Aetia

Featured emotions

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All emotions

Joy needs contrast to land. After long tension, a small kindness can carry more joy than a parade.

Grief

Grief is not linear. Characters can laugh at a funeral and collapse over a coffee cup. Honor the inconsistency.

12 techniques · 3 scene types

Desire

Desire shatters a character's restraint. Show the friction between their professional mask and the physical choices that expose their focus.

12 techniques · 5 min read

Dread

Dread suits horror, thriller, and tragedy. The reader knows the axe is falling; the character may still hope.

12 techniques · 3 scene types

Envy

Envy resents another's light. Show the psychological friction of a character forced to applaud the very success that deepens their own sense of lack.

12 techniques · 5 min read

Fear

Fear on the page is often politeness, jokes, or sudden competence, not only screaming.

12 techniques · 4 scene types

Grief

Grief is not linear. Characters can laugh at a funeral and collapse over a coffee cup. Honor the inconsistency.

12 techniques · 5 scene types

Guilt

Guilt can motivate restitution or paralysis. Show what the character believes they owe.

12 techniques · 1 scene types

Hope

Hope is active: characters plan, pray, or practice despite evidence. Without action, it reads as wishful thinking.

12 techniques · 5 scene types

Jealousy

Jealousy is not only romance. Siblings, mentors, colleagues, anyone can fear replacement.

12 techniques · 5 min read

Joy

Joy needs contrast to land. After long tension, a small kindness can carry more joy than a parade.

12 techniques · 1 scene types

Loneliness

Loneliness can live inside a crowded room. Show it through the character's exhausting effort to perform an ordinary connection.

12 techniques · 5 min read

Love

Love scenes fail when everyone is eloquent. Show care through action under pressure, such as who they warn, who they touch, and what they sacrifice.

12 techniques · 1 scene types

Nostalgia

Nostalgia can seduce characters into bad decisions. The past looks lit from behind; show what they are forgetting.

12 techniques · 3 scene types

Relief

Relief can collapse posture. After long fear, characters may shake, cry, or snap at the person who helped.

12 techniques · 3 scene types

Shame

Shame differs from guilt: guilt says “I did bad”; shame says “I am bad.” Write the body wanting to be smaller.

12 techniques · 1 scene types

Wonder

Wonder opens the chest. Use it to shift genre tone or mark a character's worldview changing.

12 techniques · 1 scene types

Emotions

Featured emotions

Fear

Joy

Browse by family

All emotions

Anger

Confusion

Contempt

Grief

Desire

Dread

Envy

Fear

Grief

Guilt

Hope

Jealousy

Joy

Loneliness

Love

Nostalgia

Relief

Shame

Wonder