Quote by KimmiBeGood

Hi, Katherine!

I haven’t read the book, but feel a kinda curiosity about the movie. I don’t like watching disturbing things, though. I guess I can always walk out if it gets too rough.

Probably depends on how they handle it. I learned drama needs moments with a little lightness or levity or connection to others, to let the reader breathe. The book had none of that and seemed like it was just dark to be dark. This is not her typical kind of book so she was probably just trying something new but to me it didn’t work.

The plot line had potential tho, so maybe a screenwriter can turn it into what it should’ve been? I like the actors in this one so I hope so. I might watch it if people say it’s good 👀

Random pop in!

I probably won’t. I didn’t love the book. Maybe it’s just too dark for me rn idk. Have you seen it?

Quote by TammyTrueheart

Can you tell me how to delete my profile? All my characters do drugs. I doubt if I can get a story published.

Account settings—>membership—>manage—> delete account

Lush accepts drugs but consent and ages are hard rules. They’re not up for debate. Any further questions feel free to PM me.

Nooo! Oh no. 😢 RIP, man. Ugh. I hate to hear that

Hey everyone! If you’re looking for a proofreader please use this thread instead of creating a new one. Thanks!

Quote by Seeker4

Staying in POV is sometimes my challenge rather than choosing. I choose the one that makes sense for the story and works most comfortably for me (meaning fewer with female POV being as I am cis male). But I also make sure to develop the non-POV character(s) in dialogue and description which deals with the consent issue. But, damn it, I have sometimes started out writing from A's point of view and the somewhere along the line, slipped into B's. Sometimes it's because I got confused writing dialogue (or wrote dialogue spoken by B and then kept going in that POV after the dialogue ended) but others I am less sure of. I just suddenly realize that I am writing B when I should be writing A.

I’ve been mid-story when I’ve figured out I love the character I’m writing but they shouldn’t be the pov. It’s SO annoying but on the bright side, you learn and relearn how deeply it elevates the story to have other characters so fully developed. 🥂

Okay, you’ve got a story in your head and it’s time to fucking GO. Do it. Most of the time, if you wait it’ll either haunt you until you write it or the idea thread will disappear, never to be found again. Keep point of view in the back of your mind though, and I’m not talking about first, second, or third person pov.

Whose story is it? Who goes through more drama, has to make more decisions to get to or away from an outcome and grows as a person? Maybe the point of view you’ve chosen isn’t really the star of the story. Remember, no matter how attached you might be to that character, the reader wants to follow a journey—they want to experience a story through the eyes of the star, not a side character.

So how to have a tight point of view? Think of the eyes as a camera lens. You can only describe what that character sees, feels, hears, tastes, smells, and thinks. If you find yourself describing a female orgasm and your character is male, you’re in the wrong headspace. If you’re writing what another character is thinking, wrong headspace. If a main character is telling the reader what they look like (“I brushed the hair from my blue eyes”), unless they’re looking looking in the mirror to see their own blue eyes it’s the wrong headspace.

Choosing the right POV is critical to keeping your audience engaged and also may help you even pass a story here. For instance, say the narration is from a man and it's describing a woman's thoughts, feelings, wants, etc. Nothing written about her dialogue or body language etc is confirming or not confirming. He can't read her mind. So if he just leaps into sex, consent is questionable and the story will likely need an edit. It doesn't mean the writer was intentionally writing outside Lush rules, but to the reader it's murky. If it's in her POV it's more easily solved because the reader feels what she does and she's giving them thoughts. If it's in his POV and he shows what he sees her do or hears her say to show her consent, it's a go.

Hope all that makes sense!

We’ve had so many side quests, the answer to these questions have been lost and and that’s super problematic for legitimate concerns like yours. I think the best thing to do at this point is to bring some of those forward and then lock the thread so they’re not lost again when others need those answers.

****

To recap, the queue is long and hard. That's how I like to fuck, but not how any of us love to verify/get verified. Please be patient with us as we get spanked by legitimate writers (heyyyy baby!) and the flood of AI written stories that keep our dudes soft and our ladies dry.

What to know (that's lost in the fillings of this thread):

1. Above your submitted story, there will be words about it being reviewed or being with a mod, etc. These are in the site design, created to help writers know their story status. Unfortunately it can be buggy or verifiers may need to discuss something about it or it's been been moved around for queue management so basically, ignore it. The only legit thing that can tell you is if you can recall your story or not.

2. If you need to recall your story and can't, send a note through the "contact us" link at the bottom of the screen or contact a verifier to check the status and/or have it sent back or moved so you can recall it.

3. The great techies in the sky are doing almighty techy things to try to help us get this working in a better way, so hope is on the horizon.

4. If you add a cover pic to an existing story, the site does not show the verifiers that no changes were made to the story itself, so we'd have to go over the entire story again as if it's new. As everyone knows, the story queue is insane, so we won't be prioritizing those. They'll get done buuuuuut.... it'll be a bit.

The system only allows for one of your submissions in the queue at a time, so do consider this before you pull an older story to add a cover picture.

Thank you for your patience!

Quote by Mandapanda2025

I don't recall getting the "It's under review and cannot be recalled." That is what I mean. We are going on Day 8, and from a notice perspective, I don't know if it's in the queue or in someone's hot little hands. Yes, I can periodically try to recall it, but I'd probably actually end up recalling it and slide down to the bottom of the queue.

If you scroll to the bottom of this screen, there’s a link to “contact us” for any questions.

the techies are working on things behind the scenes to help with the queue and the sooner that comes to fruition on the site, the better for all of us. Then hopefully this whole confusing and stressful thing will be resolved.

In the meantime, please please zip through the pages on this thread to read the details of what’s really going on. The mods have even added screenshots to be more transparent. We all just gotta hang in there—this too shall pass

Quote by WannabeWordsmith

A reminder

People who open multiple accounts and/or push AI-generated or AI-assisted dreck to the queue, and then have the cheek to complain about wait times, are doing the site and all the authors who care about the craft of storytelling a disservice.

We have made our stance on AI public. Just because we're currently publishing such work - deliberately slowly - to give real authors and those who play by the rules a chance at getting published, doesn't mean that will always be the case.

Plans are afoot to tackle this scourge, this blight on the quality of stories published here, but our resources are limited and it may take time.

If your stories are not AI-generated/assisted and your story has been inadvertently caught up in our sweeps that allow us to move past the crap and get to the real stories buried below, please accept our apologies. We currently have a very limited toolset at our disposal and manually sifting the deluge and cross-checking accounts and content is time consuming and error prone.

Please, please, again, do not present AI content and pretend you wrote it. It's not big, nor is it clever, to steal work from other authors and take credit for the mediocre, repetitive nonsense it spits out. I'm surprised the brave moderating team haven't all had a collective nervous breakdown having to wade through the same tired hipster phrasing, the same clichéd tropes, story after story after story, a hundred times a week each.

It's demoralising and unjust when we're giving our time - for free - to use our collective years of expertise to help authors find their storytelling voice, only to be presented with 30-40 stories per day, all with a near-identical voice and cadence generated by a soulless algorithm.

We urge you to have a go at writing something yourself. Something fresh. Something exciting that you're proud of and allows you to build a steady readership. If you genuinely try, we are more than happy to help you build on those foundations by providing tips, resources, and guidance to help you develop.

We're here to help and are being hamstrung from doing so by inconsiderate site members.

EPed

Now it's gonna take longer to verify stories because WW has made the entire story mod team wet and hard and we are currently out of office for an unscheduled orgy

Quote by kistinspencil

What do you have available to work with? Any dietary restrictions? Taste preferences?

Sorry I'm late! (Story of my life)

I don't do much red meat or seafood, but I'm open to trying (or re-trying, occasionally) nearly anything. Nearly. Don't come at me with insects.

Currently my favorite is a modified Zucchini & Mushroom Bibimbap recipe. Apologies to the international community for being weird and American with my units of measurement.

Cook a handful of shredded carrots, two handfuls of sliced mushrooms, and a quartered zucchini over oil with salt and pepper until tender. Boil 3/4 cup of Jasmine Rice with a dash of ground ginger and 1 tbsp butter. Fry 4 eggs. Layer veggies over the cooked rice, followed by the fried eggs. In a separate bowl, mix 1 tbsp sesame oil, 2 tbsp soy sauce, 1 tbsp sugar, and 1 tsp Sriracha and drizzle over the top. Slice a couple green onions and sprinkle on top (optional, I def don't do this all the time but it's aesthetically pleasing).

Not in awhile, but sure. Too many times to count. 😉

Congratulations, Chris! Well done!

It’s rare for me to burn down a kitchen, but I def am not a talented cook or baker. I can follow a recipe though. Share your recipes here, and help a girl out 🤪

Nope. I actually am of the opinion that stories that try to be true to reality are boring and usually give me a case of the blah blahs. Think about all the extraneous bullshit we think or feel or experience in between it all. It’s extremely difficult to look at your life and edit for the things that don’t matter to a particular story in it, because everything matters. It’s REAL LIFE

That said, I think if you use what or who you know to create aspects of stories, it feels way more real. A little truth goes a long way

Congratulations!!

I don't know who needs to hear this, but in the immortal words of my ex-coworker Charlie, "Fuck 'em all, big and small."

So stupid. So simple. Weirdly perfect.

Quote by dronette56

Wow, thank you!! I don't know what else to say.

Edit: Now I'm getting all verklempt.

I love when you make me google things. Do it again 😍

Wooooooo! Congrats, girl! Great story!!

Go to the coffee shop or a restaurants and listen to how people talk. It’ll help you create dialogue that is more unique to a character, and notice how real people move—what movements show their moods, etc.

I think reading a lot, in and out of lush, also helps. Especially when you get into a genre and 100 books later, you now see alllllll the cliches. I like to try to turn the cliches on their head. But I also like a cliche sometimes—just keep the dialogue or whatever fresh. It’s extremely difficult to make a brand new plot or character, but if you pick an element to work on each new story, I think it helps build your overall ability to create truly amazing and memorable work.

Thanks for this post! Super cool! I don’t get to nerd out about writing enough

Quote by MissVixen

Why I always add a note to y'all that I just changed/added the cover image

Def appreciated and literally we have zero problem with it! We just wish it was easier to verify but it's not. :/

Hey everyone, just a heads up. If you add a cover pic to an existing story, the site does not show the verifiers that no changes were made to the story itself, so we'd have to go over the entire story again as if it's new. As everyone knows, the story queue is insane, so we won't be prioritizing those. They'll get done buuuuuut.... it'll be a bit.

The system only allows for one of your submissions in the queue at a time, so do consider this before you pull an older story to add a cover picture. Thanks for all your patience! ❤️❤️

Quote by Chet_Morton

a polarizing category (which I'll abbreviate, somewhat ironically, as PC) 😁

😂😂 yep, overthinking it totally! I thought I was trying to guess what polarizing category you were referring to. 😂🤦‍♀️

Yeah I needed sleep. But sometimes sleepy messages are hilarious so no shame in my game

Quote by Chet_Morton

Unimportant question, but I'm curious about the hierarchy of story categories. I'd be happy to hear anyone's thoughts on this and how you use categories and story tags, not just admins and mods.

My understanding is that the IF (I don't even dare write out the first word for fear it'll be gobbled up by a censorbot) designation is absolutely required, so that the story can be automatically blocked by people who don't want to see it. Beyond that, a category that may be polarizing -- e.g., Watersports -- can be used to attract some readers and warn others to stay away.

But then we get into format. Suppose a story is a poem involving a polarizing category (which I'll abbreviate, somewhat ironically, as PC); should it be placed in Erotic Poems, with story tags alerting the reader about the content? Does a 99-word PC story have to go in the Microfiction category? Does a 999-word PC story automatically belong in Flash Erotica?

What the heck is PC? I probably need to get some sleep and I’ll feel like a dumbass when I read this again 😂

This is a fun one! Honestly, I like getting into a new category for me so if I can swing it, I will! I’m remembering to tag now (I’m a hot mess) so I try to hit all the applicable tags. I figure the more tags, the more likely someone will run across it in a search and the more tags, sometimes the more intriguing. There was a badass author I found who’d written in the love story category with a gangbang tag, if memory serves, and I was like “this has to be shit” but I couldn’t help but to read it. Sidebar: it was so NOT shit—my mind needed to open a fucking door. Or an entire wing.

I’m babbling. But the point is, if you play around with it and read others’ stories to see what they do and what works for them, you can have a bit of fun and find what works for you. And maybe what doesn’t 😂

Anyone else following the Buddhist monks walking for peace from Texas to DC? It’s so fucking moving

Merry Christmas everyone!

I'm glad I'm came back here this year. I love this place, and all of you sweet, nutty, horny, weird-ass troublemaking fuckers. A toast to all y'all!

The rest of the world can suck it 😇

Such a great one! I truly started reading this as a cynic but was totally won over. This one has stuck with me for awhile. Congrats, Madeline! Well done!

Henke gets to write all the reviews now, WOW. 😍❤️

Thank you guys! This one took a long time to write and get out there. I know it’s long af so I’m happy that anyone clicked on it and stuck with it, and to know that it was worth it their time.