey, That might work!” and then you go from there. The path away from that starting point might be kind of miserable and hard to keep going at first, but it's something that you just have to work through. You have to write to learn how to write. It's how you find your voice, and how you learn the mechanics of how you write. Everyone learns in their own way, but you have to do it to learn, right?

I wish there was a simple little list of steps or pieces of advice I could give you to make things easy, but I don't think any exist. You can read books about how to write plots and whatnot, but for me they didn't really help much. I mostly found myself just nodding along to them, saying “Yeah, I know that.” but they didn't really do anything to make me understand the process of writing on the scale I wanted to write at.

What did help was making myself start the story somewhere, and just diving into how complex everything was. There isn't anyway to make sense of it until you’ve bashed your way through thousands of words and figured out how your mind wants to write, after that it gets clearer.

I will say that after you get into a groove, and you start to figure out how your mind works, it becomes pretty magical. When you take a step back and read what you’ve written, and the voice and atmosphere starts playing into your head in the exact way you want it to, it's pure magic. That's when you know your on to something.

But I can't say it enough, you have to start. Even if you end up starting in the wrong place, just start. You'll learn so much just by writing through the hard parts and making mistakes.

I could go on and on about all this, but I'll stop here before I write a wall of text that makes your head explode. Hope my mad rambling helped in some way, and best of luck. I know how hard it is to start, but it really is the best thing you can do.

I always try to visualize the story in my head as though it's playing out as an "ideal cinematic."

Think about a movie you love, or a story you love, and the feelings you had while you watched that climactic scene, or read that amazing plot twist. Then try to write something or describe something that imitates those feelings. Epic music helps!

Another good rule of thumb is to "write something you know will be interesting to read." Don't just write something to please yourself! You know what readers are looking for when they see your characters/approach your genre; feed that desire! Are you writing romance? Make it fluffy! Action/adventure? Make it exciting! There's no reason for things to fall flat or be "boring" in your story. If they feel flat or boring, re-imagine it with a new twist!

I don't know if that was helpful at all, but I hope you could take something from it! c: <3

I could talk for ages about writing, since I majored in English and minored in Creative Writing my first time through college. If you ever wanna talk craft with me, I'm all ears and ready to help in whatever way I can!

Right off the bat, I'm in no way a professional writer and probably shouldn't even be allowed to give others advice i just do it for the fun of it.

I find that most ideas and plots come from just daydreaming. Keep from forcing yourself to think, relax, and let you mind wonder, but keep your already existing material in mind. Myself, I keep a notebook and pen with me most of the time so I don't forget something that I thought up. Sometimes it also helps to just visualize the characters in whatever scenarios you already have in mind, like a movie. Take that specific scene and build around it. Then, you just, in a weird way, let them make the story.

What are they doing, how did they cross paths, where do they come from, and what makes them all special, what ties them together, and what do they all want to achieve? And in my experience, the main plot comes from those questions being answered. Even if that scenario is at the end of the story, that's fine. Some of the best stories started at the ending (it kind of makes it exciting to know what's going to happen and THEN finding out how everything unfolded).

And absorbing other people's work is good, especially when you want to give people a reason to want to read your story. Knowing what people want is just as important as knowing what you want. Although, don't get too caught up in an already existing plot because it can end up being a clone. Yes, there are many stories with the same basic idea, but they mostly all have something unique about them (and some are painfully obvious that they don't).

The best advice I can give is that everything is gonna start out messy as hell. But that mess is what will eventually make a disorganized plot, then a organized mess, and so on.

In the situation of games, it's easiest to write the ending first, then the beginning, then all the filler. That way you have your entry, and don't have to worry about not hving a guide.

Okay, here's the thing. You're stressing way too much. You're overthinking things. Just relax a little, don't put so much pressure on yourself. As a writer, it's not your job to write a story, it's to let the story write itself. You just have to watch what happens and tell us what you see. It's as simple as that.

Am I just talking bullshit, you ask? A fair question. Lots of people seem to think that, and maybe they're even right. I have written two novels (even got one of them published) and I am almost 400 000 words into a serial novel right here on FA, so I do know a little bit about writing. Here's my advice, whether you decide it to be bullshit is completely up to you.

1. Read "On Writing" by Stephen King. It helped me immensely when I was just starting out, and most of the advice I'll give here comes directly from that book.

2. Omit unnecessary words. They clutter up your story and slow the pace. And be wary of adverbs, especially when it comes to dialogue attribution. Trust me on this, adverbs only make sentences weaker.

3. Don't stress about things like plot. In fact, forget all about plot. Don't think ahead at all. Just make up the story as you go along. A story, after all, is NOT a created thing. It's a FOUND thing, like a fossil in the ground. Your job is to dig it up with as many bones intact as possible. If you look at writing this way, with the story as a pre-existing thing, then it takes a huge amount of pressure off. Just relax and dig up that fossil, be surprised at the bones that pop up, don't think ahead at all, just take it sentence by sentence, let the story tell itself. Maybe I'm just a lucky kind of freak, being able to write this way without any conscious participation on my part, but why not try it? You might be pleasantly surprised by the results.

4. You should set a writing goal for yourself. Start low, to avoid discouragement, then slowly work your way up. You can go by wordcount (I like to do at least 1100 words per day, but you might want to start at 500 or so). You could also go by time, setting an hour aside each day to do an unspecified number of words, stopping only when the hour is up.

Hope this helps. :)

As a college student working towards a creative writing minor the main thing I would suggest is that you worry less getting it perfect right off the bat. It sounds to me like you are trying to write the piece perfect the first time, which is fine I tend to write in a similar way, but very nearly 100% of all professional writers need to do many revisions and rewrites of a story before it is complete. Getting a first draft down, regardless of if you feel good about it is the first step, that will allow you to develop more ideas and angles than you can just planning. Then you can worry about making the story the best you can.

I understand that this can be a painful prospect, writing something you don't feel confident in is tough and starting a rewrite can be depressing, but in writing sometimes you have to "kill your darlings" in order to make it really good.

Remember that there is power in the simple and the subtle aspects of story writing as well as in the big and emotional contents; the story should progress based on the characters and the actions they would take rather than them being forced to follow a preplanned plot curve; love your writing, but be able to rework it to find the best possible version of your story.

Hope this helps, and good luck to you.

# if you ever need people to reed what you have and offer advice specific to what you have I know I and plenty of others would be happy to give it a look.

Yes, to this, on many points.

I'll throw my hat in the ring and say this: you can flesh out a character(s) all you want with "history, religions, morals, laws, diets, anatomy, day to day lives, societies" but, at the end of the day, if you can't create a story about them, does it really matter? In other words, you might have everything you ever need to know about a character but if they never inspire you, then what good are they? I've had many characters I thought would be wonderful to write about. Now? They're laying dead in a pile of bytes on my flash drive.

My point it this - sometimes we can get so mired down in the details that we lose track of the larger story. With the stories I've posted, I don't really care what character thinks of this or does with that because it doesn't matter to the story.

Think about the stuff you do during the day. Does your religious (non)preference really determine where you go to eat or what clothes you wear? It may, but if it doesn't affect your decision to go out for a burger or throwing on sandals to walk in the snow, then why should it matter to the story?

In my experience, once you start writing about a character, they will show you their likes and dislikes, not the other way around. This is a journey of discovery for both you and your future readers. This is the reason I write.

As for plotting a story, pick something you think would be interesting to write about (it doesn't have to be a passion), sprinkle it with a few names and basic attributes, and you'll come up with something decent. Your first-draft will rarely be to your liking but you'll find what works and what doesn't within it. My first attempts at stories were horrendous, especially look back at them now, but I see where current ideas and styles come from. If you're hard pressed for ideas, take something very personal, write about it, throw in a dash of fictional elements to deflect attention away from yourself, and I almost guarantee you come up with something very good. I did this with one story, was able to heal something within me, and made someone cry whom I've never met. My best writing? Not by any means. But it is my best story.