Posts by Galastel
You're asking how a character, a creation of your imagination, can have free will. It's not easy for me to answer, because "they do". On a very fundamental level, that's what happens when I write. ...
Visually distinguishing a character's dialogue is not a bad idea. Sir Terry Pratchett used this tool quite a lot. Most notably, his Death spoke in ALL CAPS, including small caps when needed. (Small...
Psychopathy is characterised by persistent antisocial behaviour, impaired empathy and remorse. (source: Wikipedia) Your character needs to care for others. Watching a person get hurt, let alone k...
In a written medium, your readers can only identify your characters by what you give them. We cannot "see" your characters. So, if at any point in the story there's a John, and then again there's a...
Like @celtschk says in a comment, traditional encyclopedias like Britannica have professional editors. It is their task to decide what gets an entry and what doesn't. This is different from Wikipe...
How did Jack Sparrow escape that island he got stranded on? "Sea turtles". He escaped somehow, and he isn't going to tell us how. In fact, not telling us adds to his mystique. And he knows it, whic...
Your question makes me think first and foremost of Asimov's robots. We know how they work, right? There are the Three Laws. And they have a positronic brain. Wait, what? What on earth is a "positr...
Take a look at The Lord of the Rings as an example. Between the tense episode in Moria, that culminated with Gandalf's fall while the other characters escape, and the mounting tension of the Anduin...
To the person experiencing anger, it won't appear irrational. To them, there's a very good reason why they're angry, why they're infuriated. What you need is to show the reason. Now, the reason mi...
'Primus' means 'first' in Latin. Just as you cannot copyright the word 'first', you cannot copyright 'primus'. Same goes for 'prime'. Or any other common word. If in some fantasy universe, the enti...
The meaning of words is not set in stone. A word that used to mean one thing, can change over time to mean another. A hundred years ago, 'gay' used to mean 'merry'. Now it is no longer used in this...
First, I would argue for the right to make mistakes It's not unheard of, surely, inadvertently saying something wrong? That's what "I'm sorry" is for? Our starting point is "normally people do not...
Recently we have seen multiple questions on various aspects of political correctness. They have sparked some measure of disagreement, which is what I wanted to examine here. To what extent should ...
@Monica and others talk about Man vs. Environment stories. Since that has been explored, let me take your premise in a different direction. Another way by which the world might be a compelling vill...
Not a lawyer. You paid an illustrator to provide artwork for your book. You (supposedly) own the right to publish the artwork - that's what you paid the artist for. But that doesn't make you the i...
The trope you're looking for is referred to as phonetic accent, or Funetik Aksent. That is, spelling out words as they are spoken by a particular character, rather than they way they should be writ...
First of all, learn about the fantasy species you want to write about You want to populate your world with the traditional fantasy species, but your own perception of them appears to be based on o...
There are exceptions to the "no illustrations" trend. For example, Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrel is filled with black-and-white illustrations reminiscent of the wood engravings...
You say that in your head there are pauses in the dialogue, but in the text they just aren't there. Well then, insert the pauses. ‘How terrifying!’ said Frodo. There was another long silence. T...
Neil Gaiman writes: Don't worry about trying to develop a style. Style is what you can't help doing. If you write enough, [...] you'll have a style, whether you want it or not. (Neil Gaiman, Th...
The twin tropes you are referring to are Deus ex Machina and Diabolus es Machina. In both cases an event comes out of nowhere, not foreshadowed, to effect a drastic change. Both tropes are frowned...
In the US, an author holds the copyright to his work for all his life, and his heirs hold it for 70 years after his death, at which point the work becomes public domain. (source) In other countries...
Don't, under (almost) any circumstances write a Roman-script foreign language "the way it is pronounced". It is not helpful to anyone. If I (as your reader) don't speak Spanish, the text is gibber...
I do not know the source of that claim you heard, but I think you're taking it too literally. Generally, most authors just use their name. There's nothing about the name "J.R.R. Tolkien" or "Terry ...
I just ran a search on all of Jim Butcher's Dresden Files for the '?!' mark. Why this series in particular? It's modern Stylistically, I expected to find '?!' there. I had it on my computer, so I...
