Thanks for the tag @writeanapocalae! I kept forgetting this sitting in my notifications, but here is (finally!) a snippet from the short story I’m working on now for Camp NaNoWriMo.

Her eyes met the Oracle’s–the black, the black. She felt the intensity of that gaze and held it for a moment. “The Oracle is a lying bitch. Just like all her gods.”

And Prima walked away. She used all the length of stride her not insubstantial height gave her. Footsteps, hasty, followed her.

I will tag: @the-inkwell-variable,@zombiefaewrites,@naquadahwrite,@madmoonink, and @wintersaints. (Of course no pressure to do this if you don’t want to!)

So, my supervisor has left and the head of the department has been reviewing resumes to hire her replacement.

There was one candidate she was sold on from the resume. There’s an email that literally says “She’s perfect.” The head of the department said after the first phone interview, “I just got off the phone with the person I hope is our next [position title].” They had her come on site for an interview.

(I met her for about 5 minutes, which, is, y'know not exactly how long I’d like to be able to talk to the person whom I’d be working most closely with.)

Internally, I’ve been thinking throughout this process that it’s not great to have your hopes set on a single candidate (of hundreds) from the resume stage.

Today the head of the department shared that her ideal candidate let them know she is going to stay at her current place or work. The head of my department: devastated. In her own words, shocked. Basically lost hours yesterday afternoon because of this news.

I am…not surprised.

Y'all, I need a new job.

My supervisor is leaving, which is great for her because she’s been stuck at this place for 6 years, but not great for me because she is the only other person who thought things need to change here on a fundamental level.

Add to that the fact that the head of our department wants to hire someone else as soon as possible after discussing the division of responsibilities with me (…yay…).

What I don’t want to be responsible for is bringing another person into this environment. I don’t want to lie to people in the interviews like I feel like I was lied to. I don’t want them to start and then see all the things that I see and feel like they’ve been lied to and deceived and that everything they were told about professionalization and responsible management is just patently untrue.

I don’t want to bring someone else into this. I don’t want to be responsible for making someone feel like I feel.

I need a new job.

kaylewiswrites:

Happy Thursday everyone! It’s officially ‘curl up next to the fire with a good book’ season here in the northern hemisphere, and with some people lucky enough to have time off of school or work for the holiday season, they’ll need some books to read. 

I’d love everyone to give a recommendation (or two, or three) of the next book people should read and why! Make sure to include author and genre so people know what they’re getting into! This won’t be the last time I do one of these book rec type questions, so don’t worry if you can’t fit all your favorites in this time. 

All you have to do is reblog, comment, or send an ask with your book recommendations! Anyone and everyone is free to participate. 

I’m really looking forward to seeing what you guys recommend! If you don’t want to miss any titles, or if you don’t want to see me reblog the same post over and over again, the tag is ‘writeblr conversations’. If you want to join the conversation every Thursday, let me know and I’ll add you to the tag list:  @elybydarkness @tjswritingstuff​  @gettingitwrite​@gooseandcaboose​@julesruleswrites​@dawnhorizons​@kd-holloman​  @reininginthefirewriting​@writingonesdreams​@brb-writing​@celstefani​  @kirstenmcwriter​@no-negativity-writes@bardicfool​@nemowritesstuff​@wortfinder​@katekyo-bitch-reborn​@weareallfallengods​@carnationwrites​@seylaaurora​

Ooo! I can’t wait to go through the other notes and get some more books to read (as if I need more books to read)!

I would recommend basically anything by Robin Hobb. Her Realm of the Elderlings books are fantasy at its finest. To start at the beginning, you read the Farseer Trilogy which starts with Assassin’s Apprentice. It’s the story of an individual, but also of dragons and prophets and people and relationships and love. There are a lot of books in that universe now (I think 16?) but nine are my favorites: a trilogy of trilogies about Fitzchivalry Farseer.

I also highly highly recommend Kate Elliot’s Crossroads Trilogy, which starts with Spirit Gate. I picked the first two books up randomly from a used bookstore and suffered before getting my hands on the third and finally finishing reading the trilogy. (I tell you so you won’t make my mistake.) The world Elliott builds is strange and beautiful and vast but the stories are personal and human. And there are giant eagles. (Thank me later.)

invoked-duplicity:

gooseandcaboose:

invoked-duplicity:

invoked-duplicity:

hey guys, i have a d&d related question. i’ll start dm-ing my first campaign next year and i’m currently doing some planning about the start of the campaign. so i would really like to talk about how your d&d campaigns (whether you’re a dm or a player) started aside from the typical “we met in a tavern in a small village” classic. so if y’all wanna come into my askbox and tell me a bit about the start of your campaigns, i would be rly interested to hear about it!

so, i got 54 mssgs, plus IMs, plus tons of comments on this post so far and i have enjoyed reading all of them a lot! feel free to keep it coming, i will not have much time over the weekend, but i’ll do my best to get to them all eventually!

also, just for context, my players (except one) already have their backstory and i have

- a dwarven cleric who is from the countryside and cared for sheep with his family there
- rich elven wizard boy who owns a bookshop but wants to be a sky pirate
- tiefling bard sky pirate (without backstory so far, but hella gay and with big boobs :’D)
- poor as fuck drow rogue who thinks he’s hot shit and kills ppl for money

i already considered for two of them to know each other! so far cleric&rogue are my chosen combo!

This is so fun!

1. The individual members of the party were all individually stuck in a coastal town due to an outbreak of magical plague. The town clerics convinced us to seek out a cure.
2. A mysterious person contacted the characters individually and organized the group to retrieve treasure for him from a forgotten temple.
3. A shared acquaintance (relationship determined by the player) perished and bequeathed his research and a quest (and an airship) to the party, who met at his funeral.
4. All the members were individually traveling to a library on a distant island and banded together when their caravan was beset by beasts and later bandits.

Those are all really cool! I’m very pleased about all the messages I got about different ways to start a campaign :D It’s very interesting to see! I think no3 is my favorite, that is very very awesome!

No. 3 was really fun! I think we started that campaign at around level 7 became of what the DM had in mind, but it could work for any level. It was enjoyable to see the range of relationships the players worked or, too. We had “he was like a father to me,” “my [mafia-like] family provided him with [smuggled] artifacts” (a half-drow gogue swashbuckler), and “he created me” (a warforged paladin) to “I never tell anyone I knew him because that could reveal that I’m from the Underdark” (my little deep gnome rogue mastermind, who does a great impression of being a rock gnome bard, and of whom I’m still quite fond).

It added a lot of dimension to the now-dead NPC, too, (and created some tension in the party) as characters (esp. those enjoy thought they knew him well) tried to reconcile what they knew of him with what other characters shared.

kaylewiswrites:

Between plotting, first drafts, revising, editing, and promoting, writers have a lot of hats. What’s your favorite part? 

Reblog, comment, or send an ask with your answer! Everyone is welcome to participate. 

I tag everything with ‘writeblr conversations’ if you’re not up for seeing me rebloging answers all day, or if you want to find other people’s responses! 

If you don’t want to miss these weekly conversations, let me know and I’ll add you to the tag list!  @elybydarkness​​​​​@tjswritingstuff​​​​​@gettingitwrite​​​​​@gooseandcaboose​​​​​@julesruleswrites​​​​​@dawnhorizons​​​​​​@kd-holloman​​​​​​  @reininginthefirewriting​​​​​​@writingonesdreams​​​​​​@brb-writing​​​​​​@celstefani​​​​​​  @kirstenmcwriter​​​​​​@no-negativity-writes​​@bardicfool​​​​​​@nemowritesstuff​​​​​​@wortfinder​​@katekyo-bitch-reborn​​@weareallfallengods​ @carnationwrites​@seylaaurora​

I’m a fan of writing. I’m a discovery writer (because I like how it sounds as opposed to pantser, which I’ve never understood), so my drafting is my outlining. The story is created as I write it and as I imagine bits and pieces and scenes.

I really enjoy running scenes again and again in my head and tweaking dialogue, though when I end up writing the scene, no matter how soon after this mental exercise, it never comes out quite like the scene in my head.

I wish I liked revising and editing, but I just don’t have a good relationship with those two parts of writing yet.

invoked-duplicity:

invoked-duplicity:

hey guys, i have a d&d related question. i’ll start dm-ing my first campaign next year and i’m currently doing some planning about the start of the campaign. so i would really like to talk about how your d&d campaigns (whether you’re a dm or a player) started aside from the typical “we met in a tavern in a small village” classic. so if y’all wanna come into my askbox and tell me a bit about the start of your campaigns, i would be rly interested to hear about it!

so, i got 54 mssgs, plus IMs, plus tons of comments on this post so far and i have enjoyed reading all of them a lot! feel free to keep it coming, i will not have much time over the weekend, but i’ll do my best to get to them all eventually!

also, just for context, my players (except one) already have their backstory and i have

- a dwarven cleric who is from the countryside and cared for sheep with his family there
- rich elven wizard boy who owns a bookshop but wants to be a sky pirate
- tiefling bard sky pirate (without backstory so far, but hella gay and with big boobs :’D)
- poor as fuck drow rogue who thinks he’s hot shit and kills ppl for money

i already considered for two of them to know each other! so far cleric&rogue are my chosen combo!

This is so fun!

1. The individual members of the party were all individually stuck in a coastal town due to an outbreak of magical plague. The town clerics convinced us to seek out a cure.
2. A mysterious person contacted the characters individually and organized the group to retrieve treasure for him from a forgotten temple.
3. A shared acquaintance (relationship determined by the player) perished and bequeathed his research and a quest (and an airship) to the party, who met at his funeral.
4. All the members were individually traveling to a library on a distant island and banded together when their caravan was beset by beasts and later bandits.

My radiator, on weekdays when I need to get up early and go to work: …what? Is it cold? Someone should do something about that, but, like, not my fault

My radiator, on weekends when I want to sleep in: Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! Is it warm enough now? Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

kaylewiswrites:

It’s inevitable: It’s the first week of November and we’re talking about Nanowrimo.

I want to know if you’re participating! But don’t think you get off so easy with a yes or no question. If you are doing Nano, tell me what you’re working on and how it’s going.

If you’re not doing Nano, tell me why! And don’t worry, while I’m a fan of Nano myself, I understand it’s not for everyone, and there have been years I’ve skipped as well. Any and all opinions are welcome.

If you’d like to join the conversation, get to know writers, and hear about what I’m sure are some very cool projects, let’s talk! Send an ask, comment, or reblog with your answer.

I tag all my responses with ‘writeblr conversations’ in case a. you don’t want to see the same post on your dash a hundred times or b. you’re an extremely cool person who wants to check out other’s answers. If you want to be part of the action every week, we have a very convenient tag list. Let me know if you want to be added/removed!  @elybydarkness​​​@tjswritingstuff​​​@gettingitwrite​​​@gooseandcaboose​​​@julesruleswrites​​​@dawnhorizons​​​​@kd-holloman​​​​  @reininginthefirewriting​​​​@writingonesdreams​​​​@brb-writing​​​​@celstefani​​​​  @kirstenmcwriter​​​​@no-negativity-writes​@bardicfool​​​​@nemowritesstuff​​​​@wortfinder​​​​

I totally forgot it’s Thursday! This was a lovely surprise this afternoon when I finally logged in.

I am saving myself some stress (and probably future headaches) by not doing NaNo this year. I considered it near the end of October because I have a pesky idea for the sequel to the novel I’ve drafted (Scalped), but therein lies the problem. I don’t have Scalped completed, really. The draft is almost ready to be called a complete first draft, and that is not the point at which to start writing a sequel.

So, instead, I’m trying to do some editing this month, and I’ve written down the scenes from the sequel that have been bothering me so when I do get back to this if it still seems viable after finishing Scalped, I’ll have somewhere to start. Haven’t gotten much editing done because I’m at a conference this week, but I’m typing up some handwritten stuff, going to add that into my master Scrivener document, and then I need to see how much more there is to write before the first draft is complete!

To NaNo or not to NaNo

That is the question I ask myself ever last week of October.

The first week of October is all the craziness of other people declaring and I sit it out.

The second week of October is an idea in my head being like: you could work on me instead of the novel you’re supposed to be editing.

The third week of October is everyone with plots and covers and planning.

The fourth week of October is me about to make a poor decision.