My main problem as a writer is that I don’t write because “I have a story to tell”. I write because there are worlds I want to visit, ideas I want to explore, people I want to meet, conversations I want to hear, emotions that I want to express, and impossibilities I want to make real.
Which means that I still need a fucking plot.
This is why my forte is single scene ficlets. I plug holes in walls, I don’t build them.
it takes $0 to use the word “debilitating” instead of “crippling” to describe your mental illness
cripple is a slur specifically aimed at physically disabled people, which is why it’s Not Okay to use if you aren’t physically disabled (esp bc it was often aimed at a physically disabled person who can’t walk or can only barely walk)
just in case anyone didn’t know
And guess what guys? If you’re able bodied, you don’t get an opinion on this! Able bodied folk should just listen to our physically disabled pals.
there’s a chinese exchange student in my composition class and we were being presented something about how you can use brackets to signify translation and there was chinese text on the screen and the prof said to him “what does that say?” and he deadpanned “i can’t speak chinese” and everyone sat there in dumbfounded silence and then the presenter clicked to show that the text literally said “i can’t speak chinese” with the most shit-eating grin on his face
I’m just gonna say it: cliche romances are things that POC and LGBTQ+ people deserve. Yeah, it may be overdone with Blue And Blonde with Hot N’ Smoking Frenchman, but it’s not overdone with an Indian girl and a Black enby. It’s not overdone with a trans girl and a bi dude. It’s not overdone with two wlw. It’s not overdone with a POC or two. (Also, what is it with the token POC? Seriously?)
Are you worried about your stories being cliche? Do they feature a main cast of marginalised people? Eh, who the fuck cares? Every narrative that I know of (or nearly every) is about coming out, about the Struggle, about racial tensions. Yes, those are important, but queer people and brown people haven’t gotten the cheesy, cliche, so-sweet-you’ll-get-cavities romances. It’s just Not Done.
I can name two contemporary novels, that come to mind right away, that are rom-coms about coming out, and have a smitten (or a bit more than a smitten) of race issues, and that are in my opinion well done: Simon Vs The Homo Sapiens Agenda, and It’s Not Like It’s A Secret. You know how many YA books I can remember that don’t cover coming out or racial issues, and are sugar-sweet romances with LGBTQ+ people/POC? Zero.
My scope is limited. (PS: If you have any sappy romances featuring lesbians/any queer people, share them because I’m dying over here.)
But you know what? Write that coffeeshop book about the barista who can’t help but to notice the super-androgynous and punk enby. Do it. Do it. Please. Write that fake dating book. Say fuck it, and cheesier things have been published. You really want it published because this is YA and anything that isn’t skinny straight cis white people is immediately under scrutiny? Add mental health issues. Toss in something. I don’t know. I’ve forgotten the point I was going to make here.
Tl;dr: Cliche stories aren’t cliche for marginalised groups. As a writer in this day and age, it’s your job to make them cliche. (If that’s the genre you write.)
