With 27 minutes to spare at the time of writing this post, Mutual Benefits Chapter 16 is now posted. I have gone through hell and back this past month and will likely expand on that in another blog post where I’m not so burnt out, but hey, I haven’t missed a month in a long time, and didn’t want to break the chain now.

I really enjoy when I discover that certain things in my stories operate as representations. I especially like it when I don’t realize it’s happening as I write it. For example, while editing the chapter, it dawned on me that the story used Bloodborne, basically throughout the whole story, as this weird metaphor or representation for status. It’s used by Quinn is the only avenue for his confidence in the face of several social situations, and in this chapter <here be spoilers!> it’s used to show just how insecure he is about what’s going on in his own relationship. At the critical moment of self-doubt, he refuses to play because he feels he’s too poor at it. There’s something there, and I really enjoy witnessing that as a second party to Quinn.

That’s probably just a bog-standard rhetorical device that most writers know about or even consciously use, but hey, I never received any proper training, so I still find beauty and mystique in its usage. It wasn’t intentional, as a lot of my story usually isn’t. For example, this chapter takes a few twists and new directions, and it may sound silly to say, “I didn’t think that would happen when writing the last chapter,” but becomes more believable if I say, “I didn’t think that would happen when writing chapter four.”

If you’re a budding writer, feel free to brag about a cool rhetorical device you’ve used in the comments. I don’t get enough writers bragging about how cool their writing is in my comments. Brag away; I love hearing about your passion. Sorry about the short blog this week, but yeah, I’m very burnt out and have said all I needed to say, I think. I’ll talk to you all next week.