Activity for Galastel
| Type | On... | Excerpt | Status | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
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A: Characters speaking different languages There are two easy ways to handle this, depending on whether you want the readers to understand what is being said, or not. In truth, whether you want the readers to understand or not is the only important factor. Which characters understand is irrelevant to how you write the dialogue. 1. If the rea... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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Dead children in pre-modern setting The reality of pre-Industrial Revolution times was that about half the children born died before age 5. It would be a mistake to think that parents cared less - we have multiple written records showing that they cared very much. At the same time, there was this coping mechanism - parents tried not to... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: How to get my characters' emotions out of the way so I can get on with the plot? Your setup reminds me of multiple stories I've read as a kid of a group of characters getting stuck on a desert island. In particular, I'm fairly sure Jules Verne had one with kids, I recall another one with kids set in the 1930s or 1940s. (Not Lord of the Flies. That one put an end to the genre.) N... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: How do you prevent whiplash when transitioning between comedy and tragedy? The problem with a mood whiplash is: one of your characters just experienced something tragic, your readers are with the character in that tragic moment. If you want the readers to experience that tragedy, you've got to give them time to process, to experience. When you jump to a comic scene instead,... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Is there a way to know if a metaphor is bad or not? First and foremost, a metaphor needs to be understood. When Shakespeare says "All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances", you are not left wondering a metaphor for what the stage is - Shakespeare tells you. Your metaphors are all loc... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Re-reading and making changes to current work that makes everything worse? I too start by rereading a part of what I wrote, in order to "get into the mood". And sometimes, instead of getting into the writing mood, I get into the "this doesn't work at all, it needs to be changed" mood. Here's what works for me: instead of editing, I mark the part that needs editing, and lea... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Storing WorldBuilding Information Between the brief ordered spreadsheets @Liquid suggests and the detailed but time-consuming wiki you suggest, there is a third way: keep notes of what you need in a semi-organised way that is convenient. Let me explain. - You have characters. It might be that you need to keep only certain details a... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Writing the dialogues of characters who are much smarter than you Intelligence is manifested in how one thinks: how one views problems, and how one solves them. Eliezer Yudkowsky, author of Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, explains his approach to the problem of very intelligent characters in this blogpost. As a brief example, an intelligent character... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Ensuring that character dialogues sound like they are coming from different people The way a character talks reflects their social class, their level of education, where they come from, what kind of people they are and how the see the world. The last one in particular is key - if all your characters appear to see the world in exactly the same way, it wouldn't matter that they happe... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Creating a fairytale for adults Stories for adults, based on, or including elements of fairy tales, are quite common. For example, Neil Gaiman's Snow, Glass, Apples is a retelling of Snow White, with an evil vampire Snow White and a necrophiliac prince. "Not for children" doesn't begin to cover how dark and creepy that story is. I... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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How much description is too much? A companion question for How much description is necessary, how much description is too much? I close my eyes, I can visualise my MC's bedroom (for example) in tiniest detail: the accent wallpaper, the collection of spaceship models, the view out of his window... Of course, a clutter of irrelevant ... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Using symbols to refer to mythological figures For symbols to work, they need to be understood. Think of symbols as a language; if you speak the language, and the readers speak the same language, everything's good. If, however, you speak the language, but the readers don't, your message would get lost, just as if you'd chosen to write half your p... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: How is a semordnilap typically used? Using semordnilaps is indeed common enough. TV tropes refers to this trope as "Sdrawkcab Name". You can follow the link for multiple examples across media. A particularly known example is 'Alucard', a semordnilap so commonly used that TV Tropes gave it its own page. However, because the tool is so c... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Is using an online name generator a good idea? As far is legal rights are concerned, no, names generated by a generator are not copyrighted, nothing similar. Consider: a random string generator producing random letter combinations of random lengths could theoretically produce every word in the dictionary. One cannot copyright those, right? A nam... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Continuing a short story We cannot tell you what to write or help you brainstorming - that's your task as a writer. However, we can try to assist you with how to brainstorm. It is very helpful, looking at a situation, to ask questions. How does your character feel in the situation? What is she thinking about? Why is she the... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: How do you describe sentimental human physical interactions? One of the most touching scenes in The Lord of the Rings reads: > And so Gollum found them hours later, when he returned, crawling and creeping down the path out of the gloom ahead. Sam sat propped against the stone, his head dropping sideways and his breathing heavy. In his lap lay Frodo’s head, dr... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Do hard to pronounce names break immersion? Hard-to-pronounce names suggest a different culture. If War and Peace had its characters named not Andrei Nikolayevich Bolkonsky and Pierre Kirillovich Bezukhov, but Andrew Bolk and Peter Bek; or if the characters of the Kalevala were named not Väinämöinen and Joukahainen, but Van and John, that woul... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Fictional cultures and languages existing in the same area? Readers will buy anything, if you can sell it. Vampires, wizards, talking animals, superpowers, sentient flat figures... Readers don't look for a realistic story. They look for a good story. Any premise will be accepted, if that's what is needed to tell your story, and if your story is good. Take H... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Is it time to start closing up my novel? Remember your goal: you have set out to tell a story. So tell the story. Forget the wordcount. You feel the story needs more meat, give it more meat. You feel you need to explore more themes, go ahead and explore them. (If you don't know what to write, that's a separate problem - a separate question.... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: A question on determining audience I believe you are being too specific when you're looking at who your audience is. Suggesting your passage would be solely interesting to collectors of objects would be like suggesting that Jules Verne's extensive explanation of marine biology in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea would only be interesting ... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Could I have some characters reveal more internal monologue than others? By their very nature as being main characters, your main characters would receive more attention than side characters. That's what makes them 'main'. It's their arc that we follow, it's their motivations that we know, it's them we care about and sympathise with. Take The Lord of the Rings as a famou... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: What are some of the tricks used to end a verse with a specific word? From my limited experience with attempts at writing verse, your starting point is what it is you actually want to say. A poem is not a random jumble of words that rhyme - it is a picture or an idea displayed by means of those words. So that's your first guiding technique - what is it that you're tryi... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: How important is the apocalypse in a post-apocalyptic story? If you're setting your story after an apocalypse, readers are likely to be curious what happened. If your setting is several centuries post-apocalypse, it's not unreasonable that nobody would know, and it is less relevant to the ongoing story anyway. If, however your setting is only several decades a... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Why is it that all the bestselling indie authors are based in the US (and, to a much smaller degree, the UK)? While a great many people speak English as a second language, and can thus enjoy reading a novel in English, the majority of people for whom English is the native language live in the US and the UK. (There's also Australia, Canada, South Africa and several others. However, Canada's population, for ex... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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In the background of the Future As I've mentioned multiple times, I'm writing a military sci-fi novel. The focus of the story is war, and that happens far away from Earth. However, I'm starting with my MC's "normal", on Earth. It is this "normal" that I'd like to ask about. I've set the story in the future because for it to be pos... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Should I add racism in my book's world or have my world have no racism? There is more than one way racism can be present in a work. For example, when Star Trek have on the bridge of the Enterprise an Asian pilot, a Russian navigator and a black Communications Officer, and they all get along swimmingly, all at the time of the Cold War, the Yellow Peril and the Civil Righ... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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How to write a memorial plaque? I've been tasked with drafting the text for a memorial plaque dedicated to group X. Group X was big, diverse, and had several hundred years of rich history. Amount of space I have is 2-3 sentences. I don't want the memorial to be yet another "a whole bunch of people died in the Holocaust". I'm looki... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: How to show the same emotion multiple times? Let me start with an example: > It's the waiting that was the worst. The attack would come, they just didn't know when. Could be another minute. Could be another hour. Ben sat nearby, sharpening his bayonet. Aaron wanted to scream at him to stop making that godawful noise, like a nail scratching gla... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: What are the advantages and disadvantages of setting a story in a made up country, compared to a real one? Every revolution is different. Every civil war is different. They are different in why they are fought, they are different in how they are fought, they are different in who is fighting. (To clarify, I do not mean the obvious "who" as in "the English" or "the French". "Who" can mean different classes,... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: The relationship between the MC's Goal and the climax I believe you are misunderstanding what a climax is. To quote Wikipedia, > The climax (from the Greek word κλῖμαξ, meaning "staircase" and "ladder") or turning point of a narrative work is its point of highest tension and drama, or it is the time when the action starts during which the solution is g... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Story that's too depressing? > Are these many layers of misery inflicted upon innocents too much for a reader to handle? You must be careful here: the way you phrase that statement, you appear to be laying the blame on the reader - "the story is good, but the reader is too weak for it". Consider instead the alternative approach... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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British / American language mishmash English is not my mother tongue. I am completely fluent in English though, and I write my fiction in English. Here's the problem: I live in neither the UK nor the US (nor any other English-speaking country), so I am exposed to both in equal measure (through literature, film, etc.) I spell the Britis... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Is it bad if I don't like the "best" books in my chosen genre? Short answer: J.K. Rowling claims never to have read a fantasy book in her life, and she did just fine. For that matter, J.R.R. Tolkien hadn't read much fantasy either. Long answer: who considers the books on your list "best" in their genre? I haven't heard anything other than ridicule for Wheel of... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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First quarter friends As I've mentioned before, I'm working on a military sci-fi novel. Here's the trouble with the military: you don't spend all of your service, start to finish, with the same people. Not all the people you've done Basic Training with will proceed to the same Advanced Training as you. Not everyone who c... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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Little disjointed scenes My MC is going through boot camp. Physically and mentally, he goes from high-school boy to soldier prepared for combat. Along the way there's struggles, there's new friendships formed, there's the changing interaction with his family (we're talking Israeli boot camp - he's home every third weekend). ... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: How to present an alien culture with different morals, without it coming across as savage? @Amadeus mentions duels. A crucial fact to the understanding of duelling, mostly ignored in the modern media: it was the seconds' task to attempt reconciliation. So, in fact, asking someone to a duel was a form of ritualised threat, its intent generally to ideally not have to back it up with actual a... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Pop star names and other famous people or characters (Not a lawyer) In my country at least, the law is very clear: truth cannot be libel. However, for something to be considered "truth", you'd need undisputable proof, you'd need evidence, the truth would need to be attestable. Now what would you intend to prove, and how would you prove it? If the per... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: How can I make my character sound Scottish? The way you make a character Scottish (or any other nationality) is you research that nationality. And you don't settle for the "Hollywood Atlas" version either (meaning a collection of exaggerated stereotypes. And that's a tv tropes link). You find out about real Scotland, and ground your character ... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: MC doesn't know something that's obvious to the reader As both @F1Krazy and @Rasdashan say, it's not unrealistic for a character not to realise what is clear to the reader. In a way, the character actively refuses to connect the dots, she has a strong impetus to respond this way, whereas the readers would have no inhibition to understanding what's going ... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Do authors often base their characters off of themselves? It all depends on your perspective. Yes, some elements of the author's life, personality and way of seeing things make their way into their writing. No, a work of fiction is not a biography of its author. In particular, authors tend to have written more than one book. They cannot all be the author's ... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Could the cast of my book be more unique? You're looking at "uniqueness" the wrong way, I think. Look, for example, at The Lord of the Rings: Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin are all hobbits. They come from the same place, they share the same kind of views, they're all heterosexual white men, three of them are the same social class. This doesn't... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Character is an expert on something I'm not The answer is research, research, and more research. I'm not an expert on horseback riding, or sword-fighting, or ruling a country. The only way I can write convincingly about those subjects is by doing research. Research can take many forms. It can be reading about the subject, both guides and firs... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Is no religion a bad thing? You're looking at this from the wrong side. Your goal isn't to include or to represent. Your goal is to tell a story. The story should contain all the elements that it requires, and nothing but the elements it requires. "Including" anything that isn't useful to the story in any way is called 'shoehor... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Should I make up my own names for the days of the week/months Since you feel there's no reason for your world to have the same days of the week as our world (that's reasonable), why must your world have weeks at all? Why must the weeks be of X days? A month is a length of time that's tied to a natural phenomenon - the turn of the moon around the earth. The week... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Convincing argument about something I don't agree with The world isn't all black and white - it's grey and gray. There are arguments to be made for dictatorship. Consider, at the very least, the famous joke "a camel is a horse designed by a committee." It emphasises the ineffectiveness of group decision-making. What is democracy, if not a country run by ... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: How best to avoid the appearance of stereotype? There is nothing wrong with having a person who is a member of a minority, and extremely annoying. 'Minority' can be sexual orientation, it can be disability, it can be religion or skin colour - whatever. However, if the annoying character is extremely annoying and the only representative of their m... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: The use of footnotes to translate foreign words in a novel When in doubt, do what the masters did. Some examples: > Raoden breathed a sigh of relief. "Whoever you are, I'm glad to see you. I was beginning to think everyone in here was either dying or insane." > "We can't be dying," the an responded with a snort. "We're already dead. Kolo?" > "Kolo." Th... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Is my story "too diverse"? > Is it alienating to readers who are white and straight to be put into the shoes of someone who is drastically dissimilar to them? Is it alienating for a modern American to read a story about medieval France? Or about short hairy-footed Brits who live in fantasy-land? Those differences you mention... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Should I change from past to present tense to state a fact that continues into the present and is unyielding? General truths, such as "the earth is round" should be in present tense. Applying the past tense to such a statement would imply that the statement is not universally true, or might no longer be true. Compare: > Winter is cold. A general statement about the nature of winter, to: > That winter wa... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |
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A: Realistically incorporating trans/nonbinary characters The game Dragon Age - Inquisition did this recently, quite successfully, with a side character, Krem. Krem is the second-in-command of a mercenary group one of your companions leads, so an NPC you interact with about a dozen times throughout the game. He tells you he's trans about halfway into the ga... (more) |
— | over 5 years ago |