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#WordWeavers 2025.07.23 — Your MC is lost in a busy city, and GPS isn’t an option. How do they handle the situation?

She's lives in an interstellar civilization without electricity or electronics—or GPS. She knows how to use a map. Duh.

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

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#WritersCoffeeClub #WCC 2025.07.22 — Do you write your characters’ thoughts, or let their actions speak for themselves? Why?

I write in 1st person. The narrator is the POV. The reader gets to experience a continuous description of what is important enough for the POV to notice, what they are willing to report doing, what they want you to know about what people are saying and doing—and especially what they think about it. It is a stream of thoughts and reactions, often presented with snark or filtered by worry, and if the reader pays attention, spun in subtle ways to fit the MC's agenda. Sometimes my characters even quote their own thoughts!

Here's what it looks like in practice from the POV of the devil-girl in Reluctant Prizefighter. She's been wolf-whistled by a street gang member, but she has some defense training and has subtly dodged his grabs, but has verbally and physically bruised him. #excerpt

I hadn't learned yet how to reliably work the miracle I'd created defeating The Monster. Was this miscreant the one who might help me break through?

I looked at how his muscles moved, his legs and rear when he turned momentarily to retort to a gang mate, how he held himself erect—

I blinked. He had dimples!? Arguably cute, and not enough of a threat, nor cute enough to sway me either. I turned and walked on, trying not to grin, saying, "I doubt it."

"Doubt what?" I heard his shoes catching up.

"I thought you might teach me something." I gave him, his not exactly scrawny body, more of a dismissive look than it deserved. "I was mistaken" that you're sufficiently threatening to help me.

He sped to cross my path, but I must have intimidated him; he didn't block me. I took a much better look at his rear end. Squarish. Muscular above the hip, too. I rather liked the view, but now he'd turned red and I had to look up at his angry eyes. My hit struck home.

He asked, "What are you? Spurs? Or 2nd Street Fist Gang?"

"What are you? Besides rude?"

"NGG Syndicate. We all are." He pointed to his shoulder, and lifted a sweaty sleeve. Hiding what he revealed might be the whole purpose to him wearing the t-shirt.

"Wow. You let someone brand you!" How stupid can you get? It read NNGS in cursive, burnt into his skin with either a wire pattern heated by fire, or by an application of reluctance, but reluctant force would require him to absolutely trust the miracle worker—which might be the point! Still foolish. The scar was pink; the hair had only partially grown back. I didn't want to shudder, but did so anyway.

He added,"You're going to regret trespassing—"

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

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“To anyone reading this who is just starting out or feeling unsure, I want to say: keep going. Poetry needs your voice”

Nazaret Ranea on her journey from being one of the Scottish Poetry Library’s Young Makars to publishing her first poetry collection with Drunk Muse Press

scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/2

🏒 The Head Game 🧠
Now a 2025 Wattys Entry on Wattpad!

Two brothers. One brutal hit.

As the Stanley Cup Playoffs rage, a star player delivers a devastating headshot—to his own brother.

The hit changes everything.

Family. Future. The game itself.

📖 Read it now on #Wattpad. tinyurl.com/2x3tpckb

#Wattys2025 #HockeyFiction #TheHeadGame #WattpadReads #Sports #sport #hockey #NHL #writingcommunity #writers

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#ScribesAndMakers 2025.07.22 — Show us something you've created. Tell us the story behind it.

There's not much of a story, here. Both my spouse and I have families where preserving fruit in alcohol was a thing (Ukrainian & Italian extraction). In both traditions, what got used was with a neutral spirit, aka vodka. My grandmother used to make her vodka, and reportedly blew up the kitchen sink in a Chicago apartment a long time ago.

These cherries are preserved in bourbon, and newly made so they've about a month to go to be fully enjoyed. I'm creative when it comes to food and food preparation, so a few years ago after making vodka cherries and having left over cherries after running out of the Tito's, I tried a bunch of things like Triple Sec and Old Granddad. The batch I made with Uncle Nearest generated a fandom.

Sadly, I used my reserved Uncle Nearest for this batch. The new bottles just bought, obviously made by a distiller who bought out the original entrepreneurs, cheapened it. It was obvious: dark brown versus light reddish brown, even discounting the address change. Sad.

I think they'll make good cherries next year, though, if not for drinking neat.

More in #AltText.

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

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#WordWeavers 2025.07.22 — As a writer, do you use the same level of description you prefer to read? If not, do you use more or less?

My preference is only essential description, read or written. It differs for me between the POV and the supporting characters, less for the former, more for the latter.

Since I want the reader to see themselves in the story, I often give the POV character little or no description, other than what matters for the story, or what they think about themselves.

I took this to an extreme in Mars Needed Women in that the main character has a name that sounds like Mary† though written as if Asian, was named that because she's an atheist in a theocracy, has one child whose hair is described as resembling hers, is obviously not at all curvy because of her comments about a curvy character, and works out so is comparatively muscular. And that's it.

In Reluctant Moon, there are two main characters who are very into each other, sometimes poetically going into description of their partner in intimate detail. Empathy in action is more important to this story, but with two characters, I get to cheat somewhat: one gets to have a complexion like porcelain and the other is as dark as midnight. Oddly, it's not their skin color for which they face prejudice.

In another story in the reluctance series, the only thing I think I'm going to fully describe is the character's horns since they cause her trouble. They're the size of a crooked index finder, greatly resemble rusty rebar including the dangerously sharp point, and are positioned at her temples pointing back. They destroy hats, but can be hidden in the devil-girl's hair, which implies some sort of red. She'll describe her complexion simply as olive and considers that she's so average she could disappear in the slightest crowd, were it not for her height. I am going to get rid of her scene looking into a mirror because it kind of annoys me that she would enumerate her features simply because she can, especially since she really doesn't care about them (except when she is disguising herself).

As for non-POV characters, I describe them as much as they need to be described for story purposes. As an author pointed out yesterday, if we later learn that the murderer in the mystery has bright red hair, somebody will be neutrally described with the clue, as in, "'That yellow dress really doesn't go with her freckles and ruddy hair.'" I moderate the need to describe in Dickensian detail with a desire, again, for the reader to see themselves and people in their community in the characters of my stories.

I especially enjoy the POV tagging other characters' eye color. For example, in Inklings, Wintereyes characterizes her love interest, after seeing his eyes in the sunlight, as having caramel eyes, like the hard candy, then later nicknames him Caramello despite learning his name. I can't help but describe him as a looking like a pacific islander, for in his world he is essentially an exiled chieftain's son, so his build and bulk and general appearance tag along. As for Wintereyes, the POV, judging by her name, her eyes could be anything from crystal blue to grey, and I'd not be surprised if most readers assume her hair color is white or light blonde. In the story, she is accompanied by Mother Wolf, who is a white wolf. Maybe someone will joke that Wintereyes resembles her mother? Maybe…

=-=-=-=-=
† About the name: I was checked to ensure Googling the name will make the it apparent it isn't a name commonly used in the culture it sounds like it came from.

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

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#PennedPossibilities 734 — Have you ever written fanfiction? If so, for which fandoms?

Yes, as stated in my profile.

For those who poo-poo the idea (i.e. stigmatize it), as a professional writer I'll recommend it as an excellent way to take your obsessive knowledge of a show or a book and translate it into carefree practice writing, to wit, in order:

It doesn't matter.

It doesn't have a deadline.

It doesn't have to sell.

If the fandom is online, posting fanfiction stories is an opportunity for instant feedback you won't get in original writing, unless you are already a brand name. Mind you, those stories are NOT yours to sell or profit from, other than to profit from the fundamental practice writing and completing stories. I recommend using a distinct throwaway nom de plume for each fandom.

As I've admitted many times, I used the offered opportunity to develop my distinctive (I hope) 1st person style and playtest original (as in distinct from the IP) plot, worldbuilding, and character ideas. It should be considered dangerous only if the IP owner is litigious (for some reason, the late Anne Rice comes to mind), you find you can write nothing else and want to, or someone might use the fact that you wrote fanfiction to troll or hurt you.

As a professional writer attending conventions, more than one established author has admitted to writing fanfiction, sometimes for the fun of it or to blow off steam from the real work. As I stated, whilst it was fun doing so, in the end I focused on healing after my burnout in 2001 and perfecting a writing style for my future work.

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

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#EroticMusings 2025.0713 Week 7 (July 13-19) Craft — Do you have a distinct style? Did you develop it intentionally? Do you want to change it? CW: Note the hashtag; nothing salacious.

Do I have a distinct style of erotic storytelling? As in unique enough that a reader would recognize it as something I wrote? I am not well enough read in the various applicable genres to say that definitively, but I'd be willing to entertain the notion. I have not yet published anything that I would label as more than cursorily erotic, and that's only if the reader is reading for the double meanings and implications, which I would recommend that they always do.

Did I develop that style of storytelling intentionally? I did, very much so! I don't write to entertain; no, I write to say something (usually about gender roles) and endeavor that it also entertain. Similarly, I don't write to provide gratuitous content, but then if the reader decides they see it that way, in a reading world were textual-interpretation and the idea of mort de 'auteur is fashionable, I am more than happy to have the reader have their way. I suppose a dirty mind helps here, though I dislike the term as it implies wrong thinking and is often used to coerce and control people. I am not a fan of instructional manuals or anatomy lessons, and use of common vulgar language and over-used terms. There is plenty of pornography out there, and I've no desire to compete.

Since I write in 1st person, not 3rd, the showing experiences and the goals of the POV is necessary, and, in my opinion, what is truly erotic, if a reader chooses to see it as such, is the connections people make, the illogic of desire, how it feels, how time dialates and worries manifest, whether the POV's heart beats faster and sweat gets in the way, what the POV want for the other person and whether they react in kind, and in the end the effort and sacrifice it takes to achieve those goals as much as how they (however many of them) deal with the results and aftermath. For instance, from a WIP, it's when a simple neck massage—to comfort a person (for the sake of simplicity, call them a prince or princess) you are learning to respect who has had a bad day at court—can turn into something rather messy in a public space simply because you and they both agree it must, and consent that must happen now. When friends or antagonists get to together, they can and do learn about themselves, often make a mess of it, and maybe have fun doing so or ponder why, if not. The ripples it sends through a story can be delicious wonderful. The concept here is that all human activities are equally important to the story, and if the reader sees issues with this then it is the reader who is learning something.

Do I want to change my style? Well, perhaps I should wait and see if I find an audience that likes what I am writing, first? 😝

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Suite du fil

The "objectiveness" of so-called third-person objective is something that should be questioned in print as well as in video, IMO. We're pretty wise to how choices like editing, angles, distance, and screen time make a difference in the reception of visual media. Why isn't this interrogated more with print media? With limited/internal viewpoints we talk about unreliable narrators--how reliable is the author who purports to write in an external viewpoint? With no editor, producer, or viewpoint character to point to, we tend to be a little too quick to accept the impartiality of the invisible, intangible "eye in the sky," or wherever the author chooses to place it. Is it because the author makes these choices and we accept the author and their choices as authoritative, as it were, for the fiction? @writers #WritingCommunity