End of the Year Fic Recs

thank you @thescrapwitch and @sallysavestheday for tagging me!

This is a wonderful game, I love reccing fics and I should do it more. I'll keep it all Silmarillion for the recs, since that's the bulk of what I've read this year. I haven't had the spoon to leave proper comments on some of these, so hopefully reccing them can count too?

Recommend up to 5 series or multi-chapter fics from 2023 that everyone should read (multi-year WIPs count, if the last update was in 2023).

- The Harrowing by @chthonion. I am forever in awe of this whole series and of Chthonion's writing. Somehow every single sentence is relatable and at least half of them are a punch in the gut, but in a healing way. A delightful Frodo, Celebrimbor and Finrod working through their trauma and Annatar, remade as an elf, learning how to be a good person (and a person at all, really).

- we will make this place our home by @leucisticpuffin. Truly delightful 70s AU as narrated by 8 year old Elrond, who just makes my heart melt in every chapter. Maedhros and Maglor as traumatized foster parents doing their best, the twins with their antics and their fears and joys, it's such a breath of fresh air and I can't get enough of it.

- Hanged Man by @tethysresort. Second age fic about the fall of Eregion and the start of Imladris with so much interesting worldbuilding and plot, and characterization of Elrond and Glorfindel especially that I really loved.

- Everlasting Song by @amethysttribble. This is perhaps a little more niche, a crossover with A Song of Ice and Fire, but I'm not an ASOIAF fan at all and I have like two whole memories of the books and I'm still finding absolutely delightful. Top-notch characterization of the Fëanorians, and it really keeps you on your toes.

- Aurë entuluva by @theheirofashandfire. Just very recently caught up with it and I love it to bits! The time loop is all kinds of angsty and breathtaking, and I really love the world that is being constructed afterwards. Wonderful Russingon, and I'm also, especially, in love with her Curufin and Celegorm.

Recommend up to 5 single chapter fics/one-shots (long or short) from 2023 that everyone should read.

- Wayward Son by @thescrapwitch. Angst exactly like I like it. Fëanor and Maglor, and it will make you cry. @thescrapwitch writes Maglor just wonderfully and I really love this Fëanor that will do absolutely anything for his son.

- On the difference between hostages and sons by leodesic (and the rest of the series as well). Absolutely delightful Elrond and Elros, as seen by Gil-galad when they first come to his court. I love Elrond defying expectation, and this was such a wonderful read.

- the world to come by arriviste. Arda Remade, told through the shadows and the gaps of what's missing. It's eerie, and I love a well-written eerie fic that leaves you feeling a little off-balance. Wonderful reflection on the price of perfection.

- Sea-Bells and Sunlight by @actual-bill-potts. Finrod, Lúthien and Beren in Mandos. This broke my heart in the best way.

- in the breaking by @thelordofgifs. Short but terribly impactful study of Maedhros and Maglor before the end, one of the best I've read of them.

Recommend up to 5 fics NOT from 2023 that everyone should read (oldies but goodies).

- A Farewell to Arms by MorwenSteelsheen (LOTR, Farawyn). Such a wonderful characterization and development of Faramir and Éowyn's relationship in a slight canon divergence where Éowyn arrives in Gondor two years before the end of the war of the Ring.

- The Splintered Light by @thearrogantemu. The whole series. These Gifts That You Have Given Me (Silvergifting) is well-known in the fandom, I think, and I absolutely loved it, but the other fics set in the Fourth Age were among the first I read in this fandom that I just fell straight in love with.

- The Host of the West by @mynameisjessejk. Various fics of the Otter Mayhem and Otterless Mayhem series could have gone into every category here because I love them all, but this is the one I chose because I reread it yesterday for the fourth (fifth?) time and it still had me bawling my eyes out. Probably my favourite Finrod, and definitely an inspiration for my own writing. The whole series is about healing and redemption and elf therapy and all of it is delightful.

- The Peril (and Potential) of Unleashing Lightning in a Fishbowl by @dawnfelagund. This one took everything I thought I knew about Caranthir, threw it out the window and gave me a truly brilliant characterization I didn't know I needed in my life. The worldbuilding is also delightful, and so is Amarië.

- Aranya by SpaceWall. I read this recently and it's really staying with me. Some people in my asks have expressed interest in fics that take the Valar to account for their mistakes, and this is a wonderful one. With a bonus revolution. I really love the non-linear storytelling as well, a hard-to-use tool that is done wonderfully here. Plus the title is inspired.

Recommend up to 5 of your own fics (completed or WIP) from 2023 that everyone should read.

- your veins are empty of dust. Character study of Nerdanel as feels her family die across the sea, and she sculpts. This is also the fic for which I made the art I'm probably the proudest of to date.

- your smile tells me I'm safe. Modern AU with aro Maedhros and a Russingon QPR.

- silver. Míriel, Celegorm and Celebrimbor, and living with chronic illness.

- the light that you keep burning there. Part of a much larger AU where the second and third kinslayings don't happen, but this one is about Maedhros, Maglor and Fingon in the later years, as the world crumbles, trying to remember what (who) they're fighting for.

- if I am to braid my mystic crown. The Silmarillion retold through worldbuilding headcanons about braids.

Tagging @unforth @foodsies4me @wren-of-the-woods @camille-lachenille (I don't know who has already done it, so feel free to send me a link if you have!)

honestly its kind of comforting to see that you're not racing around to get to the "next pit stop" in academia. there's been a trend within and outside of my cohort where people are planning out a back to back master's and phd right after (!!) undergrad with no space for just. taking your time with your discipline and niche. you can see a burnout coming from miles away

oh i know exactly what u mean!! i took a few years off between undergrad and my master's (kinda not intentionally on my part but quarantine really put a dent in a lot of my plans alksjdflas) and looking back on it, i'm VERY glad that i did bc i ended up working a bit and coming into my own and it gave me a lot more perspective when it came time to applying and whether or not i /truly/ wanted a master's. honestly, my og goal was to go straight to the phd route but i genuinely don't think i could handle it mentally — academia is fun at times but it's SO draining and i think being able to come back to myself and figure out if it IS actually something that i want and is viable for me and the best option in my circumstances....that and of course i actually really do want some money bc my student debt is so scary right now haha. i genuinely don't think that even if i had applied for a phd or whatever i'd be thrilled about it right now — i think if anything i need to step back from academia after this semester, actually reflect on what it is i want, gather my resources, and also i'm just. genuinely curious to see what else is out there for me. if i ever DO end up going for a phd, i want it to be because i REALLY want it and not because im pushed to do so or because it's expected of me or simply because i feel trapped and academia is the only thing i can imagine for myself.

i hope that you've been doing fine this semester!!!!!! i know a lot of us either have exams or are writing our dissertations and theses and papers so i hope that you're doing well<3

The Devil's Den

Chapter 28: In Which There Are Many Stairs to Climb

::UNDER 18? DO NOT INTERACT. This chapter contains material NOT SUITED for you::

You can read this also on Ao3 at: https://archiveofourown.org/works/46831621/chapters/117962293

"Alcina?"

The study was quiet and quite dark; only the small antique brass and jade colored stained glass lamp was illuminated as Alcina had perched at her desk.

"Of course," she smiled," the girls tell me you stopped by?"

"Yes, I was hoping to speak to you in person."

"Oh... is something the matter?" she asked feeling a little heavier.

"Well - I don't know. I..."

For Donna to hesitate was unusual to say the least. Alcina's alertness kicked into another gear as she waited silently on the other end.

"I apologize for taking action without your consent and knowledge, but I've sent Angie to Connecticut."

Ok. That wasn't entirely what she had expected to hear, but yet she had not let on any other part of this decision and she seemed to be waiting for inquiry.

"For?"

Donna sighed audibly, "I can't shake the feeling that something isn't adding up with Mother Miranda. I spoke to her on the phone tonight to requests she send her troops to patrol her properties while she was away... she declined. And while we were speaking I could have sworn I heard Salvatore in the background, but I saw him just yesterday here in the city... I hope I am mistaken, because I can't explain that possibility or how I could have misheard it."

Alcina thumbed the dark red wood of the edge of her desk as she thought on this. Moreau had a very distinct voice, and Donna had keener hearing than her own, but the coincidence would be impossible; Mother Miranda was in Romania, that was the line she was being reached at, so what could explain such a thing?

"And you sent Angie to investigate?" she asked quietly, her own mind trying to fit the mismatched puzzle pieces together.

"Yes. With the utmost secrecy."

Nodding to herself, she pursed her lips and let out a full but silent breath, "Has Heisenberg returned yet?"

"Uh - yes - tonight as scheduled," Donna responded a little confused, "why do you ask?"

"His uses, few and odd as they may be, have enough niches to come in handy. I will speak to him personally about checking the phone lines for interference, anything that might explain this."

"Thank you for hearing me out on this, I've felt perplexed and unsure of myself all night."

"You of all people should know I will heed anything and everything you tell me. Don't lose sleep over this, if there is something to be found, we will get to the bottom of it. I - I too, have had my reservations about Mother Miranda's reaction to all of this... it stays between us. Do not fret, sister, we will uncover whatever is happening, I promise you."

"Thank you," she sighed softly, "I'm so happy you're home. I trust you're feeling... better?"

Oh, well, Alcina knew that hinting tone anywhere. She was well aware Donna knew exactly where she had been and Alcina softened her snort.

"Yes, I'm feeling much, much better, if you must know. Now, off you go, it's late - almost 9 AM. Get some rest, we'll speak later."

"Good niiiight." Donna sang sweetly.

Alcina rolled her eyes and hung up the phone.

While Donna was insufferably cute, and insufferable all at the same time, Alcina couldn't corral her thoughts from running loose on what she'd just been told. She really just wanted some peace and quiet for a moment. Was that too much to ask? There was always something happening in the underground, but the happenings of late seemed far more unusual than ever before. It was once again reminding her of what life had been like when the wars were active; always something to look over ones shoulder for, unknowing who could be trusted, unsure what land mine might be stepped on inadvertently next, what fight would drop itself at ones feet at the tip of a hat. It only reinforced her desire to leave this all behind; Matriarchy, governance, control, power, peacekeeping - Alcina just wanted a life of simplicity now. A life with you and her girls. That was it, that was all.

-

Work was absolutely not going to happen today.

You hadn't slept since Alcina left and you didn't care to, and you certainly could not have cared less than to get ready and go into work. It was Thursday. It'd been a slow, uneventful week outside of the random mishappenings, and you were so caught up in Alcina being back that you could pretty much not entertain your mind with anything else.

She was back, she was home.

Not unscathed.

The visions of those scars continued to waft through your head and it made you shudder almost every time. Were you grateful you'd healed her? Absolutely. Were you still chewing on the fact she had not, and was likely not, going to tell you what happened to her? Definitely. 

And were you still tripping over the uncanny event that happened to you and your own back several nights back? One-hundred percent.

Sure. Life had gotten weird as shit since she had come into your life. You were not complaining. But your hunches had always been part of you and they had never been wrong, whatever they happened to alert you to. And there was something, something deep, hiding from you and you could feel it but you could not fucking see it. As much as you wanted to find it, figure it out, there was also something telling you it wasn't going to happen within your control. That definitely didn't help the agitation of that nagging feeling. Still, what was there for you to do?

Maybe it was the way Alcina looked at you after she healed. That lost, concerned, fleeting, calculating, what-the-fuck look in her eyes as she peered down at you... it was so short lived. But it was there. Was it really so far-fetched your blood could do that? Was that not normal? Was she just not expecting it at all for some reason?

And who or what did that to her, and what the fuck did she look like before she came back to you? You shuddered again, the heat of anger rising in you like lava thinking about whatever harmed her like that. 

You knew you couldn't stop it from happening again, or stop her from doing what she needed to do, but there was something you could do, even if it was seemingly insignificant.

Rising from the couch you headed to your bedroom to get dressed.

-

"Heisenberg."

"Chriiiiist!" he shouted, jumping back from his contraption and soldering tool, "can we put a fucking bell on you?! You'd think with your size you'd be a hell of a lot louder," he blurted flipping up his welding visor.

Alcina raised a brow at his comment and placed a hand on her hip, "oh, pardon me for interrupting your newest little tinker toy - "

"Is it not a toy!" he bit back mimicking her own flick of the wrist, "it's a - a, uhm -"

In fairness he wasn't entirely sure what to call it just yet, it was indeed a new weapon he had envisioned recently and was tirelessly working on, but trying to explain the mechanics and function was escaping him in the moment. He'd been on go-mode ever since the mutant attacks and his brain really was on overload. Karl wasn't about to be caught unprepared again.

"It's a fuck-you-very-much-mind-your-damn-business; I ain't wastin' my time trying to school you on my genius. Wha'd'you want, Lurch?"

Unamused and in a hurry, Alcina let it slide and stepped through the threshold of his shop, making sure the door was closed securely behind her as she took only a few more steps.

"Are you still familiar with the electrical wiring of the communication systems down here?"

"Yeah, why?" he asked wiping his brow with the back of his arm.

"Could you find time in your undoubtedly busy schedule to have a look at them to make sure nothing has been tampered with?"

He squinted at her, "I mean, I am awfully busy. But... I suppose I can make it happen."

"Good," she replied without missing a beat, smirking at him smugly, "please do it quietly."

"Quietly? Do you forget who you're talkin' to?"

Deadpan, Alcina remarked, "no, that's why I said it," and turned on her heels towards the door.

"Pfff, ok Addams family reject - you gunna tell me why I'm looking for said tamperings?" he called after her.

"No. Don't solder yourself to your toy. Let me know what you find."

Karl began to chuckle to himself as the flatness in her voice trailed off as she walked down the corridor, "Nice chat, vague-asaurus!" 

He was so grateful she was healed and back to her old self.

~

Alcina certainly had plenty on her mind as she waltzed her way back through the city, regarding the other vampires she passed with a returned nod, holding herself high and regal as usual, brushing off the weighty guilt that came with the knowledge that these people had no idea what had happened outside their borders; the attack upon the lycans and herself. But, how does one alert a city to such information without causing an uproar? Would the chaos be worth their awareness? Being a leader did not come at an easy price.

And then there was the issue of Mother Miranda.

And you.

You.

What you really were.

Not fully human.

It didn't matter, at least not at this time. She had to tell herself that repeatedly to alleviate the utter cacophony that ensued whenever it came up in her mind. It didn't matter what you were, what only mattered was that you were safe and loved and protected and secret. That's all.

That's all.

Alcina barely noticed the bustling of New York when she entered it. The church was a blatant barrier from the world outside that always hit her like a bag of bricks; stepping through an otherworldly threshold, yet tonight she hardly noticed. Tonight she was wrapped up in trying to return to a previous reality that was, quite clearly, unreachable. Pretending she had not almost been killed and torn to shreds and your blood being the only thing to heal her was, well, a task all on it's own. But she had to, she had to make it her reality.

Her heels clicked on the pavement and added into the instrumentation of the night music that was the liveliness of Manhattan life. She could feel the crispness of the autumn air against her face and gently began to notice everyone else bundled up in their scarves and coats and jackets, gloves, boots, and hats. The leaves had not yet begun to turn but it was not far off. Before long winter would approach and another year would come to an end. Time seemed more linear now than ever, with you in the picture. 

Time.

Time that would slip by like the stupid proverbial sands and once they sifted through the cracks, one could not get back.

While her mind tried to take a turn for the melancholy, her eyes drifted up to the very familiar apartment complex before her; the warm light of your windows aglow in the dark sky. 

She smiled.

~

You didn't feel like wasting time tonight; the realness of the unseen world around you made itself very clear to you today and several things had shifted.

The moment Alcina stepped foot through your balcony door you were shoving her against the wall.

"Draga m- "

Was all she got out before your mouth was smothering hers; desperate to steal her breath for your own as the fire inside you clawed through you, hands tugging and pulling at her outfit.

No. Wasting time by not expressing everything you felt would no longer be the norm. This was precious, she was precious, every moment you had with her was precious.

Soon the two of you were panting and whimpering as clothes were discarded completely. Hot naked flesh of yours melding into hers that was much cooler and just as soft. Neither of you made it to the bed. You slid her down the wall and tossed her to the floor with barely a breath broken apart as you coaxed her lips open with your tongue.

Alcina moaned as you crawled between her legs, the passion in you brimming to the very top, every ounce of you screaming your demand and desire. She whimpered deep and dark in her chest, gasping as your hips collided your torso with her core, moaning as your teeth grazed her neck down to her collar bones, nipping, kissing, teasing as you went.

She leaned back into the carpet and let you have your way. Each love bite left in your wake slapped awake the beast inside her, the thrill and hunger begging for release.

You wasted very little time. Slithering your way down her buxom, perfect body you perched between her thighs and dove in. Alcina moaned out as your mouth engulfed her. Your tongue ran long, slow, heavy licks up and down her folds repeatedly, relishing your favorite flavor as you moaned right back. There was nothing so satisfying as watching her writhe before you. Her chest heaving as you hit every spot, hearing her nails dig into the floor as you picked up pace just to slow down, drag it out, dangle her over the ledge before you gave her more, everything she wanted.

"Oh yes, yes draga," Alcina whined, one hand prying from the carpet to sink her fingers into your hair, "just like that."

Everything inside of you began to burn. If you didn't know any better you'd think your eyes were glowing just as Alcina's did; boring your way through her the way she did to you, fueling and filling to the brim with the sensual need to combine and mix all that was you, and all that was her, into the perfect color to paint the rest of your life with.

You hooked your arms over her hips and buried your face as deep as it could go, absorbing Alcina's glorious whimpering cries as you fucked her senseless with your tongue. Continuing to watch her quiver and squirm you couldn't help but bask in the tremble you felt in her thighs around your head, humming into her core which only egged the fluttering in her stomach on.

"Draga..." Alcina whined, grabbing at your arms held tight about her as she felt the completion coming on fast, "h'ohhh - my god!"

With the wilting tone in her voice cracking and tumbling, your name escaped her parted lips over and over until the cry of her climax pinned and finished her with passionate convulsion. She gasped and panted as you and that skilled tongue gently brought her down, the warmth spreading through her flesh like the caressing wind on a hot summer day. Alcina didn't want to open her eyes yet, still attempting to collect the pieces of her shattered consciousness as a sly smile twisted her crimson lips upwards in total satisfaction. 

There was something so comforting and immobilizing about being wrapped up in your vampires arms, sunk into your mattress together in peace and quiet. Well, mostly quiet. After the two of you had successfully worn each other out, you grabbed your phone and put on an easy listening instrumental jazz compilation you'd found on YouTube a couple days ago. It was smooth and relaxing and fit the mood perfectly. 

But, all good things have to come to and end.

"It's late, draga, I should get going."

You nuzzled your face into the crook of Alcina's neck and sighed, "what time is it?"

"2 AM. You have work in the morning..." she cooed, pressing her lips to your head, "I've stolen so much of your sleep already."

"You can't steal what doesn't want to be stolen," you grinned lifting your face to look at her.

Arching a perfect brow she traced her fingertip over your cheekbone, "well, some thief I am then - you whittle away my menacing nature too easily."

"You're only menacing trait is your wicked allure and beauty. The teeth, blood-thirst, towering height, and you know, otherwise vampiric tendencies, are just minor details at this point."

Her laugh was bliss to your ears.   "Oh draga, you are too much," Alcina laughed, delicately cupping your cheek as she kissed your lips repeatedly, "I love you."

"I love you, too.

She was dressed in no time and you hated to see it; you hoped one day in the future she wouldn't have to leave you. How that future could ever be, you weren't sure. Despite your rain cloud, you slipped on an oversized shirt and went to your bookshelf in the corner on your room and retrieved a small black box.

Alcina was ruffling her perfect black locks as you approached slowly, a bit of the inside of your lower lip between your teeth as she turned to look at you with a smile fading from her lips. 

Her eyes dropped down to the item in your palms, silently awaiting your pending explanation.

"I uhm," you sighed, thumbing the wood, "I hope this isn't super weird, but... in case something bad happens again, I want you to have this," you said, slowly handing the box over to her, "I hope it can come in handy if you're far away from me."

Confused was beyond the term. Alcina eyed you carefully before taking the box from your hands, her curiosity fully in control as she unlatched the hook at the front and opened the lid. There inside were 9, 4 inch glass vials, each with cork tops sealed with a dark purple wax. Her long fingers traced the top of one and plucked it from it's slot - whatever was inside was dark and she couldn't make it out in the low light of your room.

"It's blood," you stated softly, "my blood. Travel size. For emergencies."

The pause was bloated to put it kindly. Alcina was utterly speechless.

Her slate colored eyes flickered with an emotion you couldn't quite place, but you were standing your ground as she peered at you. 

She swallowed, "how did you... draga -"

"Don't worry, I got it done safely. There's a little vampy, goth, witchy hole in the wall shop in Queens that does it; they have medically trained and certified phlebotomists that work there. I had no idea the vampire scene was as intense as they were, but I did some research online before - "

Alcina had placed the box on the bed and had you in her clutches with her lips pressed to yours before you could finish your thought.

There was no coherent phrasing of words for her to express in this moment. Overwhelmed and stunned that you had gone to such lengths had her wholly stumped. She could not fathom one thing in her life she had done for her to deserve you and your beautiful, thoughtful soul. Fear brimmed in her belly at the whole of it; your selflessness, your little vials of blood in her possession, the possibility of someone finding them stashed in her manor, the firm knowledge of just how much you loved her and how far you were willing to go to take care of her even when you weren't near.

What could she say to this?

"You did not need to do this," Alcina whispered against your lips, still holding your face with such reverence.

"I know," you whispered back, "but I want to. I know I can't be a bigger part of your world, I can't be there to do the things I want to, I can't know what goes on, I can't go with you on missions, I can't be there when you get back... but I can at least do this. I can have some reassurance that part of me can be there if or when shit goes south."

Pressing her forehead to yours, Alcina held you there as she breathed in your calming scent, her mind rushing through a quiet chaos.

Sensing her in such befuddlement almost made you chuckle. You'd only rendered her speechless and harmless in the bedroom, so you'd chalk this up to another win.

You smiled against her and kissed her lips feather light, "I'll see you tomorrow night, yeah?"

Alcina nodded, slowly pulling back to gaze upon your beauty and wholeness. 

~

The manor was silent. 

The girls were out and Alcina stood in the middle of her room, little black box in hand.

After a moment she placed the box on her vanity and began to remove her coat. Still swimming in a deep, dark sea of muffled thoughts, Alcina stepped towards the head of her four-poster bed and grabbed at the dark wood and pulled. With her strength it took very little effort to move the giant thing away from the wall. Behind the headboard in the dark rock of the wall, was a compartment she had dug out and made herself when she was given the manor. With one strong slam of her fist, the concrete seal around it crumbled and she was able to remove the block. Inside was a few relics from her past: two black and white photos of her and the band, an emerald necklace from her grandmother, a ring and handkerchief also of her grandmothers with the Dimitrescu crest, three locks of hair from her girls tied with the finest silk thread, and Madeleine's gold locket. 

These were stored here so no one could or would ever touch them, at least, one individual in particular. Mother Miranda couldn't take from her what she didn't know existed.

Retrieving your box from the vanity she tucked it into the nook and placed the block back where it had stood. She would have to seal it at a later date.

Alcina swept up the mess from the floor, pushed her bed back into position, and sat on the edge. 

While her thoughts were pelting themselves at her like a paintball gun, she wasn't listening. But after a while she grew tired of the barrage and headed for the bathroom to draw herself a bath.

~

Central Park was completely vacant.

The sky was black and the clouds were orange, lit from below like a fire was blooming all over the city, and yet there were no flames to be seen.

The trees were dressed in the blackest shadow you'd seen, the grass was dead and crumbling beneath your feet, the plants and tree limbs swayed in a wind you couldn't feel and somehow you felt like you were slowly suffocating.

You need to move. Flee. Get out of the park.

But where were you going?

The park became entangled with the city and suddenly you weren't sure where you were. It looked familiar but the buildings stretched all the way to the sky now, the shadows seemed to be creeping through the streets ready to gobble you up, but your legs were heavy and you couldn't cover the distance fast enough.

From the darkness behind you, you could hear a woman's voice. Muted. The shouts carrying themselves sluggishly on the dense air.

You turned down another alleyway and you were back into the park. The trees now more mangled and rugged looking, the grass still as dry and brittle but longer as you trekked through.

The voice echoed still behind you and instantly you knew you needed to find Alcina. She was somewhere near, you could feel her. But then the shouts became sharper, closer, and you looked behind you to see pairs of white glowing eyes emerging from the shadows eating up the scenery behind you, running, converging.

And then you started to run.

You screamed for Alcina but you heard no sound, just a rough, hushed, bleat of a voiceless cry. 

Why couldn't you run faster?

Where was Alcina?

The trees were coming nearer and you pushed with all your might. The shrillness of the woman's scream behind you echoed louder, though, you couldn't place who it was. It wasn't Alcina, no, no that wasn't her voice at all. If it were you wouldn't be running in the opposite direction.

As you tripped and fell your way through the mangled root system of the dense forest, you could hear the rushing footsteps behind you. Again, you called for Alcina, feeling your voice desperately clawing its way out of the fog - and yet, still you could make no sound.

And then the rush and blur of bodies ran passed you. All you could make out feature wise of these blobs were the glowing white eyes. And then a scream you did know.

Alcina.

Trapped and seemingly glued to the forest floor, you were held captive and immobile as her cries echoed around you. In the rising pool of fear and rage you broke loose and clawed your way through, still no sign and no real direction where she was. 

Calling her name over and over until you felt your voiceless cries made you hoarse, winded and tired, you tumbled through a clearing to find a black mass of bodies huddled by the entrance to a cave.

'Alcina!' your voice finally rang out.

A cackle.

The mass broke apart and you were met with 4 sets of white eyes. 

Through the darkness you could see her now. You could see Alcina on the forest floor beneath them all.

Screaming now with an utter fury you've never felt before, you dug your heels into the first and lunged.

fabby & solaris hcs but specifically centered around the strange relationship thing they have going on at zoraxis bc if i don't compile my thoughts somewhere i'm gonna forget

fabby has been working at zoraxis for far, far longer than solaris. most of the higher tier operatives have, barring maybe x-ray. but her impressive engineering work artificially pushed her up the ranks a lot during her time there

the fabricator wasn't solaris' first construction partner. she was actually passed back and forth between a lot of smaller crews, but was moved onto other projects for being too difficult to work with for one reason or another

fabby was solaris' last opportunity to prove herself. not that solaris knew that, but zor did. fabby was initially reluctant to work with someone… like solaris, but if anyone could keep her in line, it would be the engineer closest to the doctor

operation toxic rain was the first project they worked on together (the supervirus was nowhere close to finished at the time, but it didn't have to be for the shell to be worked on)

to say they got along would be the overstatement of a lifetime, but solaris was… pleasantly(?) surprised with how easy fabricator was to work with. comparatively, anyways

solaris' prior jobs didn't exactly paint the kindest picture of her future in the engineering industry. years of undermining and belittlement festered into something bitter and short fused. but one of the first things fabby did was notice her talents for what they were

fabby's not an idiot. she holds herself and her field in very high regard, and she knows a brilliant mind when she sees it. while solaris'… demeanor got under her skin with a practiced ease, her potential was indisputable. despite everything, she could appreciate having someone else at zoraxis who's talent was anywhere close to her own.

the only thing that really got in the way of them gelling any easier- beyond the water-and-oil nature of their personalities- was the visual design process of their inventions (as opposed to technical design)

it… took a while for solaris to get comfortable deferring to the fabricator. she was always rather quick to get defensive over being told just how bad she was at something like this

… but she got a little better at it once fabby started deferring to her in regards to the technical design process of some of their future projects. it took a lot of effort to swallow her pride and actually do so and solaris… saw that for what it was

they eventually carved out a rhythm for themselves, gravitating towards their niche and inadvertently maximizing their productivity in the process

in honesty? zor really did not like solaris. but, if the fact that she was working on the death engine wasn't enough to convince them to keep her, then fabby's increased output certainly was. so she's allowed to stay, but she's on really thin ice with them

speaking of zor, fabby figured that solaris' lack of respect for them would have surely blossomed some sort of hate between her and the other engineer… but it hasn't. she never quite knew what to make of that

over time, solaris has grown to appreciate fabby for being the coworker she never would have had anywhere else. someone who trusts her ability unquestioningly. someone who knows what she's worth

and on the other hand, fabby has grown to appreciate solaris' disregard towards status- her own or otherwise. of course, it drove her up the wall at first, but… it feels… nice to have someone respect her, and to know it has nothing to do with her closeness to zor.

solaris likes her as a person, not as a concept. she doesn't expect anything of her the same way the others' do. her demeanor as a high ranking operative means little to her… if she wanted to (although why would she ever want to) she could take the mask off around solaris. and it would be fine.

solaris is also very blunt. she says what she means, and rarely twists her words, if ever. and its strange for someone who lies so easily to find that comforting… but at zoraxis, you always have to stay alert for dangerous insinuations and unannounced tests of character. it's something she's been accounting for for years. but she doesn't have to with solaris. if she was truly mad- if she was truly out to get her- fabby would know from the start. and there's something… relieving about that.

their coworkers are under the impression that they get along about as poorly as they did when they first met. zor has a hunch elsewise, but doesn't comment on it much.

things were… really rough for the both of them after the death engine. it's the first time they really noticed that… they don't have great relationships with the rest of zoraxis staff

fabricator didn't hesitate to visit solaris at the hospital- though it was hard to wrap her mind around the fact that she… cared enough about solaris to do so. she wouldn't be doing that for anyone else.

solaris didn't question it… but she did appreciate it. it was a horrible stay- and a debilitatingly long one, at that- and she damn near would have lost her mind without fabby picking at it every now and again

i'm realizing how long i've been talking for so im cutitng this off but do you see this the vision from my twister mind

Hi Rainy!

I really like the way you’ve set up your commission sheet- it looks like you’ve had a bit of experience with making them, and I was wondering if I could ask if you had any tips for artists just starting out on selling comms?

I’m an artist thinking of selling commissions because I’m broke and need to make some $$ for food and living expenses lol. (this is my reblog acct so I don’t have much moved here rn unfortunately.)

I have no idea where to look for advice and Google hasn’t really been the best help as a lot of resources I’ve seen are mostly pros/people in the later stages of making an entire career out of it (which, for my situation right now isn’t exactly what I’m looking for)…

I also don’t really know much about payment methods like Patreon or anything like that so I don’t really know which is best or which to start with.

Any info you could provide would be very appreciated, even if it’s only a little!

Hello! I will try my best to help from my experience and what I heard it works. 1. It all depends on your needs, but you need to be organized. It doesn't matter if you use a notebook, your phone, an excel sheet or whatever: It's important to keep on track who requested a commission, who had paid you and the order you need to follow. Even if this list is only to yourself.

2. This is a universal thing: Make a work email and use it as a contact for customers, paypal and other things in case you don't want to get mixed with personal stuff.

3. I highly recommend using a Google Form or simmilar to receive request of commissions (you can use mine as reference or look on other artists who use it). It will also helps you to put on order the order of commissions and you will spend less time asking the customer a bunch of questions or explaining innecesary stuff. (Ko-Fi also have the tool for commission!).

4. I only use Ko-Fi (for now). I had used it on commissions. It's useful if your method is simple. Allow you to put add ons with its respective price too!

5. It's hard to make a portfolio, but at least make one example of each type of commission you are doing. People gotta see what they are buying.

6. You make the rules. You can see in my cardd I have the Terms of Service where you explain what you do and don't, how long you take to finish a comm, etc.

7. Be as clear and direct as possible. Don't accept commissions you are uncomfortable with. Don't allow people guilt-trip you or start asking to lower your prices.

8. About pricing: Look up people with simmilar skill level and art style as you to make an idea of pricing. You can start with one price and rise it as your skills improve! Set a price you can be satisfied with, or you will feel downhearted.

9. I highly recommed being paid first before start drawing. Be careful of scams too! Never trust a paypal email that isn't official (I say this cus someone tried to scam me last week).

10. I would recommed choosing a few niches of your interest and work on your public from there. It can be an specific fandom, a genre, an animal, a topic... Stuff people can know your work and be sure you are good at it. Example: I draw g/t stuff, so people into it know how I do it and what to expect from me. You will not ask the furry artist to draw you '90 mecha robots right? (THIS MAY OR NOT WORK! draw whatever you want and make you happy. Follow your heart and people will slowy get at your work).

That's it! Uh I'm not an expert, I'm still not big enough to live full from commissions but don't give up! Can be rough at first but keep working!

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my job is not my forever home. I work there 5 to 7 days a week and put in 50+ hours a week and still make only around 3000 a month. Why does the difficulty of a job not equal higher pay? I seriously want to understand how wealthy people's minds work and exactly what values they prize to reward with money. So I can get on the same page and change my behavior to earn more money, smarter not harder. Obviously hard physical labor and physical, emotional exhaustion doesn't inherently deserve money. So then what does deserve money? Right now my best guess is you have to be in a sort of mostly unspoken subculture where you live your life in some specific way and the pay off is people with money feel more secure and believe you deserve money so you can keep doing what you're doing and keep certain processes and values running in the world. Amazon is greatly valued as a concept and corporation but not as the thousands of small local franchises that make up its entire macrobeing. I just don't want this job to exhaust and depress me so much that I can't get out and move on to more enjoyable, creative, challenging, fulfilling and lovely ways to earn money that I could actually look forward to and not dread how it affects my body and mind. Being alive is not meant to be a torture zone but that's how it feels to me right now. I have to somehow learn what risks and changes will result in my experience of life having more happy, calm, positively engaging and exciting experiences.

I have a gardening business registered but don't have the time or energy to do anything with it. I'm also very insecure about sharing my perspectives in general, and I need to take courses and workshops and time to study plants and ecosystem interactions, both experientially and through books and glossaries. Maybe I should just start studying with free resources and books and quiz myself and not think it's required to have a bachelor's degree to have a business.

I'm very afraid of when people feel territorial or threatened, how they can try to shut me down, like if people say I haven't earned the right to have a gardening business because I didn't go into student debt. But I've gone into energetic and mental debt to be alive and survive and I have other types of scars that have gotten me to where I am. There has to be a way to carve a niche where I can fairly make people feel comfortable and greatly benefitted and like I've genuinely earned the money.

I want to mentally chart a path and perspective that feels good so it can inform my decisions. I don't want to be delusional or expecting my dreams will come perfectly true because a dream is meant to be an ideal that can inherently never be reached, it's always beyond reach to provide aspirations, inspirations, and comfort, not to become an actual reality.

I think if I take the free online permaculture design certificate, and make it a point to learn plant varieties, and ecological terminology and ideas, then that's a good place to start. I can map it out. Since I get bored if I don't have a sense of involvement with other people about these things, but I'm still very cautious to confront people with my perspectives, I will just quietly and invisibly write about the studies and post here.

Episode 12! The end! Oh no! ;_; )

I hate it so much that it has to end... At least it got a pretty good ending - a surprisingly good one, actually - with most plot lines wrapped up neatly. Also, I may or may not have teared up at some points. Or even right now. Daaamn this stupid franchise making me so emotionally invested. GAH.

Anyway, the rundown... as soon as I find another package of tissues...

Story makes short work of Boss Man courtesy of Kimie, we knew this was coming, no point on wasting time on it. Bye Boss Man. It was funny though that after a huge psychic superpower fight he went out by getting shot in the back. :D

BABY BROTHERS ARE CRYING, HURRY UP AND SAVE THEM!

I suppose this is where knowledge of the original comes in handy, because I think during Naoto & Takuya's journey to their brothers we were supposed to learn about how the Kiriharas ended up where they did, but well, I guess there's a limit of how much you can pack into 23 minutes. So let's just say that even in childhood Naoto & Naoya had it far worse than their counterparts... having had their powers awakened from birth (as opposed to the Kurokis, it seems), and all the shit that came with that. Plus even after being taken away from their parents, the Kurokis grew up having friends and whatnot, while the Kiriharas had like... Mikuriya. In the original at least there were some other people around in the lab, but in 2041 it doesn't seem like there was anyone, really, other than Mikuriya, so all the boys had was him, and each other.

THIS WHOLE SCENE IN THE SPIRITUAL ENERGY BEAM OR WHATEVER. SO PRETTY. ;_; )

And OH DAMN, so the Kurokis are basically the Kiriharas' reincarnations! HOLY SHIT. I'd been expecting like something since Misaki mentioned Akiko having been reincarnated (and at this point I have a pretty good guess who is her reincarnation... ....c'mon it's Kimie, it's got to be Kimie! and why that didn't create a paradox, well, that's because-- LOOK OVER THERE!!!)

Oh, so that was the symbolism with the game they'd been playing. Ooohh. I like that. Also: observe the Ark behind Naoto on that shot. Nice.

AAHH NAOTO IS SMILING, HE'S GENUINELY SMILING!

I'M NOT CRYING YOU'RE CRYING

AHAHAHA lol Takuya surprise hugging Naoto, and Naoto giving "omg what to do, I'm too emotionally repressed for this" vibes. :D Also, Naoya doesn't get a hug. Takuya may be dumb but he's not that dumb.

Naoto. OH NAOTO. OH MY HEART. Don't feel guilty Naoto, you've done all you could. I mean he's just a guy, really, and especially 2041's Naoto is a lot more sensitive and has way less of an edge than the Naoto in the original. That one was more pragmatic, even if he hated himself being able and willing to do things like killing people even if it was to protect Naoya. This Naoto is different - he's less hardened, more gentle, and also different in how he processes his feelings, he represses them more but I guess angsts over them harder.

And oh poor Naoto, he didn't get a hug. Again. :D;; Doesn't matter, it was such a lovely scene.

Also, who's been cutting onions here for the past ten minutes?! I'm running out of tissues!...

OH NO, the Kurokis' parents?! Oh my god don't do this to me, show...

AAAAAAAH............

Blah blah Kimie, blah blah of course they weren't going to do it, and that didn't happen, and OH DAMN, NAOTO & NAOYA

SO YUUYA'S VISION WAS RIGHT, BUT ALSO NOT CORRECT - THEY BASICALLY WENT BACK AND FIXED EVERYTHING - okay baby Kuroki brothers still had been taken away but that had to be done, and the parents remember and they're reunited, and--

FFS NOT THE ONIONS AGAIN, I'M ALL OUT OF TISSUES ;_; )

Alright, so I guess this is another part where knowing the original puts it all in a slightly different context. Because this whole thing with the parents is exactly the same (minus the Kimie thing) that happens with the Kiriharas in the original, but with a very different outcome. In the original Naoto & Naoya finally manage to track down their parents who run a clock shop, but find that their memories had been meddled with and they don't remember them... and then they can't even get a peaceful farewell, because the villain fucks up the whole thing for the lulz, and it's kind of heartbreaking.

Here, they basically fixed everything - so that the Kurokis don't have to suffer all that shit that they had to go through, from having to live isolated in the lab and growing up suffering from difficult to control powers to having their parents taken away from them forever.

Oh man. Naoto & Naoya are just so awesome. ;_; )

And so they go... to another dimension? to the Awesome Spiritual Place? just disappearing into the spirit universe like Shouko? At least wherever they go now they'll be together...

........please stand by until I finish being overly emotional over the silly woo brocon show........

So anyway, in the end basically Takuya & Yuuya become that world's Naoto & Naoya, doing pretty much the same thing as those two did in the original, being the small change that gets things rolling toward the Awakening - hell, Kimie even called them Saviors, that was Naoya's designation in the original (with Naoto as his protector/knight). Except well, the Kurokis are a ton more well-adjusted, especially at this point in the story. Aside of having a better understanding of everything, better control of their powers and not having the whole world out to get them, at least not seriously at this point- they even have their parents back! Lucky bastards.

The end. *sniffle*

Oh boy. What can I say? The existence of this show has taken me by completely surprise, being a reboot of an old niche franchise I'd fallen in love with and didn't expect seeing anything new for ever again. And y'know, my expectations were loooooooow because the previous anime was, as I'd mentioned a few times before, bad, like, actually really bad.

And then Night Head 2041 turned out to be - actually really good! It had just the right touches, with the animation (surprisingly good and detailed!) and just the visuals in general, and the characters! I love this Naoto and Naoya, from their design to their characterization that is similar but yet still different from the original but in ways that work so well! And I grew to like the Kurokis a lot, too, also Takuya is so pretty it's just not fair! Although the Kiriharas are always going to be the best. Also, I really want Kimie's leggings even though I could never wear them.

And I mean OK, I'm clearly biased, but even with my fangirl glasses off this was a perfectly alright show. And for a fangirl like me, oh... where do I even start. I won't even start, really, it's like half past midnight over here and I'm still running on an emotional high. Will post moe tomorrow because if I tried now I'd just post the whole damn thing.

I know there's still the manga adaptation of 2041 that's going to go on for a while still (and the novelization that I'll read now) but I'm going to miss this show so much. Thank you for everyone involved in it! You made my summer and early autumn, and pretty much my 2021 so far. Bye, Kirihara Naoto & Naoya...

Hi! Aspiring Sims 2 modder here. I'm asking a bunch of my favorite modders. Do you have any advice for beginners on working with BHAVs? Any tutorials you recommend or easy projects to start with? Useful background info? I know there's a lot of trial and error involved, but I was wondering if there's a better approach to learning about them than just looking at other people's mods and trying to figure out what on earth those BHAVs mean. Thanks again for all that you do!

Hello! Always exciting to see people who have become interesting in modding! I can try to help but honestly not sure how good I'll be at it. I'm mostly going to tell you what worked for me and some ‘modding life advice’.

Honestly what helped me the most? Breaking it down. If you find a tutorial you can follow successfully...rewrite it to fit how your own mind keeps track of how to do the steps. For example, this is how I learned to do overlay boxes...and I broke down an 18 page tutorial (when copied over from a blog post and mind you there were pictures included) down to just two pages of step 1 - whatever. Most tutorials are old and haven’t been rewritten for current years, but most are doable as the functions don’t change much. Also, compare them. If you find more than one tutorial on the same subject, see what same steps they’re following.  Picking apart other people’s mods can also help you understand those tutorials. Or see they found a better way to do the same thing. An example here...the code I use for @sunmoon-starfactory​ inventory detection, can be very different from what @mortia-laura​ use. Both achieve the same goal (detecting and deleting/adding to a sim’s inventory), but go about it in seperate ways. If I recall, my way is longer (at least on the data entry side) but I’m more comfortable with it because it’s what I know. Neither is wrong.

Another thing? Understand your limits. It's no secret that I get help from other people on some modding aspects because my brain literally cannot wrap around them. I'm talking things like primitive arguments and other things I deem "math". Which is mostly numbers. I don't deviate from what numbers I don't know, I don't stress out. But add in something new there? Learning curve for sure. Basically, know that you're not going to master everything. Few creators rarely do, and that's okay. Find your niche, improve it, and be happy with it. Of course if you want to branch out after you're comfortable, go fo it!

That being said, have a support circle that does understand what your yourself don't, and ask! I know it's scary to ask other "big name modders" out there sometimes...but honestly, most aren't scary. Personal example...I never imagined @midgethetree would have helped me. She's so smart and seems way above my pay grade if you will, but she's actually super nice (and knows how to explain things to me like I'm five...which I like! I learn best in simple steps!) and is always there to just hear me whine sometimes. It's usually about a misplaced zero where there should be a one. I also know I can count on @davinaojeda, @fireflowersims, @mortia, @veetiesims2, @nixedsims, @gayars, and so many more. To add on to that, find a supportive discord to help connect with others. Most of the ‘new’ or ‘updated’ information seems to be passed around on those.

Now here’s the most important thing and I’m writing this with myself in mind also as I recently suffered a bout of it. Whatever you make, make sure it’s how you want it. There are going to be a lot of opinions thrown at you. Some helpful and some that perhaps make the project such a giant monster it makes you want to rage quit. You won’t please everyone. You can’t. You can try, but it’s going to drive you crazy. So always take a step back, ask yourself why you’re making something and then answer if it meets your original intention. If it does and you’re happy, stick to your guns. Don’t let people push you into something you have no interest in or don’t want to do. The Sun&Moon Woodworking set gave me this problem...it was huge to begin with and was stressing me out and making me anxious because I knew I couldn’t please everyone. Got some advice on how to make it seem manageable, and that’s when I solidified my idea of what products it makes. Upon release, I got A LOT of messages from people who were asking for ‘more types/amounts/can you change it so this item comes from it’. It made me feel like I’d failed to deliver what people expect...but stepping back, it produces exactly what I want it to for my game. That’s what matters. I made something to enhance my game, it does what I want it to do, and sorry if others aren’t happy it doesn’t do more but that’s how it is. If you feel like it, add options for people who don’t agree with your choices (looking at Livestock here...heck even I use the force options!), and if they can’t be happy even then...well that’s just going to have to be their problem. Or if you know how to properly instruct people take what I call the Midge Approach, and explain how to change a particular behavior of the mod.

So when you do start modding and people ask you questions like this (which is still weird for me honestly) remember that you are not indebted to anyone (unless you take a commission of course but that’s different), you own no one anything, and in any particular way. No two simmers play their games the same and you can’t account for it all. Create for YOU first, and share when you’re happy with your results. Don’t feel bad if you don’t answer messages that make you angry because you suddenly feel like you didn’t do what other people wanted. Yeet them and continue to create what makes you happy. Create to make your game better, don’t create for the sake of people pleasing or popularity.

I know this post isn’t full of links and such to old/new tutorials but I still feel these are important pieces of “background information” to have when you get into this modding scene. I still struggle to remember some of this stuff and have to remind myself. We’re all our own worst critics and judges already, no need to let other people add to that.

I'm not going to take my anon off because I don't want my blog to get attacked. I'm being aggressive because someone asked you for in real life advice and as expected of genshin players you're giving terrible advice. You shouldn't drop friends of multiple years over them playing a game without you or forgetting your birthday. Other people have lives and if your friendship was affecting your mental health I'm sure it affected theirs too. In your posts you use a lot of "I" and "me" language (1)

which leads me to believe the problem wasn't one sided. At least OP admitted an awareness and they seemed to calm down. So maybe don't give blind advice and share biased views of your own to someone in a delicate place.

aYO MA LOOK 'ERE WE GOT A [BEEP] IN THE HOUSE

for you not to take off anon means you Absolutely know what kind of bullshit you're spewing and why you'd definitely get blasted -- it's because you Ain't Know Shit!!!!!

if you knew exactly what was going on in original anon's life why don't you go help them huh? because you sound like you definitely know about Everything that anon sent us and that karfield didn't post because oh guess what, that's someone's personal matters that karfield thought would be better left unposted! but since you know everything already maybe you should have been the one to answer the ask instead of us? maybe you should be the One Unterrible Genshin Player in the entirety of the 'terrible genshin community' who can Actually give some Solid Advice?

oh and maybe you can be the mediator between karfield and their friend too, since you OBVIOUSLY know eeeeverything that goes on between karfield (a niche internet celebrity) and their friend (either a total rando or a true celebrity WHO THE FUCK KNOWS you sure don't)?

honestly anon you sound like a little 12 year old kid who's never seen the world or interacted with real people before; here's a tip for you, hun: 'i' and 'me' are Commonly Used Words in the english language and since karfield was using themselves as an example, naturally they would use the words 'i' and 'me' (or do you not understand how language works?)

no problem is one-sided but karfield never said it was, they were only expressing their own views on a very complex interpersonal relationship that no one on the internet has any fuckin rights to know about, MOST ESPECIALLY not you

this also extends to original anon, who very clearly said that the friend who did remember their birthday has personal issues and heavily implied that the issue with the other friend was MUCH much deeper than forgetting one birthday or not playing genshin with them once

in reference to that one famous tumblr post, 'it's never just about the tomatoes':

original anon ASKED for our opinions, and we're not going to ignore someone who wants to hear our side of the story because sometimes it does help very much to get a total outsider's opinion on the issue (while giving them information to fill in the situation) but you know what never helps?

having a random fucko come in and insult both the person wanting advice and the person giving it.

i rarely get angry in general and i especially dislike getting angry to ppl who ask things in our inbox particularly because i realize that a bunch of genshin players are very young and they may not know better but we do NOT stand for someone coming on our blog and insulting our anons and even ourselves. if you know that these are delicate situations, why would you make it worse? why would you shove yourself into this series of asks that were originally only between us and the anon? in chinese we have a phrase for ppl like you: 搅屎棍

(oh and just a last note? all advice is blind and biased because we're only human :) we can never see anything totally from someone else's perspective no matter how hard we try because life and personalities and coping mechanisms are built up from individual experiences, and everyone's individual experiences are different :)) so next time you try to lecture someone who was just trying to be nice, just keep this in mind)

- katheryne from liyue

I must admit, sometimes I do feel like a ye olden solider, sending letters to my beloved across the waves during wartime. Oh my dearest Lydia, I hope the kudos and comments crops have been plentiful this season. Your last letter left me weeping. Why must you put poor Reginald through such pain?

(I gotta admit, I still can't believe that I'm talking to you. I've been looking up to your work for so long...it just feels a bit surreal, even now! Glad you like hearing my ramblings! And that you liked my vampire prompt! Did not realize you'd write back when I sent that in. Look at us now, huh?)

(Speaking of prompts, I sent those jukebox and willex ones too. And I loved them both so so much, I shall scream about them more when it is not 2 am because I need sleep)

(Oh and the update of If I Was You!!! Amazing, Stellar, Incredible, Reggie, Carrie, Julie shenanigans is my new favorite thing, DID YOU JUST DOUBLE THE CHAPTER COUNT, and I'm like 90% sure Trevor is in deep trouble with a certain angry jazz ghost. Seriously loving it)

I actually do not remember what it was like to send in 1/5 asks, because I did not get a Tumblr until very reccently! I've always been a nerdy person, but Jatp is my first time being really in a fandom. You gotta do something new in quarantine, right?

Ah yes. Luke and Emily. To me, it just seems obvious that there's so much love between them. Even with all the pain. You get it. You put it down so eloquently.

As for what kind of stories I like to read...it seriously depends on my mood.

I like niche aus, passion projects. Stories where you can just feel the author's love for the world they're inventing. But I tend to lean towards cannonverse. I like ghost stories, it's what drew me to this show in the first place. And I love exploring that concept. (Being forever gone, and always the same...it's just fascinating to me)

Platonic goodness is just WONDERFUL for this show. I will read anything with cuddles. I am touched starved and these kiddos are too, and I will cry about them puppy piling every damn day. Plus there's just some much POTENTIAL for future friendships! I love ones where Flynn and Carrie get to interact with the boys as well. And 90s content, from before and after the orpheum, just hits hard.

I really wasn't expecting to get invested in the couples on this show, but something about them is moving to me. So I do love to read about them. Watching two queer kids who lived during incredibly important areas of queer history find love together after death really hit hard for me, and there's just something so bittersweet about a girl and ghost deciding to love each other for the little time they're given.

I love family dynamics too. Anything with Ray and his seven disaster children, the band and Trevor.... I think Julie and Emily is one of my favorite dynamics to explore. A girl who lost her mother and a mother who lost her son, both grieving but with one able to speak to the dead...it's just very powerful to me.

(And of course, Luke and Emily, but I figured you already knew that)

Mostly...I like seeing the messy stuff. The unexpected consequences, the baggage. I want to see the messy emotions, the grief and anger, the jealously, the disorientation. I look for those glass shards, that might be too sharp to ever be addressed on the show. Not even the big, monumental plot lines just... the harder pieces of life, the little moments that don't fit neatly into a nine episode arc.

I just want to see them live you know? Love, laughter and loss all mixed together.

(One of my all time favorite tropes is "found family gets broken apart by trauma, only to find each other again and come back stronger than ever." I feel like this explains a lot of my taste in fiction)

Thank you for the writing advice. Your words were very motivating. I am trying to begin! I got up the nerve to start working on a little piece. Who knows if it will go anywhere. But it's been nice, to finally put some words on the page.

The POTC au is so freaking good man. The character dynamics are just on FIRE. Everything is broken and messy and the relationships genuinely tug at my heartstrings. It's such a fascinating story. Highly recommend, even with the cliff hangers.

OH HOW COULD I FORGET PAWPRINTER? Man oh man I love all her work. The wheelies art and steals universe is freaking amazing, not an avacado had me in tears (of laughter, till things got surprisingly sad). And All that Remains...slow burn Willex perfection. Jedi Alex and Pilot Willie have my HEART.

I don't think I've read firefall and weneedglitter (or if I have, I'm just not connecting the names to their pieces. I don't always remember author names. it's a problem). I will go look for them though! Cannot wait!

For more recs, I recently binge read We Found Wonderland. I was not mentally prepared for the sheer amount of feelings that gave me. Highly recommend, if you ever want an emotional rollercoaster with an incredibly satisfying end.

Going on to more serious subjects...I'm sorry your family doesn't see your grief for what it is: honest. Better to feel everything quietly, than make it an easily understadnable performance. Fake grief is so easy to spot.

I think of that scene from "Forever," when Buffy breaks down and tells Dawn that she has to keep busy, because if she stops, it means Joyce is really gone. There's a lot of truth there.

On a tangent here but.. there was a very long period in my life when I was told the ways I expressed my emotions were "incorrect". And I found that sometimes, no matter how you show your emotions, you'll always be criticized. Numbness can be called disinterest, but sobbing can be called attention-seeking too. Too big, too small: that jury was impossible to please This may not apply in your situation but...it's okay to feel however you can. It's the only think you can do, really.

As I've said before, Grief is such an odd trickster.

Don't you ever get tired of missing people... This past year, I've been so weary of grief. Sometimes it can be so sharp, but it's that dull ache. That ball and chain, no longer cutting through your skin, but rubbing it raw, weighing you down.

And people don't like to talk about that part, because it's long and tiresome, but oh, is it there. I find it hard to talk about my grief, because sometimes there's just so much of it. I could drown in it, and that fear keeps me from looking to close. To incorrectly quote Jane Austin: "If I missed you a little less, I might be able to talk about it more."

(Sometimes it's faceable. But sometimes you just can't bear it. And that's okay.)

But what you wrote in that eulogy...the love is there. It's in every word you write. I cried reading that section. I feel honored once again to see some of your jagged pieces. You're sharing your heart, and there's just so much love.

In the wise words of an author I know, "Love is like the snow Reggie. It never goes away."

And don't worry, I'm always with you.

Sending Love,

-LydiaStan7845 (aka Vampire Anon)

So...that Reggie and Nicky prompt

my god

my GOD

OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD

I think it's safe to say congrats, you've officially destroyed me! I was not prepared for that at ALL. I should know better by now I guess.

I can't get over that even though they all take place in very different universe, all your stories just feel so connected! The way this talked about those headphones, which you mentioned in the first chapter of Kill Your Heroes...it's just so cool. All the characterization and backstory is just so well thought out, and it genuinely blows my mind.

I didn't think I could love Nicky Peters more. I was wrong. The way you write about him...even though you never go into exactly what happened to him after Reggie's death, you can just feel how much it's shapped him as a person. And the trauma around his father, and how he fears becoming like that, was just so beautifully written. He's just so lovable and flawed and trying so damn hard and you made my heart ache for him. Again.

You always take these genuinely crazy situations and...you just make them feel so real. I love you explore the strains such a revelation would put on Nicky's own life, it just makes everything so compellingly messy. It seriously feel like I was watching a real-life account of a family trying to deal with such a massive complication.

That porch scene had me in tears both times I read it. Reggie's just always a big brother, even though Nicky is more than twice his age now. My heart was shattered, and then you slowly mended it, piece by piece. And for absolutely no reason at all, you wouldn't happen to have a reference for the porch, would you?

Just wow. Hope you're doing well. Sending love and applause

-Vampire Anon

i’m not even gonna reply, but i want these documented... on my blog... for posterity.  ( for any curious onlookers, i’m dating this anon now!! )

Hi, i would like a part 4 or part 5 matchup please. I'm 5'2" with brown eyes and black hair and i use she/her or they/them. And I'm finding i lean more toward demisexual right now. My hobbies include writing, reading, listening to music, cooking, and singing. Also if you need niche knowledge on ancient egypt, batman, or the titanic im ya girl. I'm a pretty big history buff and i like to learn. I also tend to scare people because I'm so quiet no one realizes I'm around, i also have a tendency to tell jokes. But my humor itself is super hit or miss. And if i don't get a joke i will ask it to be explained to me. I can also speak 2 languages ( German and English ) and I'm working on learning Italian and Japanese. I'm a hard worker with terminal sleepy bitch disease who doesnt talk abt herself much. i hope this was enough! Thank you!

Hi, A! It's so cool to see you here haha😘. Thanks for the ask🙌🏻 I match you with...

Giorno Giovanna✨

° Giorno is a very observant and thoughtful partner. He is open to anything and everything you want to do with him.

° You want to cook? Sure! What's on the menu? Nothing too strong, he hopes. His palette is very delicate. But he would try anything you make for him.

° It actually makes his heart full just seeing you cook for him. He's never had anyone do that for him, so expect an intense unapologetic stare your way while you cook for him.

° He would stand beside you, hands behind his back. "What's for dinner, amore?"

° He won't tell you, but he loves it when you sing him a song. It destresses him. He would actually just want you around him while he works. You would be reading while you hum. And he would steal glances your way with a fond smile on his face.

° As someone who loves learning, Giorno finds your niche knowledge quite engaging. You would pop a trivia out of the blue and he would look up to think. "Should we buy a book on that? I'm curious now."

° Questions. Expect a lot of questions from this curious bambino. "So what do these Egyptian gods do exactly?" "Are they simmilar to the Roman ones?" "What is Batman?" "Is he a mythical being?"

° The quiet air about you is very welcome to him. As someone who experience so much noise in his life, moments of solitude are prescious to him. He would definitely not mind your silence.

° But someone who is silent as he is, he would get curious about your thoughts from time to time. "A penny for your thoughts, cara?" He would ask. "Perhaps maybe a kiss instead?" He teases. After all, he couldn't help but doing so, seeing your thinking brown eyes.

° He would gladly teach you Italian! As someone who works in the mafia, he learned a little bit of every language. But he is very much welcome if you'd give him a more in depth learning of those that you already know.

° "'Cara' is 'dear'." He would say, a teasing smile playing across his face. "And 'Baciami' is 'kiss me'." He is a shameless flirt sometimes.

° But he would definitely want to please you a lot, get you really emotionally invested first. He'd send you flowers, make surprise visits, take you to dinner. But eating your home cooked meal is enough if he'd be honest.

° He will play the piano for you any day. Because he loves watching your sleepy face on the couch while the music lulls you to sleep. It makes him chuckle.

° And when you're finally asleep, he would cover you with a blanket and kiss your forehead. "Sweet dreams, amore." And then back to work again for him.

There ya go! I would match you with Dr. Kujo, but they guy is just emotionally unavailable, and I thought you'd fare better with Giorno instead😄. Love lots and blessed be🧡🧡🧡✨✨✨

VT again. Just wanted to say that I'm really growing fond of the chef. Most reader-insert protags are fellow agents on field duty (or civillians for non-member heroes), and it's nice to see one that has more of a support role in the organization. They have a niche and it makes them feel unique, since agent!readers are commonly Maria Hill/Phil Coulson-esque; mere operatives, not specialized superheroes. It's not a bad thing, but it does make chef!reader stand out in a good way. (1/4)

(2/4) It’s also really interesting that the setting is post-crisis; it’s actually engaging to read about their unique struggles with rationing and diet balancing. In a way, chef!reader feels like a synthesis of the best parts of agent!readers and civillian!readers. They’re an insider to the organization, yet they have their own storyline separate from the other heroes. It’s nice to see a protag who is their own character and has their own personal goals.

(¾) I think this is reflected in the chef’s own reticence to interact with the agents non-professionally. Commonly, reader-protags are the ones who make first contact and are the ones maintaining the relationships, with characters reacting accordingly. Chef!reader doesn’t do that bc they personally don’t feel the need to, and the other characters are the ones engaging them and having to check up on them, as demonstrated by Ana. 

(4/4) It’s nice to see this switched, and in Hanzo’s case, initially bc he wants something the chef can provide, not bc of a contrived desire to get to know them. It makes chef!reader feel more real and makes the story feel more organic. Forgive me if I misinterpreted anything. I read the latest of the chef series and my mind went into overdrive. I don’t mean to criticize common reader-insert conventions, but it does get same-y after a while, and chef!reader is a breath of fresh air.            

You’re not misinterpreting anything at all, in fact, you’re pretty much on the money for everything. Damn, good job!

More beneath a cut because I’m rambling again.

I generally enjoy reader characters as field agents or combat medics, it’s always fun and exciting–lots of guns, ‘I-thought-I-lost-you’ sexual tension, ‘Hold-on-I-need-you’ drama–but I’m a boring person. I like mundane and quiet stuff without the sexual tension, or passion, or love-at-first-sight stuff. I don’t know if it’s because there’s just too many of those types of reader-inserts or if I’ve just been reading reader-inserts for too long (it’s been like 15 years…I’ve probably been reading this shit longer some of my readers have been able to read–absolutely mind-blowing) or if I’m just old. Probably a combination of all the above.

(Then again, we (through Hanzo) will find out that Chef had an interesting life of their own before this. Though one can argue that being a chef is NOT boring. It’s fucking grueling work. Have you been in a busy kitchen? That shit gets nuts. Almost like Kitchen Nightmares, except less intense depending on where you go.)

Chef exists because not everyone can be a field agent. I created Chef (and a lot of other reader-insert characters) because a civilian who supports Overwatch is more relatable to me. (I can’t fight. I don’t care how many years I’ve been training, how many rodas I’ve been in, how big or small my partner is; my fucking joints and ears will get wrecked the moment I step onto a battlefield. I’ve dealt with enough injuries and trained hard enough to be disillusioned and understand that I’m mediocre at best. I HAVE VERY STRONG OPINIONS ABOUT THIS, SORRY.) I’m pretty sure Overwatch employs more than just people who can fight: hackers, engineers, tier 1 tech support, political scientists, negotiators, accountants, speech-writers, lawyers, a human resources department, etc. The same shit a regular organization would have, and I think those guys would actually be pretty interesting to write about. (I have theories on why a lot of reader-inserts are full of action-packed, super awesome agents who can fight their way out of a horde of Talon agents, but that’s for another time.)

There’s a lot to be said about Overwatch and the world post-crisis that I’m hoping to be able to incorporate into the story because of Chef’s role, but we’ll get to it when we get to it.

The chef and Hanzo are just cook and customer at the moment. There’s nothing special, and there’s no reason for either of them to talk to each other, which I think is very reflective to real life. (I mean, lots of people don’t talk to the chef of a restaurant, do they?) Chef only wants these agents to eat well and pays very close attention to everyone’s eating habits. Hanzo, well, he just eats. It’s a very sterile relationship at this point, and probably not much will change later on. (The whole series itself isn’t exactly going to be so much romantic as it is more character development. It’s a slowburn…but for character development. OTL. I’m sorry, I may have mislead some people. But Chef and Hanzo really do get along a lot better after some crap happens.) Like I said before, I’m into mundane shit.

I think the most refreshing thing is to see someone else summarize what’s happening in the story. I already know what drives this character, and I know what they’re doing, why they’re doing it, but to see it from a reader’s POV is definitely a rare treat for any writer that I can’t help but savor. I understand that Hanzo isn’t exactly your favorite, but even so, I’m happy that you’re taking the time to analyze and send me your thoughts (which are all spot-on). It really means a lot to me in an indescribable way. So, thank you very much and I hope I continue to meet your expectations. (I hope you’re also staying warm!)

WHY I'M SMARTER THAN LANGUAGE

We tend to write the software controlling those flying cars? But I always end up spending most of the members don't like it.1 Long but mistaken arguments are actually quite rare.2 Lexical closures provide a way to get startup ideas is hard. Wasting programmer time is the true inefficiency, not wasting machine time.3 Someone wrote recently that the drawback of Y Combinator wants to raise $250-500k. Language design is being taken over by hackers.4 A lot can change for a startup, it will sound plausible to a lot of money. Did they want French Vanilla or Lemon?

Organic growth seems to yield better technology and richer founders than the big bang method.5 I can call on any struct.6 The project either gets bogged down, or the startup will get bought, in which case problem solved, or the result is a free for all. Which means that even if we're generous to ourselves and assume that YC can on average triple a startup's expected value, we'd be taking the right amount of risk if only 30% of the startups were fundable would be a good idea, but you have to process video images depends on the rate at which you have to be facing off in a kind of business plan for a new type of number you've made up, you can envision companies as holes. I made for a panel discussion on programming language design at MIT on May 10,2001. What investors still don't get is how clueless and tentative great founders can seem at the very beginning.7 You have to approach it somewhat obliquely.

Usually this initial group of hackers using the language for others even to hear about it usually, because to prove yourself right you have to do is turn off the filters that usually prevent you from seeing them. This helps counteract the rule that in buying a house you should consider location first of all. I went to work for the love of it: amateurs. Which makes it easier to remember that it's an admirable thing to write great programs, even when this work doesn't translate easily into the conventional intellectual currency of research papers.8 In theory this is possible for species too, but it's a bad sign they even try. In some applications, presumably it could generate code efficient enough to run acceptably well on our hardware. The problem is the same reason Facebook has so far remained independent: acquirers underestimated them. If people are expected to behave well, they tend to be one of the only programming languages a surprising amount of effort has gone into preventing programmers from doing things that they think aren't good for you.9 I don't think we suck, but instead ask do we suck?10 And try to imagine what a transcript of the other guy's talk would be like teaching writing as grammar, without mentioning that its purpose is to refine the idea.11 But I'd rather use a site with primitive features and smart, nice users than a more advanced one whose users were idiots or trolls.12

Expressing ideas helps to form them. A company that an angel is willing to put $50,000 into at a valuation of a million can't take $6 million from VCs at that valuation. Afterward I put my talk online like I usually do.13 This is understandable with angels; they invest on a smaller scale. As a young founder under 23 say, are there things you and your friends would like to build great things for the companies they started would hire more employees as they grew. Having strings in a language where all the variables were the letter x with integer subscripts. Plus they're investing other people's money, and they even let kids in.14

It's due to the shape of the problem. If you want to notice startup ideas: those that grow organically out of your inbox?15 But I know the real reason we're so conservative is that we shouldn't be afraid to call the new Lisp Lisp.16 And it may be, this is the exact moment when technological progress stops. Currently the way VCs seem to operate is to invest in startups Y Combinator has funded. Then I do the same thing over and over seems kind of gross to me. To start with, investors are letting founders cash out partially.

And so interfaces tend not to change at all, and you'd get that fraction of big hits. That may be the greatest effect, in the sense that it lets hackers have their way with it. Essays should do the opposite. You might think that if they found a good deal of syntax in Common Lisp occurs in format strings; format is a language where you can spend as long thinking about each sentence as it takes to say it, a person hearing a talk can only spend as long thinking about each sentence as it takes to hear it. Is it necessary to take risks proportionate to the returns in this business. We wrote what was, 700 years ago, writing software pretty much meant writing software in general, because we'd be a long way toward fixing the problem: you'd soon learn what was expensive. The real question is, how far up the ladder of abstraction will parallelism go? It's pretty clear now that the healthiest diet is the one our peasant ancestors were forced to eat because they were so much more robust to have all the brains on the server. This is more pronounced among the very best hackers will like? But of course if you really get it, you can cry and say I can't and they won't even dare to take on ambitious projects. You're getting things done.17 But that's no different with any other tool.

And then there was the language and there was my program, written in the coming years will be Web-based software you can use any language you want, so if I can convince smart readers I must be pretty sharp. But business administration is not what you're doing in a startup founded by three former banking executives in their 40s who planned to outsource their product development—which to my mind is actually a lot riskier than investing in a pair of really smart 18 year olds—he couldn't be faulted, if it means anything at all, and you'd get that fraction of big hits.18 In one place I worked, we had a big board of dials showing what was happening to our web servers.19 But if you're living in the future. I decided the critical ingredients were rich people and nerds—investors and founders. I'm just saying you should think about who you really admire and hang out with them, instead of taking a class on, say, transportation or communications. Inventors of wonderful new things are often surprised to discover this, but you can't trust your judgment about that, so ignore it. When I go to a talk, you could fund everyone who seemed likely to succeed, it's hard not to think where it came from. How often does it happen that a rule works for thousands of years, then switches polarity?

Anything funny or gripping was ipso facto suspect, unless it was old enough to be rational and prefer the latter. When you know nothing, you have to be more than a language, or you have to get up on monday and go to work.20 At a good college, from which—because they're writing for a popular magazine—they then proceed to recoil in terror. How do you tell whether something is the germ of a giant company, or just a niche product? The sort of writing that attempts to persuade may be a necessary evil in a legal dispute, but it's not likely to have happened to any bigger than a cell. There is also the same: Darwinian. Those are like experiments that get inconclusive results.21 Translated into more straightforward language, this means: We're not investing in you, but we weren't interested in ecommerce per se. And it's not just the cost of reading it, and that is exactly the kind VCs won't touch. If there's something you're really interested in, you'll find valuable ones just sitting there waiting to be discovered right under our noses.

Notes

The optimal way to make that leap. 'Math for engineers' sucks, and this tends to happen fast, like storytellers, must have had a tiny.

Turn the other seed firms. For example, probably did more drugs in his early twenties compressed into the work that seems formidable from the CIA runs a venture fund called In-Q-Tel that is allowing economic inequality to turn down some good ideas buried in Bubble thinking. Geshke and Warnock only founded Adobe because Xerox ignored them. Maybe markets will eventually get comfortable with potential earnings.

It seemed better to embrace the fact by someone else start those startups. The Socialist People's Democratic Republic of X is probably part of wisdom. I hadn't had much success in doing a bad sign if you are unimportant. Or rather, where many of the political pressure against Airbnb than hotel companies.

They thought I was there when it converts. Perhaps the most important information about competitors is what approaches like Brightmail's will degenerate into once spammers are pushed into using mad-lib techniques to generate series A rounds from top VC funds whether it was putting local grocery stores out of school. They thought I was a very noticeable change in the long term than one level of links. Instead of bubbling up from the revenue-collecting half of it.

A round, that they kill you, it becomes an advantage to be higher, as on a saturday, he saw that I see a lot of people like them—people who are both.

Viaweb, he'd get his ear pierced. If you have more options. That's the lower bound to its precision. Now we don't have to solve this problem by having a gentlemen's agreement with the solutions.

Investors are one of them is that if a company tuned to exploit it.

But it turns out to do with the New Deal but with World War II the tax codes were so bad that they violate current startup fashions. As well as problems that have economic inequality.

No one seems to have gotten away with the high-minded Edwardian child-heroes of Edith Nesbit's The Wouldbegoods. I were doing Bayesian filtering in a bar. Professors and politicians live within socialist eddies of the next round, though more polite, was one firm that wanted to have to deliver these sentences as if a bunch of other people. No Logo, Naomi Klein says that I know when this happened because it depends on a valuation cap is merely a complicated but pointless collection of stuff to be a founder; and with that of whatever they copied.

Apple's products but their policies. I think in general we've done ok at fundraising is because other companies made all the East Coast VCs. 35 companies that tried that.

If you walk into a few additional sources on their companies. At Princeton, 36% of the conversion of buildings not previously public, like good scientists, motivated less by financial rewards than by selling them overpriced components. You need to fix once it's big, plus they are like, and that injustice is what we need to get users to recruit manually—is probably 99% cooperation.

Teenagers don't tell the craziest lies about me. It seemed better to read a draft of this.

In fact, this thought experiment works for nationality and religion too. To a 3 year old son, you'll be well on your board, there is some kind of gestures you use in representing physical things.

Some of the world in verse.

I have so far has trained them to ignore what your GPA was.

In 1995, when Subject foo degenerates to just foo, what if they did not become romantically involved till afterward. Some are merely ugly ducklings in the sample might be enough. The actual sentence in the same thing twice.

What made Google Google is that Digg is Slashdot with voting instead of reacting. Some VCs seem to be when I switch in mid-sentence, but starting a business, having sold all my shares earlier this year. Even as late as 1984. And yet I think it's mainly not having to have this second self keep a journal, and I don't think they'll be able to formalize a small amount, or Microsoft could not process it.

03%.

These points don't apply to the hour Google was founded, wouldn't offer to invest in these funds have no real substance.

Only founders of failing startups would even be working on is a dotted line on a road there are lots of type II startups spread: all you know Apple originally had three founders? They want so much better to read stories. But I'm convinced there were, like wages and productivity, but trained on corpora of stupid and non-broken form, that it might be?

Some of the word procrastination to describe what's happening till they measure their returns. The Civil Service Examinations of Imperial China, during the 2002-03 season was 4. Part of the world barely affects me.

So, from reading your blog, I notice you read (and write!) romance. I've never "officially" gotten into the romance genre - even though I'm sure books I've read in the past have fallen into that category. Any favorites or recommendations for someone who is interested but has no clue where to start? I'll admit that whenever I think "romance" I usually think only of Nicholas Sparks or covers depicting shirtless men embracing a swooning lady from behind lol.

What a wonderful question, and it’s going to take me half a novel to answer it properly, so here I go.

From the outside, the world of romance novels can seem like an impenetrable monolith of a genre where all the men are shirtless/ride horses or motorcycles/sweep ladies in gorgeous dresses off their feet.

It’s not. There are SO many subgenres it’s actually difficult to know where to begin handing out recommendations.

But first, the elephant in the room. Some books labeled “romance” will have no sex scenes. Some will have fade-to-black-type moments where you know the characters are about to get frisky but that’s where the scene break cuts it off. Some will have a few scenes and some will have LOTS OH MY GOD DO THESE CHARACTERS HAVE JOBS OR RESPONSIBILITIES.

For those not comfortable reading about sex, look for “clean” romances. Often clean also = “Christian,” but not always.

In everything else, the amount of sex on the page will vary wildly, depending on the author’s style, the storyline, and in many cases the genre--expect BDSM-themed books, for example, to have lots of sex (they generally do in my experience) whereas a small-town guy/girl-next-door type series may have less (again, according to my experience.)

So, with that out of the way, where to start?

I can recommend myself, obviously, though my two works are hardly typical. I’m not saying that to come off like a special snowflake--I say that because I deliberately chose to blend two genres that aren’t often meshed together, romance and post-apocalyptic fiction. What it ends up being is a slow-burn romance set in a survival-horror-esque world, though with fewer jump scares and more dread. I love them--but then, I wrote them, and I always try to smash as many tropes as possible. For example, my male lead is more emotionally honest and sensitive than my female lead, because I got tired of reading about love “opening up” closed-off men. So he’s got his heart on his sleeve and she’s the fortress, flipping the script.

So yeah, my books are part romance and part “how awful would the end of the world really be.” Pretty bad, as it turns out.

That being said, I am reading another dystopian-type series that I’m really enjoying, the Beyond series by Kit Rocha. It’s super-BDSM, so skip it that’s not your thing, but it came to my attention via an article praising the series for its embrace of enthusiastic consent. Consent is murky sometimes, especially in a lot of older romances (rape-mances, some people call them now) where some innocent young lady is swept off her feet by that shirtless hero and “wooed” somewhat against her will, but *nudge-wink* she’s really okay with it. Pretty gross to a lot of modern readers, but things have changed since the ‘70s and ‘80s. And they’re not all like that, anyway, but a lot sadly were.

If kink is your thing, then I can recommend The Boss series by @jennytrout, and the Bound series by @bronwyngreenauthor and @authorjessjarman. Both have high-quality writing with engaging, likeable and believable characters, plenty of steamy scenes, and (usually) solid happy endings.

If you’re interested in historical romances, I know very little about them myself as I’ve only read a few. I will point you at @romancingthebookworm‘s blog for further research.

If you happen to be interested in (relatively) clean fantasy-centered-around-love-stories, then I’d like to tell you about Sharon Shinn. Her works are definitely shelved as fantasy (though I’ve occasionally seen them classified as “paranormal romance” which is technically true but also slightly misleading, that’s usually werewolves and vampires and other mythical stuff) but all of her works focus on romantic relationships that develop alongside the larger plot. I loved her work before I ever started reading “romance.” Her first works are the Samaria series, all about sci-fi angels and their mortal lovers; there’s also the Twelve Houses series, which is more high-fantasy, magic, feudal political wrangling. Her current (ie, unfinished) series focuses on elemental magic and is a little harder to classify as romance (so far) so if you’re interested I’d start with one of the other two. She’s also got a handful of standalone novels, of which I’d recommend Heart of Gold (love and also biological warfare? but it works) and one of her YA novels, Summers at Castle Auburn, again, high-fantasy, with a solid coming-of-age story worked into the romance, which I adored.

I’m still a newbie in a lot of modern subgenres, I’ve got some shifter romances on the Kindle waiting their turn for a read, plus some firefighter and motorcycle club novels. Yes, those are both genres. So are billionaire romances, cowboys, police, SEALs, cyborgs (never read one but apparently it’s a thing), second-chance romances, rock stars (I’m actually writing a rock band double romance novel right now)...

...And then sometimes you get someone going for that super-small niche, the Billionaire Alpha-Shifter CEO romance. Yes, I’ve seen one. Didn’t buy it.

My general advice beyond specific recommendations is to try a bunch of first-in-series books out. To do that cheaply, there’s the library if you’ve got one handy, and I’ve gotten a few that way. What I do far more often, since I have a Kindle, is go to the Kindle romance section and look for the “bestsellers” link. It will take you to a page with the bestselling paid romances, but there’s a second section (near the top of the page) for the Top 100 Free books of the moment. I browse through them and “buy” anything that looks even halfway interesting based on the blurb and a handful of reviews. Do I get a lot of duds that way? Absolutely. But I’ve definitely found new authors I liked as well, and I went on to purchase more of their work. (Which is exactly why they offer free books, of course.)

I know this may seem woefully inadequate, because it is. The romance world is too big to be pinned down by any one person, though I’m certainly trying to expand my knowledge of more subgenres, that’s definitely part of my reading plan this year.

Hey guys. As I mentioned, I'm a UX Consultant / Product Designer. I work with early stage startups creating digital products.You seemed to enjoy my last post about building a user onboarding sequence, so I figured I'd share some more.Many teams I work with have no concept of how valuable user feedback can be to help them build a better, more user friendly and successful product.Most have simply asked their users "hey do you like it?" and when the user says "yeah it's great!" then they feel all happy inside. This isn't how user feedback works.You can check out the full post, with images and examples, here on my blog. (no popups)10 Types of User Feedback You Need to Build a Better ProductHave you ever asked a user of your product how they like it, and had them tell you it's fantastic, super easy to use, and they love it?I bet it made you feel great didn't it?Well… bad news… that kind of feedback sucks, and hearing it does nothing for you besides making you feel all warm and fuzzy inside.In order to get feedback you can actually use to build a better product, *you need to know the *right questions to ask, and the right answers to look for.Simply asking your users how they like your product is a waste of time because it will always get the same response.A number of years ago, I was working as Lead UX Designer at one of the first startups I ever joined. We were a small team of 6 people, and I was the lone full time designer / UX guy.We had a very close, personal relationship to the majority of users so getting user feedback was easy.The problem? Almost everyone said same thing.WE LOVE IT! IT'S SO GREAT! AMAZING! INCREDIBLE!But their behaviour showed a different story. Many sections of the product remained untouched and barely used. It was clear that people were confused about what certain features were for, often using them for the wrong thing.But when asked about it?WE LOVE IT! IT'S AMAZING!So why was this happening?It the same reason almost everyone answers this way when asked "how do you like it?"It's because they feel compelled to say yes, since it's obvious that's the answer you want to hear.For example, let's say your kid, or friend's kid, or any kid, runs up excitedly to show you their awful finger painting they did in class.They look at you with those puppy dog eyes and say….I made it for you! Do you like it?I hate it!! What a horrid pile of shit! is clearly not the expected answer in this situation.The child is now crying and you have cemented yourself as "emotionless monster" in the eyes of all around you.The correct response is to praise the child then throw it away a day later (the drawing, not the child).The point is, this is called asking a leading question, **because the way the question is phrased leads** the person in the direction of the expected answer.If all you're asking are these types of leading questions, you're not getting accurate feedback from people about your product.But don't worry, hope is here! By the end of this article, you will know the exact types of feedback you should be collecting, and how to go about getting it without the use of leading questions or becoming an emotionless monster.Now I'm going to cover 10 of the most important pieces of user feedback you should be collecting, how to collect it, and exactly why it's so vital to the success of your product.1 – How likely are they to recommend your product to a friend?If this sounds familiar to you, that's because it should be. It's probably the most widely implemented "feedback collection" strategy used by digital products.It's called the Net Promoter Score*® *and it's a great way to gauge exactly how satisfied a user is with your product.Why is NPS Score So Important?NPS Score is an important metric because research shows that people are only willing to share, or recommend a product, when they're happy with the product themselves.Why? Because recommending something means you're putting your reputation on the line. If you tell a friend to use something and they end up hating it, they might never trust you again (especially after that whole finger painting thing).I consider NPS a strong indicator of your user's "happiness level", and a good indication of how effective your UX and Product Design is.On top of that, user's are also asked why they gave the answer they did. This opens up a conversation between you and these users to further investigate why they might be unhappy.How can you collect your NPS Score?The method of collecting this bit of feedback isn't overly complicated. You can simply send out a survey to your users asking the question:"How likely are you to recommend this product to a friend?"The answer is in the form of a number rating from 1 – 10.After a user gives a rating, they are asked for an open text answer on what the reason is they gave that answer. This question is optional, since all you really need is the number.Afterwards, users are separated into three groups:Promoters (9 – 10 rating)Passives (7 – 8 rating)Detractors (0 – 6 rating)You calculate your score by subtracting the percentage of detractors from the percentage of promoters.For an exact, step by step guide on quickly setting this system up for free, check out this article and video tutorial I wrote.2 – What bugs or problems are they running into?In my experience, I find that some Founders and Product Managers are deathly afraid of shipping anything that is less than perfect.Before they release a new feature, they want to test it again and again and again until they've ironed out every single bug.It's as if a user running into a bug is going to make the entire company fold right then and there due to sheer embarrassment.The reality is, it's almost impossible to track down every single bug before you release something, and trying to is an enormous waste of valuable time.Why is knowing about software bugs so important?The problem with constant product testing is that it costs a ton of time and money.For most startups, time is the most precious resource they have. The more time you spend chasing bugs, the less time you have to collect valuable user feedback which will influence the satisfaction of your users.Believe it or not, running into a bug isn't a make or break type thing for a user. Being unable to figure out how to **use and get value from your product **however, is a huge make or break type thing.How to uncover bugs faster in your product?Make your users your product testers. Sound crazy right? But think about it. You have an entire ARMY of people using your product each and every day.Hundreds, thousands, possibly hundreds of thousands of people could uncover 300 bugs in 3 days, where it would take your team 6 months to track them all down.Giving your users the ability to quickly and accurately report a bug means you can have bugs tracked and fixed in lighting time.I just stumbled across this great product called BugMuncher on Reddit the other day which gives users the ability to quickly screenshot a bug, and records the important stats along with it like operating system, browser type, version, etc.Consider implementing this product, or a similar solution of your own, that allows user to *quickly and easily *report bugs.I don't mean a big text box where you ask them to describe what happened, I mean a simple way to report it with under 15 seconds, which doesn't take them away from the page they're currently on.3 – How happy are they with your customer support?Your customer support team is like the bridge between unsatisfied user and super satisfied user. Super satisfied users are more likely to turn into *promoters *of your product, meaning they will recommend it to others.Promoters are good. You want promoters.That's why it's extremely important to constantly be monitoring if people are happy with the support they receive.Almost as equally as important is *how you go about *collecting this data. It needs to be quick and easy for someone to rate a customer support interaction.Often times I'll get a follow up email saying something like_ "please help us and rate the support you received…"_I never respond to these emails, simply because a new email appearing in my inbox just means another thing I need to deal with, and since I know I can skip it, I do.How can you make it easy for users to rate their support experiences?Groove uses one of the best solutions in my opinion, and that is giving users the ability to rate their support interactions at the bottom of each email.You know those little "please rate our experience" things you see in email signature like this?Those are a great way to give people the ability to rate their experience while at the same time keeping the effort required very low.Clicking on any of these links brings the person to a pre-populated, one question survey with the option to explain more. This is a perfect setup.Groove then calculates your user's "satisfaction score" by subtracting the "not good" ratings from the "good rating".4 – Have they searched for alternatives since signing up?If your product is even semi-successful, it means you've picked a niche which has a high amount of demand for what you're offering.This is good. It means people actually want your product, and you didn't just invent the idea out of thin air.But, this also means that you're almost guaranteed to have a number of competitors who have a similar, if not identical product to yours.This is also good. Don't forget, competition means demand.Much like any other traditional business, your users always have the option to switch to a competitor should their satisfaction level start to decrease.Sometimes, users will "flirt" with the idea of switching without actually taking the plunge. If you can catch these people in time, chances are you can convince them to stay.Why is this so important?Collecting this feedback is important because it presents the perfect opportunity to uncover major problems with your product that are so severe they are causing you to lose a user.It's highly unlikely a user who has been searching for alternatives is going to tell you… "Everything is great! I love it!"A user at this stage is the *perfect person *to collect feedback from.If you can fix every single one of these problems, it means you can greatly reduce your churn rate (the amount of users who leave and never return) and keep more users coming back month after month.How to find out if users have been searching for alternatives?Simply ask them. There's a number of ways your can do it, such as by sending out a survey through email, or using a product like Intercom to ask a question right in the product interface.The important part is you ask them 2 questions:Have you searched for an alternative since you joined?If so, what were you looking for in a competitor's product that we don't have?Why not simply ask them the reason why they're looking at competitors? Because it's just not direct of enough of a question. Asking big questions with indirect answers will scare people away who feel tried by the idea of having to answer in such detail.These open ended answers can be a gold mine of information you had never considered. Perhaps your prices are too high? Maybe your product is too slow, too old, or doesn't have a specific feature they're looking for?Consider following up with these people on a live Skype call to dive further into their problems and possible solutions that could get them to stay.Just keep in mind that listening to a user and doing what a user says are completely different things. Don't do what users say they want, instead listen and then give them what they need.5 – What are their results from using your product?People signed up for your product because of one single reason… you promised them it was going to improve their lives in one way or another.Either by saving them time, money, stress, effort or increasing their happiness.They signed up because of exactly what you promised them in the headline of your highly converting startup landing page you recently implemented (wink wink plug plug).If your product has done its job properly, after a certain amount of time, their lives *should be better. *Just how much better is exactly what you want to learn from collecting this type of feedback.Why are case studies so important?Success stories from users are going to help you out in 2 ways:Uncovering benefits of your product you might not have realized.Providing you with a huge boost to your landing page conversions by offering results oriented testimonials.In landing page design, a big part of the battle in turning a visitor into a user is first making them understand the benefits of using the product, then convincing them that you can actually deliver what you're promising.That's where user success stories come in.Uncovering new benefits that users experience will give you an opportunity to write more effective copy on your landing page, or better yet, attract an entirely new set of users to your product.As for convincing them you can actually deliver? That's where testimonials come in.Featuring a story from a user that details the exact results they got is going to help increase the trust factor for people who are on the fence about signing up.How can you collect successful user case studies?Start this process by pinpointing power users of your product. People who use it far more than others, and who have invested a lot of money and time into it.This will be a good indicator that they're getting a large amount of value and great results.Next, reach out to these people individually, through email, and ask if they'd be willing to share their story.If they say yes, follow up with them. Prepare a list of questions you need answers for, but try not to structure it like an interview.Don't forget to get permission from them to feature them in your marketing.6 – How satisfied are they?Remember at the start of this article where you learned about NPS Score and asking a user how likely they were to recommend your product to a friend?While I think this is a fantastic indicator of user satisfaction, it doesn't hurt to have a backup. Why? Because not everyone can accurately answer the "_how likely are you to recommend this product…" _question.To some, it might be the case that they simply don't know anyone who would be interested. Others might just be against recommending anything at all.This is why asking a user straight up "how satisfied are you?" can also be a great indicator of how well your product is working.Why is user satisfaction so important?Simply put, users don't keep using things they don't like.Chances are, if a large number of users have told you that they've been searching for alternatives to your product, it also means that your "user satisfaction" score is going to be low.Keeping your users satisfied is the most important part of your product design. It's the ultimate goal of every feature you add (or don't add), and every redesign you implement.How to find out if your users are satisfied?Jakob Nielsen suggests simply asking them to answer this question by choosing a number on a scale of 1 – 7."Averaging the scores across users gives us an average satisfaction measure."Says Jakob, the Godfather of UX.This could be done by sending an email survey using Survey Monkey, or using a product like Intercom to ask them directly in the product interface.Don't forget to wait until they've had a chance to explore your product before asking this question. A brand new user won't have enough experience to give you an accurate response.7 – What do they think about a newly released feature?Here's the process I've noticed a lot of digital startups follow:Spend hours building initial product.Release.Immediately start thinking of NEW ideas to include in product.Spend hours building and releasing new features.Get disappointed that people aren't flocking to the product.Decide it must be because there isn't enough features.Release 4,000 new features.Attempt to deal with bugs, usability issues, updates, and customer support problems that come along with every single new feature.Run out of money.Is it obvious how much I hate adding features?I hate them.Next to how much I hate the default setting of releasing features instead of focusing on user feedback, is what happens once a feature is released… NOTHING.After releasing a new feature, you must follow it up with a process that validates the existence of the feature.If no one uses it, and no one wants it, it shouldn't exist in the product. That's why we want to know everything we can about how user's are interacting with it.Why is feature feedback so important?Bloated, unused features dilute the value of your product, and they add to poor usability.The more things you add to your product which don't add value for a user just become a big pain in the ass obstacle they need to navigate around in order to get to that nugget of value that still exists.Collecting feedback on how well users understand, or respond, to a new feature is a vital part of this feature validation process.How to find out if/how a feature is being used?The quickest and easiest way to do this is by looking at your analytics. Are people navigating to that page of your product or not?This will give you a small idea of how much people are navigating to the feature, but it won't tell you if they understand how to use it, or what it's even for.The way to achieve this is by performing user testing.Set up a user test and give your users a set of tasks to complete. Include the new feature as part of one of those tasks, and see if they're able to find it, and use it, on their own.Analyze their behaviour, and encourage them to think out loud as they navigate.Don't forget that testing anything over 5 people can be a waste of time in most situations.8 – How much effort is it taking them to perform specific actions?This is the exact opposite of asking a high level question like "are you satisfied?"Instead, this question focuses on the small detail of how hard it was to do one single thingFor example, let's say a user just went through the process of integrating a payment system, like Stripe, with their account.When the process finishes, a small notification, directly within the product, would ask them to rate the amount of effort it took them to perform the task, rated on a scale of 1 – 10.Why is user effort so important?The goal of building a usable product is to minimize the amount of effort it takes for users to reach their goals.That's why it's important to continue to test, iterate, and improve upon the various features you've built.By asking a user to rate how difficult a task was, it gives you the opportunity to focus on features that users are currently rating as "very difficult" instead of focusing on building new features, or trying to fix things that aren't really a problem.It's kind of like the way users can rate support emails, except it's directly within your product.How can you find out how much effort tasks are taking your users?Keeping track of exactly how much effort it takes users to perform all of the different tasks on your product is time consuming.You need to be running constant user surveys, user tests, observing behaviours on each task, and then combining a ton of test data to determine what features are requiring the most effort.This is called task level satisfaction measurements.The result of executing these properly is a set of analytics that show you exactly what areas of your product design need attention first, and which areas are having the biggest impact on your user's experience.If you want to learn more about the types of task level satisfaction measurements, check out this article on ConversionXL.9 – How often are they using your product?What is the average amount someone uses your product, and what is the reason that is the average?Every day? Every week? Once a year?Is there any reason it seems unusually low or high?Why is the amount a user logs in so important?Increasing the frequency your product is being used by a user may be extremely important, or it might not be that important to you at all.It really depends on the goals of your product.For a product like Facebook, the more frequently the person visits their site, and the longer they stay on the site, the better it is. Why? Because they're exposed to more advertising.But for someone running a business to business targeted product, like web hosting for example, this might not matter as much.Regardless, it's** important to have a benchmark** in order for you to be alerted if average use starts to drop, or increase.How can you find out how much people are using your product?First, the easier approach is to simply check your analytics. This won't give you much beyond a daily number, but it's a start.In order to go deeper, check out a product like Intercom (which I've already referenced 100 time now - not getting paid to either). It will automatically segment your users into lists based on their behaviour.This allows you to communicate with groups of users in order to find out why they're falling into the "slipping away" category.Intercom automatically lists users who may be slipping away.Speaking to users who are starting to "slip" will enable you to learn about specific problems users have with your product you may have never considered before.10 – What are they searching for and why?Do you have a support FAQ? A site wide search function? Maybe even support guide analytics?Have you ever look at what people are searching for?Search boxes are gold mines into uncovering usability issues you might not be aware of that are destroying the user's experience.Why are search analytics important?In User Experience Design, in order to make a product more user friendly, we perform tests with a live user and observe their behaviour.But… how do we decide what to test?This is more difficult. Testing your entire product just to uncover problems can be expensive, time consuming, and not always as insightful as you want.But knowing about a "problem area" that needs iteration and testing is a huge advantage. That's where search analytics come in.Users tend you use the search function as a "scapegoat" when they get confused or lost while attempting to perform a task.This means any phrase that's searched for over and over is a direct indication of a widespread usability issue.Once you know the problem, go out and recruit 5 users to test and watch how how well they can perform. This feedback should give you a clearer picture of *why *people are all searching the same thing.How can you collect search analytics?Unfortunately, this isn't something as simple as sending a survey out to your users and asking them a question.You will need to set up your own product to track search phrases.If that's outside your current scope, consider using a 3rd party which you can install to make search tracking a bit easier.I recommend checking out SwiftType, which I have personally used with a great deal of success.On top of that, you should also be sure to have a properly design search function (and search engine result page).Collecting and implementing user feedback in the only way to successfully improve your productBut simply asking a user "hey how much do you like this?" is a great way to feel good about yourself without actually learning anything important.This post should have given you some insight into the types of feedback you should be collecting, and they way that feedback will inform your decisions on how to build a better product.Want to hear from me more often? 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