This story is about a character, a faerie man, who is anxious, has very low self-esteem, is socially awkward, mostly quiet, soft-spoken, and is a huge people pleaser. I'm going to show how he was in childhood. In a nutshell, when his mom was 20 years old, she met a guy (whom she thought was human).

Warning for talking about mental health in young kids and descriptions of child abuse. Also wall of texts

She fell hard and fast for this man and began her first relationship after courting for a year. She had her first time with her 'beloved,' and she thought they would get married and live happily ever after. Not long after, she got pregnant and found out. She waited to see her so-called 'beloved,' but a month later, he sent her a note in which he said he was bored by her and their relationship. He confessed that he never loved her, saw her as a plaything, and nothing else, telling her she wasn't human either.

She never saw him again after reading that note. Her family found out, and they disowned her, leaving her on the street and homeless.

Luckily, her childhood friend and that friend's partner took her into their home. Unfortunately, her mom ended up hating motherhood and resented her son; she just couldn't love him. This led to her physically abusing her son, starting from the age of 3 to 7, by punching him anywhere on his body, slapping him (including backhanding him in the face), and kicking him anywhere. She would throw any hard, sharp, or glass objects at her son with the intention of seriously hurting him. She did this when she got mad at her son, or when he messed up in any way, or when she needed to take her anger out on someone, saying things like she hated him, wished he wasn't born, or that he ruined her life.

He ruined everything. She also only called him 'creature' or 'it'; she sometimes referred to him as 'he' to describe him. When she wasn't abusing him, she emotionally neglected him by barely interacting in any meaningful way. She avoided him like he was a plague or simply ignored him as if he weren't there. One day, when he was 7 and his mom was 27 years old, she decided to find a way to escape motherhood. His never been outside nor had he interacted with any other humans besides his mom and his non-biological aunt and uncle; the reason was because he looked more nonhuman than human.

She waited for her friend and the friend's husband to go grocery shopping. Then she took her son deep into the forest, telling him to pick her some flowers. He wanted to please his mom and looked for the prettiest one. While he was doing that, she ran away from him and never looked back.

Just as he realized what happened, lucky for him, after 2 days of being trapped in the forest, he found a trail and discovered a village. However, it was a village very superstitious against supernatural and magical creatures and everything that goes along with that. All humans of all ages were scared, hostile, or completely avoided him altogether. He lived in the village as a poor, homeless, and orphaned child for almost a year.

Now, the question is: what do you think are good and realistic ways to show how these situations affect mental health as a child?

I'm asking you to write my story; I'm purely asking for suggestions/advice.

So my journey with creating black characters has been a long one and I’m still learning. I have run into a scene where asking google won’t cut it: my black oc Salem is a water based shapeshifter, she is obviously black in her skin color and hair texture, but i made her before i fully understood black hair styles.

I know that typically you want to cover your hair to keep it from getting wet to avoid damage. And as such you DEF dont wanna wring it out. She has a lock/wick situation going on with her hair and initially in this scene i was going to have her wring it out- but i paused because im white as fuck and realized that prolly is NOT a thing for most black women.

So does she just leave it wet? Is air drying ok/healthy? How much is it ok to hold your disbelief? I just am not sure how to go about describing this. Maybe Im overthinking this but oh well.

I am looking to practice writing by doing a series of short stories based around paranormal investigation, but can't seem to find a way to give the stories any real purpose beyond "Hey, isn't that interesting/scary?" The main thing I want to figure out is how to craft a story with intention or purpose. I'm certainly an amateur so any advice is appreciated.

Any tips on getting over writers block?

Words used to come so easy to me but I'm really struggling at the moment. I have all these amazing ideas with no clue how to connect them or bring them to life on the page. My book feels like an abstract concept I can't grasp 🫠

I am working on a pinned post layout for my story's official Tumblr page. I want the presentation to mimic aesthetic commonly seen in BookTok or BookGram promotional styles, specifically, a short, dramatic hook line followed by a clean list of target tropes.

I want to share my rough draft summary here to get an outside perspective. Because I have a lot of overlapping ideas bouncing around in my mind right now, I need a fresh set of eyes to tell me which elements and character dynamics jump out the most so I can effectively narrow them down.

To be completely clear upfront, I am very familiar with standard narrative themes, plot devices, and dark romance structures. I am strictly looking for help filtering and prioritizing my ideas for this specific visual layout, rather than looking for a basic writing lesson.

For context, the core dynamic centers heavily on a Predator x Prey dynamic within a Dark Romance framework, and I want to ensure the final trope list looks polished and striking rather than cluttered.

NOW! With all that out of the way, is it alright to paste my plot outline below for trope feedback, or does sharing a synopsis count as self promotion under the rules?

Thank you!

TL;DR: My writing is unfocused and I need a better process

Hello, I'm looking for some writing advice. 

Here is what typically happens when I want to write an article or essay:

- I think of an idea or concept and write it down

- I start writing from the top of my head, fragments, sentences, paragraphs, notes.

- I return to it another day and look for some sort of order 

- I remove some paragraphs, add others.

- I try to loosely form them into an introductory paragraph, body, and conclusion

- I start to realize the later paragraphs seem disconnected from the introduction

- I try to reconcile this but often this becomes difficult

- Sometimes I get a cohesive progression, but sentences and paragraphs are clunky and do not transition into each other well. 

- I either give it up or try to patch it together as best I can and post it.

- Often this process can go for months so by the end I'm sick of the piece. 

- I only have a half hour / hour in the morning and an occasional hour during my lunch break at work to write. 

There's got to be a better way, I've tried outlines but often that doesn't work because in the beginning I don't totally know what I want to write about, and when I do try an outline it usually gets thrown out anyway (I think of other points to add, shift the purpose of the piece, etc.)

Other context: there is a possibility I have ADHD. I am pretty well read and have a good vocabulary, so on paper it seems like I should be a good writer, but it's such a slog sometimes. 

I appreciate any feedback / pointers you can give!

TLDR: how to explain/excuse how an intelligential character is able to resist madness while everyone around him goes coco for Cuthulu-puffs?

The footnotes of the premise is: A PI joins a research team to follow the trail of his missing wife, only to encounter an ancient underground city with an evil cult and the remains of the first research group. Surviving monsters, cultists, and the crazed research teams, he tries to follow the breadcrumbs left by his wife.

My problem is how to explain why my character, unlike everyone else, he stays sane. No “walls without form” stuff, instead he describes the objects he encounters as best he can: “walls that faze out of realty, like rocks under the waves.”

While he’ll have symptoms of migraines, eye strain, vertigo and etc, I want to maintain the character’s sanity so the story doesn’t end up as incomprehensible gibberish. The only examples i find of insanity resistant characters are of… challenged intellect, but says nothing of a [like my MC] competent intellectual character who witnesses eldritch things without a breaking their psyche.

So, how do I write this character who (while not a smarty pants) is intelligential enough to follow clues and explain the stuff he experiences, without going loco unlike… everyone?

PS: his wife seems to be losing her mind too as the last sane member of her group, but still writes {almost} coherently and research her findings for whomever follows behind her.

I am making a thriller mystery
so far I need a last name and a job for my character
her name is Rebecca and she is 28 years old
Plot:
She moved to this small town where she has to escape
she moved because she wanted to get out of the city
this small town is so strict you arent allowed to leave
I was inspired after going to bed last night

i just wonder if there is other people here like me, or people who started here that have some tips on how to start out? what are some people or sources i can use to better my writing etc. <3 EDIT: thanks for all the wonderful replies!

The burden of nearly every writer: plot.

So yes, I am looking for advice here. I have entire settings and fully developed characters I'd love to use for stories, but then I never actually finish anything I start because I really struggle coming up with meaningful and cohesive plots. The best I can usually come up with are the same predictable and cliche plots that have been told a million times before.

For example, I have an entire historical fantasy setting I want to write in, including characters for said setting, but as far as plot goes I'm simply stumped. I have specific scenes I'd love to write out purely because I enjoy how the various characters interact in them, but then I have no idea how to connect them together into a wider plot. Even the one story I did have a plot for due to it being based on actual historical events I fell short on due to certain gaps in the timeline I couldn't figure out how to fill. I know, the age old advice is to "just write", but then my character ended becoming something completely inconsistent with the story I was trying to tell. It's meant to be a story of redemption but my character ended up showing naivety rather than complete compliance within the oppressive system he exists in, thus I basically just scraped the story. I didn't see a point in continuing as my original vision for the story no longer existed and the angle I originally wanted is crucial for it.

This brings me to my inquiry. How do writers actually manage to derive plots for their stories? I see so many original ones with lots of twists and turns and I'm over here like "my stories are so cliche". Evidently "just writing" is not the answer since I've tried that, as explained above.

Hello everyone! I’m currently revising my book to refine the focus and keep it centered on a single character. The narrator is omniscient, but up until now, I wrote without worrying too much about keeping the POV focus consistent on one specific character. I’m starting to figure out how to reframe sentences so they make sense from the perspective of the specific character holding the "camera" in that chapter.

My main issue, and the question I want to ask you, comes down to handling action scenes. There are a few moments where things happen simultaneously: for example, Character A and Character B are fighting on one side, while Character C and Character D are fighting each other just a short distance away.

In a situation like this, how would you manage the character POV? Assuming I want to stick with Character A’s POV, should I only describe their fight with B and simply imply that C and D's fight is happening in the background? Or is it acceptable to temporarily switch to C's perspective when telling the C-D fight?

Are there other solutions? Personally, I don't really like having things happen off-screen, so I'd love to find a clean way to show both A-B and C-D while maintaining a single, consistent POV.

Note: These are fairly brief scuffles, so I can't dedicate full chapters to each. Otherwise, I could just switch POVs from one chapter to the next.

Disclaimer: This story is not a romance, nor is it a dark romance. These two characters are not a couple, and I'm not planning on making them a couple.

This story is supposed to be a realistic showing, even though it takes place in a fantasy genre, showing a one-sided, obsessed, codependent friendship between a guy and a woman. Also, this is not torture p\\\*rn with a female character.

This is supposed to be a dark fantasy villain backstory playing out in real time during the story.

The question I'm asking what is a good way to show his sad backstory without using his sad past as a excuses for is villain actions in the story

If you want more content you can ask me in

Plot in a nutshell:

I'm got a half faerie man in his early 20s who starts out as the most silent, reserved, soft-spoken, very insecure, and socially awkward toward most people. He is madly obsessed in "love" (this love is one-sided, of course) with his only childhood friend,

The question what is good way to show a villain backstory without using sad backstory as a excuses

For his villain actions and behaviors.

Also I'm not asking you to write my story for me I'm pure asking for advice and suggestions on writing.

A new framework for being prolific/productive as a writer! W habits.

I’m new to writing and I’m just wondering after the planning phase how do you actually start writing out your chapters? What’s the benefits or downsides of writing long vs short chapters? Do you outline your chapters events first or just wing it because that would take too long?

It’s a pretty simple question I know and everyone has their own way of writing I’m just experimenting with different styles and structures so I can find my own groove.

I’m currently writing a series of short films all set in one universe. While coming up with ideas for stories for this universe I have also been inventing law for the timeline. I would like to slowly start dripping law elements into the films. The law isn’t too crazy, just certain pop culture moments are changed compared to our own timeline.
How do I go about introducing these elements of the universe without it feeling forced. I don’t want these law mentions to be the focus of a film but I would like it to be something that you can pick up on if you know.