#PennedPossibilities 654 — How would your SC introduce themselves?

Answers for (Lightning) Bolt, assuming I write the day angel's later stories:

Gives you a look and visually checks for weapons before giving a practiced harrumph then scanning the area for actual threats. She's training as a praetorian, but is already the devil-girl's captain of the guard. She nearly killed the main series antagonist for that woman; she has the knack for being a bodyguard, and she's being trained by one of the best: The devil-girl herself.

Out of uniform, she's not likely to introduce herself unless asked, and then give de minimus until she knows you. She spent a decade blackmailed and working for a crime syndicate. Not being noticed, and not identifying is pretty much branded into her brain. Since the devil-girl was also blackmailed, they'd been forced to work together before they ended up bonding over common experiences.

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

#BoostingIsSharing

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Ooo! Ooo! #Scrivener fans and #author #writers! I just tried my weasel and hedge word RegEx string in the Scrivener search box set to "Regular Expressions." It highlights all the found words, making it easy to skip or revise.

Below find my RegEx. Feel free to try out! The \b escapes ensure only the entire word highlights. The vertical bar separates individual search strings. Some words like can are stand-ins for can't and cannot, so are not conditioned for an exact match.

\babout\b|almost|already|barely|\bbit\b|begin|\bbegan\b|\can|certain|generally|guess|\bjust\b|kind|\blike|maybe|mostly|near|course|perhaps|possibly|potentially|really|probably|seems|\bsome\b|sort|start|\bstill\b|surprisingly|\bthink\b|usually|could|\bsaw\b|\bheard\b|\bfelt\b|\bknew\b|\bread\b|noticed|recognized

#BoostingIsSharing and more in #altText.

Well, I gotta say, I do like how Scrivener's integration with the Mac printing APIs allows me to save any web page I am viewing for research as a PDF stored directly into the research folder of the currently focused Scrivener project.

Type ⌘-P, pull down the control that shows PDF by default, choose Save PDF to Scrivener

#BoostingIsSharing.

#WritersCoffeeClub #WCC 2504.25 — World Penguin Day! How have ‘the classics’ influenced your work?

One book profoundly influenced my life. It is proof why conservatives and the religious suspect higher education, especially for women, and are trying to cripple both colleges and educational institutions in general. I read this book at university. It was assigned reading in an art history class. I read it and within a year became an agnostic. I literally lost my religion, lost faith; admittedly, other factors came into play.

I had many reasons to champion women's right, but this work was clarifying. (Note I'm not using the word "seminal" for etymological reason.) If you are a feminist, or are appalled by toxic masculinity or patriarchy, you should read this. It's a well researched art history book supported by archeological evidence about the origins of patriarchy and the destruction of prior matriarchal societies in the middle east of which there are plenty of echoes in the Old Testament.

Merlin Stone, When God was a Woman.

Amazon link (not affiliated): https://www.amazon.com/When-God-Woman-Merlin-Stone-ebook/dp/B0083DJYIK

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

#BoostingIsSharing. More in #altext.

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https://notanothernewsletter.substack.com/p/weekly-wrap-up-opening-week-edition
after 84,0000 years here is a baseball weekly wrapup! @baseball @writers #writersofmastodon

What a day. I open Mastodon. We live in a fascist state. I open my Internet feed. We live in a fascist state. I look at the book I'm editing. The characters point out I live in a fascist state. Ugh! I need some whiskey this morning not coffee so I can finish my revisions.

So understanding #Hemingway

#boostingIsSharing

#WritersCoffeeClub Apr 25
World Penguin Day! How have 'the classics' influenced your work?

Bwahahahaha. Well...
They taught me how NOT to write and how to be a much better storyteller by not following their examples.

I find most of the "classics" are dry and boring, miserable stories, and most were written by old white men who sent them to other old white men, and it was a bro-fest of publishing where they labeled these dry tales as "classics".

WRITER FUEL: A new smart fabric converts light into heat and can raise temperatures by more than 54 degrees Fahrenheit (30 degrees Celsius) after just 10 minutes in the sun.

https://www.limfic.com/2025/04/25/writer-fuel-new-smart-fabric-heats-up-in-the-sun/

#writerscoffeeclub #writing 4/25. World Penguin Day! How have 'the classics' influenced your work?

Assuming “classics” means, Scifi classics. I guess, zero? I've read scant few of them. I prefer to read contemporary writers.

I only read Foundation (just the first book) because the show was coming. Neither resonated with me in the least.

I've never read DUNE or Hyperion (Though I read some DUNE prequels by his son, which were ok.)

For the first time in a while (and likely to be the last time for a while too while I write some more things ) I have a new poem out today!

You can read "Fragment of Glassy Black Material" in issue 11 of 34 Orchard, out today and available to download for free here: https://34orchard.com/issue-11/

I'm really proud of this one. It's about death, and life, and archaeology

#WritersCoffeeClub 25/4: World Penguin Day! How have ‘the classics’ influenced your work?
Depends what you call a ‘classic’. The Lord of the Rings? The Left Hand of Darkness? Swallows and Amazons? Massively.
And I will defend all three to the hilt.
You want living authors? The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet, The Mars Trilogy, Case Histories.
But, yes, Jane Austen. Yes, Middlemarch.
#books #writing #writersofmastodon

I am currently working on fixing the documentation of my story that someone wrote in a way that doesn't make any sense, and I'm told they were fully awake, okay yes it was me...

@writers @writingcommunity @writing @humour @indieauthors @authorindiespeak

#WritingMemes #Memes
#Author #Authors #IndieAuthor #IndieBooks #AmWriting #Writerdons #Writers #Writer #Writing #WritingCommunity #Writinglife #WritersOfMastodon
#BoostingIsSharing
#Repost #From #Old #Account

#PennedPossibilities 653 — MC POV: Your best friend comes over at 3 am to go on an adventure. Where are you (both) going?

If Thorn Rose comes over at 3 a.m., the adventure is going to be in my bedroom.

To study. Definitely to study.

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

#BoostingIsSharing

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#mystery #thriller #romance #sf #sff #sciencefiction
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#PennedPossibilities 652—Do you ever use cliffhangers at narrative breaks and/or chapter endings?

I usually use cliffhangers at the end of chapters. Not for every chapter, but for many. If the narrative perspective changes after a chapter, I try to resolve the cliffhanger only when the narrative perspective changes back again. In multi-part novels, I like cliffhangers at the end of a non-final part.

WRITER FUEL: Could we travel to parallel universes? Live Science considers the possibilities.

https://www.limfic.com/2025/04/24/writer-fuel-could-we-travel-to-a-parallel-universe/

Any opinions on publishing through Barnes & Nobel?
I'm looking to migrate off KDP

Did some writing! Slowly slowly closing in on the final scenes of the novelette/novella.

I need to get this first draft done because I can feel myself shifting into editing mode with it, getting self conscious and critical before it's useful.

I'm still hoping to submit it somewhere in October so setting myself a milestone now: finish the draft and get it all transcribed out of my notebook by the middle of May. Then I need to let it brew for a while.

Unterschreibe den offenen Brief auf https://www.creators-for-europe-united.eu

Aus einer Mitgliederinformation des Selfpublisher-Verbands Deutschland:

Generative KI-Systeme nutzen millionenfach kreative Werke – höchstwahrscheinlich auch deine. Dies geschieht meist ohne Zustimmung, ohne Transparenz und ohne Lizenzierung, sprich Vergütung. Auf Kosten von Urheber:innen und Rechteinhaber:innen erwirtschaften die Tech-Konzerne damit Milliardengewinne und weiten ihre Macht und ihren Einfluss aus. Die gesamte Kultur- und Kreativbranche geht nicht nur leer aus, sondern hat bislang keinerlei Möglichkeit, die KI-Nutzung ihrer Werke zu prüfen und von ihrem Recht Gebrauch zu machen, die Nutzung zu verbieten. Im schlimmsten Fall werden kreative Leistungen langfristig durch KI-generierte Inhalte vollständig ersetzt. Deshalb haben wir als Mitarbeitende verschiedener Verbände der Kultur- und Kreativbranchen die Initiative Creators for Europe United gestartet.
Unser offener Brief an die Exekutiv-Vizepräsidentin Virkkunen fordert:

1) Transparenz: Offenlegung aller zum KI-Training und für andere Zwecke verwendeten Werke
2) Vergütung: Faire Bezahlung für die Nutzung kreativer Inhalte
3) Durchsetzung: Konsequente Anwendung bestehender Urheberrechtsgesetze
4) Beteiligung: Einbindung der Kreativbranchen in die KI-Regulierung

Warum deine Unterschrift wichtig ist:
Bisher ignoriert die Politik in Brüssel weitgehend die berechtigten Forderungen der Kultur- und Kreativbranche. Mit jeder Unterschrift wächst der Druck auf die EU, endlich zu handeln. Als Einzelne haben wir den Tech-Giganten wenig entgegenzusetzen – gemeinsam jedoch können wir nicht ignoriert werden.

Diese Initiative ist kein Kampf gegen technologischen Fortschritt. KI kann ein wertvolles Werkzeug sein, wenn sie fair und rechtmäßig entwickelt wird. Wir fordern lediglich die Einhaltung grundlegender Prinzipien des Urheberrechts, die in anderen Bereichen selbstverständlich sind.
Ohne deine Kreativität wären KI-Systeme leer und bedeutungslos. Es ist Zeit, dass dieser Beitrag anerkannt und respektiert wird.

So kannst du unterstützen:

1) Unterschreibe den offenen Brief auf https://www.creators-for-europe-united.eu
2) Teile diese Initiative mit Kolleginnen und Kollegen
3) Sprich in deinen Netzwerken und auf sozialen Medien darüber

Die Zukunft der europäischen Kreativwirtschaft steht auf dem Spiel. Deine Stimme ist wichtiger denn je!