Rationally Writing
By Rationally Writing
Intro and Outro music is G.A.T.O. Must Be Respected, by Tim Yarbrough
To contact us, please email daystar721@gmail.com
Episode 65 - AI and Contemporary Fiction
Daystar and Alexander talk about AI in writing, both for creating fiction and its impact on writing fiction set in the modern world.
Hosted by Daystar Eld and Alexander Wales.
With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Episode 64 - Utopian Fiction
Daystar and Alexander record in front of a live audience at LessOnline to talk about Utopian Fiction; what it is, why it's so rare, and what it says about us as individuals and societies.
Hosted by Daystar Eld and Alexander Wales.
With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Episode 63 - Reader Feedback II (Guest: Velorien)
Short episode where Daystar and Alexander speak with Velorien, one of the writers of Marked for Death, to discuss the impact of reader feedback in serial fiction.
Hosted by Daystar Eld and Alexander Wales. With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Episode 62 - Money in Fiction
Daystar and Alexander discuss the role of money and class in fiction, and how it can affect, or fail to affect, their decisions and interactions.
Hosted by Daystar Eld and Alexander Wales With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Episode 61 - Subverting Expectations (Guest: Jamie Wahls)
Alex and I attended a writing retreat with some other authors in the rationality community, and while there decided to host an impromptu episode on subverting expectations, joined (primarily) by our Nebula nominated friend, Jamie Wahls. All I had to record with was my laptop, so apologies for the sound quality!
Co-hosted by Alexander Wales
With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Links:
Episode 60 - Animorphs: The Reckoning (Guest: TK17/Duncan Sabien)
Today we're joined once again by Duncan Sabien, aka TK17, to discuss his incredible rationalfic, Animorphs: The Reckoning. It was recorded shortly after the story finished and includes questions on not just his writing process, but the various decisions that went into changes made from canon, so spoilers ahead!
Co-hosted by Alexander Wales
With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Links:
Episode 59 - Worth the Candle Postmortem
Today we discuss Alexander's original serial fiction, Worth the Candle, and the various decisions and aspects of the story that came up throughout the writing process.
Co-hosted by Alexander Wales
With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Episode 57 - Species in Fiction
Daystar and Alexander discuss using different species or "races" in fiction, and how it informs characters and is addressed by different types of stories.
Co-hosted by Alexander Wales
With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Episode 56 - Race in Fiction
Daystar and Alexander discuss race in fiction, or rather, species, and how it informs characters and is addressed by different types of stories.
With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Timestamps
03:38 Race as a Social Construct
14:20 Approaches to Race in Fiction
22:30 Black Superman
32:55 How Race Informs Character
48:01 Literal Racism
56:48 Research
Episode 55 - Politics in Fiction
Daystar and Alexander discuss politics as a plot device, and and political fiction as a genre.
With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Timestamps:
00:35 What is a political plot?
8:58 Main types of political plot structures
24:00 Political 5 Man Band
37:05 Challenges
Links:
Rules for Rulers
Episode 54 - Irrational Fiction
Daystar and Alexander discuss irrational or non-rational fiction.
With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Timestamps
00:35 "Rational" vs "Irrational"
10:04 How do you distinguish?
18:50 Conversations around the difference
33:05 Audience Mindset
48:18 Writing non-rational fiction
Episode 53 - Horror
Daystar and Alexander discuss horror in fiction, and the unique challenges and opportunities that come with rational horror.
With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Timestamps
0:37 What Do You Find Scary in Fiction?
7:42 Rational Horror
22:50 Horror vs Thriller
31:00 Strengths of Prose Horror
Links
Episode 52 - Dropped Threads
Daystar and Alexander discuss dropped threads and side plots in stories, what tends to lead to them and how to manage them as you go.
Timestamps
2:34 Serial Fiction
9:32 What Ends Up on the Page
14:55 Side Plots
17:10 Serials
21:25 Why Threads Get Dropped
27:30 Story Shifts
37:30 Our Dropped Threads
44:28 Bonus Dropped Threads
Episode 51 - Character Flaws
Daystar and Alexander discuss character flaws; what makes for good ones, how to avoid Mary Sues, and why some flaws show up so often compared to others.
Timestamps
0:35 Flaws As Conflict Generators
5:53 Mary Sues
15:23 Brought Low
23:14 Most Common Flaws
36:02 Rarest Flaws
Twig by Wildbow
The Erogamer by Groon the Walker
Episode 50 - Abandoning Stories
Daystar and Alexander discuss the reasons authors abandon stories before they're finished, whether they want to or not.
Hosted by Daystar Eld and Alexander Wales
With thanks to Tim Yarbrough for the Intro/Outro music, G.A.T.O Must Be Respected
Time Stamps
1:26 Abandonment vs Hiatus
6:16 Different reasons for Abandoning
17:10 Alex's List
25:55 Managing Burnout
39:37 Other Authors
48:21 Author Trust
Episode 49 - Ideological Turing Test
Daystar and Alexander discuss Ideological Turing Tests; what they are, why they're important in fiction, and how to try to pass them as best you can.
Timestamps:
0:34 Turing Tests
6:15 Avoiding Caricatures Isn't Enough
10:14 Passing ITT
25:48 Frames
37:53 Personal Challenges
47:11 Presentation
Episode 48 - Romance
Daystar and Alexander discuss romance in fiction, particularly in finding meaningful romantic conflicts as either the major plot, or as a subplot in a broader story.
Timestamps:
7:21 Body Language and Chemistry
14:00 Source of Romantic conflict
21:43 Troubled vs Doomed
30:20 Extreme Romantic Contexts
36:29 Compatibility
43:06 Conflict from Change
50:38 New and Ongoing Conflicts
Episode 47 - Timeskips
Daystar and Alexander discuss the value and pitfalls of using time skips, long and short.
Timestamps:
1:13 The Two Axes
11:51 Rules for Timeskips
25:27 Relationships
42:13 Extremely Long Timeskips
Episode 46 Bonus
Bonus bit of conversation from Episode 46.
Episode 46 - Story Research
0:30 A Stable of Experts
12:49 Inspirational Research
19:15 Spot Research
Episode 45 - Writing as a Skill (Guest: Kuiper)
Timestamps:
1:19 Writing as a skill
21:03 What improves writing?
24:20 Don't grow attached to your ideas
32:45 Skilling up one at a time
45:36 Sticking with or abandoning
50:25 Other ways to improve writing.
Episode 44 - World Building II (Guest: Erratic Errata)
Episode 43 - Reader Feedback
Timestamps:
2:02 Paretto's Principle
6:30 Trends and Spikes
19:50 Typos vs Style
26:56 Continuity
29:30 Actionable
37:49 Deep Criticism
45:50 Spoilery feedback
Episode 42 - Worth the Candle (Guest: CthulhuRaeJepsen)
Timestamps:
2:19 Writing Under Pseudonym
7:52 Worth the Candle
17:07 Spoiler Talk up to Ch. 84
Episode 41 - Worldbuilding: Second Order Effects
2:50 Battle School concept
6:46 Inadequate Equilibria As Story Elements
22:55 Shadows of the Limelight
28:22 Consequence of the Consequence
37:20 Aesop Exacerbation
41:14 Confronting Civilizational Inadequacy
Episode 40 - Review: The Prestige
Timestamps
2:24 Summary + Was it Rational?
16:30 Foreshadowing
21:34 Clashing Ideologies
25:22 Noticing Confusion
30:25 Magic and Storytelling
45:40 Repeat Viewings
Episode 39 - Children in Fiction
Timestamps
0:31 Advantages of child protagonists
4:43 "Children don't act like that."
16:00 Keeping smart/mature children children
20:37 Evergreen methods
26:40 Predictive Processing and "Wonder"
34:33 In Pokemon: ToOS
Episode 38 - The Medium of Prose Fiction
Timestamps
5:03 Technological limitations
11:01 Conventions
16:45 New Media
19:27 Music
24:45 Subjectivity
31:45 Mediumception
Episode 37 - Power Dynamics
Time Stamps
0:42 Power in Fiction
3:46 World vs Protagonist vs Antagonist
11:14 New Dimsensions vs Power Creep
14:34 Rationalist Fiction
22:25 Power Differential on a Different Axis
32:55 Powers as Part of Identities
37:01 Protagonist vs Antagonist
47:58 Power in Romance stories
Episode 36 - Effective Brainstorming
Episode 35 - Breaking the Story
Time Stamps:
00:49 What is Breaking the Story?
5:12 Example
13:38 Character Arcs
28:40 Plot and Endings
Episode 34 - Review of Dark Wizard of Donkerk (Spoilers)
Time Stamps:
1:12 Magic Systems
9:18 The Twist
15:53 Spirit Magic
20:47 Potential Sequel
25:17 Plot Threads
28:33 Villain
31:49 The Prophecy
Episode 33 - Review of Pokemon: OoS (Spoilers to Ch. 43)
3:30 Planning the story
8:36 Present Tense
10:15 Viewpoints
16:39 Goals/Defeats
23:41 Cycles
28:24 Interludes
34:55 Criticisms
Episode 32 - Multiple Perspectives (Guest: TK17)
1:30 Archetypes vs Whole Characters
5:34 Choosing Who Gets what Scene
14:45 Shifting Focus and Disorientation
25:06 Different Character Dialogue
35:30 Differentiating Characters
Episode 31 - Action Scenes
Timestamps:
1:23 Action Scenes in Different Mediums
5:38 What Makes a Good Action Scene
11:22 Avoiding Repetition
17:01 Rational Action Scenes
20:07 Pacing and Flow
Episode 30 - Literary Fiction
01:20 What Qualifies as Literary Fiction?
15:06 Pretentiousness
25: 03 Literary Fiction and Rational Fiction
35:50 Writing Literary Fiction
45:43 Recommendations
Episode 29 - Creative Appropriation, Part 2
01:24 Taking Ideas vs Fanfic
7:17 Stealing Mechanics
11:33 The value of something new
19:36 Taking our ideas
27:09 Guardian
Episode 28 - Creative Appropriation, Part 1
01:03 How to not be original
11:10 Adding something new
16:01 Stealing details
22:10 The argument against copywrite
28:38 Artistic distinction for using
Episode 27 - Description
Timestamps:
01:16 Why is description important?
8:53 What is good description?
14:40 When to put the description?
22:12 Alexander's notable examples
30:00 Daystar's notable examples
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Episode 26 - Tabletop RPGs and Writing
01:04 Gaming creds
05:10 Starting a story vs an RPG.
15:50 Railroading
28:36 Players as Characters
35:23 Exposition
37:51 Source Books
Episode 25 - Endings
2:41 What makes endings satisfying?
15:23 Alternate endings
18:38 Bad endings
25:56 Ambiguity in endings
32:07 Downer endings
37:58 Endings we've enjoyed
Episode 24 - Beginnings
Time Stamps:
0:35 What's in a Beginning?
5:00 Two Types of Prologues
9:15 The Third Type of Prologue
17:16 So what, if it works?
20:01 How to make the beginning engaging
30:08 Beginnings We've Enjoyed
35:10 Setting Tone
Episode 23 - Force Awakens vs Rogue One
Episode 22 - Bottom Up Storytelling
Timestamps
00:35 Top Down vs Bottom Up
08:24 Natural Stories in Premises
11:06 Pitfalls in Bottom Up
24:20 Homespun Examples
Episode 21 - Top Down Storytelling
Timestamps:
0:25 Top Down World Building
2:29 Science Fiction for Social Commentary
18:41 Top-Down Writing in Our Work
25:30 Fitting Story to Genre
33:28 Tips for Top-Down
Episode 20 - Religion in Fiction
Time Stamps:
00:31 Personal Backgrounds
05:52 Religion in Fiction
10:05 Real Religions vs Fictional Religions
13:28 Religious or Atheist Strawmen
23:19 The Role of Faith
27:24 The Problem with an Afterlife
31:13 Do's and Don'ts
40:49 Examples
Episode 19 - Exposition
Timestamps:
0:45 Exposition vs Narrative
4:38 Bad Exposition
17:00 Exposition as Story Character
18:22 Exposition Timing
24:30 Good Exposition
Episode 18 - Writer's Block (Guest: Eaglejarl)
Timestamps
00:52 How does Writer's Block manifest for you?
9:07 Avoiding Writer's Block
20:15 Getting out of Writer's Block
27:20: Everyone Dies
Episode 17 - Serial Fiction, Part 2
Timestamps
00:34 Chapter Length
03:56 Overall Length
6:18 Dangers of Stretching Stories Out
10:06 Serial Structure
12:33 Continuous Character Growth
17:23 Continuous New Conflicts