Posts by Galastel
@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 du...
I don't think readers are as conservative regarding genre as you make them out to be. Roger Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber is one very well known example of fantasy, with no elves, no dragons, and a...
There are multiple hints of dictatorial times within the English language. For example, have you noticed how farm animals have Anglo-Saxon names (calf, cow, lamb, pig), whereas meat derived from th...
Similar questions have been asked in the past, for example How do I make an ESL character sound realistic? and How to write dialogue for someone who is intelligent but barely speaks the language? Y...
You might find it helpful to look at the Torture Porn trope, to have a clearer idea of what to avoid. A work would be called "torture porn" when it appears to seek to disgust the reader/viewer whil...
First thing you would need to decide is what you actually want to do with that sequel. Do you intend to write something that is basically "more of the same"? "More of the same", but more modern? Or...
To the best of my understanding, the main problem with the zombie genre is that it positions decay-disease-disability as non-human evil to be eradicated, and as a threat to humankind. (I don't nece...
Word's grammar checker is calibrated for documents, not for fiction. And even for documents, it is a bit of automated software, that is bound to make mistakes. You shouldn't trust it implicitly, an...
Conflict makes the story interesting. If there's no conflict of some sort, if everything your characters want - they get handed on a silver platter, then you've got no story. Does the conflict(s) ...
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....
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 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 po...
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 ...
I don't know if Fanfic is a crutch or useful practice, but it is fun. For me, writing fanfic is one of the ways I enjoy a book. So I'd do it whether it's useful or not. That said, can writing fanf...
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 ...
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."...
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 m...
Surely there's more to you than "mental illness guy"? Consider what other parts of yourself you could project onto a character. A hobby of yours can be your character's main occupation. A childhood...
What keeps writers writing is the utter impossibility of not writing. Tolkien had no hope of ever publishing The Silmarillion, yet he kept writing and rewriting and editing and re-editing it throug...
I think, to humanise infanticide, you can present the whole thing as the terrible tragedy it is: the parents would have done anything to prevent this situation, they would accept any sacrifices to ...
Theoretically, yes, you can have four parallel stories. The relevant trope is called Four Lines, All Waiting. The most famous example of such storytelling that comes to mind is G.R.R. Martin's Song...
Mythological creatures, or creatures you've invented, don't need to be capitalised, just like real-life animals. There's no grammatical difference between "a dog", "an orc", "a dragon" and "a manan...
I'd say the question of Active vs. Reactive hero is as much a question of how you present events, as of what is actually happening. Let me give you an example: Frodo, the main character of the wil...
Let's start with description: how to describe a living creature, without referencing other living creatures. What does it have - scales, tail, wings? How many limbs? On how many does it walk, if at...
What positive character traits does your MC have? Surely he isn't all bad, a one-dimensional caricature of schmuckiness? Consider: in The Three Musketeers, d'Artagnan beats his servant (and Athos ...
