2025: Inching Closer to My Goals

I wanted to engage more this year. Instead, I crawled deeper under my rock. I don't really want to dwell on what feels like the failures of 2024, so let's skip to the articles I want to look at, shall we? As I did last year, I'll read through five of the special categories, pick two articles from each, and see what ideas I can steal lessons I can apply to my future articles.

Natural Laws

This is one of those categories I keep promising to write about and not doing it. My world has a lot of nature, and must have rules governing it, yet I keep putting off writing about them. So I'm looking less for examples of laws I can use (because really I know what mine are) but for good models of writing about laws.

Anti-Magick of Hekara's Abyss

by Kwyn Marie

I feel like my descriptive writing is dry and bland. I know the advice of adding quotes and scene snippets, but that doesn't address my main problem of being bored by my own articles. I love the way Kwyn Marie has brought the flavor of fiction writing to an informative article.

Animal Bonding

by Kveldulfr83

I love articles that explore the relationships between people and animals. Being able to bond with one is an appealing idea. This is a natural law, not a spell, so it focuses on how and when it can occur, rather than precisely how it's done. I love the depth it goes into and the care people take in making sure that the bond will be successful.

Plots

I have messed around a little with the plot template, but I feel like I really don't know how to use it. From the fields it looks geared toward story writing, but I've seen it used mostly for one-shots. I'm a writer, not a tabletop gamer, so I dove into this category looking for plot examples I can learn from.

Gothic Romance Plot - The Vampire Princess and the Servant

by Arger Growler

I am not, I admit, a huge fan of romance. Nor of vampires. Combine the two, and ordinarily I'd give it a hard pass--but this grabbed me. The development of the theme and how it ties in to the action promises a story that I hope I get to read when it's written. I'm also getting a better idea of how to apply this template to the story I'm trying to write.

The Lilith Box

by Gary Kimzey

Such a beautiful thing about World Anvil is how I can stumble across gems that I would never go out of my way to look for otherwise. I read this plot and was entranced. Didn't even notice the sidebar the first time through--only the second time saw it was "steampunk horror", two other genres I don't have interest in. This plot outline is as good as a full story in itself, so spoiler warning: the dramatic conclusion is presented in detail. If knowing the ending will ruin it for you, be careful about reading too far! For me it's the opposite--when I'm reading outside of my comfort zone I want to know where it ends up so I can better enjoy the ride.

Materials

I have a couple of material articles in my world, and they are boring. It's not that my world is lacking in stuff, but that none of it is magical or techy or any kind of interesting, so it's boring to write about. I may not be alone in this, since there weren't many everyday materials in this category.

Ice Cream

by

Ice cream? In a medieval fantasy? Yes! Cold, ice-based desserts have been around since at least Roman times in the real world, and when you add in a sprinkling of magic and a meddling pantheon there's no reason not to have a few amenities that weren't necessarily common in standard Medieval Europe. Food is another thing I haven't written about much because I don't know cooking, but since this is a material the process of making it (more of a tradition) isn't a big part of it. Maybe looking at ingredients as materials would be a way to edge into the subject.

Fiber Optics

by SheWolf Symphony

As someone who works in physics, this one caught my eye immediately. The article is longer than I normally prefer to read, but I found myself following along and nodding through each section. (It does help that I have some knowledge on the subject, so that's my one caveat about recommending this article: if you don't know what total internal reflection is, read up on that before you read this.) The article walks a fine line between material and technology, but since the emphasis is on the properties of the optical cores it makes sense that it's in this category. So I might have a look at the technologies I've already written about and see what parts of them might be worth expanding upon as materials.

Military conflicts

Ugh. One thing I have never enjoyed about history is having to learn about wars. Keeping track of who was where and why they mattered and when battles were and what were the parts I have to remember later. I've written about exactly two, and only because of Summer Camp prompts. Reading about fictional battles isn't any easier for me than reading about real ones, and with apologies to everyone who wrote wonderful accounts about their wars, I truly could not finish most of them. What I found was a pair of articles that took a different kind of look at the military conflict template.

The Bessom Hill Donnybrook

by Harlen Ogni

Now this is the kind of war that captures my attention. It approaches the subject with a bit of fun in mind, and even though there were a couple of serious injuries as a result, the incident is memorialized by revelry more than solemnity. Definitely check out the linked articles as well, which expand more upon the tradition at the center of this kerfuffle.

Protocol: f145c0

by Lexi Con (WordiGirl)

At first this article seems out of place in the conflict category, but--at least the way I read it--the conflict lies more between the log entries than within them. It begins as a struggle with technology that isn't doing what this logkeeper hopes, and ends with a two-week gap in which "an unfortunate turn of events" occurs that suggest a more dangerous confrontation with the technology going far beyond its design.

Prose

I attempted NovelEmber, but did not succeed. In fact I unpublished the first chapter I'd already written because there's so much that needs fixing. Here, I'm looking for the kind of writing that I aspire to. Read what you like, so the advice goes, and try to write like that. And let me tell you, it was HARD to pin down two favorites from this category.

Cray Fishing

by Asmod

I love this piece. It's so short, but so full. It's a seemingly ordinary scene of two people working together to bring in their catch, but contains hints of past events that led one of them to this place and to a discovery of contentment.

Stardust

by Rin Garnett

I want to write like this. The characters are so real, the scenery so clear--even the environment feels alive.

Well, what now?

I hesitate to make promises. Summer Camp and WorldEmber are where the bulk of my worldbuilding happens, and I expect the same this year. I may also participate in some of the unofficial challenges if I feel like they fit my world. I wish I could do more, but it feels like real life is becoming harder to balance with my fiction.