Prose Weaver

03/07/2025

Hello All!
It has been a long time coming, but here at Prose Weaver, we have some Big news to announce!

We just rolled out a new set of features, along with registering with the site, users can do more things with us.

Today, we are announcing the introduction of Account, Chat, and User Search features!

The Account function allows you to create a writer-based account system that showcases yourself, books you've written, and relevant details about you and your writing, reading habits, and dreams.

https://lnkd.in/ga6CqKB4

Secondly, we have a new Membership function. Where you can seek and view other profiles on the website, and send messages back and forth.

https://lnkd.in/gHNXFXDJ

Lastly, we have enabled a chat function that allows users to chat with other users registered on the site.

https://lnkd.in/gS9xxqUr

We are currently busy working on future functions and features. Next update will allow users to connect with literary agents, publishers, writers, and authors! Stay tuned!

This link will take you to a page that’s not on LinkedIn

30/03/2025

New fuctions coming next sat.
stay tuned!

26/11/2024

In the spirit of NaNoWriMo, the annual November challenge to write 50 thousand words in 30 days, I have something quick and simple to say. Even though this challenge creates the culture of writing even if it does not make sense or is total nonsense, I have a caveat to this. You don’t have to follow the rules. You don’t HAVE to write just for the sake of getting your word count up to 50k. For any writer who has ever tried to write something for publication, you would know that quantity is just as important as quality- even during NaNoWriMo. At this point, if you feel a strong inclination to edit your work and revise your plan, then do that. This is YOUR book. This story belongs to you and no one else. Besides that, I only have one thing left to say. I said this last week too and it is this: Keep writing, keep going. You’re nearly there. I’ll see you at the finish line.

12/11/2024

NaNoWriMo check in

For those of you who are partaking in the 2024 National Novel Writing Month, I have a short message for you. You are nearly at the halfway checkpoint. Keep going. Keep writing. Keep creating. And remember to write because you find joy in it, because you feel you must. Write for writing’s sake. Don’t worry or care right now about becoming published or getting royalties. That’s not what writing is about. That’s not why we do this. Atleast, not primarily. Write from your heart. Keep going. You’re nearly there. I’ll see you at the finish line.

06/11/2024

Ideas are cheap…

Brandon Sanderson is the bestselling author of the Mistborn series. He was a lecturer who taught Sci fi and fantasy writing at Brigham Young University. His 2020 lecture series are available for free on Youtube. He has earned my respect in more ways than one and is one of my mentors for a reason. In one of his lecture videos, he said something that is now a platitude, “ideas are cheap”.

When I first heard from Sanderson that ideas are cheap, my instinct was to shake my head and scoff. It’s easy for you, I thought, you’ve already published several books and have written even more. Of course you would say that ideas are overrated and cheap. When most writers who get stuck or blocked are lost for ideas, here is a successful author saying that ideas are cheap. Come back to earth! However, the more I listened to Sanderson and the more I myself wrote my own stories, the more I understood what he meant.

As an author, we must be able to be able to see ideas from everyone and everything. Ideas are in fact, everywhere. They are like butterflies and we each have a net that we must use to capture them. With the current story that I’m writing on, I have drawn on prompts from various sources to use as building blocks. These prompts have elevated my story so that it transcends beyond “just a story” but it can be a story that speaks to the universal themes and experiences of being human. A writer, particularly a gardener-type writer who does not rely on planning, may get away with starting a story from one idea, because as he writes, he will naturally expand on and add more ideas. However, many half-baked novels have risen due to writers starting on such an expedition without properly thinking through the various hooks and themes of their novel. While it is okay to be a Gardener-type writer, it remains important to have a strong foundation for your story and the ability to come up with a range of ideas on which to draw from.

Now it is your turn to share with us your own experience in this area. Describe a time when you worked on your story and ran out of ideas. How did you solve this problem? Were you able to continue your story or did you find a better one to tell? Let us know in the comments below.

30/10/2024

Write what you know but...

At times, the plethora of writing advice out there can be daunting and overwhelming. At other times, you may find a gem amongst the rubble, one that takes your writing journey to better and higher places. “Write what you know” is common writing advice.

We tell this to young and aspiring writers starting out and we tell this to experienced authors who need to be reminded of the basics. But, like with all golden nuggets, this one, Write what you know, is not as simple as you might think.

After all, if we were to take this advice at face value, we would not have stories about rat chefs, princess ogres or monsters in outer space. A big part of being a fiction writer is the fiction part, the imagination, the creativity. When we write, we are creating life and breathing life. And something that once did not exist, now does, not only in the writer’s imagination but in the conscious mind of all readers who participate in this grand narrative.

Shrek is about an ogre who, against all odds, finds and fights for love.
Not everyone would resonate with a story that explores the conspiracy theory of how birds are not real but are in fact drones sent by the government to spy on people. but most would understand that feeling of being watched and judged.

The emotional storyline that grounds the reader into this story world, is the core of every good story. While there are stories out there that are ‘just for entertainment’, a good story tends to be one that speaks to the human condition and appeals to the humanity in all of us.

And so, I would like to add a caveat on this advice for both aspiring and experienced writers:
Write what you know, and if you don’t know enough, then find out.

22/10/2024

Count the bullets

All mini arcs must be in the story for a reason and must show something about the character whether that is the character’s motivation, flaws or proactiveness. Similarly, dialogue arcs need to be there for a reason, also showing an aspect of character or moving the plot forwards. Maybe the dialogue is for the purpose of revealing a secret, or establishing conflict between characters. Whatever it is, the purpose should be clear enough for the audience.

Action arcs contain an action-type promise (X must defeat the bad guy) with a progress and payoff to that promise. In Deadpool, our main character has _ bullets left and _ many bad guys to kill. This scene counts the bullets as Deadpool uses his skills and ingenuity to kill all the bad guys. Counting the bullets gives the audience a sense of progress towards the goal (kill all the bad guys and survive). Finally, we have the payoff whereby Deadpool is about to shoot the main villain but he has run out of bullets (of course, he can’t kill the villain so quickly or else that would be the end of the movie).

If an action scene seems a bit boring, then a possible diagnosis could be that there is no sense of progress. Maybe it is an action scene with no clear stakes. Some people didn't like Deadpool and Wolverine because in all of the fight scenes, you have two characters who both heal. Neither can die from the fight hence, no stakes. Personally, I think this reasoning takes away from the whole point of those kinds of fight scenes which is to establish and act out all of this tension and conflict between the two characters. The payoff is found later when these characters, who hate each other, are able to work together towards a common goal.

So, the next time you are writing an action scene and you feel like it is boring but you are not sure what to do about it, remember to ‘count the bullets’ and create a sense of progress towards the established promise in your scene.

What is one of your favorite scenes or mini arc done well? What was good about that scene? Let us know in the comments below!

15/10/2024

Proactivity and motivation
Characters must be proactive. This comes down to motivation. Why do characters act and behave the way they do? What drives them? This is important to establish early on during act 1. This is why there is a bit of breathing room, an emotional beat between the inciting incident and the beginning of Act 2. Between these two beats, the main character is weighing the cons and pros of the problem and makes his first plan to go about solving this.

If you are a writer and there is not much going on in your story, or you are not sure what to do next, then a possible diagnosis could be that your character does not have enough motivation, personal stakes or understanding of the situation/problem to make any plans towards solving said problem. One way to solve this would be to keep on writing. Keep writing until your character is developed to the point where he can find enough motivation and personal stakes in the problem to go from a passive character to a more proactive one.

The use of flashbacks is one way to show character motivation and the stakes that they have in this story. However, there are much better ways of showing motivation other than backstory through flashbacks. For example, in the film, John Wick, dialogue is excellently used to introduce the assassin and murderous side of John Wick. The mafia boss tells his son in a monologue that still gives me goosebumps to this day. The most memorable line of dialogue was, “John Wick wasn’t exactly the boogeyman. He was the one you sent to kill the f___ boogeyman.”

In just one sentence, one line of dialogue, we understand the implied backstory of John Wick and just how powerful and scary he is. In the next action scene, John Wick is then able to show off his fighting and gun skills, solidifying our perception of this character.

Which do you prefer, a character who is proactive from the start, or a character whose proactivity builds over time? Let us know in the comments below!