LIZORAE

Kingdom Hearts is an award winning video game. It also has a plethora of characters, convoluted plot and sometimes, is plain cringy. But I still love it. And so do thousands more. What makes the mess of a story so intriguing and inspiring to so many people? How can gamers and non-gamers (like me) still be hyped for the next instalment 12 games, excluding remakes, several mangas, a cancelled Disney TV show and 18 years later?  After thinking about for a while, I've figured two things out. These "secrets" can throw almost every other storytelling advice out the window. Not that you should throw out everything you've learnt about writing, but you get my point?  Be prepared for two of my favourite advice ever. 1. Enjoyability over quality.  Source: Gifer Even though I know  the story is a mess, there are inconsistencies and moments I wish I could forget ( "Did someone say a door to darkness?" ), I keep watching the cutscenes. Why? Because I like it anyway.  ...

Every author can agree that first drafts are their absolute worst draft. You might want to keep it for sentimental value. Or to mark your progress. But what happens when someone stranger finds it and even worst, reads it? Enjoy this meme made by yours truly's! (who may or may not have been procrastinating until it's too late to write a full blog post)   Transcript Isuldur, aka the reader, holds the Ring. We can't see his face. Elrond, aka the author, shouts: Cast it into the fire! Destroy it! Isuldur smirks and says: No.

Authors need to always have a place to find new ways of incorporating ideas. Where do these ideas come from? There are two sources: real life and stories.  The two of them are the same, but different. Mind blowing, I know. Today's focus is going to be on the latter, stories.  Humans need stories to survive, so how much more do authors need stories? I'll give you the answer: a lot. We're one of the biggest sources of entertainment. To be able to live up to this expectation, our creative well must be stimulated. Here are five sources authors can take from. (I swear this is not just an excuse for me to gush about some of my favourite stories.) 1. Books Source: Gif Library Let's start with the obvious. Books. If you weren't expecting this one, please say you're completely sleep deprived and we'll forgive you. Maybe. Like I talked about last week,  studying how books are written is hugely beneficial to authors. But you don't always need to be criticising t...

Ever since I first started reading writing blogs, I read hyper critically. That was the day everything changed. *cue dramatic music*  The more problems to find, the better it was the criticise. It made me able to stand even the worst books. Any book I touched, I read and finished.  It's because of critical reading that has made me editing my own works so much better. I can go on and on about the benefits, but that's not the aim of today's post. When I read in this mindset, no matter what book it was, I read it. A lot of this happened: Me: *reads badly written book* Friend: So, how's that book? Me: Oh, this? It's trash.  Friend: So why are you reading it? Me: *Jafar grin* I'm an author. Crazy is my middle name. I read everything. And I mean everything. (Except the books which contained content I'm not chill with.) Some people thought I was a little weird for doing that. Okay, a lot weird. But I found this quote that totally got me. "Read, read, read. Re...