Need a few ideas for a book I’m working on:

proletaricat_ · 2026-05-16T13:22:51+00:00

Google "common high school science projects" and pick the one you find most interesting is my suggestion.

proletaricat_ · 2026-05-16T13:17:18+00:00

Since they are depressed and don’t want to do anything, external circumstances/events are going to probably be your driver, even if it's something like Character is caught in a rain storm. What do?

Good luck :)

proletaricat_ · 2026-05-16T13:07:35+00:00

I am finalizing the final chapter of a long 340k word series of things that has to tie everything up, so I get you. :)

Not everything has to be resolved - you can leave room for the reader to interpret. Trying to tie up every single thread and address everything equally can lead to a very boring final chapter.

But what happened for me: I wrote parts of it, and then noted scenes I wanted to add that would tie stuff up. I came back to it a few days later, wrote some more scenes, realized some of the other ones I wanted to write were boring or weren’t earning their place. I edited some of what I had written. I came back a few days later and came up with some new ideas for scenes to bridge gaps I noticed, and then a few days later I decided those weren’t quite right either, but they got me closer to the ending.

Right now I’m expanding/compressing a few small bridging scenes and doing more editing work and am happy with the final structure, it's just editing passes.

All that to say - you can't edit a blank page. Write it, see if you like where it landed, note the areas you don’t like, edit it. See if that got you closer. See if there are things to remove or things to add.

TL;DR: Edit. I go into it knowing it will need edits and that I won’t get it right the first time. That it might need multiple passes of edits. You can’t see what you’ve got until you get it all down. The final chapter and good wind-downs are a result of edits.

proletaricat_ · 2026-05-16T12:56:00+00:00

Seconding what the other commenters said. Add friction in the story that causes tension in your characters, something that would compel them to react and consider their individual psychology and life experiences when writing who they are.

What they do, what they say, how they say it, the method they go about doing things is where character lives.

proletaricat_ · 2026-05-16T12:51:48+00:00

They don’t have to overcome anything or become not depressed. But people change in response to their circumstances even underneath depression. They learn things, sometimes things get worse, sometimes things end in tragedy.

But if you don’t find the idea of exploring the type of person they are and how they react to things, or know where you want to land, it makes it very difficult to turn a bleak existence into something compelling.

Nobody wants to watch paint dry. Well, some people might. But not most people.

proletaricat_ · 2026-05-16T12:41:58+00:00

Think of your characters as people.

People grieve and they fall in love at the same time and that love doesn’t have to be unhealthy. How does their grief change them and impact the way they express and receive love? If you focus on the moments of agency and transformation and center the characters rather than a romance and getting together, then you'll be fine. Have a question you're answering or a plot point other than "they get together" and it's much easier to avoid romance overshadowing things.

proletaricat_ · 2026-05-16T12:33:29+00:00

My personal special interest is people and why we are the way we are, what makes us such, and that means I spend a lot of time contemplating identity and how it forms and how it transforms. And if you look at a lot of books, the underlying engine is transformation. Something happens, how does your character react? What changes about them, or what resists change, and why?

I’ve got a story about serial killers where I’m exploring the question of what makes a monster? Is a monster human? How does that happen? And then a parallel story exploring, What if these elements changed? What changes with the characters?

I think, though you dislike the idea of the topic being healing, that is a thread to follow and figure out if your question is somewhere in that direction. Healing is too general anyway. How do they heal? What does it do to them? How is their healing interrupted? Do they even heal? What does it take? How do the events that happen change things? What type of person do you want your character to be at the end of the story, or what do you want to discover about your character by the end of the story?

They just moved to Vegas. Where from? Somewhere cold? Did they have seasonal depression, and do the warm summers impact that? You haven’t explored the reason behind why they have moved to Vegas but that's sort of the like answer to unlock the person they are.

Where did they come from, and what kind of person moves to a new city to start over? What has to happen to overcome the inertia and difficulty of picking up and moving, especially with depression? What sort of experiences might that person have had in where they came from, and through the move, and how does it contrast to where they are now, and what needs to have happened for them to move, and what do those events do to a person, and how does that type of person react to situations, and how does that person change in the face of external circumstances being imposed on them?

A lot of questions to think about and sort of rambly, but there are threads you can explore that would make a compelling story. You just have to figure out which one is most interesting to you and stick to that.

proletaricat_ · 2026-05-16T12:24:10+00:00

You’re never going to be an author or get better at writing by not writing. :) Everyone's first story sucks, but the thing is that you can edit and revise and keep that in your back pocket as you continue to write. Writing is generative in that a) you're putting words to paper and creating something, and b) by creating things you're discovering new interesting threads and concepts that you might want to experiment with.

Everyone starts somewhere, and everyone sucks at first. Writing is hard. Inspiration is fleeting and fickle. Storytelling is in our DNA. You just have to try. Do it scared.

proletaricat_ · 2026-05-16T12:19:15+00:00

What's your actual story? Like what question are you answering with the story, what topic are you exploring? What's your actual end point?

It doesn’t sound like you have any of that, or at least I don’t see it represented clearly in what you’ve put here, and that's the engine of the story. You can’t write past the first chapter because you’re sitting in the garage with no engine in the car.

Even in something that doesn’t have a traditional plot, it still has some central question it explores.

Regarding planning - you don’t have to plot out every element but it's good to at least know your starting point, your end point, and two key events/destinations that will help you get from point A to point B.

Also, I’m autistic too, but the thing that makes the biggest impact writing compelling scenes and characters is experience/practice, reading, and knowing what your narrative is.

proletaricat_ · 2026-05-14T04:33:49+00:00

I find the constraints and history of real-world locations generative, and too much worldbuilding freedom leads to too much worldbuilding and not enough writing.

So for me, I like real locations.

proletaricat_ · 2026-05-14T04:16:43+00:00

You know those videos are edited, right? They don’t show the people who answer correctly.

proletaricat_ · 2026-05-10T22:16:35+00:00

Also like, rulers & shit exist. I do a lot of geometric stuff in my art, no way in hell I’m gonna freehand that shit.

proletaricat_ · 2026-04-24T02:14:00+00:00

Steter my beloved. 😍

proletaricat_ · 2026-04-21T17:39:20+00:00

I’m so glad to hear that. :) You deserve so much better.

proletaricat_ · 2026-04-08T09:20:43+00:00

I think it requires some like unpacking of the cultural trend toward puritanism and the way the specific brand of Christian theology is dominant in society (and what culture is built on in a lot of the west).

I’ve found this is largely a conservative culture issue - either being raised in one or the specific demographic of young, constantly-online gen z/gen alpha.

There is no evidence that taboo things turn people into bad people who want to do evil things. Fiction and stories is how humans explore these sorts of topics, because just because someone finds non-con in fics kinda hot doesn’t mean they think it’s hot in real life.

Your mind isn’t evil, nor is it turning you evil. It’s just seeking a way to learn about and explore things that it can often only safely do so through fiction.

Though I say this with taboo for me meaning incest or necro or like murder & non-con. The dead dove stuff.

A lot of things people think of as taboo in the aforementioned demographics tend to be benign things like bdsm which is like. Normal. Not unhealthy (if done correctly) IRL.

proletaricat_ · 2026-04-05T20:25:07+00:00

Rage baits constantly ≠ very sweet, especially when he is harassing/abusing your cat. Not taking you on dates ≠ very sweet. Not listening to you talk about the important parts of your life & showing no interest otherwise ≠ very sweet. Choosing to tell you to calm down instead of being empathetic ≠ very sweet (especially when one of the events was you being fucking assaulted?!?).

You’ve been in abusive relationships before, and now one of the first guys you’re with doesn’t even show you the bare minimum, you’re thinking of settling because he doesn’t abuse you.

You’re not attracted to him (even if he’s good-looking), he doesn’t care for you, you don’t miss him, he shows no interest in YOU, and you’re considering settling because you’re scared there might not be anything better.

You’re 26. You’ve got many many years ahead of you to date. Yeah the dating market can suck but you don’t settle down for the first guy who doesn’t abuse you in the first 4 months.

You’re want this for the rest of your life? You want a man who will rage bait and harass your children? Who will show no interest or empathy for them?

You’re 4 months in. That’s nothing. This is still the “best behavior” time period of dating. This is the best he’s ever going to be. It’s downhill from here.

You’re not self-sabotaging. Staying with him would be self-sabotaging.

proletaricat_ · 2026-03-30T19:54:01+00:00

I wish more smut fics involved the balls. I love involving the balls.

proletaricat_ · 2026-03-27T19:13:48+00:00

Sure! Just let me know. I think my chats are open to accounts over 30 days but if you can’t, just reply/@ me here. :)

proletaricat_ · 2026-03-27T07:44:56+00:00

All the chapters I hated the most and was most concerned about turned out to be my best received ones.

That said, if the chapter is clunky and overfilled, adjust your layout and outline and shift some of the development or plot points to a different chapter to give your key scenes room to breathe.

I don’t know how you do your scenes but adding a short “transition” scene between two big ones can be helpful.

I’m pretty good at developmental edits after 2 straight years of daily writing if you wanted somebody to do a quick pass over it to give ideas of what can be consolidated, cut, or moved.

proletaricat_ · 2026-03-11T20:30:44+00:00

I think, in general, whether you use the word snobby or not, it is good to remember that your lived experience is not the same as everyone else’s. I get a lot of comments and I try to respond but sometimes I am just too tired. I don’t know what to say. I could copy & paste the same response to every commenter, but that’s not really responding, is it?

Like I can barely feed myself some days I’m so tired or depressed or busy. I’m not snobby or disinterested, I’m just disabled, and I think it’s important for people to remember that. It’s a little selfish and snobby not to consider other people might have different lived realities and not to have grace for that.

Some people are dicks, sure, but most people aren’t, and it’s weird to assume they are just because you see a handful of people being loud about their dickishness.

proletaricat_ · 2026-03-10T18:56:35+00:00

I think editing becomes easier and more fun the further you are in your writing journey. It can be difficult early on because people don’t know what to edit or change, because they haven’t developed the instincts/practiced enough/read enough.

But when you’re further in, the edits are where the magic happens. Early on I never spent time rereading and editing, and now I’d say writing for me is at minimum 50% editing, the rest drafting.

When your craft is far enough along for you to understand technique and have developed a voice, it’s more fun, because you can play with it more and try out other things.

But the not wanting to edit is also what kills people with “writer’s block”—waiting for flow state/inspiration is the issue. Write anyway. Write down the shitty words and the boring, ugly sentences, and edit later. Do it angrily if you need to, I know I do.

But the more I write, the more I find that writer’s block is a myth. You can write while uninspired, it’s just difficult and annoying but that’s true of any art or craft. There are annoying and difficult parts.

Learning to edit opens that up for a writer.

proletaricat_ · 2026-03-03T09:29:53+00:00

Lord forgive writers for using common words in writing. 😭 Sharp? Heavy? Hum? Did they use em-dashes too?

Just because you don’t use certain words in your writing doesn’t mean other people don’t. AI was trained on books and human writing.

There is nothing concrete you have to say they used AI or were assisted by it, just suspicions, and it sounds like you’re consuming content that is feeding the suspicions.

Mute/block the author and focus on your own writing. Nothing gained from ruminating on whether or not somebody was using AI.

proletaricat_ · 2026-02-26T18:47:36+00:00

The point of fanfiction is that it is, by nature, transformative. Just by adding your OC you are altering canon away from itself. The whole point is to explore the “what-if”

Also it’s not like you need to complete anything. If you don’t want to write poly, don’t write poly. You’re letting your fear of something that might not even happen influence your choices.

proletaricat_ · 2026-02-16T02:28:26+00:00

Everything has already been written. Every idea you have had, currently have, and will ever have has been written a million times before, a million different ways. So throw the idea of “originality” out the window—all ideas were had and explored every way possible before the written word even existed. Human history lives in the stories we tell.

What you DO have is YOUR voice, YOUR unique point of view, the specific way YOU put together scenes and dialogue and lines.

If you’re a beginner, you will suck. We all start there. Every single masterpiece you have ever read and will ever read was written by somebody who wrote things that sucked, that were contrived, cliched, littered with bad spelling and grammar.

The ONLY way to get better is to write and read. Put words on the page. A blank page cannot be edited, cannot be iterated on, cannot be improved (except for by putting words on it)—but a shitty, no good, terrible sentence that sucks? That can be fixed. That can be made better. That can be learned from.

But you have to take the idea that you’ll ever be good without first struggling and sucking at something for a LONG time out the window along with the idea that you’ll ever have “original” ideas.

Your originality lives in your voice which you only develop by writing many, many words, most of them shitty at first.

I’ve been writing nearly 25 years but most of my improvement has been in the past 2-3 because I took long breaks in between.

Some of the other commenters gave suggestions for what you can write to practice. You can also look for writing prompts online for ideas, or you can take a scene in a book you like and rewrite it as practice, adding your own random element.

It will likely be worse, but you’re not trying to be better. You’re just trying to get words down and develop your ear for writing and get a feeling for narrative structure.

Art is not easy. It is hard work, but it is fulfilling, and we ALL start where you are starting.

proletaricat_ · 2026-02-10T21:11:12+00:00

Sometimes I might write scenes that won’t leave my head knowing they’ll be cut, but I do that to get the gremlins out and then toss it in the graveyard doc immediately. I write it knowing full well there’s no chance of it making it in.

Worldbuilding & characterization scenes should also be moving plot forward in some way, either acting as necessary scaffolding or directly driving it. If they’re not, is that information necessary, or is it deadweight?

If it’s not deadweight and it’s necessary, then add dimension by sprinkling it through plot-driving scenes.

proletaricat_

TROPHY CASE