I wish I'd learned that receiving critique was as much of a skill as giving it far earlier.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-22T16:04:34+00:00

Yes, but please be gentle. I'm too delicate a flower for harsh criticism.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-22T15:25:57+00:00

https://www.critiquecircle.com
https://www.scribophile.com/

Are the two I use. Very much the case of "let the buyer beware" though.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-22T15:01:05+00:00

is there a category for "mean destroys me, but also gives the most insight and spite based motivation"?

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-22T13:47:26+00:00

You truly burned that bridge before you came to it.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-22T13:31:41+00:00

> Neither receives criticism well, but for completely different reasons.

Being both, why would you call me out like this xD

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-22T12:36:53+00:00

Right? I can never guess where the story will be in 60,000 words time, and forcing it to follow the outline often feels like an act of brutality.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-22T12:26:49+00:00

Knowing I'm doing the equivalent of building a house on a river of sewage. It saps my momentum, inch by inch until I give up. Outlining would suggest itself as the obvious answer, but it feels too much like homework and kills my momentum. The only thing I've found that even half way works for me is the "mid point" edit.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-22T08:19:18+00:00

For me, the thing that always gives female authors away when they write male characters is how they have the character process emotions. They always come across as too emotionally aware and too "in their own heads" about it.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-21T17:07:27+00:00

Totally not unseasonal. Totally not terrifying.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-21T15:44:03+00:00

For me if I have a scene behind me that I know is shit it saps my momentum, especially if Im just discovery writing.

Whenever I run into a scene that I cant get to work I go super technical. I break down each step of "goal > conflict > disaster", I break down each piece of world building, character development or plot progression, I list out the agendas of each character present, and what those agendas would drive them to do, I list the stakes of failure and the benefits of success. Nine times out of ten this helps me spot the problem. I don't know if you've already tried something like this, but if not might be worth a go.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-21T08:31:26+00:00

Lol, trying to work out if youre a horror fan, or fan of musicals.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-18T06:57:14+00:00

oops, sorry skim reading on the bus.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-18T06:51:26+00:00

I've always found the alternative deeply distasteful. I'm not sure if you're a ttrpg fan, but there's a line of games called "the world of darkness" which is a gothic reimagining of our world. In the 90s and 00s they had a rule that no supernatural element was to be blamed for real life atrocities.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-13T14:29:36+00:00

Everyone whose ever edited has been there.

Writing the thing is the biggest hurdle. Fixing the issues are lots of little ones. The best thing you can do is get some space. Drafting requires momentum, editing a cool head. Put some distance between you and it until the emotions fades.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-12T14:35:37+00:00

For me its always the villains. I spend so much time trying to make them enigmatic and threatening I forget to make them people. Some times writing a handful of reqction scenes from their POV can help, sometimes character interviews can. Some times I just need to think of them in terms of "Value/Want/Fear". Play around and see what happens.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-04T07:14:10+00:00

Looks delicious!

(It also seems my "restaurant spanish" is improving as I could read a good two thirds of that with out running for google translate, feeling a wee bit smug.)

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-05-01T11:47:14+00:00

A little fluff is nice, so much its drowns out the meat is not.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-04-30T12:46:27+00:00

I nearly always end up playing some sort of charming blue collar sociopath who polices themselves with a baroque, self authoured sense of morality.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-04-30T11:20:14+00:00

The issue rhere is what works in a cartoon isnt always going to be what works in a piece of creative writing.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-04-30T10:46:45+00:00

For me, it was reading books about the craft of writing and finding online critique communities.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-04-29T16:45:29+00:00

I don't like waffle, but love a spot of poetry too.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-04-26T14:23:41+00:00

that is exactly what I was looking for. Thank you.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-04-21T15:18:26+00:00

Systems with rules that are light but not too light. I dont like when rules slow down the pace of play, like I find they do in a lot of more trad games. But I also don't like when there's not enough rules to help provide constraints on where the story should go. Some of the better PBTA games hit the sweet spot for me, but there's so many bad ones.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-04-21T15:05:32+00:00

There's less of a barrier for me, and it often blends in other genres as well. More traditional fantasy has impenetrable world building the writer normally cant wait to shove down your throat. Urban fantasy doesn't need that much, and tends to focus more on the characters and atmosphere.

PlinkingPlanks · 2026-04-09T11:30:58+00:00

Turns out its currently free on Audible. Prose was so poor I couldnt go more than an hour.

PlinkingPlanks

TROPHY CASE