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magpiefngrl · 4 years

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Book Recs Jan-Jun 2020

I’ve been reading voraciously these past six months (my Goodreads challenge says 68 books so far). Here are some memorable reads, grouped according to what you might be into.

I want queer romance please:

Brothers of the North Wild Sea by Harper Fox (m/m historical)

This book ruined me (in a good way). Or maybe it isn’t good that I’ll be carrying it inside my heart for ever and ever till the end of my days, my lip wobbling at the mere thought of it. A wonderful romance, a pairing I adored, gorgeous prose, a fascinating historical background (medieval times, north of England, Viking invasions). There’s a faint supernatural undercurrent that becomes more prominent at the very end. I sobbed through the last few pages with fear, with relief, with happiness. Highly, highly recced.

Bitter Springs by Laura Stone (m/m historical)

Every historical novel I’ve read is set in the UK, so the fact that this is a US historical book was fascinating to me. Two POC cowboys fall in love while seeking mustangs in the wilderness of Texas (?? idk where Del Rio is). It’s sweet and loving with a side-serving of jealousy when a former lover briefly appears on the scene; but mainly it’s two men getting to know each other and falling in love in the desert. I loved the horses too.

The Sins of Cities trilogy by KJ Charles. (3 books, 3 different couples, interconnected, m/m historical)

OK so the first book in the series didn’t do much for me. A pairing who loves to be domestic and sweet and to drink tea by the fire is cute... but I got bored. The second one, though... I think my eyes popped out of my head from the sheer heat of it. Justin Lazarus shot to the Top-5 of my fave characters of all time, and I’d willingly kill all of you for him, sorry that’s how it is. The trilogy is a murder mystery set in Victorian London, and unlike most romance series, you’ll need to read the books in order. Overall, this isn’t my fave series of KJC, but it was fun nonetheless, and it does have Justin in it so it’s worth a read.

Slippery Creatures by KJ Charles (m/m historical)

This one is amazing!!! This is KJC’s latest, first in a trilogy with the same pairing, which means the HEA is 2 books away (it doesn’t mean that this ends unhappy; another reader called it the WNDY ending -- We’re Not Done Yet). Boy, this is a scorcher. Set in the 1920s, it features spies, secret societies, murder, lies, kidnapping, grey characters with elastic morals: these are all catnip for me, and I inhaled this novel twice in a week. Highly recced for anyone into a gay historical romance, who loves a bit of pulp with their gay sex. The second installment is out next month.

The 13th Hex (novella) and Widdershins by Jordan L. Hawk (both m/m historical paranormal, but different universes)

I can’t say I’m enamoured by Hawk’s writing skills; in fact, I usually feel a tad let-down by the prose, mainly because the books have such potential. Hawk’s plotting is fantastic and his world-building fascinating and truly unique. I just love both of these worlds and their magic systems. Hot sex too. I don’t want to discourage people: I’m possibly just too fussy with prose. Hawk is super popular and you should give his books a shot. Widdershins is free! (In case it sways you: Hawk recently came out as a trans man.)

Unnatural by Joanna Chambers (m/m historical)

I read a few romances by Chambers lately, some less satisfying than others. This one is a standalone companion novel to her most popular series, called Enlightenment, set in Regency Britain. It’s a well-written fast read; a friends-to-lovers romance, with lots of tension and chemistry between the leads. As in all Chambers books that I’ve read so far, there’s lots of angst about one’s homosexuality (very era-appropriate) and lots of pull-and-push before it ends in a very HEA.

****

Do you have anything with fantasy and/or magic, my kind lady?

His Majesty’s Dragon by Naomi Novik (alternate history, Napoleonic wars with dragons)

Do you like dragons who talk and bond with honourable officers during times of war? Do you love soulmate bonds and sentiments such as: “I’ll do anything for you” and “You’re mine” but when it’s people, it makes you uncomfortable? Well, here former Naval officer Lawrence and his dragon Temeraire (and all dragons with their handlers) have this bond, and it’s the best thing ever. I’m in love with Temeraire, I shiver at the profound bond between Lawrence and his intelligent dragon, and I can’t wait to read the rest of the series by a beloved author (ahem).

The Dark Artifices by Cassandra Clare (YA urban fantasy)

I don’t hold the best opinion of Clare’s writing skills so I was pleasantly surprised when I read the first installment a few years back (Lady Midnight). I decided to reread it during quarantine, and then I moved on to the second one, Lord of Shadows. They’re both long novels, tightly-plotted, with several romances evolving on page.

I was excited to read the last one, A Queen of Air and Darkness, but alas! I didn’t love it. To start with, it’s 1000 pages long, and unlike books of that length that I’ve read, you feel it. The book drags. Everyone and their mother has a POV and a love story on page. There are no subplots, because they’re all Plots: all afforded equal space in the narrative, so there’s lots happening at the same time, but the story doesn’t feel like it’s moving forward with a good pace. As the end of the trilogy, Clare indulges in some of her fave elements, namely mentioning someone’s eye colour every three pages, or having every single person paired up by the end (something which bothers me a great deal). There are a few plot contrivances that ensure her main pairing conveniently gets their HEA. I confess I skimmed most of the last part of the book. I’m happy I read it and got to the end of the story, but I can’t say I was satisfied. If you’re looking for an undemanding, escapist fantasy, though, it’s the ticket: it certainly worked for me when I had quarantine brain.

This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amar El-Mochtar & Max Gladstone

Sci-fi, literary af, two time-travel agents from opposing Agencies bent on destroying each other, exchange letters and fall in love. I’m completely torn in half: half of the book (the prose, the imagination) left my jaw on the floor. The rest of it left me cold and indifferent. Wonderful prose, couldn’t get into the characters. Short and dense.

Swordspoint by Ellen Kushner

Queer fantasy novel that gives strong Dangerous Liaisons vibes. Written in 1987, one of the first fantasy novels to feature a society where same-sex is accepted. The writing is beautiful, the plot twisty. There’s no actual magic, but there are sword fights, courtroom drama, intrigue. Good fun if you like that kind of thing.

The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang

Adult fantasy. So far (I’m half-way through) it’s phenomenal. I’ve seen it recced everywhere and was so happy to see that Scribd offered it in my subscription. Set in a Chinese-inspired world, it features a vivid setting and memorable characters, and I’m loving it. I predict it’ll be my new fave. Do heed the content warnings (pretty much every CW you can think of applies); it’s quite dark as it progresses.

A bunch of novellas and short stories by Aliette de Bodard

This author came to my notice about a year ago. I’ve been following her on twitter ever since, but didn’t have the chance to read any of her work until I saw she had a bunch of stuff available on Scribd. I read a couple of sci-fi novellas set in a Vietnamese-inspired future; The Citadel of Weeping Pearls was my fave.

She’s also published a fantasy trilogy with fallen angels and magic set in a war-ravaged Paris, which sounds awesome. I haven’t read it, can’t afford to yet, but I did read two short stories set in that ‘verse and they were fabulous. The atmosphere, the setting, the premise, the Fallen of the Dominion universe just sounds like very much my thing. Here’s a link to some free stories they offer, if you want to check out her writing.

The Autobiography of a Traitor and a Half-Savage by Alix E. Harrow

I read a short story by Harrow several months ago and was blown away. I’ve rarely fell so fast and so deeply in love with an author. I haven’t read her debut yet, but I came across this short novella and she blew me away again. It’s a story set in the US, magical realism rather than fantasy imo, and it’s about colonialism and the land, and it’s so powerful. You can read it for free at Tor.com. Please do, it’s incredible.

******

#books #book recs #sff #sff books #gay romance #fantasy books #romance books #diverse reading #marginalised authors #WOC #Authors of Colour

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prismatic-bell · 5 years

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So I was thinking at work, and you know what Disney should have done if they insisted on remaking Beauty and the Beast? They could have solved two major problems from the first movie in one fell swoop.

First, let’s identify the problems. First, there are only three (named) women in the original BatB movie: Belle, Fifi (Lumiere’s girlfriend, who has a different name in literally every single adaptation), and Mrs. Potts. Or, if you want to be blunt about it: The virgin, the whore, and the mother. Thaaaaaaaat’s not just a whole bunch of unfortunate stereotypes right there, not at all. (There is one more woman, but she’s unnamed: the wardrobe. Apparently in development her name was Madame Armoire, so that’s what I’m calling her.)

Next: Lefou. He was an awful gay-stereotype lackey in the original and he became an awful gay lackey in the remake. Note that I actually like Lefou--I think he’s an incredibly fun character--but that execution, in 2018? Nah, fam.

And how would I fix both of these?

Very simple.

Make Lefou a girl.

With some minor plot changes.

Bear with me a minute here. So we start out with Mademoiselle Lefou following Gaston into frame, right, just like the original. But this Lefou is wearing clothes that are way too big; her hair is chopped short and ragged. It becomes obvious from the way she acts and speaks that her giant not-exactly-a-dress is an old shirt of Gaston’s, and the hair is a self-administered hack job. This Lefou, like Belle, is sort of a town joke--it’s only Gaston’s apparent goodwill that keeps her able to remain in town at all, and the reason for her off-kilter, tomboyish look pretty quickly becomes apparent when Gaston says he intends to marry Belle: Lefou protests, and then quickly goes sad and wistful when Gaston says he deserves the best. Lefou might be kidding the town (and herself) with her overblown Gaston-crush, but she’s not fooling us.

Now, I’m a fan of the stage version, so we’re going to borrow from it just a tad here. There’s a song that isn’t in the movie called “Les Maison des Lunes,” and it’s basically the scene where Gaston gets in cahoots with the owner of the asylum, only awesome. (Listen, it’s a great song.) We’re borrowing that. But instead of Lefou gleefully going along, as the song goes on, Lefou starts to realize just exactly what she’s agreeing to, culminating in a line where, in reply to Gaston saying “she’ll be my bride,” Lefou replies “she’d rather die” and quickly covers it up with a rhyme. Maybe she’s just realized she’s turning against a fellow outcast; maybe it’s occurred to her that she, too, will be tossed aside in some terrible fashion when Gaston no longer has a use for her. It doesn’t matter. Blocking and voice tone show she is, at most, now a very reluctant ally to Gaston’s cause.

Lefou is still reluctant to watch the house for Belle and Maurice to return, no longer because she’s “missing out on the action” but because doing so means facilitating a plan she’s no longer on board with. As The Mob Song approaches, Lefou observes how Belle talks about the Beast, and we see her looking between Belle, Gaston, and her own reflection in a hanging pan with increasing horror; she’s not in love with Gaston, and never was. All she was in love with was an ideal that’s suddenly been shown horrifically wrong. All she has to do to know it is to look at Belle’s face; that’s love, right there.

And so Lefou tries to pull away from Gaston as the march to the castle begins, but she’s dragged along--so she tosses Belle the cellar key, or, if we’re going with the animated “Chip did it” version, perhaps she’s the one who kicks out the blocks from under the wood-chopping machine in the hopes it’ll crash out the window.

(I’m also in favor of girl!Chip, by the way. There are even some schools that already do it that way because of a lack of boys for the cast.)

And so, the melee in the castle, there’s one big change: Lefou quickly realizes this is her chance to make up for the harm she’s caused, and starts wreaking holy hell. Gaston’s crossbow (which he carries but then never uses)? “Accidentally” burned when she just fucking yeets it right at the sentient cookstove. Random approaching villagers trying to take the stairs? Bowled over by a living bust Lefou offers a good rolling start. The doors finally slammed? Yep, she’s there, slumping down amid a group of highly suspicious household objects all out of breath until she asks one very important question: “Where’d Gaston go?”

Now at this point you may be thinking okay, Lefou was the shittiest queer representation ever, but he was representation, and I’ve just swapped out a gay man for a lesbian, which is very much not the same thing. No problem, my friends, because remember the feather duster whose entire role is “be slutty to the point even her name doesn’t matter”?

The feather duster is now a very charming wineglass who, in human form, is a footman. (Or valet, if you prefer the term, although a footman is more likely to make sense as a wineglass and if we’re going deep into the lore, would also be more frequently in contact with Lumiere, the maitre’d.) Given that everyone else has horrifically on-the-nose puns for names, let’s call him Duvin.

(If you’re going to scream about historical inaccuracy because I made the singing candelabra queer, we’re gonna have some words about what your real problem is.) Now if you must have “Human Again” in your Beauty and the Beast--and let me state here that I hate it in the musical and hate even more that they put it back in the animated version when the original reason for removing it was that it makes no fucking sense--this does raise a bit of a problem with Lumiere’s lines, in which he says he had “a mademoiselle on each arm” and Mrs. Potts suggests his return to humanity “should cause several husbands alarm.” But might I suggest, if we’re doing this and doing it right, let’s give the wineglass a greater role than poor Fifi/Babette/Plumette did, make him gay, and go right on ahead and let Lumiere be the giant flaming (not sorry) bisexual flirt he really should have been in the first place, and change the lyrics to “a dashing young thing on each arm” and “should cause several spouses alarm.” Other than the fact that we’re including it at all, that fixes all problems with Human Again.

(If you object to me removing a female character here even though I’ve added two via Lefou and Chip and liberated a third by giving Madame Armoire back her original name and bigger role, I can fix that too. There is absolutely nothing in the lore that prevents the cookstove from being a chick. You could also make Belle’s bed canopy sentient and have her turn back into a maid. Or give that violin-playing hatstand a female role. I’m deeply in favor of the hatstand being Cogsworth’s long-suffering sister. There are many options.)

But let’s get back to the end of the movie, shall we, since I just left the Beast about to be deadified and Lefou collapsed in the hallway and Gaston alive, and none of these are a satisfactory turn of events.

Lefou’s dazed question sends those objects capable of going upstairs fleeing toward the West Wing, just in time to see the Beast fall and Belle’s fateful declaration. Yay! Lights! Flashing! Magic! The Beast is alive and is now a kind of pasty-looking dude who really had no right to call anybody else ugly! Let’s go down to the ballroom, everybody!

. . . . ready for it?

We’ve got Belle--who, without that unfortunate trio of named ladies, just becomes our heroine and, now, our princess. We have Mrs. Potts, the head maid, who very neatly pairs with Cogsworth as our dignified elder heads of the staff, and Chip, who’s The Kid. These are three different kinds of women--understated, professional, Literally A Kid.

And then we add our traditional femme via Madame Armoire . . . who comes in with a very dapper Lefou, proper vest and watch chain and everything. Lefou never stops being a hunter or butch or kind of goofy. It’s just she’s found her people.

(And Lumiere and Duvin both get to be equally courtly and not all stereotyped to death or the butt of any guy-in-a-dress jokes. Although if we must have some kind of clothing joke, I’m deeply in favor of “I had forgotten how very dashing you look in uniform.” “Ah. In uniform?” CUT AWAY AND NEVER MENTION AGAIN.)

THERE. GOOD QUEER REP. MORE WOMEN. NO MORE UNFORTUNATE THINGS WITH THE NAMED WOMEN.

Hire me, Disney.

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entamewitchlulu · 4 years

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so i did a reading challenge this year and i wanna talk about what i read

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i did Popsugar 2019 and wanna talk about what i read: Book Reccs and Anti-Reccs

1.) Becoming a Movie in 2019: Umbrella Academy (vol 1) by Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba

4/5. A fascinating take on superpowers, dysfunctional families, and the apocalypse. Can get pretty gory, confusing here and there and you have to pay close attention to panels for lore, but overall an entertaining romp.

2.) Makes you Feel Nostalgic: Circles in the Stream by Rachel Roberts

4/5. Middle grade novel about the magic of music, belief, and of course, friendship. Definitely written for kids, and has some unfortunately clumsy Native rep, but overall an absolute joy to dive into once again.

3.) Written by a Musician: Umbrella Academy (vol 2) by Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba

4/5. Ramps up the confusion to ridiculous degrees with some absolutely bonkers, unexplained arcs, but still fun to watch this dysfunctional family do its dysfunctional thing.

4.) You Think Should be Turned into a movie: All That Glitters by Rachel Roberts

4/5. Continuation of Circles in the Stream, but with more unicorns, more rainbows, and more fae, which makes it automatically even better than the first.

5.) With At Least 1 Mil. Ratings on Goodreads: 1984 by George Orwell

1/5. I understand why it's important and all but wasn't prepared for some of the more graphic scenes and the overall hopelessness of the message. Would not recommend or read again.

6.) W/ a Plant in the title or cover: The secret of Dreadwillow carse by Brian farrey

5/5. A fantasy world where everyone is always happy, save for one girl and the princess, who set out to solve the mystery of their kingdom. Poignant and great for kids and adults.

7.) Reread of a favorite: Cry of the Wolf by Rachel Roberts

4/5. Yet another installment in the Avalon: Web of Magic series, which clearly I am obsessed with. Please just read them.

8.) About a Hobby: Welcome to the Writer's Life by Paulette Perhach

5/5. A welcome kick in the pants, chock full of great advice told without condescension, and full of hope and inspiration for writers both new and old.

9.) Meant to read in 2018: The Poet x by Elizabeth Acevedo

4/5. Absolutely beautiful coming of age novel told in verse. Do yourself a favor and listen to the audiobook version.

10.) w/ "pop," "sugar," or "challenge" in the title: Black Sugar by Miguel Bonnefoy

2/5. I think maybe I just don't understand this genre. Or maybe the translation was weird. I was confused.

11.) w/ An Item of Clothing or Accessory on the cover: Our dreams at Dusk by Yuhki Kamatani

4/5. It had a lot more slurs/homophobia than I was prepared for, but otherwise is a very touching, relatable collection of queer characters living in a heteronormative world.

12.) Inspired by Mythology or Folklore: Ravenous by MarcyKate Connolly

3/5. A girl goes on an impossible quest to save her brother from a child-eating witch. Really wanted to like it more because I loved the first one, Monstrous, but it dragged a little.

13.) Published Posthumously: The Islands of Chaldea by Diana Wynne Jones

3/5. I adore Diana Wynne Jones, but this one was missing some of the magic of her other books. Not sure if it was because it had to be finished by someone else, or if I just grew out of her stories.

14.) Set in Space: Binti by Nnedi Okorafor

4/5. Powerfully written story of a girl straddling tradition and innovation, who wields power through mathematical magic, surviving on a spaceship alone with a dangerous alien occupation after everyone else has been killed.

15.) By 2 Female Authors: Burn for Burn by Jenny Han and Siobhan Vivian

2/5. Ostensibly a story about a revenge pact in a small island town, but leaves far too many dangling threads to attempt alluring you to the sequel.

16.) W/ A Title containing "salty," "bitter," "Sweet," or "Spicy": The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith

3/5. It's okay but I literally just never know what anyone means at any time. Are they being reticent on purpose or do i just not understand communication

17.) Set in scandinavia: Vinland Saga by Makoto Yukimura

2/5. Technically and historically accurate and well made, but the story itself is not my cup of tea. Very gory.

18.) Takes Place in a Single Day: Long WAy Down by Jason Reynolds

4/5. A boy goes to avenge his murdered brother, but ghostly passengers join him on the elevator ride down. Stunning and powerful character-driven analysis.

19.) Debut Novel: Nimona by Noelle Stevenson

4/5. Charming and then surprisingly heart-breaking comic about Nimona, a shapeshifter who wants to become a villain's minion. Really love the villain/hero dynamic going on in the background, along with the dysfunctional found family.

20.) Published in 2019: The Book of Pride by Mason Funk

4/5. A collection of interviews with the movers, shakers, and pioneers of the queer and LGBTQ+ community. An absolutely essential work for community members and allies alike.

21.) Featuring an extinct/imaginary creature: Phoebe and her Unicorn by Dana Simpson

4/5. Incredibly charming, Calvin and Hobbes-esque collection of comics featuring the adventures of Phoebe and her unicorn best friend.

22.) Recced by a celebrity you admire: The Emerald Circus by Jane Yolen

2/5. Recced by my fave author Brandon Sanderson. An unfortunately disappointing anthology proving that any story can be made uninteresting by telling the wrong section of it.

23.) With "Love" in the Title: Book Love by Debbie Tung

4/5. One of those relatable webcomics, only this one I felt super hard almost the entire time. Books are awesome and libraries rule.

24.) Featuring an amateur detective: Nancy Drew: Palace of Wisdom by Kelly Thompson

4/5. REALLY love this modern take on Nancy Drew, coming back home to her roots to solve a brand new mystery. Diverse cast and lovely artwork, though definitely more adult.

25.) About a family: Amulet by Kabu Kibuishi

4/5. Excellent, top tier graphic novel about a sister and brother who have to go rescue their mother with a mysterious magic stone. LOVE that the mom gets to be involved in the adventure for once.

26.) by an author from asia, Africa, or s. America: Girls' Last tour by Tsukumizu

4/5. Somehow both light-hearted and melancholy. Two girls travel about an empty, post-apocalyptic world, and muse about life and their next meal.

27.) w/ a Zodiac or astrology term in title: Drawing down the moon by margot adler

3/5. A good starting place for anyone interested in the Neo Pagan movement, but didn't really give me what I was personally looking for.

28.) you see someone reading in a tv show or movie: The Promised NEverland by Kaiu Shirai

4/5. I don't watch TV or movies where people read books so i think reading an adaptation of a TV series after watching the series counts. Anyway it was good but beware racist caricatures

29.) A retelling of a classic: Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy by Rey Terciero

5/5. We can stop the Little Women reboots and retellings now, this is the only one we need. In fact, we can toss out the original too, this is the only one necessary.

30.) w/ a question in the title: So I'm a spider, so what? by Asahiro Kakashi

4/5. Cute art despite the subject matter, and a surprisingly enthralling take on the isekai genre. Love the doubling down on the video game skills.

31.) Set in a college or university campus: Moonstruck (vol 2) by Grace Ellis

2/5. An incredibly cute, beautiful, and fascinating world of modern magic and creatures, but unfortunately falls apart at the plot and pacing.

32.) About someone with a superpower: Moonstruck (vol 1) by Grace Ellis

4/5. Though nearly as messy plot-wise as its sequel, the first volume is overwhelmingly charming in a way that overpowers the more confusing plot elements.

33.) told from multiple povs: The Long way to a Small, Angry Planet by becky Chambers

4/5. Told almost in a serial format, like watching a miniseries, a group of found-family spaceship crew members make the long journey to their biggest job ever.

34.) Includes a wedding: We Set the dark on fire by Tehlor kay mejia

4/5. Timely and poignant, a girl tumbles into both love and resistance after becoming one of two wives to one of the most powerful men in the country.

35.) by an author w/ alliterative name: The only harmless great Thing by brooke bolander

3/5. Much deeper than I can currently comprehend. Beautifully written, but difficult to parse.

36.) A ghost story: Her body and other parties by Carmen Maria Machado

4/5. It counts because one of the stories in it has ghosts. A sometimes difficult collection of surrealist, feminist, queer short stories.

37.) W/ a 2 word title: Good omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman

4/5. Charming, touching, and comical, probably the best take on the apocalypse to date. Also excellent ruminations on religion and purpose.

38.) based on a true story: The faithful Spy by John Hendrix

4/5. Brilliantly crafted graphic biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and his assistance in fighting back against Nazi Germany.

39.) Revolving around a puzzle or game: the Crossover by Kwame alexander

4/5. The verse didn't always hit right with me, but the story is a sweet, melancholy one about family, loss, and moving on.

40.) previous popsugar prompt (animal in title): The last unicorn by peter s. Beagle

5/5. Absolutely one of my all-time favorite books, it manages to perfectly combine anachronism and comedy with lyricism, melancholy, and ethereal beauty.

41.) Cli-fi: Tokyo Mew Mew by Mia ikumi and Reiko Yoshida

4/5. Shut up it counts

42.) Choose-your-own-adventure: My Lady's choosing by Kitty curran

3/5. Cute in concept, a bit underwhelming in execution. Honestly, just play an otome.

43.) "Own Voices": Home by Nnedi Okorafor

3/5. The storytelling style was definitely not my style; while the first book was slow, too, it felt more purposeful. I found my attention wandering during this installment.

44.) During the season it's set in: Pumpkinheads by rainbow rowell

3/5. Cute art, but precious little substance. The concept simply wasn't for me in the first place.

45.) LITRPG: My next life as a villainess: All routes lead to doom! by Hidaka nami

5/5. An absolute insta-fave! Charming art, endearing characters, an incredible premise, and so much sweet wholesome fluff it'll give you cavities.

46.) No chapters: The field guide to dumb birds of north america by matt kracht

3/5. It started out super strong, but the joke started to wear thin at a little past the halfway point.

47.) 2 books with the same title: Unfollow by Megan Phelps-Roger

4/5. A brave and enduring personal story of growing up in and eventually leaving the Westboro Baptist Church. Really called to me to act with grace and kindness even more in the future.

48.) 2 books with the same title: unfollow by rob williams and michael dowling

1/5. How many times do you think we can make Battle Royale again before someone notices

49.) That has inspired a common phrase or idiom: THe Outsiders by S.E. Hinton

4/5. Definitely good and deserves it's praise as something that pretty much revolutionized and created an entire demographic of literature.

50.) Set in an abbey, cloister, Monastery, convent, or vicarage: Murder at the vicarage by agatha christie

3/5. I just cannot. physically keep up with all of these characters or find the energy to read between the lines.

ok that's all i got, what did y'all read and like this year? (oh god it’s gonna be 2020)

#book reccs #lulu booktalks

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ruteekatreya · 5 years

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Granbelm Aftermath!

This show is so good. I’ve reblogged enough Machikado Mazoku stuff that I’m sure it’s obvious I’ve liked where it’s going, but Granbelm I haven’t seen many posts on, so! I really loved the show at pretty much every step. A magical mecha BR with a cast solely comprised of gals? Where the mecha are Ryu Knight-styled chibis? Sure thing! Where Minion A (voiced by YAoi) has a mecha that’s even shaped like a Demon Lord’s wizard minion? The show knows where it’s at!

There’s a lot of minor stuff throughout that I’ve loved - such as Nene-nee having her NEET tendencies come out in a perfect sniper mech (That’s also a mobile armor because honestly she’s a cheating jerk, I love it), or the way that even Rosa’s dorky open shirt pilot outfit has cute hood-ears and feels like something someone would actually wear (I see you there, Shinichirou Otsuka. Even if I wouldn’t have realized the relevance without my friends who comment on the backend, doing so) The fights are also, quite frankly, the best mecha fights I’ve ever seen. Period. And I’ve been in on The Mecha for a long, long time, even if I fell out of it like 8 years ago! Seriously, it’s great shit. I’m glad me and wifey started watching it, since it suffered the most being streamed with friends. (Probably, I haven’t gone back to check on Fire Force, and won’t now because lolno, nor do I have Amazon to watch Vinland Saga myself.)

But at its core, I was super interested because it put together a pair of female leads who were probably going to be lovers into a situation with a lot of drama, and dang did it deliver on that. The stakes always feel pretty high, and pretty personal! And I was pleasantly surprised by how they handled it all around, when Nene-nee made it clear to Shingetsu and Mangetsu that some folks are here for imminently personal reasons, rather than Anna having an inferiority complex to her ex- and a pair of minions who do what she wants. Nene-nee was probably the antagonist they needed to beat there, since she and her sisters are adults and can handle losing out on the easy solution to getting their mother back. From there, Suishou coming out as a villain in her own right who’s been playing Anna (And exacerbating all the toxic shit Anna beats herself with) works well, culminating in the honestly heart breaking scenes where she forgives Shingetsu, then stabs her mother so she can try to prove her own superiority to ERNESTAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA anyway (Yoko Hikasa did a superb job torturing those syllables.)

Thematically, I think, once the theme first came out more explicitly, I got a bit eye-rolly at first. But on reflection, I’m fairly sure “There are no quick fixes, and the dream for the quick or sweeping fix can be toxic” is not one that really comes up a lot anymore, so I guess it’s fine, it just feels more common than it is. And they certainly never actually betray the theme unintentionally. The most useful thing Magic lets people do in the text is grow flowers or do parlor tricks for real. We can guess that Nene-nee, Nana, and Mimi were subsisting off it (Presumably by either Jedi Mind Tricking everyone or selling shady immortality), but they do that just as well off of whatever they’re doing in the epilogue (Nene-nee is evidently a teacher, f’rex). Yes, Magic can heal the curse on Shisui, but the curse on Shisui is itself a form of magic, so it’s hardly uniquely helpful (And Shisui ends up healing her curse herself before the time shenanigans means she never got cursed.) Equally, Granbelm doesn’t fall into the other failure state of this theme, of “Trying for the quick fix is thoroughly Bad, especially if you’re in a bad situation.” The show’s never cruel to Nene-nee and her family for trying to get their mother back, for instance. Is it the most useful theme? Nah, but it’s done well - the scenes with Mangetsu coming to terms with it (After having spent a bit more than half of the series glowing about how awesome her mecha is) are a favorite. I do think the series could have stood to just not even engage in some of that ‘is she human’ stuff that Japanese media generally tends to spend more time on (Even tho it does come down quite emphatically on ‘ye she is’ at least). I also liked that Mangetsu got to respond to “You’re just here for your friends, your family, and your lover” with “yeah, so what? So what if I don’t have a Grand Thesis on How To Save The World?”

The ending was also well done. I think I’d rather a longer epilogue, to be honest - Whether the show could have done more with more slice of life elements is debatable, maybe, but the ending definitely could have. And while I get that we can infer that yes, Anna and Kuon get to live too, rather than having to stay dead while Mangetsu comes back... I still want to actually see Anna get the hugs she needs (in particular.) I like her! ( I liked all the gals, the characters are really all quite good.) And we were tragically robbed of seeing more of Shisui, the super-cool amazing big sis... who’s actually kind of a space case derp, her younger sister just dotes on her. A slower paced epilogue would be very nice. But it does work as is, and with Mangetsu coming back... makes it clear that the others do as well. And indeed, the girls are all going to get the lives they wanted; Nene-nee and her family presumably never lost their mother (As whatever Magical bullshit she got into that altered her mind never happened,) Shisui and Kuon are presumably living together, and Anna... will get to actually live a normal life (And because she was superb at basically everything but magic, she’ll presumably excel now, though she’s lost any memory of her ex-). The only one who kinda gets left high and dry is Suishou... and Suishou probably didn’t want a happy life at all. ...also, Shingetsu’s regular moon-bunny ninja princess outfit is far superior to her stealing Mangetsu’s clothes and hastily stitching them onto her own in the scene at Magiaconatus. That was a little silly as a design. :V

So many of the details are superbly done as well. YAoi handles Suishou amazingly and gets to flex her muscles as an actress with a shitload of range, convincingly pulling off that range with just one bastard of a gal. And similarly, Suishou’s look in the OP, and the way her mecha is so thoroughly a Minion’s mecha... until it turns out, she’s the villain (...sorta! She gets kind of a raw deal too!) , and her mecha correspondingly switches to be more Demon Lord-looking. The spirits were a nice touch I’d like to have seen more of. The animation is just so fucking top notch. And while you can be annoyed Mangetsu’s a mech, the way they actually did the protagonist switch is pretty good.

My only real complaint is pretty moderate. I *really* liked a lot of the mid-game where it becomes clear Shingetsu and Mangetsu have The Depression, that depression manifests in different ways for them, and both are dealing with it as best they can. That gets handled well while it has the camera on it, but ends up falling out of focus with the reveal that Mangetsu’s depression is more directly magical, since she’s a magical construct. The show could probably have worked with that a lot longer and been different, and fairly interesting; and while it’s on screen, it’s legitimately very good. Probably something I’d like better, personally. But where it ends up going was still quite good, so hey. The other thing I really didn’t like was people’s tendency to jump to Madoka as their point of comparison. It’s... it’s just not. Really at all. If I were going to compare it to something recent (Though Madoka’s more quasi-recent by now) it’d be Revue Starlight (Though it’s not oriented on queer issues, which is pretty damn important to Starlight itself, so that comparison’s more superficial too, tbf. But it’s also a damn sight more accurate.)

#Granbelm #Spoilers under the cut #More original works please

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nellie-elizabeth · 5 years

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Really long and rambling Queliot analysis...

Okay, so I have some Queliot Thoughts that I wanted to write out before the finale murders us all. This isn't discourse about the show's handling of queer rep. I have thoughts about that too, but this is more about the relationship and how I view it in universe, not in terms of the writing/authorial intent. This gets very long so I'll put it under the cut.

Also I wrote this quickly and didn’t really edit for content so seriously please be warned... this is kind of a mess. Here goes.

I'm such a fan of angst and obviously I love all of the angst-y interpretations of everything post-3x05 given the conversation we learn about in 4x05. But before I saw 4x05, I always sort of had this different interpretation of Queliot in the aftermath of the mosaic timeline, and I find it really compelling.

So, Q and Eliot get their memories of the mosaic timeline back, and it's obviously really emotional and intense for them both, but their memories aren't necessarily crystal clear. Some things feel incredibly real and immediate, but other things feel like they happened in a dream, or under water, or just slightly... off. But without realizing it, totally subconsciously, they just sort of... operate like a couple. Not in terms of confessing their love or holding hands or anything obvious like that, but they're just so comfortable and in sync with each other. Their minds are used to living in close quarters, sharing a bed, sharing the little pains and joys of everyday life, and so they just keep doing it without meaning to. We as the audience get to see that play out in 3x06. Eliot doesn't even think about what he's doing, he just straightens Q's clothes for him, and they lean into each other on instinct, El giving Q that little forehead kiss. (Obviously in light of Eliot's rejection, that scene seems super sad to us now, but I also like the idea that it's just an ingrained instinct for them to behave that way).

We know, from a writing standpoint, that the revelation in 4x05 wasn't something that was planned all along, it was developed as they were writing that episode. That means that the majority of season 3 doesn't take it into account. So, when Q is being tormented by the depression key, none of his insecurities or self-loathing are tied back to Eliot, and the rejection he has just faced. But if you go with this interpretation, Q doesn't feel insecure about Eliot. I kind of love the idea that even though Eliot regrets what he said to Q, he wasn't 100% wrong, either.

Now, by that I don't mean that Eliot was right when he said they wouldn't choose each other. That was hurtful, and it sucks that El didn't trust Q to know his own mind in terms of his sexuality in particular. I absolutely think Eliot owes Q an apology. But there's that moment when Eliot reminds Q that they've just been hit by 50 years of emotions all at once. I think there's some truth to the idea that jumping in to a serious relationship would have been a mistake. (I want to pause and say that my head-canon is all in service of an eventual Queliot endgame, OF COURSE). Q and El remember this life they've lived together, but I don't think that those 50 years have stuck entirely in their minds and their development, if that makes sense. This goes back to my theory that their memories, while real, retain a certain element of dream-like or hazy quality to them.

In that moment, if Eliot had said yes to Q in the throne room, they probably would have been so happy. For a while. But I think Eliot would freak out any time something came up that they hadn't had to deal with in the mosaic timeline. I think Q would be too nostalgic for a life they never lived, and I think the pressure to replicate or repeat that life would have torn them up inside. Let's say that in the moment, Q is crushed by Eliot's rejection, and El hates himself so much for being a coward that he locks that memory inside of himself and never thinks about it.

And let's say that the next day, Quentin has had some time to think about it, and he decides that his relationship with Eliot is good. It's always going to be good because it always has been. They can be together, be a couple, or not - and neither option is going to ruin their long and loving life together. Neither option could possibly cause a rift in something so fundamental and true in both of their lives. Eliot and Quentin are not ordinary friends, and that was true long before the quest took them into Fillory of the past, and it will be true long after, no matter what.

Think about their relationship - when they meet in season one, they are both deeply damaged people. They do a very destructive thing under the influence of the emotion potions and Eliot's substance abuse, and have sex with each other and with Margo. And while this causes huge problems for Alice and Q, and while Margo and Q have their falling out over it, Eliot and Q seem... fine. They never really have an on-screen apology or reconciliation, because they didn't have a falling out. Q yells at Eliot in that scene in 1x12, but El is way too fucked up and in his own head to really care. As Eliot heals his own issues, he and Q come out of the whole thing stronger than ever. They've been loving and supporting each other since they met, and I think when you compare their friendship to the other ones in Q's life, it's really the most stable, consistent support system he has. Obviously Alice really loves him, and obviously Julia is awesome and they get to a really good place eventually too... but Eliot is really the only character with whom Q doesn't have a lot of bumpy road to travel.

So Q is disappointed that Eliot doesn't think they should give their relationship a shot, but Q also knows Eliot really well. Maybe he doesn't fully understand that Eliot regrets rejecting him, because Q's not a mind-reader, but I think Q does know that Eliot loves him, and that's something he can be confident about, no matter how that love manifests.

Throughout the rest of season 3, Eliot is repressing the fact that he fucked up and he wishes he could be with Q, but Q is quietly, contentedly, finding ways to move on from the hopes he briefly had that maybe he and Eliot could be together. Q will always love Eliot, and if he knew how Eliot was feeling, he'd probably fight for them and all that... but his heart isn't shattered into a million pieces or anything. He gets to be Eliot's friend. He gets to love him always, and that's enough for him.

The end of season three arrives, and Q makes his choice to sacrifice himself and stay with the monster. So many people have tied this decision to Queliot, saying that Q was willing to give up his freedom because he had nothing to live for, since Eliot doesn't want him. In my less angst-y interpretation, Q is being a hero. He's making a sacrifice. I also think, applying Queliot to the decision, he feels like he's already had a wonderful, full life. He got to experience marriage and fatherhood and growing old. That ties in with his conversation with his dad. He's willing to sacrifice a lot to bring magic back, because in some ways he's not sacrificing anything. It's obviously not a happy thought, spending eternity in a castle with a scary monster, but it's something he's genuinely willing to do. Eliot, on the other hand, is not in the same good place emotionally that Quentin is. He's simmering with love and regret over the loss of his loving partnership with Q, in a way that Q doesn't understand because he took Eliot's rejection mostly at face value, and forgave him and moved on from it in a mostly healthy way. That's why Eliot can't respect Q's choice, and shoots the monster with the god-killing bullet. He can't stand the thought of never seeing Q again.

Flash-forward to 4x05. Q is in a really bad place because his dad is dead and he believes Eliot is dead, not to mention all the drama with Alice suddenly showing up again, and then Eliot does The Thing - he breaks through and he says "proof of concept" and he says "peaches and plums," and Q is so fucking relieved and he loves Eliot so fucking much, and now he has hope, a desperate, frantic hope, of saving Eliot's life. I think the whiplash of losing Eliot and then the potential of getting him back is probably enough to stir up a lot of the emotions that Q thought he had put to rest. But, in keeping with what I've written above, Q hasn't been harboring a broken heart all this time. He's been in love with Eliot, sure, but that was a settled part of him, something true but dormant, if that makes sense. We can't forget that when 4x05 starts, Q believes that Eliot is dead, and hasn't seen Alice since her terrible betrayal. During the course of one single episode, Alice is back in his life, and he talks to Eliot, discovering the chance to get him back. These are his two main love interests of the show, and there's definitely a parallel being drawn with the fact that they're both suddenly back in his life at the exact same time.

I want to take a moment to say that I don't actually have a big problem, character-and-plot-wise, with Qualice. If Queliot had never been introduced in canon, I'd probably root for them. I don't think I would have been an avid and passionate shipper, or anything, but I'd find the story compelling. In fact, I still do find it compelling, I just no longer root for them to end up together. There are so many stories with the will-they-won't-they element, but there's something cool and slightly different about Qualice, in my opinion. We don't have to wait long for the "will they." They do, half way through the first season of the show. And then they break up in a spectacularly dramatic way, and Alice dies shortly afterwards. For the rest of the show thus far, their romantic plot thread has been about seeing if they can crawl their way back to what they once had, and even if they get there, is it what they remember? Are they the same people who fell in love with each other? Often in genre shows, where death is impermanent, the deaths of major characters are there for plot reasons, they're there for angst reasons, but often the lasting effect of something like that doesn't really play out. Here, the ramifications of Q and Alice's relationship from season 1 are only just starting to get unpacked here at the end of season 4. Some people might find that incredibly aggravating, because they're sick and tired of the relationship, but I actually find it compelling, as long as they don't erase Alice's development for the sake of her love for Q.

We also have to remember that the story's not over yet. Q and Alice trying again makes perfect sense to me, given everything that's happened on the show so far. But it also makes perfect sense to me that they finally work out that while they will always love each other deeply, they aren't going to make it as a couple. If we look at how I've imagined Q's inner thoughts and feelings since 3x05 happened, he's not wallowing in misery over Eliot. He loves him, but he loves Alice too, and he doesn't think that Eliot is an option for him right now. Maybe the "proof of concept" thing threw him for a loop, but Q has known all along that Eliot loves him... that was never a question in his mind. He still believes that Eliot decided not to be with him, despite the fact that they love each other. And Alice? Alice was his first love. Alice is someone who he hurt deeply, and who hurt him deeply in return, and Q likes to fix things. He wants to fix this, and I say it makes perfect sense for him to give it a try.

So how would I go from here, if I were in charge of the show? Well, let's assume that Q, Alice, and Eliot all actually walk out of the finale tomorrow alive. I'm not sure I think that's likely, but let's pretend. Obviously we get an awesome reunion hug, and tears and joy and Margo is there and Eliot gets to cuddle with her and with Q and everyone cries.

So now we’re in season 5. Eliot learns that Q and Alice are together now, and while he's disappointed, he decides to follow through with the promise he made to Memory!Q when he was trapped. He pulls Q aside and tells him he's sorry for what happened when Q asked him to be with him. Q is a bit startled at the apology, and Eliot explains that he deeply regrets being so dismissive. Eliot isn't sure if the two of them would have worked together or not, but that's not the point. Q was being open and vulnerable and honest, and Eliot brushed it aside. He downplayed the importance of their life together on the mosaic quest, and he hates himself for making Q think he was alone in his feelings. Q tells Eliot that he understands, and he's happy to think that maybe now they can share their memories of their life together without this barrier between them. Q leaves the conversation at first feeling like he's gotten some closure, and Eliot is wrestling with a totally unfamiliar feeling of jealousy and heartbreak as he watches Q and Alice go on with rebuilding their romance. (In my head-canon, Eliot was never jealous of Arielle and the three of them were in a totally happy, loving, devoted poly relationship, so Eliot has truly never felt jealous of anyone over Q before).

But then, because this is The Magicians, some magic shenanigans brings some stuff to light. We've seen the show do stuff with sex magic before, with Q and Alice, and there was Penny-23 worshiping Julia, so I would want there to be a scenario where maybe sex magic was required, but there's a twist about it being between life-time lovers, or something. Or maybe it's a truth serum that forces people to reveal any and all secrets, so Alice and the rest of the gang finally learn about the mosaic timeline. Something magic-y and plot-important-y happens that forces Q and Eliot to talk and think more about the mosaic timeline, in some form, and Eliot, either out of necessity because of the magic, or because of the emotions it brings up, confesses to Q that he's still in love with him and wants to be with him.

Q is shocked, and confused, because he felt like he had reconciled his love for Eliot and his love for Alice in his mind. He loves them both, and since Eliot doesn't want to be with him like that, it was okay for him to love them both and try to build a life with Alice. But now? Suddenly realizing that Eliot is an actual option for him? It hits him that he really wants that, that he had it backwards. He thought Alice was the love of this life, and Eliot was the love of a life he once lived. But instead, Alice is the memory of something he once had that made him really happy, and Eliot is the here-and-now. But he's made a commitment to Alice, so he's incredibly torn. I want Alice to be the one to dump Q. She realizes that he's thinking about staying with her out of obligation, and she tells him she deserves better than that, and runs into Kady's arms and decides that she needs to be single for a while, and continue to work on redeeming herself and finding her purpose and goals in life.

But now, see, Eliot is insecure because he thinks if Q chooses to be with him now, it's only because Alice decided not to be with him. It goes back to the whole "not when we have a choice" thing. We'd have a couple of conversations, some insecurities and doubts, and then some other dramatic plot-y thing would happen where Eliot or Q are in danger and the other one has to do something heroic to save them, and there's a desperate thank-god-you're-alive kiss, and that leads to an honest conversation and a decision to try and see where their relationship might take them.

Aaaannnd... scene.

This ended up way longer than I thought it would... lol. Congrats if you actually got to the end. I think the reason I felt compelled to write this is that I wanted to see a way of writing Queliot that felt actually true to the character development we've seen on the show thus far. When I'm reading fic, you can bet I LOVE reading about how Quentin is madly in love with Eliot, and Alice is a non-factor, or how Q and Eliot have both been silently pining ever since 3x05... but that doesn't square with the canon of the show. How do we reconcile what we've actually seen on screen, in terms of Quentin's character development, and Eliot's and Alice's as well? I think the above analysis is as sound as any other I've seen, and if the show actually follows through on the Queliot build-up, it would be an organic way for them to start to bring that relationship to the forefront without betraying Q's canonical and on-going love for Alice, and the fact that there's no hard textual evidence to support the idea that Q and El have actually been pining for each other this whole time. Just because they've got other people in their lives, even other loves, doesn't mean they couldn't still end up getting together on this show.

Fingers fucking crossed.

#my posts #queliot #the magicians #magicians #quentin coldwater #eliot waugh #alice quinn #the finale is going to kill me dead you guys

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piccolina-mina · 5 years

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My apologies @witchwolfmouse. I realized I kinda hijacked your post regarding M*ribel:

Y’all there’s room for people to ship Isobel/Maria and there is room for other people to be critical of the ship considering Isobel’s treatment of Maria and how deeply Maria dislikes Isobel because of how she treated Rosa... If you’re going to ship the two of them, considering what’s unfolded between the two of them onscreen thus far, then you’ve got to be prepared for some people not to be about it, especially fans of color and wlw of color and especially black fans who fall into either or both categories.

And I admittedly got in my feelings and droned on more than anticipated, so I made my reply into a post, since it was so long.

I'm ship and let ship. I have been that way from the beginning. The only reason I even became as vocal about shipping in this fandom in the first place was because of how unwelcoming it was for anyone who shipped anything alternative from the canon ships. There should be equal space for shipping and for those critical of it, and for a long time there wasn't equal space just all of one or the other depending on the ship.

Ironically, now it's slightly more equal but ridiculously divisive for silly reasons, but I digress.

I do think that an inability to take shipper goggles or whatever goggles off to actually understand certain criticisms about race and its relation to shipping, fandom, and within the show and how it's handled there has led to a lot of defensiveness by some who only see criticism as negative attacks, then respond in defense, which prompts defensive responses back and a host of others feeling genuinely invalidated and unheard, especially when what they are pointing out is skirted over.

There are genuine people who ship maribel, and hey, if you like it, I love it for you. I don't have to ship it or agree with it, but for those who genuinely love it, more power to them. Flood the tags for them. Make content.

Ironically, that's literally all I personally wanted from the beginning. Diversified content and discussions even if it's not my thing. By doing so, it makes me smile. It's all I ever wanted so it's not a nuisance for me personally.

Plus in this case, while I don't care for Isobel or the ship, I'll never say no to more Maria content. Fk it up!

Regarding M*ribel and discourse. To put it bluntly, and to go back to where some of the original friction and frustration stemmed in this fandom. The beauty of it is how much space there is to discuss in detail all angles of the amazing queer representation which I love, but the inability to discuss the race representation and issues and even the intersectional aspect of race and queerness, not without it always somehow stepping on the toes of queerness.

A wlw ship would be amazing. Hell, if it's done well, maybe this wlw ship could be amazing. Ship away, but also, please, know that someone criticizing it for legitimate reasons doesn't have to mean they are invalidating you or the wlw representation, especially when someone's criticism may be coming at it from an angle of a POC, or WOC, or QWOC who also feel invalidated. Quite damn often.

There are a lot of racial aspects of this show where despite the show's diversity, are very problematic or uncomfortable (a diverse cast does not mean all diverse issues disappear, if anything, it highlights them more so). And fans of color who voice them or have a different take than you should not have to be lambasted because they are approaching something from a different angle you may or may not have the experience with or know about.

LGBTQ fans some of whom may not be of color can look through their lenses of their own representation and what that means good or bad. But fans of color also do the same. We're always going to do the same. We can't shut that off as it's our identity and how we see the world through our experiences. Just like many of you, and those of both do it from both angles too.

There's a heterosexual bias willingly acknowledged frequently in fandom "the straights" or "the heteros" and that's fair and valid. Rarely does anyone enter the space and get pissy about that and not without being checked directly or indirectly. But you can't enter the tag and present something from a POC viewpoint or a WOC viewpoint without being directly or indirectly checked and often by people who honest to goodness aren't in the position to do so and show that based on how they choose to address or frame something.

Why? Why the "I don't see it that way so it must not be true?" Or "prove it or your lying" angle? Why do fans of color--too many to be dismissed as a fluke-- have to explain or otherwise be invalidated? That is what that is. Invalidation.

A racial bias being acknowledged or even a gender one makes people defensive or uncomfortable or unkind. That isn't fair. That isn't awesome.

And it has been a problem for a very long time.

Now if we're talking about m*ribel. Where some may see a wlw ship, a classic enemies to lovers ship, two beautiful women who could be something magical... Maria being in on the alien secret via Isobel... snarky personalities and sniding becoming something deeper ... hot hate sex ... two badass women who have been through some sh!t being a badass couple together... I do get the angle.

Where some people see that, I personally see a ship that makes me uncomfortable. I understand not everyone will see it as I do, and that's okay, as I said, ship and let ship.

But for me, when I think of Maribel, I think of Isobel violating Maria and her mind without her consent. I think of how disturbing it is that another woman did that to another woman without thinking about it as a violation (you don't have to agree, but much like what Noah did to Isobel at more extreme levels, it makes ME think of the rape and power dynamics and abuse dynamics).

I see someone who has had a total disregard for humans outside of her presumed husband violating them at will with powers she has yet to fully gain control of thus putting herself and those she violated at risk. I think of how unusual it is that she doesn't even have friends she hangs out with and doesn't know how to be one, or to be nurturing, or kind, or considerate.

And I don't know if I would like to see her with someone who is snarky and such, but also all of those things too. I see someone who is selfish in general and selfish in all of her relationships, and it's troubling (to me) when someone so inherently selfish is ever combined with someone who isn't because of how draining that is.

And to me, Isobel is the most selfish character with no give, and I don't care for the (far too common) trope of a black woman having to guide her into the light as a project and build her into a better person.

I think of an unfortunate history of women of color being violated not just by men but also white women that goes back centuries.

I see Isobel's total disregard for Maria's life and agency. I see Isobel's sense of entitlement she cannot seem to shake where she thinks she is entitled to Maria's acceptance and attention and her anger that Maria has the audacity to dislike her because apparently people are supposed to like her even when she treats almost everyone terribly. Which is a very subtle but very insidious barely noticeable dog whistle type of example most people of color can attest to as an example of white privilege.

I see someone who has clung to Maria specifically despising her on behalf of Rosa (and maribel shippers are welcome to interpret it as confirmation of a crush or attraction, and they can do so I understand that take, too) so much so that her primary reason for believing that Maria was an evil alien killer was the fact that Maria didn't like her nor as a psychic with legitimate abilities didn't allow Isobel to violate her.

The racial context of that scene alone was bothersome because of two cops jumping to a conclusion and sharing their theory with citizens with no concrete proof before speaking to their suspect (Maria) and using the word of a known racist and an entitled white woman with a grudge (Isobel) to support their theory, which if that doesn't parallel real life and how POC can find themselves at the mercy of the criminal justice system due to this, I don't know what is.

I see a woman who didn't have the slightest grasp of mind violation until she was violated by a brown man (who subsequently ended up being the presumed big bad of the season). That's what I see with M*ribel.

Where some shippers are able to see the chance for more LGBT rep and that's valid. I see troubling racial undertones that genuinely make me almost as uncomfortable as Noah and Isobel, and that too should be valid, and considered, and respected, and not dismissed, or misconstrued deliberately or otherwise.

There should be space for the criticism too, and the different takes, especially takes deeply rooted in another form of disenfranchisement. Just, consider and respect that sometimes. Not all fans of color will have the same take, we're all different people, so no one person can speak for the others, which means sometimes there will be opinions that differ on reasons that relate to race, and that's okay too.

From the first episode until now. Through Maria sidelining, and maricael/miluca shipping, and Malex angst, and Echo obstacles, and Liz decentralization, and the demonization of Noah, and Rosa injustice...through all of, there are things that should be discussed freely without being invalidated, dismissed, or made into something else.

There are many ways in which there will be race perspectives and things fans of color will present and ponder that other fans may not consider at all. And sometimes it will spill into something you like or enjoy, but those feelings especially about something so personal and specific and real ... even if you don't like them, or agree with them, or they make you uncomfortable or defensive, they matter too.

#that's literally it #but if all of this is misinterpreted or gets lost in translation and the only focus is on not shipping maribel #or whatever angle i won't forsee where this post is called out for something or another i got nothing #i'm kinda tired #roswell new mexico #roswell nm #maria deluca #i won't tag isobel since it could technically classify as anti #rnm discourse #rnm notoriety #rnm fandom fkery

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spnmetafromheaven · 6 years

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Breakdown of the Cupid Scene from 08x23 “Sacrifice”

After rewatching “Sacrifice” for probably the fifth time, I can honestly say my favorite scene from the episode has to be in the bar where Dean and Cas are waiting for Cupid to arrive. I remember the first time I watched it, it didn’t hit me too deeply; a few laughs here and there and the pleasant surprise of queer representation where the audience is the least likely to expect it. The complexity of the scene, however, is subtly genius and I need to rant about it.

(Prepare for an excessive amount of overanalyzing and the use of image-stills below the cut)

So, right away, we see Dean waiting at a bar by himself.

(Shocking, I know). Following his line of sight, we can infer that Dean is watching something, likely a tv screen above the bar. Right afterward, we are shown this clip:

A man with a bow and arrow. So, already we can make the connection that this is the television show Dean is watching as he waits at the bar. (I’m pointing this out to explain that this is how “subtext” works. While it’s never explicitly confirmed this is the tv show Dean’s watching, editing and visual cues invite viewers to make this valid conclusion. The scene is filled with even more subtext for us to unravel on an even deeper level.)

By its inclusion, we know that there is something important about this imagery. Placed in a scene about trying to find Cupid, it isn’t too hard to make the connection that the archer is mean to symbolize Cupid’s bow - the very thing the characters are after in this episode.

This clip of the tv screen is taken from Dean’s perspective. We just saw him watching something over the bar, and now the creators are giving us some information on what exactly Dean’s focused on. Then, we get this image:

The man is aiming his bow and arrow straight at the audience - or is he? As we know, this angle is taken from Dean’s perspective where he is still sitting by himself at the bar. So what do we see after this?

Cas walking up from behind Dean.

What’s interesting to note is that the bar actually has two entrances. There’s the door behind Dean that Cas walks through, and there’s another door at the end of the bar off to Dean’s left. (We see Cupid use this door for her entrance later). But the writers specifically wanted Cas walking up behind Dean. It’s even directed in the original script (courtesy of SupernaturalWiki):

[DEAN is seen sitting at the bar watching a hunter on the bars TV aim his bow at the TV screen. CASTIEL walks in the door that’s behind DEAN and sits on the stool next to him.]

But why is it important to have Castiel walk up behind Dean? Well, prior to Cas’s entrance, the last thing we saw was the image of the archer aiming at the tv screen. From Dean’s perspective, it would look like the archer is aiming at him and/or behind him. Cas’s entrance sets him right in line with the archer’s bow.

The context of this scene is crucial: Dean and Cas are focused on finding Cupid’s bow; a tool used to signify two people falling in love. The general audience knows how Cupid bow’s works in most mythology, with pre-destined lovers being shot with a magical arrow. The writers of the scene are likely depending on this pre-existing knowledge for viewers to pick up on these metaphorical clues, i.e. aiming a bow and arrow = someone destined to fall in love.

So, right away we have this image of Dean and Cas being aimed at with a bow and arrow in the context of looking for Cupid’s bow. It’s a visual cue that is meant to carry romantic connotations. If this seems like too much of an interpretative stretch for some, I can also point out that the writers use this same visual metaphor later on in the scene for a canonically romantic couple.

So after Cas sits next to Dean, the two greet each other. At one point, Dean refers to the bartender further down the bar:

DEAN

Free drinks. Your, uh, buddy over there thinks you saved his life.

Which is followed by this nice compositional parallel:

Dean and Cas at one end of the bar, and the bartender and a customer at the other. The fact that they are the only ones at the bar at this time only further emphasizes the mirroring images.

And so, Dean and Cas start talking about their plans for the future.

DEAN

Talk to me. Are you sure about this? I mean, it's one thing me and Sammy slamming the gates to the pit, but you -- you're -- you're boarding up Heaven, and you're locking the door behind you.

CASTIEL

Yeah. I know.

DEAN

You did a lot of damage up there, man. You think they're just gonna let that slide?

CASTIEL

Do you mean do I think they'll kill me? Yeah, they might.

DEAN

So this is it? E.T. goes home.

During their exchange, Dean discovers that Cas is likely to die at the hands of the Angels once the trials are done and they are able to seal up Heaven. It’s a realization that he is likely to never see Cas again.

Admittedly, it’s a heavy topic.

As Dean and Cas talk, there is actually a song being played in the background at a fairly faint level. The song is titled, “I’m So Blue” by Katie Thompson. (Here’s a link for anyone’s interested. It’s a beautiful song, I totally recommend listening to it). The lyrics can be heard at the time of Cas’s entrance and throughout his and Dean’s dialogue. The song goes:

You love me so but let me go

Now I'll never know

How our love would go

Waiting, watching the stars up above

Hoping that I could win back your love

I'm so blue without you

Thought our love was true

Then you found someone new

So yeah. It’s a love song- a tragic one about losing a lover and never knowing what could have been. These lyrics eerily mirror the topic of Dean and Cas’s discussion - about Castiel going back “up” to Heaven, likely for good. So once again, we see romantic connotations underlying Cas and Dean’s interactions set there by the creators.

For a scene where a man is supposed to find his soulmate, however, a love song isn’t entirely out of place. For all we know, this song wasn’t meant to be connected to Cas and Dean in any way. Yet, the lyrics are rather depressing for someone who is meant to be meeting their soulmate, let alone the fact that the bartender and his soulmate already have their own song to signify their transition to lovers.

The moment the two fall in love, “Nice to Be with You” by Gallery starts to play. Along with being played at a volume the audience can actually register, the lyrics of the song are way more fitting to the moment of finding your true love:

Oh, it's so nice to be with you

I love all the things ya say and do

And it's so nice to hear you say

You're gonna please me in every way

Honey, I got the notion you're causin' commotion in my soul

Baby, you and me have got somethin' that's real

I know it's gonna last a lifetime

Looking back to the scene, Dean and Cas finish their conversation and we finally see the entrance of Cupid.

Like most of the general audience at this point, Dean and Cas see the woman enter the bar and automatically assume she is the bartender’s soulmate. Dean especially comments on the “obvious” tension between the two will be lovers.

DEAN

Holy crud, this is like the first five minutes of every porno I've ever seen.

As the woman makes her entrance, the bartender signs some papers and introduces the man sitting at the bar.

[DWIGHT takes the pen and signs.]

DWIGHT [introducing GAIL to the MAN at the bar.]

Gail, Rod.

ROD

Ma'am.

DWIGHT

Rod rides a stool here most days.

So here we learn that the customer, Rod, is actually a regular at the bar. Regular enough for the bartender, Dwight, to remember his name and where he often chooses to sit. It’s safe to assume that Dwight and Rod have known each other long before this specific night, and are probably friends. This lets the audience entertain the idea that true love has the potential of happening even in the midst of a seemingly platonic friendship. This could be a not-so-subtle jab at viewers that maybe this potential can found in other relationships on screen as well…

Interestingly, Rod is also wearing a bright red hat. For the dark interior of the bar and his other neutral clothing choices, Rod’s red hat stands out like a lighthouse. From a set design perspective, it’s clear that the viewer's eye is meant to be drawn to Rod’s hat. When Cupid first enters the bar, Rod even makes sure to tip his hat towards her, drawing the viewer’s attention even further to what’s printed on there.

A pair of wings.

A pair of wings that, as an audience, we can connect to the Angel sitting just a few feet down the bar.

Cupid, of course, does her work and touches the shoulders of Dwight and Rod to make them fall in love. Her quick exit afterward leaves Dean and Cas obviously confused, yet this is soon cleared up.

Right after Cupid’s departure, Dwight and Rod look to the television screen where once again, there is an archer with a bow and arrow. Composition wise, this shot is pretty awesome. The brim of Rod’s bright red hat is pointing towards the archer, who in turn is drawing back his bow to point an invisible arrow to the right, which is where we see Dwight. The viewer’s eyes are meant to bounce from one to the other - from Rod, to the bow, to Dwight - thus, making the connection.

Rod himself looks to the right, following the viewer’s eyes as they land on Dwight. As the two make eye contact, “Nice to Be with You” hits its opening chorus and the two fall in love.

So, in summary, the two characters fated to be in love - who were old friends before this - are connected by the visual cues of a bow and arrow. Sound familiar? Because, as a reminder, this was the way Dean and Cas were introduced into the same scene just moments earlier. (i.e. Dean waiting at the bar, the arrow pointing towards/behind him, and Cas making his entrance right afterward from the same direction).

And a reminder, these details were deliberate!

Dean and Cas:

[DEAN is seen sitting at the bar watching a hunter on the bars TV aim his bow at the TV screen. CASTIEL walks in the door that’s behind DEAN and sits on the stool next to him.]

Dwight and Rod:

[DWIGHT and ROD stare at the hunter on TV as he displays the use of his bow.]

To wrap up the scene, Dean and Cas finally realize their mistake. Just like the general audience, they hadn’t thought to consider that Dwight’s soulmate may not be a girl. They assumed Dwight’s heterosexuality.

The show itself presents Dwight as an extremely masculine character. Appearance-wise, he has a wild head of hair and a scruffy beard. He’s wearing a neutral-toned plaid flannel, making connections to the rough outdoors and physical labor. He’s even sporting a few scars and bruises from the bar fight earlier that day.

The first time the audience even meets Dwight, it’s when he’s pulling out a gun to protect his bar and patrons.

He’s bold, tough, and willing to get his own hands dirty to protect those around him. He even gets tossed around a bit, earning him a few bloody wounds that he patches up later before returning right back to work later that same night.

Here, we even see him doing some physical labor, picking up the heavy beer cases and moving them behind the bar.

So as far as the audience has seen him, Dwight is a very masculine character. He shoots guns, he gets bloody, and he even serves alcohol for a living, doing all the hard work and manual labor himself. This is what makes his queer sexuality even more of a surprise to the general audience - because Dwight isn’t the image society thinks of when it thinks of queer men. In this way, Dwight challenges the stereotypes of what we understand “masculine” to be.

Out of all the characters in the scene, Dean is the one that most personifies this moment of confusion. Unlike Cas who gets up and follows Cupid out the door, it takes Dean a moment to process this realization, as it probably goes against everything he had been expecting just moments before (As a reminder to the, “This is like the first five minutes of every porno I've ever seen” line). I won’t go too deep in analysis over Dean’s expressions in this scene - I think everyone can make their own interpretation of what’s going through his head here - but I’ll leave some screenshots as a reference.

And that concludes the analysis of the Cupid/bar scene! So, in summary,

While waiting to find Cupid’s bow, Dean watches a tv screen where an archer aims behind Dean, which is exactly when Cas makes his entrance from the same direction

While Dean and Cas talk about how they may never see each other again, “I’m So Blue” - a love song about someone who lost their lover - plays behind them

Dwight and Rod parallel Cas and Dean in multiple ways throughout the scene, including scene composition, Rod’s hat having wings, being old time friends, and the tv archer aiming from Rod to Dwight

Dean and Cas personify the heteronormative perspective of the general audience by assuming the woman (Cupid) was Dwight’s soulmate; along with Dean’s observation of the “sexual tension” between the two. Both of which, we learn, are inaccurate.

So, yeah, while just a few minutes long, this scene is jam-packed with amazing things to unravel after just the first viewing.

#supernatural meta #scene analysis #destiel #08.23 #outside world analysis #parallels #text #images

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lebibish · 5 years

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Dear Yuletide Author 2019,

Happy fall! (Or winter, which it feels like here!) The Yuletide fic exchange is one of my favorite times of year and I am always amazed with the wonderful and lovely stories that come out of it. I absolutely promise—I will love whatever you write because you have put time and effort into one of these fandoms which I adore and which deserve so much more love. So thank you!

(This...got rather long...)

Things I am generally interested in:

- World building – both cultural shenanigans and language and how does this actually work and let’s dig into the stuff that was handwaved—did I say both? I obviously meant everything)

- Family feels – found family, kidfic, good sibling relationships, comfort, people you would fight to live for, snarky banter, deep understanding of someone else. Also, I love kidfic. Also, good parenting.

- Competence – I really, really enjoy watching/reading about/listening to people being really, really good at something.

- Magic – fairy tale magic, magical realism, that whole social media thread about people having small everyday magics, hidden magical realm, magic school, I love it all.

Squicks, or things I am not interested in: For Yuletide, I prefer not to have unhappy endings. Bittersweet I can handle. Not a fan of cheating in relationships (consensual polyamory, on the other hand, is VERY GOOD.), grim!dark cynicism, unlikable heroes, angry-teenage-boy angst (this does not just apply to teenage boy characters btw, just saying I lost a lot of interest in Harry Potter after book 5. It was good characterization, he had all the reasons to feel that way! I’m just not that interested in reading from his point of view at that point).

That got long, sorry!

Specifics:

Fandom: Horror Movie Daycare (CollegeHumor)

What I like about this fandom: I love kidfic. I love people taking care of kids, being good with kids (even if they’re nervous and unsure of what they’re doing—genuine interest and care goes a long way), and the subversion of expectations in this.

What I would love to see (optional details are optional! Tell me a story you’re interested in and I’ll love it!): I am torn between wanting to know Ms. Katherine Daisy’s background (where did she come from? Why is she like this? How does she keep getting these creepy jobs? IS SHE FROM NIGHTVALE?) and wanting her to remain a mystery (particularly, seeing her from an outsider’s perspective—what do the families of her kids think of her? How did they find this daycare? Does she have any coworkers? Neighbors? Family? What do think of her and her job? Do any of the kids she takes care of grow up and come back to visit her?)

Fandom: Assassin’s Creed Odyssey (game)

What I like about this fandom: What do I not like about this fandom? I play as Kassandra—she is pansexual, always down for sex, not great at emotions, totally motivated by family, kind of protective, kind of an asshole, and I head-canon her main relationship being Roxana BECAUSE THAT RELATIONSHIP IS ADORABLE. But I’m more than happy to read other people’s versions of Kassandra too! I love the attention to detail in the culture, I love the connections to Greek mythology, I love Kassandra’s relationships throughout the game (families, friends, lovers…)

What I would love to see (optional details are optional! Tell me a story you’re interested in and I’ll love it!): Kassandra in different time periods—they opened up so much room for amazing stories in that plot. Kassandra in the middle ages, messing with the patriarchy. Kassandra hanging out with the all the queer Classics majors at Oxford, (OMFG I just pictured Kassandra meeting Miss Fisher and having sexy, sexy adventures solving murders together), Kassandra in YOUR favorite historical period being her awkwardly kind, aggressively violent self. But also, that opens up so much angst? Because this woman has spent so much time separated from her family and has fought so hard to find them and now she is going to outlive literally everyone? (sort of spoiler warning: Phoebe in the DLC makes me cry so hard and if you want to make that a real thing and bring other people too I WOULD BE SO HAPPY). How does Kassandra cope? I kind of imagine she basically just keeps building families around her over and over again, but I could also see her retreating from getting close to people. ALTERNATIVELY. Kassandra growing up—why does she stay on Kephallonia so long? What is she like as an awkward teen? Kassandra being a big sister to Phoibe. Or. After the main story, I made Alexios one of the crew members on the boat and that was consistently hilarious. I also got the entire family together for that dinner scene—including awkward, angry step-brother together and the family shenanigans of two awkward, angry brothers and AWKWARD AGGRESSIVE Kassandra somehow being the reasonable human sibling is AMAZING.

Fandom: Sinbad (TV)

What I like about this fandom: I ask for this fandom every year because: people with different cultures and languages coming together and forming a functional group/found family/deep friendships, real mythology being played with, magic hiding in the world as science becomes more prevalent…it’s all amazing.

What I would love to see (optional details are optional! Tell me a story you’re interested in and I’ll love it!): Sinbad’s original curse—not being able to stay on land for more than a day and what that would mean if they had succeeded in being traders; the possibility that Cook has something strange going on with his own refusal to leave the ship; and post-series what these people end up doing and how they interact. Any and all back-stories are love, any and all myths, legends or monsters entering the story are brilliant.

Fandom: Much Ado About Nothing (Shakespeare)

What I like about this fandom: Beatrice/Benedict – snark. So much snark. Smart, competent people who are confident, but also insecure in some really specific ways. NOT a fan of Claudio.

What I would love to see (optional details are optional! Tell me a story you’re interested in and I’ll love it!): Ok, so, I love the original play and I love it’s various incarnations (the David Tennant and Catherine Tate one is amaaazing) but my first introduction and the one I always imagine is the Kenneth Branaugh version. Beatrice/Benedict is my OTP…except. Except. The speech where Beatrice and Don Pedro are talking and he asks if she’d have him and she says no unless she could have another for working days…I want that story. Beatrice/Benedict and their home together becoming a place where Don Pedro goes to rest and hide from the demands of the world (romantic polyamory OT3, platonic friendship, it could play out in so many ways). Or, Beatrice/Benedict going with the Prince. Beatrice having adventures and charming and outraging people everywhere and Benedict and Don Pedro amused and indulgent and jumping in to troll people left and right.

Fandom: The Pirates of Darkwater

What I like about this fandom: SO MUCH WORLD-BUILDING. All the islands and the magic and the ship (see also, any of the details for Sinbad…). Grumpy thieves and mercenaries who are secretly good people but have bad impulses/habits.

What I would love to see (optional details are optional! Tell me a story you’re interested in and I’ll love it!): Since the series was never finished—HOW DOES IT END? Does Ren become a King? Do the islands come together in a diplomatic alliance? Do they save the day and sail off into the sunset? OR Ren growing up. Living with his old guardian in an ancient lighthouse and entertaining himself by being a gymnast—but also, how do you raise a secret heir to a kingdom without letting him know he’s a secret heir to a kingdom? Shove a lot of books at him and cross your fingers? Teach good governance through a series of ridiculous hypotheticals and then hem and haw whenever he says “When will I ever need to know this?”. OR pick an island and explore it . Look, magic, pirates, adventure, mysterious islands with a variety of civilizations...you can't really go wrong here.

Fandom: 镇魂 | Guardian (TV)

What I like about this fandom: Aha. Ha ha. Ok, seriously—time travel, magic, SO GAY, teams, SO COMPETANT, the constant jostling for who gets to sacrifice themselves for someone else this time, other worlds, WEIRD AF worldbuilding (magic? Aliens? Energy beings that are totally not ghosts because the censors don’t like superstition?), TIME TRAVEL, cats, shape-shifters, I will Wait for you, two cultures colliding, hurt/comfort everywhere

What I would love to see (optional details are optional! Tell me a story you’re interested in and I’ll love it!): Fix it fic. FIX IT FIC. Reincarnation? Not actually dead? Someone, something rational and reasonable steps in before tragedy becomes inevitable? PEOPLE GET THERAPY? I don’t care. Fiiiiix iiiiit. AND/OR Shen Wei waking up and negotiating a brand new world—new Dixing and new Haixing. I…kind of prefer that happening much longer than the show makes it seem in the end? Like, I have unreasonable feelings about him waiting 10,000 years to see the love of his life—but I also kind of like the idea of him waking up and being incredibly confused by the culture that has built up in Dixing. Also—more of the actual culture that has built up in Dixing so that it’s not just the desperate poor neighbor but a functional, interesting society that has it’s own traditions and families and no sense of seasons or time but what they designate for themselves (does the lantern change that?) AND/OR I’ve been haunted lately by the idea of the original Kun Lan who we never meet…actually being reincarnated as Zhao Yun Lan?

ALL MY LOVE AND GRATITUDE! YOU ARE AWESOME! I really hope you enjoy this Yuletide!

#yuletide #dear yuletide author #yuletide letter #challenge prompts

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scarletjedi · 7 years

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My wife, gentlepersons

Brig was already aboard the boat when Gimli and Legolas arrived, attending the rigging for the simple sail and making ready to depart.@brydylcai: All of the writing asks because I worry you don't have enough to do

so.

all the ones I haven’t answered yet. Behind the cut because long

1. Tell us about your WIP!

Heh, which one? I’ve started writing chapter three of We Are Made Wise because I’m finally getting over my block (I think there was a little burnout). I’ve just updated Old Man Luke, and Pineapple 2 is next. I’m almost finished with my next original short, I’ve figured out where to go next in my novel, and...yeah. :)

2. Where is your favorite place to write?

Where it’s quiet and I can focus. Sometimes that’s the living room. Sometimes it’s my office. Sometimes it’s the Starbucks on the corner.

4. Do you have any writing habits/rituals?

Depends on where I am. I have to have some sort of ritual to get focused. In my office, I light candles. In the living room, I put on music. At the coffee shop, I have a snack.

6. Favorite character you’ve written?

My original character, Jamie, from my book is a HOOT. He’s a gay Jewish teen whose convinced that *he* will be the one to capture definitive proof of the Jersey Devil. He’s the non-magical pov in the fic, and his voice is fun.

7. Favorite/most inspirational book?

Well, on the one hand, I re-wrote the Hobbit, so that’ book is clearly an inspiration.

8. Do you have any writing buddies or critique partners?

@brydylcai is my in-house sounding board, the same way I am for her. I don’t have a regular beta, but I’ve worked with several depending on the project/story, and they’re all lovely people.

9. Favorite/least favorite tropes?

I love revelations/coming out stories. I hate deliberate misunderstandings.

10. Pick an author (or writing friend) to co-write a book with

@brydylcai and I have discussed writing a book together already, so Imma go with her :)

11. What are you planning to work on next?

I have the doc with We Are Made Wise open, so either that or my next short, depending on if I write more tonight or wait until tomorrow.

12. Which story of yours do you like best? why?

Comes Around Again is the one that earned me what little notoriety I have, and Old Man Luke is doing the same in Star Wars, but I’m most proud of Drowned in Moonlight. That fic was written to excise some grief over Carrie Fisher, and I think I did her proud.

13. Describe your writing process

I’m tempted to say “Incoherent screaming into the void” but that’s a joke that’s been made before. My process. Hmm.

I tend to write by the seat of my pants. I like to see what develops and grows naturally. Once I get to a certain point, I’ll stop and make a plot sheet/note page, but I usually have the rough shape figured out before I start to write.

Once I have a draft, I’ll edit. Sometimes I’ll print and edit on paper. Sometimes I edit online. My original works tend to get more editing than my fanworks.

14. What does it take for you to be ready to write a book? (i.e. do you research? outline? make a playlist or pinterest board? wing it?)

ha ha ha ha - My original novel has been 15 years in the works, and has gone through many drafts. It’s working now, but I need familiarity. So, I think what I need is research for context and an outline for plot, and a good enough knowledge to feel like I’m winging it.

15. How do you deal with self-doubt when writing?

I put it down. If I’m not confident on one project, I’ll put it down and turn to another. (This usually means putting down my original work in favor of fanfic, because I’m more confident with that overall, but...). I know what sounds right to my ear, and if I’m not hearing it, there’s usually a reason. Distance/time often lets me see it.

17. What things (scenes/topics/character types) are you most comfortable writing?

I’m a Jersey Girl, so I tend to set things in Jersey. I love dramatic conversations, so I’m comfortable there. Queer characters.

18. Tell us about that one book you’ll never let anyone read

That I wrote? Or that I read? Twilight/50 Shades.

19. How do you cope with writer’s block?

I beat it with a hammer unitl it’s writer’s pebbles.

20. Any advice for young writers/advice you wish someone would have given you early on?

Write what you love. Write the truths that you know, and research to write the things you don’t know. Don’t be afraid to break your characters; you can put them back together in new and interesting ways. You’ll be given a lot of advice over the years--read enough to recognize what you like. Develop your taste. Take the advice that helps taylor your work to your taste. Reject the advice that changes it away.

21. What aspect of your writing are you most proud of?

Subtle meanings and implications.

22. Tell us about the books on your “to write” list

Here are 3:

a) The Lesbian Werewolf Romance Novel.

b) The Teenage Zombie Novel.

c) The American-Teenager-Falls-Into-Fantasy-Realm-and-there-are-also-dragons novel

23. Most anticipated upcoming books?

Jer Keene’s next book. I read the first as fic, and then read the novelization, and now I REALLY want to know what comes next.

The Kingkiller Chronicles book 3

25. What’s your worldbuilding process like?

Seat. Of. My. Pants and flailing. Seriously, I write something because it sounds right, and then figure out how it works after.

26. What’s the most research you’ve ever put into a book?

I wrote parts of CAA with the hobbit, the lotr, the unfinished tales, and the moves on and open in front of me.

I became a pagan, and my research for that has influenced my writing of my book.

27. Every writer's least favorite question - where does your inspiration come from? Do you do certain things to make yourself more inspired? Is it easy for you to come up with story ideas?

I mentioned I was pagan? My patron, Brigid, is among other things, a muse. She pokes, and I start thinking (or I think, and she eggs me on. I’m not sure of the order. could be either or both). But, most of my ideas come from things I read. When I want inspiration, I read.

Ideas don’t come as easily as I would like, but the fact that I have several projects at once means that it comes easily enough.

28. How do you stay focused on your own work and how do you deal with comparison?

I have a hard time focusing period, so that’s a challenge. I have put effort into being less jealous because it’s ultimately a useless exercise.

29. Is writing more of a hobby or do you write with the intention of getting published?

I want to be published like JK Rowling or Stephen King - one thing that gives my financial security, or with enough frequency to do the same.

30. Do you like to read books similar to your project while you’re drafting or do you stick to non-fiction/un-similar works?

tbh, i read mostly fanfic these days. Most Genre fic makes me angry because there’s something missing from the text. it’s usually women/gay people.

31. Top five favorite books in your genre?

scifi/fantasy

a) American Gods - Gaiman

b) Foundation/Elijah Bailey mysteries - Assimov

c) The Hobbit

d) Guards!Guards!

e) Years of Rice and Salt

32. On average how much do you write in a day? do you have trouble staying focused/getting the word count in?

Depends. There are days i can’t get a word out. There are days I’ve written about 10k. It depends on if I’m having a good focus day.

33. What’s your revision/rewriting process like?

long.

34. Unpopular writing thoughts/opinions?

....like what?

35. Post the last sentence you wrote

““The things I do for the greater good,” Gimli grumbled, his frown softening as Legolas’s laugh rang out to echo through the cavern. “

36. Post a snippet

from Old Man Luke, chapter 11 (probably):

Obi-Wan stood just to the left of the closed door, hand stroking his beard ad the sight of those assembled. It took all of his focus to keep his eyes from growing wide, or let his hands tremble the way they wished to.

Before him, sitting at a conference table, was Asajj Ventress (scowling at the table like a chastised Padawan, though she had submitted to the indignity of the locking cuffs easily enough), and the adult twinned children of Anakin Skywalker.

Luke sat much as he had before, calmly and with no outward signs of concern, reminding Obi-Wan uncomfortably of his own master. Leia sat back from the table, her arms crossed and her expression sardonic. She, too, was apparently unconcerned, if outwardly exasperated, and Obi-Wan knew that if hadn’t already been told, he would be able to see the resemblance between father and daughter in a heartbeat.

Still, Obi-Wan had the distinct and uncomfortable sensation of not quite living up to her expectations.

The bulk of her resentment, however, was aimed directly at the only other occupant of the room—Anakin.

Their father.

Obi-Wan needed a drink.

37. Do you ever write long handed or do you prefer to type everything?

I write long-handed when I’m having focus issues. It’s slow enough to make me focus.

38. How do you nail voice in your books?

I talk to myself. Out loud. Constantly.

39. Do you spend a lot of time analyzing and studying the work of authors you admire?

When I read, I’m known to stop and think “that was a perfectly crafted sentence!” or “How did they do that?”

40. Do you look up to any of your writer buddies?

all of them. They’re all awesome, though in different ways.

41. Are there any books you feel have shaped you as a writer?

Harry Potter. I’m not sure how, but I’m sure it has.

42. How many drafts do you usually write before you feel satisfied?

Depends on how fully formed the story was in my head before I started. Fanfic gets 2 - rough and beta. Original fic gets rough, first, second, etc

43. How do you deal with rejection?

Badly at first. Then it evolved into a desire to prove them wrong.

45. First or third person?

Third.

46. Past or present tense?

Past.

47. Single or dual/multi POV?

Depends on the needs of the plot.

48. Do you prefer to write skimpy drafts and flesh them out later, or write too much and cut it back?

the first is what I do. The second is what I’d like to do.

49. Favorite fictional world?

A Galaxy Far, Far away. (Then Middle Earth).

50. Do you share your rough drafts or do you wait until everything is all polished?

depends on the fic. I like to show things to @brydylcai, but only in the fandom’s she’s in. I have been known to invite friends into docs as I’m writing, so...

51. Are you a secretive writer or do you talk with your friends about your books?

I’m more open than I used to be about fanfic. I’m less talkative about my original works.

52. Who do you write for?

She knows who.

53. What is the first line of your WIP?

Of this chapter: “Brig was already aboard the boat when Gimli and Legolas arrived, attending the rigging for the simple sail and making ready to depart.”

54. Favorite first line/opening you’ve written?

my book begins with a ghost hunt. that’s fun?

55. How do you manage your time/make time for writing? (do you set aside time to write every day or do you only write when you have a lot of free time?)

I try to set aside time while not working, but i also tend to write in whatever little moments I have. Between classes, standing in line, etc.

#brydylcai #ask meme

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