Professor Von Ball's Creative Writing Help

[~*Jax*~]

Hi there,
 
InSim is a great place to host your stories. There are a large number of talented people walking our forums, and every story (and trust me, I've read them all) is worth your time.
 
However, there comes a time in every author's life that they may need some assistance.
 
This is where Antecdote Assistance comes in.
 
If you have any questions about the meaning, alternate spelling, or even another word for, the word you have in mind, ask us!
 
If you would like someone to pre-read your story to make sure the grammar and spelling are correct, post in this thread and someone will answer you.
 
I am even offering my personal assistance to those who would like some grammatical and structure help for those entering the storytelling contests! There are always great contests going on here!
 
We are all here to help!
 
Good luck with your stories, and I, for one, can't wait to see what you come up with!

[starlucid]

Inyri...Don't know if this is an appropriate place to ask this but I would like to try to add audio to some of my stories and don't have any idea how I would do that is there a tutorial or something for that?

[~*Jax*~]

Audio, you mean as in an .mp3 file?  Your best bet would be to find a site that will host it (it will eat up a bunch of bandwidth, so I don't suggest here) and then provide a link.
 
Because of the nature of the forums, there is no way to embed the file into the thread itself.

[Dese]

star, you could upload the mp3 at sendspace or somewhere like that and put a link to the download in your story post. I love story soundtracks, music helps convey feeling very well.

[starlucid]

Thanks!  I want to finish off a story I have posted but without music it would make very little sense I wanted to recreate a afro-caribbean ceremony and drums are definately needed! LOL!

[~*Jax*~]

Oh COOL!!!!!

[babyblue1387]

Hi guys. I'm starting a story called The Nahuatal Princess, and I was wondering if I could post the first bit here in this little section. I haven't taken the pics for it yet (waiting til I upgrade my video card), but I have started on the story. I only have the first bit down, it's kinda like to prologue to chapter 1, but I was wondering if it sounded good and would translate well into a sim story. I got all fired up today because I learned how to take pics, and I've been intending to do a story. So yea...let me kno if you're interested, and I'll post it here. :smt109

[starlucid]

Well I would love to read it love Native American themes!

[babyblue1387]

I finished Chapter 1, parts 1 & 2. I hope to get enough of the story written before I take pics so that I can upload something for a while. But here goes chapter 1.

Chapter 1 – Family History

Part I – As We are Now

We are, more or less, a normal family. We’ve been in Pleasantview for, maybe, 4 years now. On the outside we look normal, anyway. My father is an accountant, and my mother stays at home to care for my sister and I. She cries a lot but doesn’t say why. My brother is overseas; a sort of priest, I guess you could say.

We are constantly haunted by demons from our past. A terrible bloody past that may well come into our present and embed itself in our future. My sister always asks our mother why she is crying. That is because she is not old enough to remember what life was before Pleasantview. But I am. We are the last of the Nahuatl Indians, and this blood that runs through our veins has been passed down for centuries; it is the blood of kings and queens. It is full of purity and blessings of the Gods. Yet many see us as a threat. They have been chasing us for the past 14 years, trying to ensure our destruction, trying to finally make us all extinct. This doesn’t make any sense, does it? Let me back up.

This is my father, the last Nahuatl King. His given name is Necuametl, which means ‘king.’ He ruled the small tribe of Nahuatl we lived with in Southern Mexico. His new, Spanish name is Zacarias, which means ‘He has remembered.’
   
This is my mother, Quetzalxchitl, precious flower; queen. Now named Basilia, queen. She ruled the women, teaching them all that they needed to know.

This is Tlanextic, my brother. His name means ‘light of dawn,’ and he is now a priest. Though he goes by the name Fedele, faithful.

My younger sister, Zyanya, ‘always, forever.’ She is now Amaranta, meaning unfading. But sometimes we call her Peppi.

And this is me, Xiuhcoatl, Alondora. I am the fireserpent, weapon of destruction, defender of mandkind. And yes, I am pregnant.

Not pictured here are my eldest brother, Tlacaelel (‘greatest of our male heroes’), and my eldest sister Teyacapan (first born). Tlacaelel was killed when we escaped from the village. He was next in line to be king, but They got to him first. That was when we knew we had to leave. Teya, however, chose to forsake her past and become Paca, which means ‘free’, because she was finally free from us and the responsibility that fell to her when Elel was killed. She was to take my place as the next queen, but she ran from her responsibility like a child. Her name was never again to be spoken in our house. To my parents, it was as if she was dead.

Part II – The Escape from Mexico

It was beautiful that day. It had to be 14 years ago. I remember because I had just learned how to make clay dolls from my grandmother. Amaranta was only an infant then. I was playing with grandmother and it began to rain. She took me inside because she said the water was angry. Then she told me about the water goddess and how she was eternal; then I fell asleep.

I awoke to angry noises. Shouting and screaming and crying. So I cried. I cried because I felt the pain and the anguish that was in the house. And I could smell it. Death. There was the stench of death in the air, and everyone got silent when they saw I was awake. Grandma was dead. I could see her lying on the floor. She was dead. Then someone burst through the door, dumping a limp body on the couch.

“They are attacking, please, they got Tlacaelel.”

There was my brother, bloody…dead.

So we fled. The soldiers all came to our house and they surrounded us. There was an escape plan ready, and we followed it. I don’t know how many died that day, but it rained, and their bodies were washed and purified by the water goddess, and returned to the earth. As we were about to enter a cave, a blind seeress came up to us.

“You will have new names. Your Nahuatl ones are no longer safe.”

“But they are sacred to us. You have named the royal family for 100 years. I will not give up the name you saw for me,” my mother said.

“Quetzalxochitl, you must be strong for your children. You are now Basilia. It still means queen. Though you are not now queen in body, you are queen in heart.”

“And what about Tlanextic? Will he be safe?” asked my father.

“Yes, he will be Fedele, but he is safe because he is away from here. Teyacapan, you are heavenly, Celestina, for the heavens have now chosen you to lead your family.”

But Teya was not happy. I was christened Alondora and Zyanya became Amaranta. We were told never to use our Nahuatl names again, unless in the most private of moments. Even then, we were to guard our words. We were to hide nearly every aspect of who and what we were. As we were being led underground and out of our village, it burned behind us, and my mother cried. Even as a toddler, I knew what was going on. I’d never return home. I could see the buildings and the trees and the gardens on fire and I watched my past burn behind me as my future came rushing toward me, faster than I’d ever know.
------
Hope it doesn't get too confusing. Comments much appreciated. :toothy5:

[starlucid]

Oh! I love it so far!  Who attacked their family?   That part I don't get.

[babyblue1387]

Right now I'm just leaving it as something like mercenaries. I'm trying to figure out how to work having a king and queen into a modern day society. I think I might change the place from southern Mexico to something made up just so that it would make sense to have a king and queen. But the people attacking their family work for the current ruler who is doing something like genocide. He'll get his. The bad guys always do.:devill:

[Sam the T-man]

Hey guys, don't know if this is the right place but I was googling for creative writing tips and found this - there's some good stuff there I hadn't thought of

[atlbynghtst]

i have done a story on thesimsresource.com, as i love doing stories ( used to like to build houses ) but i dont know how to upload a story to anywhere but there because they ahve a story wizard that finds the whole thing....so i guess what i am asking is how do you upload a story here?

[~*Jax*~]

i have done a story on thesimsresource.com, as i love doing stories ( used to like to build houses ) but i dont know how to upload a story to anywhere but there because they ahve a story wizard that finds the whole thing....so i guess what i am asking is how do you upload a story here?

 
YAY!  Another person who wants to upload stories here!!
 
OK, basically what you want to do is get an ImageShack or Photobucket account to hold your photos.
 
Then, when you are ready, click on the New Thread button in the main story forum.  This will open up a page that is a lot like the one you used to post the comment.
 
Write your story in the box, interspersing it with photos using the photo button (you will need the link where your intended photo is hosted) and insert the link.
 
When you are done, click the submit button and there you go!

[Sam the T-man]

I don't tend to bother with the in-game storyteller anymore, the word limit on that is too low for me. I just use OpenOffice and type it up there, insert the pictures I want to use as a guide, then when the time comes to post it just copy/paste the words, tweak where necessary (using bold/italics, e.g.), and uploading my pictures on the fly - I have the Imageshack Toolbar which lets you drag your pictures into the text area and it uploads that way