How to Use Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs for Characterisation

via How to Use Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs for Characterisation

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End of an Era . . . Okay, Just the End of Spring Break

First rant: Why in all of reality did it get cold again?  It was warm and nice a week ago, but now it’s back to jeans and long-sleeved shirts.  Worst part is that the changes happen overnight, so you go to bed wearing spring pajamas and wake up feeling like you were abandoned in the arctic.  Totally ridiculous.

Second rant:  Me and WordPress aren’t really getting along.  It’s actually been this way for a few weeks.  I’ll go to another blog on my phone and it will say I’m not logged in, so I can’t do a comment.  Get to my computer and I’ll see that the ‘like’ went through, but there are times where even then I’m not logged in.  Yet, I go to my own blog or a third one to find that I’m in.  This makes it much harder to interact because I’m having to depend more on my phone than my laptop.  Maybe this is preparing me for the summer when I only have the evening for blogging.  Not allowed to use my phone during the summer job, which means I’ll become more absent than now.

Yahoo Image Search

So, where were we?  Well, I’ve been home and it was Spring Break.  It was also Passover, so don’t ask me how the eating was.  I cheated a few days due to stress or simply going out with the munchkin.  Food restrictions that aren’t flat out fasting don’t work very well with me because I don’t like the alternatives.  Not a fan of fish (smells the same alive as it does dead) and you can only eat so much leftover turkey and brisket before you feel like you’re being punished.  The side dishes are always the best, but those that survive the original meal are devoured the next night.  This all means that my week had no culinary grandness to speak of.

I did get some writing early on in the week, but not as much as I’d hoped.  I think.  Sunday was the best day and then I did okay on Monday.  Tuesday was the life event, which left me emotionally wandering.  Worked on a jigsaw puzzle while watching ‘Kill La Kill’ and then I hung out with a friend at night.  ‘Toejam & Earl’ is an unforgiving game.  It was nice to go out and just chill with someone too.  Especially after a day where I had to stay away from my outlines and notebooks because I was on the verge of burning everything down.  It was a rough day and I really hope to put a name to the ‘life event’ by the end of May if not earlier.  Honestly, I’m getting frustrated by not being able to say what it is because I get the sense that my vagueness has driven people away.  Although, a bunch have managed to figure it out from clues I’ve dropped in these goal posts.  Anyway, let’s move on to the other stuff.

Thursday and onward was all about time with the munchkin.  New stuff too.  We went to a new petting zoo where he fed piglets, calves, camels, goats, and other animals.  He got to hold baby bunnies, guinea pigs, and ducklings, which he loved.  A few of the animals were still kept indoors because of the cold, but there were enough for him to have fun for several hours.  Friday was rain, so we watched TMNT 2: Secret of the Ooze and relaxed.  Today is a rainy day too, so it’s going to be Lego Star Wars 2 and relaxing.  He’s managed to make it the last few days without video games, so I think I’ll let us play a little longer than I originally promised.  Did I miss a day?

Saturday was when we took my soon to the one zoo in NYC that he has never gone to.  It’s hard to get to the Central Park Zoo because trains and subways are expensive.  I don’t know the route that well either.  He had a lot of fun and we got to go through the zoo twice since it’s so small.  They have a tropic zone building with free-flying birds and we were greeted by a peacock.  Was hard to figure out how to get around it, so people were kind of stuck around the entrance until it moved.  The weather was cool enough that most of the animals were active like the red pandas. It was a nice couple hours before we left to have a family dinner.  Then it was back home and to bed.

Next week is back to work and I’ll probably use the nights to prepare June blog posts.  I have next weekend for writing a bit.  My goal was to write 3-4 chapters last week, but I still can’t figure out if I can say I reached it.  I only wrote 1.75 chapters, but there are 2 chapters that I cannibalized and removed because they didn’t really work.  They came off as filler with a few important points that I could add to other scenes.  So, I may have gotten 3.75 done if you count those?  Either way, I feel like my prolific days are far behind me and I can’t get sales to boost enough to call this a career.  All the promos for War of Nytefall: Rivalry that happened so far have netted me 6 sales.  It’s been almost a month and nothing seems to work.  Free and paid stuff seem to fail, so I’m not sure what to do about the situation.  I’ve always been more artist than businessman.  I’d rather just write and publish, but money needs to be made.  This is why ‘Bedlam’ is blog only and Ichabod Brooks will be on the back burner for a while.  I have no way to go back to Legends of Windemere because I gave that series finality.  There are no more stories from those characters.  So . . . That’s that.

Goals for the week:

  1. Last day of Spring Break relaxing with the munchkin.
  2. Get back into the work schedule.  5:30 AM wake ups.  Ugh.
  3. Shake fist at thermometer until it gets warm again.
  4. Try to get at least 2 biking days in.  I’ve been royally failing here.
  5. June blog posts.
  6. Write more War of Nytefall: Eradication.  (This is here because I know I won’t get to it until next weekend.)
  7. Tinker with secret project.
  8. Life event.
  9. Change up the pinned Tweet.  These seem to slow down once they hit 150 unless I spend a lot of time retweeting.  No sales gained from these activities.
  10. Watch more ‘Defenders’ and finish reading ‘Fushigi Yugi’.  Have the last 10 volumes of ‘Naruto’ coming my way at the library too.  I’ll need to find more manga series to get into soon.
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Smorgasbord Posts from Your Archives -#NewSeries- Pot Luck and Do You Trust Me??

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Goal Post Delayed. Enjoy Some Funnies!

Spring Break is almost over, so I’m out with my son.  I didn’t want to do the goal post today since I wouldn’t be able to respond to comments so easily.  Tomorrow is relaxing before school starts up again.  This means . . . Funny pictures time!  (Seems I got on an anime kick.)

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Guest Post: A Game of Books (The Tower in the Mist by Deby Fredericks)

The Tower in the Mist

Mages vs. Amazons vs. Giant Badger vs. Tyranny

Zathi’s job is to capture renegade mages, but Keilos isn’t like any other mage she’s dealt with. Her drive to bring him in only leads them deeper into a cursed forest. Together, warrior and mage will face deadly beasts and grapple with decisions that compromise every principle. Until they stumble upon a place of ancient, forgotten magic. Zathi must choose — allow Keilos to claim it, or kill him once and for all.

Pre-Order it on Amazon!

Charles often tells us how his Legends of Windemere series got its start as a role-playing game while he was in college. I am here to confess that I, too, wrote my book because of a game.

In my case, it was the video game Dragon Age. I have all three of the series, and I played them back-to-back-to-back-to back from September, 2017 to the end of March, 2018. Okay, maybe I was a little obsessed.

The series is heavily focused on a core conflict between Mages and Templars. As in many fantasy settings, mages are feared by the public who do not have magic. The solution was that the main church, or Chantry, decreed that all mages should be imprisoned in Circle Towers. There they are guarded by Templar warriors who have absolute power over them. The potential for abuse is obvious, and the violence between Mages and Templars is a theme throughout the games.

Much as the games riveted me, I was frustrated by the false binary of Dragon Age. My characters were always arguing for more options than life-in-prison vs. mages-running-amok. Surely there was a better way! The Tower in the Mist was born from that frustration.

During my intense immersion in Dragon Age, I virtually stopped writing. Every inch of my writing mind was jammed with Dragon Age. There were times when I was afraid that my career was over. But, guess what? My writing career didn’t come to an end. Six weeks after I finished my playthrough and took a break, I started a novella. As a matter of fact, it’s this very novella, The Tower in the Mist.

In it, I share my own interpretation of Mages vs. Templars. Now, I want to make it clear that this isn’t Dragon Age fan fiction or any sort of licensed tie-in. I’m a novelist. I can do my own world-building. I created the land of Skaythe, where evil mages oppress the commoners, and I created the Minstrels who try to change their world through alternatives to violence. But if I hadn’t played Dragon Age first, I’m sure I would be working on different projects today.  

If you like Dragon Age, swords and sorcery, or epic fantasy with a heart, I hope you’ll venture forth to find The Tower in the Mist.

Author Biography

Deby Fredericks has been a writer all her life, but thought of it as just a fun hobby until the late 1990s. She made her first sale, a children’s poem, in 2000. Fredericks has six fantasy novels out through two small presses. The latest is The Grimhold Wolf, released by Sky Warrior in 2015. Her children’s stories and poems have appeared in magazines such as Boys’ Life, Babybug, Ladybug, and a few anthologies. In the past, she served as Regional Advisor for the Inland Northwest Region of the Society of  Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, International (SCBWI).

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Nyte vs Nytefall: Yes, Clyde Is an Asshole

I think I explained this situation before, but it relates to the location naming theme of the week.  The vampire kingdom cities of Nyte and Nytefall were created a little by accident and me being clumsy.  I had come up with War of Nytefall as a series title to replace ‘Realm of the Night’.  Then, I wrote Legends of Windemere: The Mercenary Prince where Mab debuted and talked about the city of Nyte as the Dawn Fang capital.  Yet, I made Nyte the home of Xavier Tempest instead of Clyde . . . So, why was his place the capital instead of wherever Clyde called home?  In fact, why was the city called Nyte instead of Nytefall considering the title?

Answer to Question 1:  Nyte is the city that the Dawn Fangs talk about publicly and allow the mortals to know about.  They speak of it as their capital even though it’s more of a decoy.  The real capital is Nytefall, which is really difficult to reach and known only to a handful of non-vampires.  That covers that oops and it fits the secretive nature of the Dawn Fangs.

Answer to Question 2:  Nytefall is the island city that Clyde created for the Dawn Fangs and he named it to piss off Xavier Tempest.  Yes, I know it’s difficult to have a series where the two main locations are so similar, but this made too much sense.  Clyde is a big enough of a jackass to do something like this.  It means whenever someone says Nytefall, Xavier may briefly consider his own kingdom losing the war.  It’s a name that can catch in the noble’s throat and hurt his pride.

In this case, I did a creative spelling of a common word (Night to Nyte) that was in the older series title.  Then, I added ‘Fall’ as an afterthought and had to work that into the story.  I needed a reason for the similarities and used the personality of the protagonist to get the job done.  This is a lot of a back and forth in creating the location names, so it shows that you might not have everything until you’re coming to the end of the outline or first draft.

This even set up the two locations to be polar opposites in several ways:

  1. Nyte is found on the mainland of Ralian far from the ocean.  Nytefall is an island in the Cerascent Archipelago.
  2. Nyte is known to mortals and can be approached if need be.  Nytefall is a mystery and nearly impossible to stumble onto much less get to if you try.
  3. Nyte is a very dark, urban city that has a common architecture.  Nytefall is a sunny, tropical island with a wide array of building styles.
  4. Nyte is protected by a complicated barrier.  Nytefall is open to attack if people can find it, but it means facing Clyde.

All of this started because of the names.  So, have you ever doing anything strange with your location names?  Is there a funny story behind any of them?

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Author Inspiration and This Week’s Writing Links

Staci Troilo's avatarStaci Troilo

Ciao, amici! Another busy and beautiful week at the Troilo residence come and gone.

Our Easter celebration was low-key for us this year. At first, I felt bad about skipping some of our traditions. But then, the day came. The meal, though simpler than my usual holiday fare, was delicious. The love flowed as freely as the wine. We all missed my daughter, who couldn’t make the trip from college, but everything else was as it should be. And then it was over, and we all went back to work.

I’m still knee-deep in the sci-fi world. My first release is around the corner. I’m both excited and nervous. There were plenty of times I thought:

I like to read sci-fi and love to watch it, but maybe I’m not the best person to write it. After all, I wasn’t exactly a fan of my science classes in school. The…

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Derailing Bedlam: Courting of the Killers Part 1 #fiction #adventure

As usual, here is your warning that this story has cursing, sex (not graphic), innuendo, and violence.  It’s my Rated-R action adventure called Derailing Bedlam.  This is the fourth outing (third official) for Cassidy and Lloyd, so feel free to click on one of the two covers to see how it started.  Each one is 99 cents!

Cover by Jon Hunsinger

Cover Art by Jon Hunsinger

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Continue reading

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How to Write the Best “About The Author” Page Possible

Nicholas C. Rossis's avatarNicholas C. Rossis

Vacation writing inspiration | From the blog of Nicholas C. Rossis, author of science fiction, the Pearseus epic fantasy series and children's books Look at me, world!

Writing a book is hard. Still, I’d rather write a 5-novel series than a book blurb. And when it comes to writing a couple of paragraphs about me, aka Author Bio, well, that’s when I really freak out! Why is it so darn hard telling the world a few things about us?

So, I was particularly happy when I discovered this excellent post on writing your About Me page. It comes from a surprising source–Elegant Themes, the makers of my favorite WordPress theme, Divi. Read on for some great tips on creating a killer Author Bio page, courtesy of Lindsay Pietroluongo!

Lindsay’s About Me Page

“If we’re gonna be friends, you should know that I re-heat my coffee as many times as it takes to burn my tongue, I only watch horror movies through my fingers and I seriously dislike elephants, although…

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7 Tips to Creating Fictional Location Names

Fictional World Map (Created by Dan Meth)

Continuing the topic of naming locations, I’m going to do my best to come up with some useful and humorous tips.  I only had to create one new place in War of Nytefall: Rivalry, so these are going to have to go outside of the new release.  Apelios doesn’t really give me a lot to work with either.  Here we go:

  1. Make the location pronounceable.  It may be funny to write one with only vowels or consonants, but you could lose a few readers if they can’t figure out how to say things.  It can help to have a pronunciation guide or mark it during the first appearance, so this is more of a guideline.
  2. Consider the terrain before you come up with the name.  You can only get away with naming a desert city after water once or twice before the joke gets stale.  The founders would have to be aware of these things too.  A person who has lived in the clouds for eternity won’t have a good chance of knowing what a worm is, so they probably wouldn’t use it to name a town.
  3. Use real world examples for your fictional ones to help get the creativity flowing.  This can really help with natural territories.  Rocky Mountains, Great Barrier Reef, Grand Canyon, and other locations in our world are fairly simplistic.  You would be surprised how many places can be named by how they look.  It can easily be chalked up to an ancient traveler being awed and not that creative.
  4. If you name a place after a person then you need to come up with some history.  It doesn’t have to be much.  Could be how the person found the area or some great feat that they accomplished to earn the right.  To relate this to the reader, you can have a local explain it briefly or have the characters read a sign about it.  To avoid an info dump, you want to be brief or spread out the story.
  5. As with monsters and characters, you can always use another language to come up with names.  Consider something about them and then go to Google Translate.  It can be related to the terrain, a historic event, their biggest export, or whatever makes this place stand out enough to be included in the story.  Do keep in mind that people who actually speak the language will understand it, so try to keep it clean.  Unless the joke is that the town is really a swear word.
  6. Accept that people will mispronounce the fictional locations if they are made by letters being tossed together.  Seriously, I’ve gotten Windemere, Windmere, WindEmere, Winemere, Winmere, Windermere, Windermore, and a few others.  (For those who wonder, it’s Win-deh-mere.  This probably doesn’t help.)
  7. Don’t rely too much on common endings for locations such as -burg, -town, City, Village, etc.  Only way to get away with using the same ending is if you build it into your world creation.  In that case, you can NEVER stray from the pattern or the whole world will implode.  The deaths of millions of fictional characters will be on your head, you monster.
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