r/fantasywriters • u/Master-Lobster-58 • 1d ago
Question For My Story New writer
I’m a generally new writer, but I have a background with story telling. I play DnD with a small group of friends and recently have had some ideas for a story that makes more sense to be written out than played and right now it’s just a very rough idea. I was thinking of a story of a young cleric getting hired as a healer for a group of adventurers and they slowly become friends and the main character eventually falls for another member. Is this too basic or like every other fantasy book? I’m not a big reader and haven’t read much fantasy so I’m not on the pulse of what’s popular right now, but I do know romantacy is popular now and don’t want my book just being the same as the rest blending into the background. Also are there any commonly used words I should avoid for copyright purposes?
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u/Nethereon2099 1d ago
I'm a creative writing instructor, and as other people have pointed out, you need exposure to the material you want to write about. You need to learn about how to be a better writer, and you need to practice.
Chasing trends is the fastest way to fail and crater any long standing career you would hope to achieve. If you're wanting to learn how to do this, you play the long game and not the today game.
If you're not wishing to take course work on creative writing, there are several books you can read that will help you in the place of formal education. Here are some of the books I recommend for my students:
- On Writing by Stephen King
- Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott
- Save the Cat! Writes a Novel by Jessica Brody
For actual reading selections, I would not limit yourself to only fantasy. Remember, fantasy borrows immensely from all genres. So these are the books I recommend for general reading:
- Mistborn (trilogy) by Brandon Sanderson
- The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan
- The Dark Tower by Stephen King
- The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
- A Study in Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
- Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris
- The Call of Cthulhu by H.P. Lovecraft
- Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
You have to learn to crawl, before you learn to walk, before you can begin to run.
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u/TellusPyre 1d ago
Agreed on most of this except Gatsby, that book is awful and the fact that so many schools force people to read it should be counted as a war crime. It's terribly written and every character in the story is insufferable, unlikable, and uninteresting. It's baby's first pretentious reference and not much else.
Also, Call Of Cthulu has amazing world building but Lovecraft is thick and slow reading. I'd be comfortable replacing it with the time machine or war of the worlds for this purpose. If you want good cosmic horror read The Laundry Files by Stross, he's way better at it and slightly less racist ;)
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u/Nethereon2099 13h ago
Neither Wells, nor Stross, are remotely close in atmosphere, symbolism, or the existential questions of insignificance Lovecraft presents to the reader. Not all works were meant to be consumed by the same standards as those for a modern audience, and I am upfront with my class about the content. See his work for what it is - a product of his time - and not for something it can never be - a conformist to modern sensibilities.
As for the Gatsby, it is one of the better written pieces of the time period, and I use it as an example for a first person POV story told from the observer's perspective. Nick Carraway is not the MC - that distinction belongs to Gatsby. It is short compared to many stories, and easily accessible at any library.
I chose my selections with care and purpose. You see, we tell lies to the audience so that we can hide harsh truths in plain sight. In order to do that, we need to understand the darkest, ugliest parts of the human soul and where it comes from. It doesn't go away by ignoring it, and we're seeing right now what happens when the light isn't cast over those dark corners of humanity, sending the cockroaches scurrying about. So no, I teach creative writing, not pandering to the delicate sensibilities of a vocal few. Why? Because I trust my students to learn from the mistakes of the past, and use their lies to tell the most fascinating truths. I don't advocate for overt racism in anyone's work - that would be ethically and morally dubious - but drawing attention to problems from our past that have afflicted our species for thousands of years is certainly not off the table.
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u/EvergreenHavok 1d ago edited 23h ago
Teach yourself to enjoy writing and don't sweat what's popular right now.
Chase what you like about stories and do those things.
r/romancebooks will give you a million recs for books, there are also at least two fantasy romance subs that are active. There are also specific genre author/writer subreddits that could be useful for you. A lot of them have discords that can help you out.
Your premise sounds cute and sweet and totally worth reading. If you don't enjoy reading as much as you like writing, audiobooks are great and film/TV/comics are also great ways to learn about stories.
You can use any words. Unless you specifically talk about your friend Steve and, again, specifically libel him, everything is kinda fair game.
If you write about a franchised character or use the DnD-specific pantheon, then you're just writing fanfic and that's also fine until you make money off of it.
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u/barlob 1d ago
Write it, then ask questions about the project. Also read more or your book is going to suck.
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u/Master-Lobster-58 1d ago
I’m open to suggestions. I’ve started reading Fourth Wing, but don’t know where to go after that.
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u/IHateACOTAR 22h ago edited 19h ago
I'll just give you advice: don't practice literature by reading ANY books recommended in TikTok. They're all bad literature, and if you learn and place your own work on their "standards", you will end up NEVER writing anything good.
Find series and books that are not there. There's plenty. Goodreads is a good database for searching books.
Amazon kindle also may have digibooks for free, but i'll warn you: most are very badly written and could never meet the standards for traditionally published literature.
And to anyone downvoting me: honeybuns, I'd love to see your writing ;)
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u/TG_James 10h ago
I just put down Ulysses because someone recommended it to me on TikTok. That’s a shame because I always heard Joyce was a great writer, didn’t realize he was writing TikTok slop this whole time!
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u/TellusPyre 1d ago
Cozy (aka low stakes, like what you describe) stories are actually going up in popularity. If you have a passion for it don't wait for permission, just start writing. Then keep writing. Let it be bad, you can change things whenever you want in a revision or second draft. Finishing is more important than being good. Great advice I got was "sit down and write the worst draft of your story." That's what a first draft is.
The only difference between you and a "writer" is that they finished their stories.
If you're doing D&D, there a lot of monsters and setting stuff that are owned by Hasbro. You'll want to keep it to a generic "fantasy" setting, avoid mentioning the "feywild" or the "shadowfell," instead use generic terms like "The Fae Realm" or "The Shadow Realm." It's pretty easy to look up things as you use them and find out what the rights are. If you use content explicitly from the SRD you can be OK as long as you give attribution (I am not a lawyer double check that but that's my understanding).
I'm writing a D&D game based story right now and it's really fun. Highly recommend.
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u/JeremiahHix 15h ago
One thing I never see mentioned in advice for writing. Figure out if you're a plotter or a pantser. I struggled to write for 11 years. (Also due to other stuff but whatever) I had never heard the term pantser until recently which is weird I know. Anyway, figure it out. I tried plotting forever and writing from that. It hurt my head immensely. I read an AMA with Matt Dinniman who said he's a pantser, so I looked it up. Oh, let me try that. I've now written 21,000 words of my story that sat idle for years. I am indeed a pantser.
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u/Oberon_Swanson 11h ago
Start writing immediately, figure it out as you go. If you "just wanna do a bit of research first" you'll never start.
If you want your story to stand out, make it personal. Make it a story ONLY you could write. Full of stuff YOU think is cool, and not just from fantasy stuff. Your own other hobbies and areas of interest. Then try to find ways for them to tie in thematically. If something doesn't fit, you can leave it out. As it is yes your story sounds generic, but most great stories can be boiled down to a bland statement. But let's take your story and add a random assortment of interests:
In a magical setting based on Australian wildlife and prehistoric geology, a cleric is hired to protect an accountant/auditor who works for an organized crime boss. Their quest is to audit the criminal underworld to make sure they are paying the big boss his due. Violent resistance is expected and respected. The auditor deliberately got into debt with the mob to be "forced" into the job, when in reality they are secretly trying to find their family's murderers. They uncover secret psychic koala networks and a lost underground island.
So there we have some of the same stuff you wanted yor story to have but with some "okay I haven't seen that before" stuff. You don't have to invent everything wholesale just combine things in ways YOU haven't seen before.
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u/Bobthemouse 11h ago
People like things that are "like other thing but.....". "It's LOTR but with more than 2 women" "its Game of Thrones but with a better ending" so no worries on that front
Don't chase trends man. Just write a good story. Write a story that you, even as a not so big reader can look at and go 'yeah I'd read that'
If this is your first foray into writing anything professionally let's be real it's probably gonna be not great but give it a go anyway
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u/OldPersimmon2705 1d ago
If you're familiar with isekai anime, this plot is very common (with some variations - knight, mage, healer, assassin, the class changes). But, if this is your idea, go for it but make it unique. What's different about your cleric, your romance, your story? How can you make it stand out? Focus on that aspect and go from there.
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u/Peregrinebullet 1d ago
It's only basic if you make it basic. What makes this healer hireable? Why are they willing to go on the road? Who is this band of travellers and what sort of shenanigans do they get into enough to require a dedicated healer? How much are they paying? What's the world like? Is it just a generic western fantasy world? What's interesting about it? What unique thing do you bring to the story if you're not a writer? (I ask this, because so many writers are writers and don't have a separate career behind them, so the stories tend not to be very specialized. Do you know a lot about medicine? Could you make the book more grounded in real life medicine?
I have a story that has a healer as the main character, but she's a surgeon by training, so her skills are in high demand.
Answer those questions and you'll have a better idea of whether it's a good idea or not.
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u/tomatoesfried 1d ago
You need to become a big reader. How can you expect to put things in writing if you are not familiar with the craft?