Open Thread: Oracle Hotline

[mithen]

--When you’re writing an emotionally draining (or sexy, or sad, etc) scene, how do you get in the mood?

Music, music, music! I've got a variety of playlists for different kinds of writing, and some go-to artists for things like fight scenes to get the right feeling set up.

Sexy writing I really prefer a lot of privacy, as I am easily embarrassed. Since I have a semi-permanent houseguest now due to the lockdowns, that makes it difficult! I'm trying to get some other rhythms set up so I can get some space to myself now and then... (houseguest is lovely about giving personal space and steers clear of the second floor most of the time, I'm just super-shy!)

I hope your writing is going well! I've done some research and set up for what I want to do, and it's just a matter of setting my fingers to the keyboard at last...

Comments

[bradygirl_12]

Music does help. I have an old-fashioned CD collection with some great soundtracks. :)

I like to do some visualization, too. That technique can help with strong emotional/sexy scenes. :)

Writing is going well. It's great to be in the zone! :)

Good luck with your writing time! :)

[me_ya_ri]

I'll choose an appropriate music, one with a good tempo for the scene I want with no words that I can understand and get caught on as I write. Then I'll read over what I did before and try to sink into the story. Along the way I'll fix any small typos or errors I find, add bits of description to add depth and usually by the time I get to the scene I need to write, it's just easy to pick up and go.

For me there's no real difference between a sexy scene and a regular one other than for certain really intense sexy scenes (also for really intense battle scenes) I tend to drop from 3rd person past tense into first person present tense and not realize it. The past to present tense thing really trips me up frequently. Third to first, not as often, but it still happens.

Makes editing fun. _@

My writing is... slow. Very slow. It's kind of like pulling teeth right now, especially getting any sort of depth into the story. I figure that it's *waves hand at the world right now*. On the other hand, I've taken up watercolor and that's going great gangbusters. All the stuff I learned in high school suddenly makes sense. I'm painting the way I usually write.

So *shrug*. The creative energies are still there. They're just redirected somewhere new. I'm not gonna complain.

Good luck getting your writing done--stay safe!

[navaan]

Oh, I have different strategies. Sometimes before I get into the scenes I reread passages from books that I remember got a strong emotional reactions from me when I read them — even if the scenes are not related to what I want to write action- or plot-wise. Sometimes I rewatch scenes or episoed from the canon if that applies.

I do listen to music sometimes, but I don't use playlist often.

I am the same about writing the sexy times. Social distancing should be perfect for it, but I haven't managed to get away far enough to write any Mature rated stuff since...

Writing is getting slightly better. Concentrating on plots is still hard.