This Is I Think, My Best Prep Tip As A DM:

"someone who allows you to rest" is the relationship dynamic of all time

It is well-known that if you give your name or eat the food of a Fey, they have power over you, and in turn own you. You decided this wasn’t a terrible deal.

A Quick Guide to Varying Sentence Starters

One of the things that really winds me up about my own writing is looking back and seeing a multitude of sentences beginning with “I” or “And” or “But”. I’m a messy first-drafter as it is and I do a lot of line edits, but it’s still takes up a significant portion of my time going back to change things. 

So, I’m here today to share with you the ways I try to vary my sentence starters and some tips and tricks for drafting and edits” 

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We all know why it’s important to vary your sentence structure, and by extent, your sentence starters. Besides obvious intentional things such as creating tension, or specific mood/tone/atmosphere, we should be aiming to vary how we start sentences to keep the reader engaged and not it being repetitive.

This is especially important if you, like me, write in first person and begin a lot of sentences with things like “I was” or “I am” etc. Or if you have a habit of beginning sentences with characters’ names. But what other options do we have? Here are five general categories that I like to use:

ING WORDS Coughing, she pushed her way through the blaze.  Smiling, he leaned in for a kiss. 

SIMILIES (and other techniques) Like the chattering of a typewriter, their eyes flittered over the group in front.  Sweeping in like a dove, she cut through the awkward conversation.

PREPOSITION (beside, near, with, across, around, out, at, in, etc.)  On the starter’s whistle, I pushed forward.  Under the heavy fog, the streetlamp glowed valiantly 

CONNECTIVE (Because, but, and, despite, after, before, etc.) After he left, I slipped the dagger back into its brace.  But I wasn’t about to give in now.  ED WORDS Distracted, she let the ice cream fall from her hands.  Stunned by his words, they stopped in their tracks. 

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Obviously you can make these examples much more complex and attuned to your own styles! There are lots of other ways you can vary your sentence openers, these are just what I personally use - so hopefully you can get some use of them! 

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Hints and Tips!

Use the highlighting treatment! Go through your WIP and focus on your sentence openers. Select a different colour for each category (Blue for She/He/They/I starters, red for ED Words, yellow for ING words, as an example) and use it to help you see where you may need to add some more variation! 

This also is a great exercise to do with a published book you really enjoy or by an author you admire - it’s a great learning experience!

Use a good mix of short, long, and medium sentences! If you find that your writing feels a bit samey or dry, even with varied openers, try changing the structure of the whole sentence itself! 

Experiment and play around with word order and structure - free write for a few minutes every day and try something new! It’s all practice and even if it never sees the light of day in your WIP, it’s still a worthwhile thing to do! 

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I hope you’ve enjoyed this guide and/or found it useful!

If you’d like to request a particular guide, please pop into my inbox and leave a request!

WEIRDLY SPECIFIC BUT HELPFUL CHARACTER BUILDING QUESTIONS

What’s the lie your character says most often?

How loosely or strictly do they use the word ‘friend’?

How often do they show their genuine emotions to others versus just the audience knowing?

What’s a hobby they used to have that they miss?

Can they cry on command? If so, what do they think about to make it happen?

What’s their favorite [insert anything] that they’ve never recommended to anyone before?

What would you (mun) yell in the middle of a crowd to find them? What would their best friend and/or romantic partner yell?

How loose is their use of the phrase ‘I love you’?

Do they give tough love or gentle love most often? Which do they prefer to receive?

What fact do they excitedly tell everyone about at every opportunity?

If someone was impersonating them, what would friends / family ask or do to tell the difference?

What’s something that makes them laugh every single time? Be specific!

When do they fake a smile? How often?

How do they put out a candle?

What’s the most obvious difference between their behavior at home, at work, at school, with friends, and when they’re alone?

What kinds of people do they have arguments with in their head?

What do they notice first in the mirror versus what most people first notice looking at them?

Who do they love truly, 100% unconditionally (if anyone)?

What would they do if stuck in a room with the person they’ve been avoiding?

Who do they like as a person but hate their work? Vice versa, whose work do they like but don’t like the person?

What common etiquette do they disagree with? Do they still follow it?

What simple activity that most people do / can do scares your character?

What do they feel guilty for that the other person(s) doesn’t / don’t even remember?

Did they take a cookie from the cookie jar? What kind of cookie was it?

What subject / topic do they know a lot about that’s completely useless to the direct plot?

How would they respond to being fired by a good boss?

What’s the worst gift they ever received? How did they respond?

What do they tell people they want? What do they actually want?

How do they respond when someone doesn’t believe them?

When they make a mistake and feel bad, does the guilt differ when it’s personal versus when it’s professional?

When do they feel the most guilt? How do they respond to it?

If they committed one petty crime / misdemeanor, what would it be? Why?

How do they greet someone they dislike / hate?

How do they greet someone they like / love?

What is the smallest, morally questionable choice they’ve made?

Who do they keep in their life for professional gain? Is it for malicious intent?

What’s a secret they haven’t told serious romantic partners and don’t plan to tell?

What hobby are they good at in private, but bad at in front of others? Why?

Would they rather be invited to an event to feel included or be excluded from an event if they were not genuinely wanted there?

How do they respond to a loose handshake? What goes through their head?

What phrases, pronunciations, or mannerisms did they pick up from someone / somewhere else?

If invited to a TED Talk, what topic would they present on? What would the title of their presentation be?

What do they commonly misinterpret because of their own upbringing / environment / biases? How do they respond when realizing the misunderstanding?

What language would be easiest for them to learn? Why?

What’s something unimportant / frivolous that they hate passionately?

Are they a listener or a talker? If they’re a listener, what makes them talk? If they’re a talker, what makes them listen?

Who have they forgotten about that remembers them very well?

Who would they say ‘yes’ to if invited to do something they abhorred / strongly didn’t want to do?

Would they eat something they find gross to be polite?

What belief / moral / personality trait do they stand by that you (mun) personally don’t agree with?

What’s a phrase they say a lot?

Do they act on their immediate emotions, or do they wait for the facts before acting?

Who would / do they believe without question?

What’s their instinct in a fight / flight / freeze / fawn situation?

What’s something they’re expected to enjoy based on their hobbies / profession that they actually dislike / hate?

If they’re scared, who do they want comfort from? Does this answer change depending on the type of fear?

What’s a simple daily activity / motion that they mess up often?

How many hobbies have they attempted to have over their lifetime? Is there a common theme?

a list of "beautiful" words for january

to try to include in your next poem/story

Accollé - in heraldry: entwined about the neck; also: collared, gorged

Bacciferous - bearing berries

Commorient - one of two or a number of persons perishing at the same time by the same calamity

Dreikanter - a three-faced pebble faceted by wind-blown sand

Estaminet - a small café

Frondescence - the condition or period of unfolding of leaves; foliage

Graveolent - having a rank smell

Hwyl - fervor, excitement

Ichnite - a fossil footprint

Jardiniere - an ornamental stand for plants or flowers

Knop - a usually ornamental knob

Lacustrine - of, relating to, formed in, living in, or growing in lakes

Mucedinous - having the nature of or resembling mold or mildew

Nomistic - based on or conforming to moral law

Oblivescence - an act or the process of forgetting

Pabulum - intellectual sustenance

Quodlibet - a whimsical combination of familiar melodies or texts

Risorgimento - a time of renewal or renaissance; revival

Saeculum - a period of long duration

Trouvaille - a lucky find

More: Lists of Beautiful Words ⚜ Word Lists ⚜ Writing Resources PDFs

Write a piece about someone getting hit while they're already down (literally or metaphorically)

Ten origin stories for Dungeons & Dragons sorcerers that aren’t “my mom fucked a dragon”:

Sorcerer who attained their powers by practising bending reality to their will for thirty minutes every morning, and is honestly baffled when people try to explain that magic doesn’t work like that  

Sorcerer who was incredibly unlucky and kept getting struck by lightning, and after the seventh or eight time it sort of stuck  

Sorcerer who claims to be a god of calamity and ruin, and they’re actually telling the truth – they just happen to be a very small god of calamity and ruin  

Sorcerer who tried some pipeweed they found in a beholder’s stash and experienced some unusual long-term effects  

Sorcerer whose parents learned the hard way why you’re not supposed to get frisky on the night of a lunar eclipse (answer: because you end up with a baby who can conjure knives)  

Sorcerer who’s a time traveller from an unimaginably distant future where people can just do that  

Sorcerer who spent four minutes technically dead due to one of those incidents that begin with the phrase “watch this”, and woke up with slight brain damage and power over unearthly spirits  

Sorcerer who’s been cursed to die in a fire, and the curse is fulfilling itself in an extremely roundabout way  

Sorcerer who was supposed to be an ogre mage’s dinner, but the ogre mage had been brewing potions the night before and didn’t clean their cauldron before dunking the poor kid into the soup  

Sorcerer who got so angry one day that they spontaneously developed the ability to set things on fire with their brain

you know how mathematicians have the journal of recreational mathematics, right? where they publish stuff like, ‘oh i found this cool property of this one seemingly boring number’, or, ‘this is literally nonsense but it sounds ~scientific~’ and it’s all great fun to read?

well

behold, the journal of recreational linguistics

with such delightful papers as ‘tennis puns’, ‘animals in different languages’, and ‘gifts from a homonymous benefactor’

excuse me while i go read all 50 volumes in one sitting

how to write creepy stories

over describe things

under describe things

short sentences in rapid succession build tension

single sentence paragraphs build dread

uncanny valley = things that aren't normal almost getting it right

third person limited view

limited expressions

rot, mold, damage, age, static, flickering, espsecially in places it shouldn't be

limited sights for your mc - blindness, darkness, fog

being alone - the more people there are, the less scary it is

intimate knowledge, but only on one side

your reader's imagination will scare them more than anything you could ever write. you don't have to offer a perfectly concrete explanation for everything at the end. in fact, doing so may detract from your story.

Write a piece about a day where nothing goes right