The Timeless Story A Shot Of Remembrance By @doctorliamsr Explores A Conversation Between Flynn & Karl

NaNoWriMo - My Cartoon of the Day - Day 20: Magical Portals & New Discoveries!

A story contains untold magnitudes and there are so many possible choices: who is telling the story to whom? Where are they located? How honest are they? What choices do your characters make when confronted with the plottwists you dreamt up?  The sheer creative act of storytelling requires bravery. Shifting through this realm of possibilities and finding which door you want to open and which approach you'll take.

Day 20: Magical Portals & New Discoveries

Storytelling transforms. It lifts you up from your everyday life and places you in the midst of this world of yours. It allows you to look at the world through another's eyes and walk in their shoes. It's a magical portal all by itself and that's not even including all those hidden portals we so often find in fiction. Are there any portals in your story? Ways your characters leave their regular lives and get thrust into adventure? Allow yourself to be amazed & keep writing away!

NaNoWriMo - My Cartoon of the Day - Day 18: Dressing Up All Fancy: Organize a Ball!

Your characters get a fancy engraved invitation to attend a glorious ball! A chance to dress up prettily and party the night away. A romantic subplot is lurking around the corner as they ask if there's still space on the dance card? Or perhaps it's a time of intrigue and mystery as all the major players are in attendance and secret identities come crashing down?

Day 18: Dressing Up All Fancy: Organize a Ball!

Whether it be a night of magical bliss or horrifying dread - a fancy ball is a chance both for bringing story lines together as characters meet and for branching out as there's so much more happening beneath the surface! Watch out for story ninjas, get your fanciest jewelry ready and have a blast!

NaNoWriMo - My Cartoon of the Day - Day 07: Maps

Have you drawn a story map yet? What does your narrative’s landscape look like? We are all on this writing expedition together with different maps to guide our way. I like creative and associative maps and it was fun to draw this filled with funky little writing places we can explore.

Day 07: Getting Lost in the Realm of Possibilities

What are the central features on your map? The sightseeing marvels no reader should miss? What monsters are lurking in those empty spaces only barely sketched in because no adventurer has ever returned to carry tales? Any hidden treasures that your main character has buried in the early days and now can’t find again? 

NaNoWriMo - My Cartoon of the Day - Day 4

In the spirit of embracing spontaneity: let’s roll some story dice! Dice are known for generating random plotbunnies, offer challenges and nice silly fun. 

Day 04: Let’s roll the story prompt dice!

Whether you the Most. Serious. Writer or the Absolute. Goofiest. Of. All. I am curious to hear what random chance has brought you!

The Temeraire story The Diplomat's Dragon by indecisive_lotus is such a joy to read.

For those unfamiliar with the Temeraire books by Naomi Novik: it's the Napoleonic wars with dragons and it's marvelous. Arthur Hammond is a diplomat who gets unwittingly & initially unwillingly adopted by an Incan dragon named Churki. As he's been strongly encouraged to retire at the end of the series, he's now run out of excuses to introduce Churki to his family.

Throughout this entire story he's essentially fighting a losing battle to Churki & his mother who outmanouver & outsmart the fiercesome diplomat. It's hilarious to behold how Hammond finds himself at a loss and fails to see the traps he falls into, while still wanting to maintain his decorum & social graces.

The language of the story mimics that of the period and the social context of the time is well-represented and thought out.

I enjoy the humor of this story, the increasing desperation of Hammond, the character portrayals. Churki is very in character, and, as a massive dragon, knows when to adopt the customs of the English gentry when it suits her, but also how to completely ignore them when it suits her purposes better.

Mrs Carter is an intriguing dragon's companion. I look forward to reading more of this story & how it develops, for it's been wonderful to spend more time with these characters.

NaNoWriMo - My Cartoon of the Day - Day 15: Crossing the Half-Way Point Today

I struggle to believe it, but we are about to cross the half-way point! How are all your energies holding up? How is your word count? Regardless if you are far ahead or far behind: remember that there is still another half of the month to go & anything is possible! We can do this.

Day 15: Crossing the Half-Way Point Today

Take a moment to bask in the sensation that we made it here! These markers are a good place to reflect on all our achievements thus far, be they large or small. The sheer fact you are still here is to be applauded. Take a breath. Look around. Celebrate. And keep writing: one word at the time!

NaNoWriMo - My Cartoon of the Day - Day 17: Main Characters Take Charge!

It is a truth universally acknowledged that characters in stories are prone to take on lives of their own. We are well into week three of NaNo and this is often the moment when your characters stop waiting for you to come up with a story and start insisting on steering the wheel themselves!

Day 17: Main Characters Take Charge!

What shenanigans have your characters gotten up to that you hadn't planned out? Any new characters who walked onto the page and insisted on being part of your story? Resistance against the ideas you had for them and blazing a path of their own devising? How have your story and your characters surprised you?

NaNoWriMo - My Cartoon of the Day - Day 26: Visualize Your Story

Have you made any fanart yet? Drawings of what your characters look like? Maps of where they live? Favourite childhood memories that bring joy when they resurface in a moment of struggle? We are all inherently creative and I love how NaNo encourages us to embrace it in the broad sense of the world. Whether you make art by drawing, by writing, crochet or sculpting or something else entirely, we are all artists together.

Day 26: Visualize Your Story

When you are stuck on storytelling, it can help to draw a map. Where are your characters now? Where would they like to go? What obstacles do they face in their paths and what shortcuts are available to them? Like your NaNo writing: your drawings don’t need to be pretty or polished - a first sketch, like a first draft, just needs to exist.

If your characters are fighting you: challenge them to draw the way out themselves! Have them sketch their heist or adventure. Allow them to get nice and messy with paint to express themselves or perhaps lament that they stopped drawing past childhood and wish they could embrace their inner artists again. Have them pick up a pencil and explore the absolute FUN that embracing creativity brings and renew it in yourself. For we are in final days of this creative madness. And we are still here! We can do this. Put your pencil to paper and create!

NaNoWriMo - My Cartoon of the Day - Day 25: Channeling Atlas: Carrying the World on Your Shoulders

We are Atlas: we not only dreamt up our story worlds, we are singlehandedly holding them up in the sky and breathing life into them. As writers, the weight of our story can sometimes bear us down as we struggle with finding a way to make sense of our narrative.

Day 25: Channeling Atlas: Carrying the World on Your Shoulders

As our characters run rampant and have all kinds of ideas for what is happening, as our plotpoints diverge and refuse to come back together to be neatly tied off, as self doubt creeps in and rears its head when our first draft doesn't look as polished as we'd secretly hoped: we set our shoulders, bear the weight and keep. it. high!

We are in the final stretch of NaNo now. For some exhaustion may be setting in, while others are celebrating their early victories. Remember: your story depends on you to hold it up; we can bear its weight & there is still time. Keep writing!

NaNoWriMo - My Cartoon of the Day - Day 21: Let Nature Inspire You!

Inspiration often strikes in the oddest places and yet a reliable way for me to call down that creativity strike is to take a walk outside. Breathe in the cold crisp air, smell the fallen autumn leaves and look at the calmness and tranquility of the trees. Feel the wind on your cheeks, the warmth of dragon scale gloves° and the joy that comes from moving your body.

Day 21: Let Nature Inspire You

Take a moment to glance around you and feel where you are in this moment. What do your senses tell you? What is the weather like and when did you last move around & smell the air? Where are your characters right now? What do their senses tell them? What would they like to do to relax or feel better? What is it that you need to call down a creativity strike? Let's write!

°Why, yes, I absolutely adore my self-made,  crocheted dragon scale mittens that I often erroneously refer to as gloves and I still wear them every winter day as I have for the past 6 years. There's a reason for their recurring appearance in these texts and that is that they make me feel *fabulous*. Wearing your own art is such a magical feeling & I highly recommend it.