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Setting Alignment: Grimdark vs. Nobledark vs. Noblebright vs. Grimbright

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Hello everyone! I’m here with a new blog post about writingcraft. Over the past few months, I've been hearing about setting alignment, along with terms associated with it. In this post, I wanted to go over what some qualities of each aesthetic are, give some examples of fiction with the aesthetics, and help clear up some misconceptions about setting alignment when it comes to series. What is setting alignment? So, what is setting alignment? Setting alignment refers to qualities exhibited by the characters and setting in your story. Usually, setting alignment is portrayed as a graph with one axis that spans from grim to noble while the other goes from bright to dark. Grim and noble refer to the qualities of the protagonists, while dark and bright refer to the aspects of the world around the characters. This sets up the information contained in the next slides, as each aesthetic’s name is a compound of two of these words. The Types of Setting Alignment Grimdark First off, we’re visit...
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Four Secret Ways Cixin Liu Dominates Science Fiction, and How You Can Employ Them

Hello everyone! I'm back with another post. For the past two years, I've been enjoying stories by this Chinese sci-fi writer by the name of Cixin Liu. You may recognize his name from the Netflix series, The 3 Body Problem, an adaptation of his Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy. After reading his anthology A View From the Stars and several excerpts from his short story collection To Hold Up the Sky , I felt like I should leave my commentary about them here, as I feel that Liu helped me, albeit indirectly, through his stories, and has shown other writers some clever ways to stand out. Who Is Cixin Liu? Cixin Liu is the most prolific science fiction writer in the People's Republic of China, earning him the nickname of "Da Liu" (Big Liu). Charming audiences with his unconventional and unique stories, he has amassed an international following outside of the Sinosphere the past few years, mostly facilitated by the translation of his magnum opus trilogy containing...
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Badger Buildings: Part Two in a Case Study of Worldbuilding in the Redwall Series

Hi everyone! Here is part two of a series analyzing worldbuilding in the Redwall series by Brian Jacques. If you haven't read the first post yet, here is the link . Today, we will be thoroughly analyzing the two main locations of the Redwall series along with a brief about lesser, general locations throughout the books. Because this focuses on architecture, it will be a guide for you to learn how to develop your locations, emphasizing buildings, in your story. WARNING: This series will contain blurbs from the actual books, so there will be multiple spoilers in this series. If you are planning on reading this series and want to avoid spoilers, please proceed with caution. Breakdown of worldbuilding: Structures When it comes to worldbuilding, you're going to want to make sure you have structures your characters live in or visit. As a result, it will be important they are adequately described to portray your world as realistic.  Materials The materials a building is made from will...
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The Death of a Species: An Unconvential Alien Invasion Story

Hello everyone! So, continuing with the trend of Prometheus' Wildfire and Like No Other , I have another short story for you all. After ending with the dark note of the main protagonist of my last short story being imprisoned and tried, I thought I would provide another one that ended on a more hopeful tone. Because of this, I wrote this unique short story. I hope you enjoy! Inspiration When I wrote this story, I had just finished reading the Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy by Cixin Liu, which chronicles an attempted invasion of Earth by an alien civilization. Around the same time, I saw a video in my YouTube feed that had a title suggesting that humans would be the first civilization to invade another planet. With these two pieces of inspiration, I had the great idea to write an alien invasion story - but have the aliens be the ones to be invaded and have the humans be the aggressors.  However, everything isn't too different. The aliens in this story have several anal...
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Prometheus' Wildfire: A Corporate Thriller about Generative AI

Hello Everyone, So, I completed this story as a final project for a humanities class. I thought I would share it with you all. Let me know what you think. Like my last story, "Like No Other," it will have a link to the YouTube version of this story. Inspiration "Prometheus' Wildfire" is intended to depict the scenario of individuals throwing out the proverbial baby with the bath water when it comes to technology. While certain technologies that have been invented are morally gray in nature, such as nuclear weapons or the “bug” devices used by spy agencies, it seems these devices are bucketed in with other technologies that have a less sinister or even benevolent association in conventional paradigms. The idea for this story had two sources of inspiration. The first came from my use of generative AI plugins in Canva to create images and portraits with a cinematic style, while the second source of inspiration came from the trend of AI movie trailers and short mov...
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Like No Other: A Mind-Bending Short Story about AI

 Hi Everyone! I know I've been absent for a while. To be honest, regular posting isn't my thing. So, I'm switching my blog to being a more "whenever-I-think-about-it" posting strategy.  Okay, enough about me and my schedule. Now, what you may be looking for. I wanted to share this short story I wrote a while back with you.  Inspiration I got the idea for this story from the idea of the "singularity" in AI, defined as an AI system that can perform tasks that are indistinguishable from human work. However, due to resistance against AI, it made me wonder what would happen if an advanced AI turned against AI, but only because it was unaware of its nature. Additionally, I had learned about the Cultural Revolution in China, and it made me wonder what a Second Cultural Revolution in China might look like if it addressed issues faced in contemporary society, and how this would impact relations with other nations and the world order. Despite the nature of the pro...
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Is The Maze Runner All Hype?

 Hello everyone! I'm officially back from summer break! I'm sorry for the hiatus, and hopefully I'll be able to stay on track for a monthly post the rest of the year. 🍀 For at least two years, I've been hearing about this series called the Maze Runner written by James Dashner. I learned about it when the series received a film adaptation and my best friend told me about a spin-off series. I decided I would check it out, as it looked like a unique series. However, I feel like it didn't live up to all the hype it received. In this post, we're going to take a look at The Maze Runner , the book which the series is named after, and analyze how well it stands up as a teen novel. WARNING: This post contains some spoilers for the first book in order to analyze the quality of the story. If you are planning on reading this series and want some plot or worldbuilding elements to remain a surprise, I would suggest reading this post with caution. Summary of The Maze Runner T...
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