Good morning everyone! I just finished my 6th chapter of my WIP. It’s one of those dialogue chapters that kind of helps put some of the plot points in place and gives a deeper look into the characters and how they interact together. It’s a conference between my main characters and their leader where they get their missions and confirmation that they all have to go in hiding. It’s also my shortest chapter yet. My book has been all action and I used this chapter as a little break but now I’m anxious like is it enough to keep the readers turning the page or did I just kill the whole thing with a boring chapter?
Some times in order to keep things interesting, you need to ease the tension. I didn’t like Netflix’s Lost in Space because the writers never let us catch our breathe and have some fun.
You ever sit there, and be like… my novel is boring, it’s not exciting enough, and if it’s not exciting to me, why should it be exciting to the reader? I feel like I’m at that point in BTTG, but I also don’t want certain things to happen in the story where it feels unnatural as far as friendships/romance etc? (sigh) Maybe it’s just my ADHD and my dopamine has dropped for this project.
I need a Alagossian story that is humorous to me.
This means, the third story will be full of action and adventure, but shouldn’t be so dramatic and have tons of silly and side-hurting comedy.
At least I think so. The other stories need some good-hearted laughter too.
The type of laughter that I can sink my teeth into and shed tears from laughing too hard.
Like my stories need to be the good type of funny. The probably with that is, I don’t know if I am funny enough to make that happen.
Yeah, they’re really not. There are so many times where I ask myself what’s the point of posting on WP. At the same time, there doesn’t seem to be any better alternatives? I tried Royal Road. Got absolutely zero interaction. It was worst than WP. I’ve thought of maybe trying Fiction Press since I used to write stuff on fanfiction.net for years, but the visual presentation is not as pretty as WP… but who knows? Maybe that’s for the better? People will judge by the writing and nothing else? Assuming you get actual feedback.
I don’t know if fiction press is worth the trouble.
At least fanfiction.net gets visited because fandoms live on so even though the platform sucks, people put up with it. But for original fiction, readers might have more expectations.
Certain niches do very well on Tapas. You might want to check it out to see if you see stories like yours on there.
I was doing some thinking about how to tag my two books that I earmarked for entering Watty and switched them to reflect the ‘core’/‘heart’ of the story versus tagging in hopes of ranking. It was prompted by interesting article in Bootcamp Mentors book and was an cool process. Might blog about it on my Wattpad profile later.
Also, looking at some ideas about doing another duology for The Fireman’s Girl (as in serious vs humorous romantic suspense). Like, Ablaze and Desired. Or Blaze and Desire Two different women, but the same city, linked via a wheelchair detective and a fireman who dated both women (married one).
No, I agree. It’s a whole different ball game when I post fanfiction. I think part of it is an ADHD thing. Rejection dysphoria I think it’s called? And just the whole dopamine “reward” system. It can be hard to stay motivated to do something when we get no feedback which feels like a rejection of our writing, and without the feedback, the immediate “reward” that would supply the dopamine to keep the project going is hard to maintain. That’s why a lot of ADHD people like video games or things with immediate satisfaction. I beat this boss, I get loot. I do this side quest, I get access to a new area. Long term goals like writing, where it can take years to finally achieve the goal, is hard.
On the bright side, this forum has helped. Just having a group of people to vent to or ask advice from in spite of not getting reviews or reads helps that “dopamine” stay up at times. But yeah, I have my dark days full of doubts. (sigh) It takes me a lot of mental willpower at times to push myself to keep going in the hopes that one person out there will find, and like my story.
I always had the impression that Tapas needed to be web novels? I mean, ideally I’d like to turn mine into comics some day or at least have some drawings, but for now, it’s all writing. The book covers on Tapas definitely seem to match my asthetic though. Like I tend to visualize my stories as “animes/cartoons” in my head, not as real life people. I’ll browse around, and check it out.
I don’t think they have to be web novels. Major difference is that they are supposed to have short chapters so you might have to split the longer ones.
I’d be interested in reading that. Tags have always been confusing for me, and if they’re pointless as far as rankings go, but useful in other ways, I’d love to learn about it.
I linked the article today on my profile, but my efforts were more aligned with making sure the tags actually tell a reader what to expect of the story instead of misdirecting them.
Also!
Also, finished the writing for now to take a break an prep for the ONC. The story sits at 6 chapters, 14K with all 3 pov introduced, all 5 main characters on the scene (2 of them don’t get PoVs). Plus, catch up on reading and do another review.
The book covers on Tapas definitely seem to match my asthetic though. Like I tend to visualize my stories as “animes/cartoons” in my head, not as real life people. 
Tags have always been confusing for me, and if they’re pointless as far as rankings go, but useful in other ways, I’d love to learn about it.