Let's Talk About The Fantastical

Hello everyone, glad you could make it back. 

So today we're going to talk about the Fantasy Genre and how big it really is. So we all know that one fantasy book that we all really like. Or pretend to like. Or pretend to know. Or so on and so forth. Well here's the thing, the Fantasy Genre is a lot bigger than what I first thought it was and maybe it will be bigger than what you originally thought too. Today I'm going to dive into Fantasy Genre and the Sub-Genres.

Fantasy (The Big Name)

Fantasy is a fiction genre set in an imaginary universe, often but not always without any locations, events, or people from the real world. Most fantasy uses magic or other supernatural elements as a main plot element, theme, or setting.

Science Fantasy

Science fantasy is a mixed genre within the umbrella of speculative fiction which simultaneously draws upon and/or combines tropes and elements from both science fiction and fantasy. It also sometimes incorporates elements of horror fiction.

Historical Fantasy

Historical fantasy is a category of fantasy and genre of historical fiction that incorporates fantastic elements into the narrative.

High (Epic) Fantasy

High fantasy is a subgenre of fantasy, defined either by its setting in a fictional universe or by the epic stature of its characters, themes, and plot.

Urban Fantasy

Urban fantasy is a subgenre of fantasy defined by place; the fantastic narrative has an urban setting. Urban fantasy exists on one side of a spectrum, opposite high fantasy, which is set in an entirely fictitious world.

Low Fantasy

Low fantasy is a subgenre of fantasy fiction involving "nonrational happenings that are without causality or rationality because they occur in the rational world where such things are not supposed to occur."

Heroic Fantasy

Heroic fantasy is a subgenre of fantasy which chronicles the tales of heroes in fantasy settings.

Dark Fantasy

Dark fantasy is a subgenre of fantasy which can refer to literary, artistic, and cinematic works that incorporate darker and frightening themes of fantasy. It also often combines fantasy with elements of horror.

Gaslamp Fantasy

Gaslamp fantasy is a subgenre of both fantasy and historical fiction. Generally speaking, this particular realm of fantasy employs either a Victorian or Edwardian setting.

Now there are more sub-genres of Fantasy, but I'm sure you get the idea now. If you want to start writing in the Fantasy genre you can work in any of the above or even start combining them if you so desire. That's the great thing about Fantasy, you can really do anything you want. Just make it fantastical.

Hopefully, this has helped you and, as always, just keep writing,
Dakota

I Want To Write, But I Don't Know What To Write

Hey everyone, glad you can make it back.

So how many of you have ever got that urge to write, to create something, and when you sit down to start you just don't know what to write. Maybe you've been working on a mansucript, a story, a poem, or your main peice of work, but you feel you want to take a break from it and work on something new? Yet nothing is coming to mind, all you have is that urge to write something new. Well, today I'm going to tell you of my five favortie writing prompts and, maybe, they'll work for you.

A Picture is Worth 1,000 Words

I know you've had to hear this at least once in your life. And it works as a great writing prompt. Find yourself a picture, hit up deviant art, tumblr, Facebook even and find a picture that captures your eye. Or have a friend do it for you. Here's the thing, you get no contex about the picture. You just get to see it and go for there. Now you can set the word limit, you don't need to have a thousand words, but it works for the name.

Dialogue Prompt

This prompt is a really easy one to get going or it can be really hard. Honestly, it depends on how you see the world. If you hit up Pinterest there are hundreds of dialogue prompts there and you can pick any of them to start with. Let your creativity go for it. But let's say you don't want to do that? Well what you can do is go out in public, take a seat somewhere there is a lot of people and just listen to what they are saying. Yup, I'm saying you should eavesdrop on people. Listen for the oddest few sentences you can find, then write the story to go with them. You'll be surpised on what you can come up with.

Lyric to Prose

So everyone has that one song they really, really like to jam to. That's great, but I bet you didn't think of it as a place for a story. Take any song and listen to it once, maybe twice if you need too, and then write the story that it inspires. Some people go with the story behind the song others take what they feel about the song and write it there. Its fun. Now you want to make it a little more random? Go to Pandora or Iheartradio and pick a station, listen to a few songs and pick from them. Or, if you're the social type, go up to a stranger or a friend and ask them what the last song they listened to was and you listen to it, then write the story. I've seen this prompt produce some really great stories and I hope it works for you as well.

It's All In the First Line

For those of you who can just write without any planning (who I envy very much) this is the perfect start for you. Go to your local library, bookstore, friend who has a bunch of book' house, any place where there are plenty of books. Grab a book, and just let it open, don't think about it, just let the book open and when you have a page, close your eyes and pick a line. There you go, you have the first line of your story and just keep writing. This is a little difficult to do, especially if you're like me and like to plan everything out, but if you can jsut write, go for it. See what you can come up with.

Order from Randomness

So this prompt is probably one of the most frustrating, but amazing, prompts I have ever dealt with. I was introduced to this by my creative writing professor who was a man of literary fiction. Darell Spencer was professor and where he did not deal with genre fiction, he taught me alot about the craft and his method. Okay, so here's how it works. You go out into the world with a note book and just start writing down things you notice. Things that catch your attention, details about something that are cool, interesting or random dialogue you here; just write down everything. Make sure to number them as well. 1, 2, 3, 4, so on and so on. Once you've got a bunch of details, ask a friend to pick six random numbers from 1 to however many you have. Then you take those five sentences/details you've collected and put them into a paragraph. Yes, it will make no sense at first. But you just keep repeating the process. Always collect more detials and just keep putting them in. Keep making paragraphs in the same way, then go back and put in new sentences in random places (have a freind or significant other picking the numbers) and slowly the story will build. If you do this you'll write something you'd never think you would have wrote. It worked for me. I didn't think I would end up writing gay sex for a class assignment, but I did.  This can be a frustrating task though, just a heads up. It takes time and patience.


Well everyone, those are my top five writing prompts. What do you think? Some you want to try? Do you have a writing prompt that you really, really like? Let me know. I'd love to see what you come up with.

And always remeber, just keep writing.
Dakota

It's Your World

Hello everyone, glad you could make it back.

I've heard that writers are often called egoistical maniacs with god complexes and I kind of have to agree. Sort of. We essentially are the gods of the worlds we create. Think about it. Our stories begin as nothing more than a blank piece of paper or a blank word document and then, boom, there's life. We create. We are gods. We rule over the worlds we create. Awesome? Intimidating? Both? Well its something we're not going to escape, which brings me to the topic of today's post. World Building.

What is World Building?

World Building is what it sounds like. You're building a world. Your story takes place somewhere, be it modern day New York City or a medieval fantasy world or maybe even the outer planetary ring in a sci-fi future. You have to set the world that your story is taking place and this is often pushed to the back burner. We all know characters are the most important, right? Or was it the plot? Maybe it was the sentence structure? Actually all of them are important, but World Building is one of the most important ones. Without your world, you don't have a place to place your story.

Your World is a Character

People give me a weird look when I say that the world is a character and like any other character that you'd create, there is a lot of questions that you need to ask yourself while creating this character. How big is world? What type of world are you going for? Why are things the way they are? If you think making your main character is a lot of work, then you're going to be blown away by how much you need to do with world building. Here's a great starter list for you if you need some starting points. Click Me

How Much World Building is Needed?

Alright, this is a tough question to answer. In all honesty, you'll probably never be done world building. There will always be something that'll come up and you'll realize that you didn't address. For me, I recently realized that my world didn't have any holidays. Okay, you're probably thinking "holidays" really? Yeah, it makes total sense that my world would have holidays, they're part of culture. So I had to make sure to create theses. Here's the the thing, you'll work and work and work and work on your world building but only like 10 to 15 percent will make it into your writing. But you're going to need it.

But What If My World Isn't A Made Up One?

So you're basing your story in the real world? You still have to world build. You're basing your story in New York City? You'll have to build up New York as the world. What's the culture, the sounds, the feel, how does the city interact with your character, how does your character interact with the city; not everyone knows New York so you'll have to create this place for the reader. Details are everything.  Take a look at any of the popular Young Adult novels out there. If they're based in the real world, the authors have created the world again inside their novels. I hate to talk about her, but Stephenie Meyer did a great job with her Twilight Series. Everyone knows about Forks and its a real place.

Great Novels and Great Worlds

With every great story, there is a great world that it is based in. Some are created so well we don't even notice them, but then are those who we have fallen in love with the world. J. R.R. Tolkien created one of the most influential fantasy worlds out there with his Hobbit and Lord of the Rings series. Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 is an amazing dystopian novel that, arguably, predicted many events that have come to pass. Then you have J. K. Rowling's wizarding world that is more than just a craze for thousands, if not millions, of people. When your world is great, it'll help make your story great.

There are so many things that go into world building and some people may hate it. It can be incredibly tedious, but at the same time, I find it to be incredibly fun. Making a world come to life will be a challenge, but you'll love it.

Just remember to keep writing,
Dakota

Taking the Critique

Hello everyone, glad you made it back.

So I'm part of a writing group and we meet every week and I've been a part of this group for a while now. Well, I've started noticing a few things about some of our newest members and it got me thinking about how they are responding to the critiques we were giving of their work. Thus the topic for this post. Taking the critique is an important part of being a writer, but some people just don't know how to do this.

Everyone's a Critic...

Yes, We Are Tearing Apart Your Baby

Your work is like your child. You've spent hours working on it, filling a blank page with words, bringing characters to life, and so forth. You love what you've done. Then someone comes along and tears it apart. Soon you pages are covered in ink, things are crossed out, there are comments all along the margins, and editing marks are pointing out every flaw that you missed in your own editing. Okay, I'm going to say it now. Yes, this does hurt. It sucks when you see your work covered in marks. But here's the thing, every writer has gone through it. When you get serious about being a writer, an author, you have to learn how to accept the pain and power through it so you can get better.

Should You Listen To Everyone Who Critiques Your Work?

Oh, god no. Please don't listen to every person who critiques your work. There'll be plenty of people who will read your work and put in their two cents about it. Some people are going to love it as is, some people will have things to tell you how you could make it better, and some people are going to hate it no matter what you do. You're going to need to recognize who are going to be those who want to help and who are just there to bash on you. Sometimes the closest people to you will be the worst people to have read your work, friends and family tend to be the ones who love everything that you do no matter what.

Find Those Who Will Be The Right Balance

This might be one of the hardest things that I have seen my fellow writers go through. Finding that right person to look over your work, finding that one person who will give you their honest opinion regardless of your relation with them, finding that one person whose feedback will be helpful to you; this person or people will be invaluable. This will take some time, but you'll be happy when you find this person. It'll help put you further along than those who stay on their own.


This is something that I know many starting writers struggle with. We get brave enough to show someone our work and then we get that first bad critique and it hurts. Then we have to figure out what we are going to do next. Do we trust anyone else to read our work? Yes, yes do. We have to. I'm lucky enough to have a whole group of people who I trust to give me honest opinions of my work. Everyone needs to find that person or those people who will help push them to be the best they can be.

Just remember to keep writing,
Dakota