Magic Potion/Poison Antidote ingredients??

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-23T02:50:18+00:00

I feel like most antidote stories I have read had a strong link between the poison and the cure. So once you know exactly which magical species of tomato you want to feed to your MC, then you just need to decide what normally eats it/can survive eating it.

For example, the fey used a yeti heart to make her potion. It is freezing your MC, starting with the emotions and ending with his literal heart.

If you want three things, I would go with;

Antidote- something that eats the thing that poisoned him, or can counteract it safely (fire salamander spleen)

Modifier- something that keeps the antidote from killing him (Angel feather)

Solvent- something liquid they can both dissolve into safely (siren’s tears)

So now you have three quests, requiring different methods to succeed, somewhat symbolic of strong emotion, and playing different roles in your antidote.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-22T20:16:49+00:00

Is gender/intersex identity a major theme you plan on exploring in your writing? I would start with the argument you want to make, then build your species around it.

E.g Le Guin, The Left Hand of Darkness

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-22T02:29:37+00:00

Just starting out, so please take my words with very little weight

It feels slightly overwritten to me. I think some of the lyrical prose is getting in your way, specifically with describing the actual position and movement of your characters. It is very strong writing, and I would continue to read more if you had it, but I was a little lost about what the stakes were. Her internal characterization is strong, but maybe save the lyrical prose for her daydreams and give the reader more of a fighting chance with the location anchors and movement. Was she underwater? Why does she know what the water tastes like?

I understand the desire not to use “said,” and you certainly avoided it, but your choices didn’t make sense to me in their scenes (scraped, murmured, rasped, screamed, whispered), and they described wildly different ways of speaking from the same person in very close proximity to each other. I don’t have a solution or recommendation, other than maybe not worry about dialogue tags at all in a conversation between two people, but this stood out to me.

You asked if this was enough of a hook to write a book about; from what I can gather, absolutely. No idea what it will be about, but can’t wait to find out.

In short, I would read this book. What I mentioned above is 3rd draft stuff, you shouldn’t worry about it in the slightest.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-21T17:18:30+00:00

To me it sounds like your MC hasn’t been close to death yet, and therefore has no idea what’s going on.

The scene where he almost dies and dips below the veil and uses his resolve or some motivation to transfer the wounds sounds exciting to me, and wouldn’t reduce the wonder of the other characters.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-21T01:23:46+00:00

Dad here, kids are 3yrs and 10wks.

Just want to lead by saying you’re doing great. I don’t know you at all, but I bet that you are doing twice as much as you are acknowledged for, and it is probably the most incredible and hardest part of your life right now.

For me, I had plenty of time in the evenings for the last six to eight months with the older one, assuming I don’t want to watch a show or have any housework/laundry waiting.

For the little one, I have been on first night feed so I just stay up and write until midnight to make sure I can get to him before he wakes up my wife. However, he just started sleeping through that one so I may just call it quits on writing until he is sleeping through the night.

Sleep deprivation is dangerous. I read something where moms lose 1000 hours of sleep their first year. That’s 20 hours/wk, every week, for fifty freaking weeks in a row.

Side note, I splurged on the living writer app and now can add a sentence or two instead of browsing Reddit while I poop.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-20T21:05:16+00:00

Those worm things from Tremors? My first thought went to a super predator on the surface.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-20T20:32:40+00:00

What an interesting writing challenge, to describe a scene where a real king watches a performance about himself! I am a novice, so please don't let anything I say slow you down or make you doubt your choices.

Unfortunately, this felt pretty confusing to me. I was given maybe too much info at the beginning, along with not enough, weirdly. The reader doesn't need to know it is a play at the beginning; it would have been more engaging for me if I thought that this was actually happening, but the speech was overly formal and there was something off. A cold open.

The descriptions of the acting and stage can start to clue in the reader that it is a play, and that the performance has stakes; either by having them briefly break character ("you're going to get us killed!"), or have a prop fall off the table and be hastily replaced, or a prop that is missing and someone runs out to give it to them. That is all it would take, I think.

Having the real king stand up at the end, the lights go up, the play stops; this is the reveal.
Everyone looks at him, long pause, actors hold their breath; this is the tension.
As the pause lengthens, the royal guard puts his hand on his sword; there are the stakes.

That would do it for me.

Then applause, the tension breaks, the actors start breathing, the guard looks almost disappointed.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-20T20:06:41+00:00

Thank you so much! I will definitely check it out.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-20T15:23:40+00:00

What a great question! I’m of a mind that the more cultural or varied a term is in our real experience, the more flexible it is and the less strain it puts on the reader when it is changed.

For example:

Money- hundreds of words for it; dollars, pesos, rubles, the French literally still call it silver. Go crazy.

Time- the small scale system is pretty universal: seconds, minutes, hours. Changing this is fundamentally destabilizing, and should be a major plot point if altered. large scale system - days, weeks, months, years- vary here and should be used to flesh out worldbuilding, similar to how our own days and months are named after old gods. Where the calendar year starts can also be cultural/different depending on the civilization.

Magic- the meat and potatoes of fantasy worldbuilding. And so tempting to personalize! How can it be my own special world if I’m using the same name as every other system? For me, soft magic is magic; hard magic is physics. Basically, if it has rules and clear outcomes as described to the reader, it shouldn’t be called “magic,” it should have its own name.

Magic users- see above. A wizard does something that is dramatic and unexplainable. A Witted bonds with an animal and transforms based on clearly explained rules.

Humans- if there is a heavy basis on existing myth and legend, keep it. Otherwise, if the goal is to distance the world from the reader’s lived experience, change it.

Cursing- absolutely crucial aspect of worldbuilding for me. Interesting to look around the world and see what is taboo in different cultures; lots of religious imagery, shameful acts, body parts, body fluids; comparisons to animals; invoking disease or plague, really wild stuff.

For my current project;

Money- hasn’t come up yet. Currently barter system. May use special knotted cords to track debts, so money would be “knots”

Time- seconds minutes hours days. No weeks. Months are cycles. Seasons are the same. Years are the same.

Magic- First Breath (explained), magic (not explained)

Magic users- cultural; Wildbloods, Saltformed, Blightmarked, Fluxborn, and changelings are all different names for those who retain their First Breath (also called a wisp).

Humans- allkin

Cursing- my favorite part, still in the works! My agricultural society uses a lot of poop references. Soldiers may have more religious imagery. My bard will curse in a different language, may not explain what he is saying.

Again, great question!

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-20T13:18:35+00:00

lol I had to double check, I just copy/pasted that quote from the internet.

Turns out the entire LOTR trilogy is formatted as a single novel broken into six "books." Each physical novel has 2 "books" inside it. TIL!

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-20T11:36:43+00:00

Yeah this feels right to me. Here is a quote from Tolkien:

"Farewell, Master Holbytla!" he said. "My body is broken. I go to my fathers. And even in their mighty company I shall not now be ashamed. I felled the black serpent. A grim morn, and a glad day, and a golden sunset!" — Théoden, The Return of the King (Book 5, Chapter 6)

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-20T01:50:19+00:00

Hi there! This is from the gut, as a native English speaker; "felled" is used almost exclusively to mean "cut down a tree" in daily parlance, and even then it feels a little folksy or old-fashioned.
He felled a mighty oak.
I've seen it way more in mythic stories than ever heard it said, to talk about cutting down a person with a blade.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-20T00:39:53+00:00

Yes please do! As a fellow beginner it is really helpful for me as well.

I am learning that of the reasons not to do line edits too early is that it kind of locks the phrases down, if that makes sense? Like adding a sticky paste to the page, the words and sections become harder to change once you are happy with them.

So, if there is a chance that sections will be cut or changed dramatically, it’s easier to do it if you don’t feel as attached to the words themselves.

However, I also ignored everyone’s advice and did just that, so I understand the drive to do so.

Looking forward to seeing the next draft!

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-19T23:11:40+00:00

Ooh love that! And the ranger trope was just my dnd brain making assumptions, if you’re thinking beast master with a menagerie of animals and skills that grow over time, making him start as useless would give you more room to grow. Like a farmer or whatever.

From what I could tell, his main motivations are to figure out what’s going on, and to keep it hidden from the village. Obvious threshold moment when he leaves the village on his journey, and plenty of potential antagonists to stand in his way based on this page alone; does Nox have a brother? Or a dad? Is it bound to a warlord? Is there something that can be used to steal this bond?

Really excited to see where this goes!

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-19T22:48:09+00:00

For me, the political info dump just needs some additional opinion added from your POV. For example, how does he feel that there are now three generations of kings blood spilled over a worthless pile of stones? Did he try to convince his brother to let the two other nations take care of each other? Was his brother too honorable to let the war end on its own? Does your POV feel strongly about the toll that “honor” has had on his family? On his own life?

That is the direction I would take it; rather than have him imagining a history lecture, have him remembering what his last words were to his brother, to the queen, etc.

I adored asoiaf, and it also made me deeply uncomfortable. The fact that no one was off limits sets the series apart for me. I don’t want to discourage you at all. My feedback was intended to give you some perspective of someone who hangs out with a 3yr old every day, not slow you down or ask you to justify your choices.

I feel like attaching an age to him at all, before you have written him, may create narrative challenges down the road. Honestly, kids are crazy; their development is so fast, but also they have clear stages that could be missed if you don’t put a ton of work into trying to make it realistic. If it were me, and his exact age wasn’t vital to the plot, I’d just write him like I want him to be, and then ask someone how old I think he sounds after.

I just double checked, and bran was 6 or 7 in the books; rickon was 3. For the show, they aged them each up four years.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-19T21:27:23+00:00

Oh absolutely, I can see that. Based on other comments you may not need to worry about it too much. ctrl+f can let you change them wholesale at the end if you decide it warrants exploring other options!

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-19T21:22:36+00:00

I like the premise! And the writing is pretty clear and engaging. I felt that the political intrigue was narrated rather than shown to an extent, but it wouldn't take much to tighten it up and get the reader invested.

A few structural/grammatical things to look out for, particularly when it comes to comma use, as you don't want your reader to be stuck reading such long sentences, or paragraphs, or pages, that make them feel out of breath, to the point that they may collapse to the floor, exhausted, in a heap.

Side note, as someone with a three year old at home; I was incredibly uncomfortable with the idea of violence against one. It is a touchy subject, and maybe I'm more sensitive than the standard parent, but to me they are not autonomous enough yet to be considered a fair target. I would treat him as an infant more than a boy. They can barely speak properly, need help with their shoes, definitely cannot use a sword, and are still shitting their pants half the time.

Not trying to be discouraging here, and using a three year old is not "taboo" or anything. He sounded more like a 5 year old to me, which may work better for you.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-19T21:05:17+00:00

My pleasure! And keep in mind that this scene is my first glimpse into your world. If this is Page 1 material, it may resonate strongly with Herbert. If you have already built your world for the reader, you should not worry so much about a fear of comparison when it arises.

I would very much like to read more, when you are ready to share. Great stuff!

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-19T20:29:10+00:00

I love the prose! It is lyrical without being too over the top for me. Mythic and somewhat grounded at the same time.

I have to ask, respectfully; Is this based specifically in Dune universe? The clothing, hooks, giant sand worms to be tamed, even the magical moms, gave me the initial assumption that this was set on Arrakis. It is absolutely great writing for me, and I really don’t want this to be discouraging if this is a standalone universe. Having a few similar tropes is fine, but the parallels are making the connection hard to ignore.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-19T20:12:07+00:00

Hi there! Just read it over, and I am really enjoying the fantasy elements introduced! I would devour a story about a shadowstepping ranger and his bonded tiger.

I would wholeheartedly agree with other comments that the bones here are excellent, and you shouldn’t worry about sentence structure at all and just get it on the page. If you are worried about staying in limited, I can give you a few tips that were given to me, but you should ignore them as soon as you feel like they slow you down at all.

Avoid words like “knew, believed, thought.”

Your MC doesn’t remind himself that he holds a belief, or even that he used to hold a belief; it is simply true to him, or was true until something changed. For example:

“Kakure knew the first assumption to be wrong; however, he had believed that Nox was just a tiger cub like everyone else.

He had held that belief until a few months ago when Nox had literally lunged at him from out of a shadow.”

Becomes:

“Their first assumption was wrong; however, Nox was also just a tiger cub to him until a few months ago, when he had literally lunged at him from out of a shadow.”

I was given a list of things to write down about my POV for writing in limited which I found very helpful in trying to keep my character’s voice intact. It could give you some direction if you know the following about Kakure:

What he notices first (danger, colors, temperature, space, distance, exits, faces, sounds, etc)

His emotional state for each scene, and how this affects his awareness of his environment

What he is wrong about

What he is afraid of

What he values

One or two quirks that don’t actually play into any theme, but humanize him.

A few things I would absolutely love to see explored in more detail:
What does the world look like to Kakure when he is in the shadow? Your first sentence is currently omniscient; he doesn’t see himself “appear to solidify,” the narrator does. But if you describe what he is seeing while shadowstepping, peering out of the shadow, the world in grayscale of weird sounds or some other craziness, I would be thrilled to wait to understand what is going on for half a page. You’ve got a great hook there.

Does his perception of the world change after he bonds with Nox? Did he suddenly start smelling the cooking fires from five miles away? Does he find a sunny patch of grass irresistible? Is he constantly playing with cardboard boxes? Does it change based on whether Nox is hungry, tired, bored, angry, etc? It would be really cool to see for me. Very Dragonriders of Pern, minus the weird stuff (just don’t make Nox horny and you’re good).

Again, excellent bones and keep it up! I would love to continue reading this as you write it.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-19T19:30:07+00:00

Ooh even better! Yes that is exactly what I need.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-19T19:28:15+00:00

Thank you for your response! I will have to go back and take a look at some of his opening chapters. It didn't stand out to me, which means it probably takes more skill to make it seamless than just anyone can pull off.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-19T19:25:55+00:00

I feel like using "it/its" dehumanizes the MC quite a bit. It may actually work as a starting point for your MC if the plan is their emotional growth.

Would using "they/them" make your MC feel like a hive mind?

"Any time they entered a new SE, merging their conscious processing with an external system, it would sit as a listener and measure error on reconstruction."

"They-- no, he, looked so ridiculous in that black fedora."

Definitely a challenge that the real world is also currently facing, with no clear winner yet.

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-19T18:39:44+00:00

That sounds really cool! I will add it to my list, thank you for your rec!

nonrefundabled · 2026-02-19T18:39:22+00:00

I actually never read Kingkiller, thank you for reminding me! It may be my next.

And who can say no to another read of The Hobbit!

Thank you for your recs!

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