It’s really that the story is bigger than a romance, though that element remains. Lol, it’s going into the paranormal section anyway.
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My big line has always been ability to care for self and others, and that’s not an age thing, completely. That’s been taken away from anyone under 18.
That’s really the difference between now and history.
Now? We’ve got an increasing number of people plain unprepared from cradle to grave.
I think I have the flu or something and I promised my readers a new chapter on Monday 
Still not even halfway through writing it 
Edit: OMG I just went back to read what I’ve written so far. It’s so boring
What is wrong with me? 
How do I fix it?
The last 300 words I wrote
I started feeling a bit better, though really exhausted. I felt so helpless and weak, no strength in me whatsoever. My brain was fried, too tired to think or do anything.
I got up and went straight to the bed. I lay there motionless until I fell asleep.
Next thing I knew, my phone was ringing, waking me up from a restless sleep. I removed my face from the pillow with a whiny protest. The phone was buzzing and flashing upside down on the sheets. I grabbed it and turned it to see the caller; it was Wilder.
I frowned and hung up on him. I didn’t want to talk to him. What part of leaving me alone did he not get?
I looked at the time on my phone; it was ‘5:23 PM.’ I gasped. I slept for hours, even though it didn’t feel like it. I sat up quickly, wincing as the pain came back to literally bite me in the ass. Then, another phone call came through.
It was Wilder again.
I grunted and pressed ‘Decline.’ This time, I blocked him.
Peace and quiet at last.
My stomach growled. I realized I hadn’t eaten anything since last night. So, I picked up the room phone and dialed room service. I took the menu from the table and scanned it before ordering some steak and steamed vegetables.
Once I finished ordering, I hung up and checked my bank account. Damnit. Not enough balance to keep me here for more than a night or even to share an apartment with a roommate.
I sighed as I realized that I needed my family’s support. I dreaded calling Dad and raising all sorts of questions about why am I not living with Wilder anymore. I didn’t want to get the “I told you so” lecture. In fact, I didn’t want anyone to know about the fight between Wilder and me.
Once it’s more than 500 years, the age gap stops bothering peeps
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Don’t tell me that they’re upset because Orion and Ireland are 7 years apart? 
That’s insane. Plus, she’s a big girl. She’s like what? 23 years old? Come on Wattpadders, grow up! Ugh.
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Yeah. I noticed that people get easily offended these days.
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Oh, so it wasn’t feedback from Wattpadders 
I see now. That sucks :<
Hang in there, Alex 
Speaking of feedback, one reviewer told me I should avoid writing homophobic characters. Why not?
I ate a whole bucket of popcorn, and now I watched videos and I have a new idea. I have drafted out Max’s idea but this other idea keeps annoying me lol.
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Doxing, as far as I’m concerned.
Plus, even if you redeem the character or use them as a foil to soapbox “the right way as per the masses”, you’ve got an increased level of a lack of contextual skills the younger your audience is. Some people are 13 on Wattpad–even here. That means all 4 years of high school have not happened yet, for everyone.
Don’t get me wrong, if they are on a website, reading, they may well be brilliant giving the levels of of functional illiteracy in the US .
Or they may be precocious, like my 6 year old, trying to read over my shoulder. Too many things to explain to that kid, for her to read what I write, yet.
The problem is that my child ain’t no other writer’s problem other than mine.
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If it makes people feel better, it’s a mature story with lots of trigger warnings.
Plus, the character isn’t totally homophobic. His father is, tho.
Edit: Oh, and I don’t encourage it. But let’s not pretend that homophobes, racists, and all those other people don’t exist. We don’t live in a perfect world, so why should the worlds of our stories be perfect?
OK. I really don’t feel so good 
I hope it’s not covid.
talk to you guys later
Well, they are not real without real problems.
And placing a mature rating, giving warnings, is as much CYA as you need to do.
Besides “morally gray characters” should exist: where you you could root for them, for half their beliefs.
But as far as "adult contexting" goes,
just this past week, I wound up explaining in a group of my contemporaries what nagging (and worse) looks like. This was instigated by a male who didn’t articulate it (which means he couldn’t easily contextually express himself), and by the way she asked, she’s asked this question before, so she couldn’t grasp what was said in the past.
So I broke it down into a couple of categories but boiled it down to:
If you worked a job where your boss corrected you the way you correct your spouse, and you’d want to walk out that job because of the disrespect, then you’re asking for a miracle for your partner to stay with you.
It was an epiphany moment. Ain’t nobody younger than 35 in that conversation. There was no reason to not know this.
And both people wrote well, so it wasn’t the writing per se. But there’s some huge barriers to comprehension out there, even with skilled people.
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Yes, this! I was watching a video of a teen’s (I assume) reaction the The Catcher and the Rye. I haven’t read the book though I know it’s considered a “classic”, but the reader had taken it so literally, it was like she forgot this was a fictional character in a fictional world. And if you read this, then you support whatever behaviors the characters have. And it’s like… no. The fact that she had a strong moral reaction is a good sign that the writing was effective, whether that reaction is positive or negative. And there is more to take from stories than whether you liked the MC or not. Sometimes the entire story is meant to be a metaphor of other themes, food for thought, even a social experiment. But (sigh) people are just diving into these books, and just “bad thing happened” and now the whole thing is horrible. It’s fine if a book isn’t your cup of tea. Not everyone wants to read certain stories with certain themes. There are some things people can’t handle. At the same time, it doesn’t mean the entire book is “bad.” The writing can be spectacular, the story and characters superbly written, but just because you don’t “like” a character, doesn’t throw the whole book in the garbage so to speak. 
This too. Definitely this. I don’t have kids, so I’m not sure what they’re reading in schools these days. I know there is a lot of controversy. I understand holding back with some themes for younger kids because maybe you don’t want to traumatize/shock them with mature content haha but when I was in high school, I used to go to the library and take home like 5 books a week. Read them, bring them back, and repeat. My parents never stood there like ooooomg don’t read this because drugs! I was smart enough to know what I was reading wasn’t real. That it was for pure entertainment purposes. Like reading Romeo & Juliet. In HS, I thought it was stupid, mostly because I didn’t have the skillset yet to understand the craft behind Shakespeare’s writing, but just because it was like wait, these two lovers meet for like a week, and all this drama happens, and they kill themselves! How stupid are these lovers! What?
And it wasn’t until I was a little older that I realized Shakespeare has a lot of poetry/technique in his writing, and it’s known for that drama/darkness. So while I still think Romeo & Juliet are dumb, I at the very least acknowledge Shakespeare had skills. No one in my HS was saying, hey, this book is relationship goals! Or we should copy the behaviors of these characters! We read it to study some of the lines/scenes, and yes, to discuss the situations that happen. It’s possible schools are so focused on politics these days, they just really refuse to teach critical thinking. Which imho is better than politics. If you want sheep, then sure, keep going with politics. If you want truly intelligent people who can think for themselves and hopefully be decent human beings, then critical thinking skills is a must.
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I think I burned myself out a bit. I want to write everything, and nothing at the same time. I don’t know what to work on. So now I’m procrastinating by looking up how to publish e-books for my poetry which I’m also all over with. Bah.
Good news is that I received a positive comment on that fanfic. Someone actually understood and appreciated the intent I was trying to get across with Poseidon. And I was like 
Yes! Thank you. I’m glad someone sees it. It was encouraging.
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I agree once again, and it’s definitely reflective of shifting trends over what styles are acceptable in writing and also what themes are permitted. Nick was giving some feedback on a first chapter earlier today, one I remember for having a more classical style that while didn’t necessarily knock my socks off but was still perfectly readable and perfectly adequate, and he wrote, “I’ve read lots of books with this style over the years. It always feels less like it’s trying to entertain or engage me and more like it’s trying to impress me… Historically, whenever we work with this kind of content, it tends to do well only to other writers and among narrow peer groups but it doesn’t make a splash to any broader audience. I’m not saying this to change the style, nor am I saying this type of content can’t become popular, I’m only leaving this as knowing what you’re getting into.” Not to say whether he’s right or wrong, but I think this is very reflective of the shift in attitude toward writing with more “classical” structures—and the fact that people are ripping into Catcher In The Rye out of all books is kind of interesting.
I know you’re talking about theme versus style, but I think those tend to be highly correlated: the books which tend to have those folds that stymie readers also tend to have language that demands a bit more thought, a bit more consideration. Like you said, “craft.” In any other context besides Wattpad, we wouldn’t be having this debate over whether more “complex” books are a thing of the past: ask anyone on the street, even someone who doesn’t read much, if they think that Shakespeare or whatever shouldn’t be taught because it’s unrelatable and they’ll look at you like you have two heads. It’s accepted that people don’t always need to stick with what’s simple.
And it’s not just a discussion over popularity: obviously these sorts of books won’t be as popular. But people go ahead and call them unilaterally bad, or criticize them because they’re unlikely to be popular and not because they’re doing anything objectively wrong. It’s kind of like complaining that Thomas Keller is off at The French Laundry serving a “Nova Scotia lobster galette” instead of fish and chips because not everyone wants to eat lobster. That’s entirely one’s own prerogative, but one shouldn’t then act like anyone who does want to blow a few hundred bucks on a tasting menu is willfully ignorant or somehow has less important of an opinion, and I don’t like how this is becoming a broader trend in writing communities that this idea of “challenge” is inherently bad. It is, believe it or not, possible to enjoy a challenge—or that what may be a challenge for someone isn’t a challenge for everyone, and that the nine-mile run isn’t inherently unfair because you personally struggle with it.
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Chapter One done.
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Some grammar problems but it does look interesting
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That is always an interesting thing with machines. The Star Trek standard is that proper English is used by programs bound to their programs, but those who are sentient break free and speak how they like.
And it makes some sense: things that are programmed would be programmed with technicality in mind. But not all bots today use proper grammar. They’ve been taught new tricks without a mind.
So the question on how to handle this would be how hard you want the grammar to be adhered to.
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oh yeah, i agree. grammar isn’t something that has to be adhered to 100% in fiction, i mess around with it a lot when writing Marsy’s pov, both in-text to show their unusual thought patterns, and in dialogue because they’re speaking a language they learned, like, yesterday.
the thing you have to watch out for is convincing your audience that the ‘mistakes’ are intentional. otherwise you get nit-picky dicks like me commenting on them lol