Posts in category: Personal

As a lot of you may already know, I’m currently working on a novel. It’s been teased periodically on our Discord server and I’ve mentioned it when building the city in modded Minecraft (which is it’s own post coming soon).

But I don’t talk about the book too much outside of those things. The main reason is not wanting to spoil it, paranoia about copyright, etc. However, I’ve decided I do want to talk about it a little bit. After all, this book has been in my head for years.

So the best way, I feel, is to write weekly “logs”. It’s kind of like a development log, except I’m a writer and I’m posting bits and pieces of story progress.

In this post, I want to discuss world-building. Things such as world-building platforms, how to manage the lore, and keep all of my notes together.

Growing up, I used pen and paper. I had handwritten the whole story in a random notebook we bought for back-to-school. But then I’d have to go on the computer and type it all out. Nowadays, using pen and paper isn’t as feasible, as it hurts my wrist to spend a lot of time writing.

I’ve also tried a lot of different online platforms. For the longest time, I was trying to make WordPress work for a story bible. And it kind of did – I set up a wiki page, I arranged everything on the website, made “Articles” searchable, and the whole works. But ultimately, I didn’t like how it looked.

Fairly recently, I was messing with a Linux distro called Zorin. I thought it looked cool and sci-fi enough for this book, so I tried it out for managing this story. I researched different programs and software I could install using Docker. There are quite a few good ones out there (one called Bookstack, which can be used for a lot of different things). But ultimately, I had settled on trying Obsidian for a while.

Obsidian is a beast of a program. It’s very cool, simple to use, and very customizable. I was able to format it wiki-style in order to organize everything. But it still wasn’t scratching that itch that was bothering me.

I had previously experimented with a custom website coded to work like a mix of a wiki and a kanban board. This ultimately worked the best for me. Not only was I able to throw all the ideas on the website, but I also organized all the chapters for the book and made a way to export things. There was something about seeing my project displayed proudly on a Word document, being able to scroll on my phone, almost as if it were an eBook copy I was reading.

But when it comes to the writing process itself, I found a tool called tome that I ended up purchasing. This is actually a nifty little tool. It essentially helps you develop your story, asking questions you can answer, and giving tips on different aspects of the story.

This is a really cool resource I’ve been using to help get my ideas together. With all of these pieces combined, you’d think I’d have a lot written. I mean, technically I do?

The world-building site has almost 2,000 words in just characters, places, and lore alone. In total, having 29 entries. That’s not too bad for a book that’s been in progress for years, which I started rewriting!

I don’t have a concrete total of how many words for the actual novel I’ve written. It’s about 8525, give or take, accumulated over a few different places. That’s the running total at the moment for this writerly log.

Next time, I’m going to talk about – and work on – developing mood boards / Spotify playlists for all my characters. Stay tuned!

Happy International Cat Day!
Cats have been a big part of my life for as long as I can remember. Buffy was one of the first cats we ever owned. He would sit and watch my sister/I when we were babies.
Buffy was one of the cats closest to me growing up. In 5th grade, I remember spending hours on the computer writing my book while he lay on my bed. He was one of my best cat friends. For the longest time, I went by Buffymlg online, which came from the cat.
Tribute to the other kitties, too: Bella, Maxwell, Murray, Annie, and Gus Gus.
But currently, Teddy reminds me of Buffy. I can’t deny the similarities between them.

Teddy has me through some of the hardest times in my life. Time and time again, this cat has cuddled the bad dreams away, been used to catch my tears, and been my rock through it all. I can’t deny that I don’t know what I would do without this cat.

Cats are such wholesome, innocent beans. They love us unconditionally, much like dogs. They’re our protectors, our cuddlers; they listen when there’s no one else around. The friendship of humans and cats is undeniable. And that’s why they mean so much to us: Simply because they’re our friends when we need it most.

Maybe not every cat is like this. Gus Gus wasn’t much of a cuddler, but that cat was one fierce protector when he wanted to be.

Loving an animal so much is such a blessing in my life, and I can’t say I’ll ever stop loving every single one of them. Our pets deserve the world, so we give them our whole hearts.

Writing is hard.

Actually, let me rephrase that: reigniting your passion for writing after losing it is hard.

Here’s the thing. I’ve had this specific story living in my brain since I was in the fourth grade. That means these characters have coexisted with me for nearly 20 years.

Back in high school, I carried a little notebook everywhere I went, scribbling down ideas every spare second I got. But when graduation hit, my passion for writing seemed to vanish with it.
When high school ended, so did a lot of the passion for writing.
I haven’t completely abandoned the characters. They’ve always been living in my head rent-free along with their stories. All of the characters have their own backgrounds, secrets, and personalities. It’s simply not possible to not think of them sometimes.

But last year is when I started experimenting more. I woke up with the idea of: “what if I create a physical character? A version of my original character I can hold?” And this inspired a spiral into custom doll making because, for some reason, that inspired me to write.
But the good news is that it did, it actually did help.
Having to sit down and think about my characters, what they are wearing, their personalities, what accessories they carry? It made me realize how generic my characters are.
And that part of my writerly journey inspired a whole passionate rewrite and rework of my characters.
My story became less of an average weird chick flick and slice of life, reforming itself into a more modern, scifi feel. While the story still takes place in the year 2105, my vision of the future looks entirely different now.

The takeaway? If you are facing writer’s block or struggling with character development, try building your characters from scratch in the real world. Take a few minutes to design their wardrobe. map out their physical traits or maybe even make a poseable doll.

It completely transformed my writerly journey, and honestly, it might just help you, too.

I’m so excited to finally share this sci-fi world with you. Welcome to the journey—this is just the beginning.