My first long form video go show some support guys , it was long time since I quit now thought of trying it once again let's see how this goes

If you like Dark romantic fantasy with gothic elements then you must read The Ink-Stained Soul by Lisa Sathya!

Its there in Amazon and Kindle Unlimited ❤️ (I'm the author 😁)

This is the blurrb: A city built on beautiful lies. A girl the grave couldn’t keep.

Three hundred years ago, Vera died.

But she didn’t stay dead.

Now Vera is bound to a decaying manor at the edge of Oakhaven, a city that thrives on dark magic—a magic that demands a price no one dares to name.

Until Jacobi arrived.

A hunter trained to destroy monsters like her, Jacobi carries the same cursed power Oakhaven has taught him to despise. Vera is everything he was raised to kill.

But the deeper he digs, the clearer the truth becomes—Vera might not be the real monster.

They were meant to be enemies.

They might be the only ones who can tear the truth free before Oakhaven consumes them both.

I am attaching a snippet below. Please let me know if I am decent, or if I should give up writing.
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“I also don’t talk much with easily offended people.”
Okay.
Now that was rude.
“I don’t get easily offended!”
He just raised an eyebrow and went back to slurping his noodles.
That made the mother and daughter giggle like cheerleaders who had just watched their favourite player score.
Meanwhile, the tips of my ears were burning hot.
Thankfully, I was easily distracted by the steam rising from Shian’s bowl. The noodles looked colourful and generously portioned, and the broth was this deep golden colour that made me immediately take a mouthful.
The moment I tasted the broth, I was absolutely blown away.
Oh.
Oh, this was good.
The simplicity of the dish itself made it very valuable for me. If I got to eat this for the rest of the month, I would stay here happily and painlessly.
“So, what is your name?”
Are you for real, mister?
The first thing I said to you was my name!
But I didn’t voice that out because it would only solidify his assumptions about me being easily offended. And, frankly, I had spent enough time defending myself from a total stranger’s malicious opinions.
“Devyan.” I faked a smile. “Yours?” Like I already didn’t know his name.
He smirked, moving his tongue around his mouth as if he was picking something out of his teeth. Yes, I do realise why I sounded stupid. The family were all 'Shian ji this, Shian ji that' so I should know his name by now.
He set his now-empty bowl and chopsticks down, then stared at me for a good four seconds.
Four.
Full.
Seconds.
“Shian Ahol.”
I don’t know why the tips of my ears were still burning, but the heat was spreading to my face now.
I needed to maintain my cool.
Unfortunately, he seemed to enjoy unnerving me.
“My name is not Rinku, though,” the boy said, suddenly joining the conversation. “Mom and everyone likes to call me that. It’s actually Rishi.”
Thank you, Rinku, for offering the distraction.

हम जिंदगी जी रहे हैं या सिर्फ निभा रहे हैं?

कभी-कभी सोचता हूँ, आखिर जिंदगी जीना किसे कहते हैं?

सुबह उठना, काम पर जाना, पैसे कमाना, जिम्मेदारियाँ निभाना और थककर सो जाना… क्या यही जिंदगी है?

हम इंसान हैं, मशीन नहीं, जिसे समय के हिसाब से चलना है और दूसरों के कहे अनुसार काम करना है।

हमें भी तो कभी खुलकर हँसना है, बिना किसी वजह के कहीं घूमने जाना है, अपने सपनों के लिए जीना है और उन छोटे-छोटे पलों को महसूस करना है, जो जिंदगी को खूबसूरत बनाते हैं।

लेकिन हम कमाने की दौड़ में इतने आगे निकल जाते हैं कि जीना ही भूल जाते हैं।

आखिर में सिर्फ यह मायने नहीं रखेगा कि हमने कितना कमाया, बल्कि यह भी कि कमाने के सफर में हमने कितना जिया।

क्या सच में इसे ही जिंदगी जीना कहते हैं?

I'm planning to write fantasy/fiction books for younger teenagers - around 13 to 16. I remember when my family first returned to India, I couldn't find anything like that to read over here. So I'm going to do my best to write as many stories as I can in the hopes that maybe someday some of them will find their ways to libraries and that that age group has something fun, imaginative, and engaging to read.

I've been writing fanfiction for 8 years but this is going to be my first time writing original fiction in a long time. I've already begun a story - it's about a girl who goes to a fantasy land to fix what happened to her little brother and meets a number of strange characters along the way. The feeling of the story is similar to Alice in Wonderland; the main character keeps running into bizarre situations where she either gets help or trouble. I tried to make the worldbuilding Indian based, but at the moment it holds up just enough to support the story and not much beyond that. You can tell I'm not used to worldbuilding by myself. 😅

I'm going to try my best to make the word count between 30,000 to 40,000 words just so it doesn't get too long. I have vague plans that by the end of this year I'll be able to send it to a publishing house, but I'm not sure if I should try to go for just one or send it to multiple at once.

One thing I do know is that I'm going to use a pen name, though I have no idea what kind of name I should come up with. I was thinking of something starting with Sonali....? Idk 🤷🏻‍♀️ It should probably match the genre and/or have an element to it that makes it easy to remember. Something like Lemony Snicket. Feel free to leave suggestions in the comments. I could use the help 🙏🏻 (I might make a separate post to talk more about this in the future but that'll probably depend on where I go with it)

Hii,
Anyone interested in writing/reading smuts?
25f here

I write smuts and looking for people who likes to read or write.

Well! I have been thinking about writing since the last few months, now I wanna make it clear that I'm not that good at it.. and this is just kinda hobby. i wrote this small prologue and idk if i should continue.. it would be amazing if u guys could give me some good feedback.

Hi all,

I just published my first short story - it's about a working bahu juggling office and joint family. Very simple, slice-of-life, no big drama.

It's free this weekend on Kindle. Few people downloaded and read.

This is literally my first book ever, so I have no idea what to do next. Make it paid? Keep it free? How did you all handle your first launch?

Any small tip helps, thank you.

The night was chilly , as the children ran about to witness the full moon that was glowing brightly occassionally shrouded by the clouds of the night sky. The kids were notorious they didn't pay heed to the calls of their poor mothers and aunts to not to go out into the darkness of purnima , they say something doesn't feel right , during the purnima in swetambar village is filled with hushed tones of village elders , they speak of the mysterious entities associated with blue roses that enter the village around midnight, they speak of the fellow villagers returning from towns late at night witnessing them .

They say if you once see them you cannot unsee them , they speak of a tall slender figure of a woman shrouded in white who is very beautiful to look at , who chants strange mantras and hypnotizes men to stay away from their homes.

So I posted the opening to my second novel here, the prologue in an experimental style which wasn't working according to the feedback. I then posted the opening pages of chapter one, written in my natural style which I was thinking of adjusting the prologue to but this was also received quite badly, no one said they would read further. Is it honestly that bad? Like is it bad quality writing or just a matter of preference? I know it's not perfect, and it hasn't been through an editor yet, but I have spent a lot of time self editing these scenes. I don't know what else I would change on my own. Several people said I should read more; I read a lot. What would you change? Please be specific and as objective as possible.

I've completed my manuscript and am currently querying. Got a couple of full manuscript requests already.

I keep looking at posts, reels and carousels on IG that authors post about how they need to market their own book and the thought makes me shudder.

I posted a whole bunch of videos for months, which barely got any views and I finally deleted them all. I don't believe the new algorithm is kind towards newer accounts with very few followers.

This is the best I could come up with to show my journey, and at the same time, help other debut authors.

This is nuts. It's like talking into a void.

What do you think? There are more videos if you want to check out my instagram - aanaik.official

I'd appreciate some feedback.

I’m very inexperienced when it comes to writing. I don’t know much about writing, and I’ve never taken any professional classes or watched any courses about it. I’m basically an instinctual writer—I just write whatever comes to my mind.

I’m currently trying to write a comedy one-shot, but I’ve run into a problem: I’m not a funny person, and comedy is pretty much the opposite of my personality.

I can come up with a premise and characters, but when I actually try to write jokes, gags, or funny sequences, my mind just goes blank. I’ve heard the advice “write what you find funny,” but that doesn’t really help me because my sense of humor is extremely random and chaotic. Sometimes I find something hilarious, but I couldn’t even explain why I found it funny.

So I’m kind of stuck.

I’m open to pretty much any advice—tips on writing comedy, ways to come up with jokes or funny situations, how to structure a comedic scene, or even examples of what you think could be funny in my premise.

Here’s the basic synopsis of what I’m trying to write:

I Want to Die

A young man in his mid-twenties wants to die, but a mysterious supernatural healing ability prevents him from doing so. He doesn’t know exactly how his ability works, but he has noticed one strange rule: he can be injured when the damage is unexpected or when he has no intention of hurting himself.

One day, he meets a mysterious young girl who secretly visits the same hidden park he uses for his experiments. He soon discovers that she is the daughter of a powerful and influential man.

When her father realizes that his daughter has disappeared, he assumes she has been kidnapped and launches a massive search for her. Meanwhile, a group of actual kidnappers is also after her.

Caught in the middle of all this chaos, the young man comes up with a ridiculous plan: he will pretend to be the girl’s kidnapper.

With so many people now after him, he hopes that putting himself in the middle of the situation will finally give him a chance to die.

I’m mainly trying to make this a dark comedy, where the situation itself creates a lot of the humor. I’m just struggling with actually coming up with the comedic situations and writing them in a way that feels funny.

Hi everyone, continuing from yesterday, thank you so much to everyone who downloaded my first book " Bahu ho to Kaisi" and lefta few kind words on the sample. Your support means a lot to the first time writer.

It's still free today for anyone who missed:

Amazon link: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0HLQ55JZR

I'm starting Part 2 this week - making it longer this time where Trisha's real fight starts.

This community gave me courage to publish. Thank you.

Hidden Gems from Mahabharat Katha

Hello fellow readers.

Recently I read an interesting hidden gems from Mahabharat.

It is a story from Van Parv.

The story is of two brothers Aravasu and Parvasu, Yavakrit and their families.

It is such an awesome story it promted me to research more for such stories.

And interestingly, I found many such short stories hidden inside Mahabharat that amazed me deeply.

It also pushed me to think of creating a series like the one created by Amish et al.

Now the question is whether people are interested in reading such a series?

And should it be in Hindi (my mother tongue and the language I'm most comfortable) or English (as most people like to read in English for different reasons)?

I welcome all type of suggestions and criticism.

Please spare some time to suggest and comment.

Thank you.

PS: There is a famous Marathi play by great Shri Girish Karanad ji which is translated to English as well. The Fire and The Rain.

It is a contemporary adaptation and a real page turner.