waverly

Trans Rights are Human Rights

  • she/her or they/them or it/its

M.A. Linguistics, B.Sc. Computer Science. Also interested in art and music theory. Tumbling through life. Navigating the universe. Laying on the floor. Profile Picture by ikimaru on Tumblr; Header courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech.



zandravandra
@zandravandra
kitkat
@kitkat asked:

what changes, if any, did you make to your writing habits when embarking on a big long serial story?

my writing habits are kind of weird because I don't really have a set rhythm; I just write when I'm inspired, usually in long bursts over several days. for Her Majesty The Prince it got really intense to the point of hyperfixation, where I would literally wake up, eat, and then write until it was time to go to bed. I would bring my laptop around the apartment so I could keep writing if I needed to be in a different room for some reason! it was a bit wild!

obviously that wasn't sustainable. the big challenge was slowly ramping down my frenetic pace to make sure I could keep writing after the hyperfixation died down, instead of just stopping entirely as the inspiration dried up. that was my big worry—I wanted to keep writing!! I didn't want to be at the mercy of brain chemicals for this one. thankfully, it worked; I was able to shift into a more usual kind of writing mode, where I can get a few hours of writing done in a day and still have brain left to do other things with

looking back, I think the biggest change is that I've gotten way better at planning stuff out. usually I'd just have a rudimentary bullet point list for main story beats to refer to, but it was always pretty sparse. for Her Majesty The Prince, however, my notes document is as long as many of my books. I have 20,000 words of bullet point list items, all meticulously organized. because since I'm stuck with whatever I write—I can't go back and seed plot threads, once a chapter is out it's locked in—I've learned to write in a more "open" way, if that makes sense?

I'm way better at subtext! I can trust my future writing self a lot more! I find myself now writing some throwaway lines that I don't really have plans for, but that I know I'll be able to tie into the greater plot later—and it turns out that I can! for a 100% plotter like me, learning to pants it once in a while has been a great boon to my writing. I'm really excited to see what it does to my future books! ^^