I am not a writer, just a daydreamer, there is this original fantasy story I kept imagining for years, so I tried to put it to paper, but couldn't express myself good enough, so I turned to... shortcuts (rule 6), those tools wrote a great story, it had the same characters, places, and goals of my story, but it's just not the story I wanted to write.

I asked you how to fix this, and got told ditch those tools, that the only way is the hard way, and to start reading. you convinced me, but I need some tips to go on the right directions. read what? where? where to read short stories? where do you post your stories?

I am not gifted like you, but can you help me be good enough?

After over a year with these Characters, knowing them, shaping them, loving them, it's time to let them go. Sending my first draft to literary agencies first thing tomorrow!

EDIT: I've been told first draft is the wrong way to describe this! To be clear, this is a completed manuscript that's gone through 6 different revisions and a boatload of rewrites. I, mistakenly, thought the "first draft" meant the first completed version of the story you send out, not the first version you write. That's totally my bad, and I misspoke. Please don't be sad on my behalf.

I am a plotter. And not only that, I am a prolific plotter. I'll see a picture or hear a word and within hours I'd have a whole book plotted out, within days I can write a chapter outline for several chapters. I love researching character names and coming up with lore. It's not just an idea, it is a whole plotted book and world. But then I sit down to write and I manage to write maybe 10k, a few chapters, before I either get bored of the project or get paralyzed in the minutia of writing every single scene and the transitions between the scenes. I've been writing for 10 years. I've been to workshops and read writing books, tried following a schedule, tried not following a schedule, done everything, even tried pantsing! And yet I have never finished a single draft of any of the 50+ stories I've plotted. I love writing and it's always been my dream to publish a book and share my stories with the world but for some reason I have been physically unable to finish a single draft in my entire life. Is it a sign or do I need to do something different? Should I just give up and accept that I will never finish and publish a book? Please help.

Hello people of internet, I’m a young ( won’t specify age ) author. I’ve been writing for a couple weeks, because I’ve always had a knack for English in school. I feel that every story I write recently is just a mess of bleak, boring emotions and content. If I did follow through with these ideas, I feel that the character could not be sad at any point, because if everything is something, then nothing is. It also just feels too heartless and cold. Here’s an example that I wrote the other day ( it will be terrible, sorry )

I woke up two hours ago. The ticking of the clock on my left side wall acts as a metronome to my breathing. Adjacent to me are childhood stuffed toys that illustrate a part of me that I’d forgotten to love. I glance over at the clock.
11:42
Nearly half of the day gone, and I hadn’t gotten out of bed yet.
My clothes bagged up on my body and my feet stuck to the floorboards, glued down with cold sweat and remains of spilt drinks.
A lifeless soul trudges downstairs in a body that isn’t mine….
( continued on about what the character finds downstairs )

You can tell that I’m a young author I feel, as my application of techniques and variety of structures are poorly executed. I’m honestly in a very stuck part of my writing life where I have all these ideas bunching up in my head, but not the ability to write them down in a coherent manner.

This is a short segment of something I'm working on right now. any advice to improve my writing?

   The Leaves seemed quieter today. Rustling slower. The birds also seemed a lot more active, but they just seem to do that some days. Those were just a few of my thoughts as i walked past the old bakery. Any sites of glass, ha been gone for a while now. I kept on walking, trying to find a place to rest. And there it was. The plant nursery. I walked inside it, glancing at the still working grow lights, over the tables. I remember when it first opened. I remember thinking how they were going wayyyyy overboard. Then I seen all the solar panels,and the green-house, and the generators, and I thought they were mad with how much supplies they kept. Right now, I was beyond grateful.

   I headed towards the back, with the bags of phosphorous, and nitrogen. They were the final bags that I needed to take back to the base.The bags were as heavy as those small crates of pond stones I took from the collapsed shed a few days ago. As I picked up the 4th bag, the pellets came pouring out, spilling all over the floor. Dammit, I muttered under my breath. I dropped the bag, and as they kept flowing out, like a small stream of water, out came a dead mouse. The little bastard must have thought it was food, and eaten the pellets.

   I kept on loading bags into the metal cart I had brought in. As I loaded the final bag into the cart, a little cassette fell out from between the wall, and the bag. For the time I had been looting this place, I had been finding little cassettes that Jane had hidden for me. By now, I think I had found 17 of them. As I began to bring the cart back out to the front, I began to hear them opening. The tearing of thick petals separating from each other. As quickly as I could, I grabbed the walkman from my bag,  popped in the new cassette, and hit play, as “Dreamer” began playing. It was the 3rd Laufey tape I had found. Either Jane thought she was my favorite, or she was just hers. 

   I looked up at the sky to see how much longer I had. The sun was beginning to reach the treeline by now, so, I guess i should start heading back. The walk back was always peaceful, if not, a bit nerve-wracking. At any time, a wild animal could jump out from anywhere. From the abandoned cars in the streets, or the very overgrown bushes. But at the same time, in the 2 years that that could've happened, it hadn’t. I'm not sure why, but, it just hadn’t. Either way, there  were still dangers out here. The next song began playing as I walked by the, still un-named plant. Its Giant flowers. They opened every night, letting out a steady hum. Around it, there were multiple twisting tendrils, still slowly spiraling about. I'm guessing that's where all the larger animals went.

In my book the fantasy race procreated with humans but the only ones in the area were indigenous people groups. Black communities. And Irish communities.

I am none of these races. Currently I am diving into research carefully. Trying to use resources directly from the population depicted. Trying to read books by people of these different cultures to understand how they might see the world. Again everyone is slightly different. But genuinely I just want to pay respect to these cultures wherever there is necessity to do so.

What is difficult here is that some of these humans moved to the fantasy world. Stayed there and the current story takes place generations down the line.

Which means their culture is now a blend of the fantasy culture and what was passed down through their families traditions and culture. Of course anything that is considered a cultural element is specially noted as the culture the practice or element comes from.

I myself am a third culture kid. I grew up in South America but was born in the United States. There are many times that I find writing white people hard because there are cultural things I simply did not grow up with. More than anything I find comfort and understanding with people who have grown up as a minority in the United States. Because I was the minority down there and experienced racism a lot. My experiences are different because racism looks different to some extent everywhere but I’m so glad I went through it so I can empathise with other people’s pain.

Part of me wants to chicken out and make everyone of white origin but that’s just as racist. And honestly I wish more people would bring respectful diversity into literature. Eventually I would really love to use a section of my profits and my story to raise awareness of other culture’s history and raise money for people that genuinely could do powerful things through it.

Am I too ambitious? Should I just chicken out? But my heart is saying it’s the cowards way out. And this could be a beautiful thing if I handle everything with care and precision.

Please tell me of any resources that would be useful. Any advice. Literally anything will help. I do not want to be disrespectful to any human and the history and journey they are on.

New Life, New Info

After freeing himself from the stranglehold he observed his surroundings and his own body.

It was the body of a middle aged man of 34 years old. He had thick boots covering his legs and gray coloured trousers accompanied by a red plain shirt. It was a weird combination.

After further examination he found himself standing on a completely different land which was far away from the pollution rooted rotting land on Earth.The diff was just Heavens apart.

As fresh air entered his nostrils he devoured it like a hungry wolf, for a moment all thoughts vanished from his mind and he gained a brief moment of respite.

There was lush greenery everywhere and most of the land was covered with thick peculiar grass which ended up to his knees, to confirm his guess he bent down slightly and moved his fingers through a strand, just as fast a stream of vivid crimson sap wept from the severed stem along its lining. Sudden pain jolted his mind awake as he gained his bearings and stumbled a few steps back, adjusting to this middle aged man's body.

This was Reth marvens family farm land which extended upto 100s of acres, this guy was really aloof he even left this farm land alone like an antique memoir given to him by his father to treasure which resulted in the wild grass.

For a fan bearer to have this much treasure it was odd,but his father Carnet Marven was a rank 7 Farmer path Rivenor, it was not that efficient in combat but was highly efficient for productivity of goods and prosperity of the Kingdom, so it was not that strange.

But the solemn thing was that only this unproductive lush green land was left, assets were not worth much.

After walking for a bit, he discovered his house which was supported from four sides by a smooth weathered monolithic stone but still terribly well balanced. The house had a strange shape, half was submarine type elliptical hull and the other half was unbendingly connected to it as a usual house with slanting roofs.

Even the colour of the house was contrasting, it was greenish white and on the periphery was a transparent pipeline made from mystical material known as aeroles, the black smoke was gradually rising upwards and escaping towards the unbound sky. As wandering his eyes reached the surrounding area which was nearly filled with metal scrapes which had red green algae and strange flowers growing on it.

This information was too much, he wasn't able to keep his eyes on just one thing, it was wandering here and there. Every single thing was making its presence known to him.

After this and that, he made his way through the short sidestairs and reached the hall which had one large area and a room separated by a wall, it was likely to be the elliptical part of the house.

The inside was well lit by the modern looking square shaped lanterns and the fire which was producing black smoke was also adding to its effort. There was a rich resonant aroma of wood (Chandan/Sandalwood) permeating the inside of the room.

At first glance his eyes rummaged through the hanging photos by the wall, protected by a thin layer of aerole.

One had a picture of an imposing but ugly looking man with good stature and physique and a beautiful maiden , both had proper sense of fashion unlike Reth Marven.

Below their photographs, their names and dates were written.

They were none other than this guy's parents.

[ Carnet Marven (father)

689 th summer 12 sun's ]

[ Glair Marven (mother)

693 rd winter 87 moon's ]

This world didn't have 12 months; they had just summer and winter, one summer and one winter made one complete cycle (one year in Earth's terms) .One summer had 150 days referred to as 150 suns and winter also had 150 days referred to as 150 moons.

Other wall photographs were of him and his siblings , one young lady and two kids and a young man in early twenties.

They were 4 siblings in total.

The oldest brother Kasper was mid forties by now, and his sister Gyna late thirties and I was 4 years younger than her.

The youngest sibling Ragnar was mid twenties with a gap of nearly ten years between us.

Through memories he got to know that they were all alive but not well plump with resources and status, they were also having a hard time, his sister and younger brother had chosen the path of Rivenor. But they were still rank 8 and 9 respectively.His eldest Brother Kasper was under the right hand man of one of the ministers in the king's court, in the money area he was at forefront.

But they were not living together currently, Gyna was in Rhaem city and Ragnar was in Sythara (one of the most populated cities).

While Kasper was in Velmora country's mid-sized kingdom led by the Finn family.

As for me or this guy, he lived an aloof life and half heartedly serving as a fan bearer of the King Qirae Belvora to not lose his remaining contact with humanity and get a uniform flow of money.

After removing the shoes the zig zag structure of floor marble was oddly satisfying to feel through.

Reth Marven had taken 10 days leave stating health issues.

So, Swaraj who was now Reth Marven had a good chance to rest ,examine and explore.

I don't see any reason for this yet symbolically in the book. Is this a publishing industry trend/change? It is giving me the creeps. Thoughts?

I'm thinking about making a horror movie surrounding a Black person getting taken advantage of, and then getting revenge on each person who was in charge of it. Do you think that this is a decent idea, or will it be too much? It's based off of my own research as well as my commentary on certain events happening in the world. It would be kind of like The Purge in the sense where the main protagonists are technically the bad guys, but I'm wondering if this is even a good idea to start working on or if I need to refine it.

Any feedback is appreciated!

(Also, for a bit of context, I am Black, so it is coming from my perspective as well)

I have been querying about two weeks and have had three full requests. I’ve already received a bunch of rejections too but they don’t really bother me - until today. I received a rejection based on my query letter (which has already won me three full requests). The letter was not from the agent I queried but on behalf of the agency. The letter was a criticism of my query letter and they attached query writing articles. Since I didn’t initially query this agent I looked them up on MSWL and lo and behold they provide query coaching. The whole experience isn’t sitting well with me. Don’t know if I’m overreacting and this is normal in the business?

Hello,

Fantasy

I am currently working on a story that has a prologue that follows a different perspective than that of my main character. This is the only spot in my story where I have this happening, and the prologue is getting to be a little long (19ish pages). It connects into the story about two chapters in, introducing a side character and a conflict that arises directly from the events in the prologue, which happens approximately one week prior.

It feels like a nice short story that leads into the main piece.

What would you think?

this is for the solo journalling rpg ive been playing through called thousame year old vampire

I've heard about too many writing advice at this point. I've listened to authors breaking down what their writing process is. I've heard my English teacher talk about every technique you could think of. But what is a writing advice that has truly stuck with you? A writing advice that has drastically improved the way you wrote once you implemented it in your writing?

Para aquellos que son escritores o lectores de cualquier género online ¿Cuál es la mejor plataforma o app para escribir historias propias o fanfics?

Quiero volver a escribir historias, pero no se que aplicación sería más apropiada, antes escribía en Wattpad, pero ahora no sé si haya mejores apps o sitios.

I've been writing different kinds of stories on Reddit, especially on r/stories. Some come from real experiences or ideas, while others are completely fictional. I enjoy experimenting with horror, mystery, strange situations, and other topics that catch my imagination.

What I like most about storytelling is the freedom to explore different ideas. One day I might want to write something that feels realistic, and the next day I might come up with something mysterious, unsettling, or entirely imaginary.

I've started thinking that, someday, I'd really like to write a book—or perhaps several books covering completely different subjects and genres. I don't want to limit myself to just one type of story. I'd like to explore different themes and be able to write honestly and creatively, without unnecessarily restricting the kinds of ideas I explore.

I'm still exploring my style and figuring out what kind of writer I want to become, but writing stories is something I genuinely enjoy.

For those of you who write: Did you always know what kind of stories you wanted to write, or did you discover your style by experimenting with different genres? And have you ever wanted to write a book that explores several completely different themes?

A while ago, I posted that my novel came out too huge, and after a bit, I got the new one, and it's in perfect size.

I misplaced the old one, so I gotta find it...

Thanks to everyone who gave me advice to fix my mistakes, and if you're interested in reading or reviewing my story, l do hope you like it.

Thank you!

Are there any tropes you absolutely can’t stand? No matter how well written it could have been?
What makes you hate that trope?
Have you ever come across a book that made you love or enjoy a trope you usually hate?

Hi, so I am david and I am 16 ...

So something happened in my life recently and i really became sad and stuff so i found writing like an escape from reality.....

So i published my book yesterday like 12 hours ago

And basically this is my first time writing a book and i never read a book in my life and english isn't my first language

Yes all this isn't an excuse if my writing is bad

I heard someone say my story is unenjoyable and it has a problem with prose and i have inability to use sentences

It kinda hurt when someone said it's unenjoyable idk why because I poured 3 to 4 months just making this every day....

I know i know i should handle critism and learn to handle it , I know but it's kinda scaring me that what if no one will like my story and everyone will hate it idk why

And i have 50k words buffer and idk if people even like this format

So in the last 11 to 12 hours I have received 22 views on the first chapter and 14 or higher views on every other chapter royal road

So with all these factors I don't know what to do , should i rewrite or what?

The book is ink 😭

(and I am sorry if it seemed like attention seeking, I am just in a dilemma)

Exactly as the title says! I love writing, always have, always will, but I find myself having a mental roadblock whenever it comes to more dialogue heavy scenes.

I love being descriptive; the environment, sounds, smells, use of repetition to indicate mental state and those sorts of things, and that's always made writing these dialogue scenes feel so... unnatural to me, out of my element.

I don't want to have a bunch of he said she saids in a row, but I also don't want to go to heavy on descriptors between parts of a conversation to the point where it disrupts the flow.

Any tips or resources on how to stike that balance of... dialogue descriptiveness?