Hyba Is Writing

Printable Freebie for Writers: Sprint Sheets Writing sprints have been extremely helpful for me this past month . In fact, most of the writing that I managed to complete wouldn't have been possible without the help of writing sprints. In light of that, I decided to make these very simple black and white printable tackers, to help you track your writing sprints. Get them here (completely free, of course). There are two kinds of sprint sheets. The first is Time Attack. These are sprint sheets where you have a certain number of minutes, and you try to write as much as you can in that period of time. Simply fill in the date, the name of the project you're working on, the amount of time you'll be writing for, and how many words you were able to complete once the timer is done. The second is Word Target. For this kind of sprint, choose a target word count for the day or any other set period of time, and try to reach it. Fill in the date, the name of the project you're writin...

October 2024 in Writing It's been a while since I tracked what I was actually up to over the month. I'm not really sure how I'm going to get my year-in-writing post done come December! But, the good news is, this month has been easier for me to keep track of, and there's been quite a lot happening. I'm going to keep this short and sweet. Submissions First and foremost, I submitted a poem to a magazine and a short story to an anthology. The poem has, as of my writing this, already been rejected, so I'm excited to share that later on this year, hopefully as part of a little poetry book.  I'm still waiting to hear back for the anthology (by the way: this marks my first submission to an anthology, ever!). Finally, I also submitted a small interactive fiction to a game jam. Speaking of IFs... Interactive Fictions I submitted a tiny little IF to a game jam, and I felt so powerful after doing so that it ignited a crazy IF-writing flame deep in my soul. Which is to ...

I'm trying something out that's a little outside the norm, I think, and that's using Google Groups to create a newsletter. Essentially, you can just subscribe/join the group, and anytime I make a post, it automatically sends it as an email to your inbox. Which seems to me to be pretty good newsletter functionality. I've also finagled it so that you can reply to emails and we can have threads with conversations between members, though how well this works is yet to be seen. Now, I've already tried this successfully with one other person, but I would like to test it with a few more to make sure it works. If you'd like to help me out and are comfortable with it, I'd really appreciate a few volunteers to request to join the group so that I can add you, just to test out a couple of newsletters and see if this actually works. Good to know before you join: You will need a Gmail account to access the group. You will need to be logged in so that it shows you both th...

This excerpt, I shared for an ask over on tumblr. The ask was : Happy STS! What part of your story has been your favourite to write, or what part are you looking forward to most? (feel free to share a snippet 👀) Ohohooooooo 👀 So. Many. Fun. Scenes. Some are super shocking and I’ll save those for when readers get to them 😼 But if I could choose one for this ask…  It would be the scene from the one I’m currently focused on, The City of Light , where Lysia is ordered to hunt Lucius down and arrest him for treason. Absolutely epic! Best friends since childhood, pitted against each other because one of them made an (objectively minor) error which has the potential to have huge ramifications for the kingdom. Plus they’re both super skilled with their weapons of choice, and it’s a very explosive battle with a lot of onlookers. Very bittersweet. Very point-of-no-return. Very fun. (((And 👀 le snippet can be found below.))) She came out of nowhere, silent and deadly, too quick....

This excerpt was shared in answer to an ask that was sent to me on tumblr, and which I have since lost. The ask was: Q: Share a scene where a truth or secret is revealed. Here’s a scene from The City of Light that fits the bill.   Noctora’s brows shot up. “Don’t worry ?” she asked incredulously. “How can I not be worried? That blasted Sissan diplomat is on his way home as we speak! He’ll probably tell everyone about the stupid, inexperienced girl they’ve put on the throne back at the City of Light.” “Calm down,” Alev said gently. “Our relations with the Sissans have always been shaky, to say the least. That diplomat knew you were young and inexperienced. He knew you were still learning how to fulfil your role. He said all of those things to humiliate you.” Tears threatened to spill out. “Well, he succeeded, didn’t he?” she muttered, taking a seat on a nearby divan. “I’m sure the whole of Sissa knows of my ineptitude by now.” Tomorrow, the vultures would start circling. “...

The Black Hare : An Interactive Fiction You are travelling to Talesmoth to find the Black Hare, a notorious criminal who has evaded capture for years. Two paths lay before you: > You are going to take him down, once and for all, and avenge your father. > You are going to make him notice you, and become his apprentice. FEATURES Choose between two main routes: Vigilante or Apprentice. Choose between three core personality traits: Integrity, Outlaw, and Risktaker. Customize your character as the story progresses, building them throughout the experience. Choose from 4 secondary characters to help you on your quest - or choose to go it alone, and see where the story takes you… No romanceable characters. An original fantasy setting with rich worldbuilding and lore. Enter the world of The Black Hare, and interactive fiction set in a fantasy world where you can either become the criminal, or put a stop to him at last. This is a cross-post from my tumblr blog. Links found within may r...

Sipofsnips: ‘Grey’ / The Qarran Tales Today’s prompt from @sipofsnips is a fun one for me because it’s the name of one of my characters! Which means I have so much to choose from!!! Grey is one of the main characters of my fantasy series, The Qarran Tales . Here’s a snippet featuring Grey doing some quick thinking on his feet to save Mila from a ruffian. Grey took a step forward, his grasp tight around the hilt of his sword. “I wouldn’t do that,” he said. “I told you I didn’t care much for that man, but the same can’t be said of the girl. I can’t allow you to hurt her.” “What’s this, then?” the axe-wielder asked, chuckling. “You like her? Are you trying to save your lady love , boy?” Grey snorted. “Don’t be foolish,” he said. “That girl is more important than that. You don’t know who you’re threatening to kill, do you? She’s too valuable.” He was pulling words out of thin air, and his performance skills were absolutely terrible, but as long as it made the man hesitate, he didn...

It's The Coding That Gets Me I decided to start a new Twine project for the game jam. Not because I wasn't happy or excited for the others , but because I decided I needed to focus on just one mechanic and create something that revolves around that one mechanic. In this case, I wanted it to be a choice-consequence mechanic. I figure, if I'm going to be making choice-based experiences, then I should probably be familiar with the nitty gritty details of how they work.  Which is great! Great idea! Wonderful! Woohoo!  Except... Well, with choice-consequence mechanics, we start to lean more into coding. Which I can do. I've made RenPy visual novels before, for funsies, and I'm proud to say that I did get pretty far with it, going way beyond simple choice mechanics. But I'm really not feeling it these days. It's a combination of my arms still healing (my fingers hurt after typing for more than a few minutes) and not being all that interested in coding when all I w...

  Where was it? Where had she put it? Where?! A growl ripped free from his throat as he flipped over the mattress. It fell on the bedside table and the lamp crashed on the ground, glass breaking. Great .  She took it.  She left - and she took it with her. He ran his fingers through his hair, tugging at it harshly. What was he going to do now? Without it... He was as good as dead. Was that what she wanted? It was one thing for her to leave him - he couldn't really fault her for that. But to leave him to face certain death? Certain death. The words ricocheted in his panicked mind. Was it? Certain? Maybe he could make it. Maybe - if he left now - he could somehow save himself. He had just about packed some essentials into a bag and grabbed his keys when there came a knock on his front door.  His blood ran cold in his veins.  He was too late.

Character Backstories Vol. 9: Lysia and Ramona It's been a while since I shared a Character Backstories post! Today's victims are Lysia Solas from The City of Light and Romona Marx from Neon Vape: A Vaporwave Odyssey . Lysia Solas ( The City of Light ) Lysia Solas is the only daughter of Oydin Solas, a lawmaker in the Kingdom of Valgus. As such, she's expected to continue on the family tradition. Every Solas has been a Lawmaker, and every Solas will continue to carry that title.  Being a Lawmaker makes for an interesting, stable, and respectable career. Lysia understands her duty to uphold her family's long-held tradition. Nevertheless, there was a brief period of time, in her younger years, when she rebelled against the idea, when it all became too unbearable for her.  It was at that time that Lysia took her affinity test... And since then, she has been one of the most accomplished warriors of her time. The mysterious energy which powers Valgus - the City of Light - i...

Worldbuilding: Musical Instruments in The City of Light << This post was inspired by a WBW ask I received over on my writeblr. You can check it out here. >> There's an awesome scene that I wrote very early on when I was writing my fantasy novels. In the scene, Mila gets her first dance - but, as it turns out, the handsome stranger who has asked her to dance is, in fact, prohibited from being there, and all too soon, the entire group - Mila, Ragnar, Gray, and this bold stranger - are running away from the City's Guardians. Still, the dance was magical while it happened, and the scene remains a favourite of mine even years later.  Back when I first wrote the scene, I imagined that there would be waltz-like music playing in the background. Very European fancy dress ball . And there's a lot to be said for the aesthetic; it can be quite beautiful. It's just that, I didn't want my world to feel too familiar. I wanted to make it as different as possible - whi...

"What's it like, over there?" His voice carries with the breeze, and she feels a chill run down her spine.  "Not so different from here, I guess," she replies, never tearing her eyes away from the millions of twinkling lights in the dark sky above. This, of course, is a lie. Everything is different back home. Everything is...  "Do you want to go back?" She shakes her head, stretching her legs with such satisfaction her toes curl. "I don't ever want to go back," she tells him. "I like it here. With you." He sits up, looking down at her. In the pale moonlight, his expression crumples into confusion. "What about your family? Your friends? Your life ? You didn't even get a chance to say goodbye." After a moment of hesitation, she asks: "Would you go back, if you were in my place?" "Yes." The reply is immediate. "You know how to get here now. You said it was easy enough. I'd go back, see my ...

I'm in the middle of a move. Or, more specifically, we moved, but we still need to populate the place, because pretty much all I have is a couch and a couple of changes of clothes 😋 Nevertheless, I can't express the relief that coursed through my blood when I finally got here and decided, Nope, I don't care if I don't have all the furniture and all the stuff; I'm moving in now .  (There are very few times in my life where I've put my foot down. This was one of them.) This was, of course, in no small part due to the fact that the previous living arrangements were definitely No Bueno and played a huge role in my declining physical and mental health over the past year. Moving has been a balm. I can do a lot more than I could at my old place, even with my injured leg, and to be frank, I'm looking forward to learning to use my muscles again. Getting healthy. Getting well .  God, what more could anyone want, really?  When I moved in, the place had electricity, bu...

Interactive Fiction Projects for Game Jams and Personal Fun  Lately, I've started using Twine again to make interactive fiction games. It's not much - just a little goofy fun here and there - but it's been a nice way to write in little tidbits, which is a lot more manageable for me at the moment.  It's also a little more challenging. Interactive fiction utilizes a lot of choice-based gameplay (I'm not making the kind where you enter commands). Choices have to mean something; they have to take you down another path or change something significantly enough that it matters in the story, either immediately or later on down the line.  That's where the challenge lies: the choices - and scale. I'm working on it best as I can, but I have a default setting in my brain that makes it so that even if I try to keep a game small, I end up creating so many choices and decisions and paths that it quickly blows out of proportion.  I sat down this time around and made a web o...

Here's a little exercise I decided to do today. While perusing open calls for submission and game jams, I found myself thinking, if I was in a perfect state right now, I'd go for this, and this, and this one, and this...  Well, alright then. Sure, if I was functioning at 100%, I'd do all of the cool things I found. Given my health issues and other obstacles, it's all way too much. Still, it kept nagging at my brain: In a perfect world, I could... I could...  I decided I can make a list of all the things I'm interested in going for, and just seeing how much of them I get to do. If it's none of them, then that's that. It's ambitious to even get one of them done. If I can, by some miracle, do more than one? Amazing! (But I'm not gonna hold my breath!) Go ahead and give it a try. Do this exercise: In a perfect world, if you were in perfect condition and there was nothing else getting in the way, what would you try to go for this month, or in the next few...

At some point he grew up, and realized that the love he had become so accustomed to receiving from the people in his life had become measured, restricted to short hugs on celebrations and little kisses after time apart. Affection was rationed, and he'd become hungry - greedy - for it. When he became ill, there was no comforting presence in his life, no Mom to bring him hot tea and take his temperature and boost his morale with chocolates. No Dad to lean his head against while they watched cartoons. Just him, alone, in an apartment that was too small for living, but enough, he guessed, for surviving. He lay there in his bed, burning up with a fever that would, at some point, break, and wondered what might happen if he didn't call anyone. If he didn't tell them. Would anyone notice? Would there be someone to say, "Hey, we haven't heard from Luke in a while. Maybe we should check in on him..."? Probably not. It's only been a day, after all. The ceiling above ...

How About We Don't Fake A Death? and other fun editing questions The second third round of edits for Murder in Heliopolis is well on its way to being finished, and with it, I find myself honing in on a set of decisions that are transforming the book for the better.  (By the way - you can read the original first draft right here . Enjoy! ...Sorry about that ending. I'm fixing it!)  After months away from both the book and writing, I came back to the manuscript with a fresh pair of eyes. I tried to be brutal in my edits. I wasn't pulling any punches. At the end of the day, I want the best for my story, and that means getting over the fact that editing is hard work on a number of levels. Sure, there's the whole emotional element - I love what I wrote, but it's just not working, etc., etc. - but there's also the actual mechanics and stages of editing. When you're editing a book and you're changing up scenes, plot points, and even worldbuilding elements, th...