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#might write those too eventually
alasblogpoetry · 1 year
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Coolth.
Earth a lifeless cement - Dirt frozen over, Trees bare and dead.
Wind a motionless freeze - Air is as if claws Cling onto our skin.
Sun a heartless deceit - A disk blank and white, An absence of heat.
Fire - its faint orange tongues barely touching our skin.
Layers of sweaters - heavy but transparent to coolth.
Submerged, by woods, by deathly coolth of morning, by thirst for warmth.
Together a freezing love - Forget the fire and layers, We hug.
Warmth.
(to MK, AK, DB, and Art)
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sciderman · 2 months
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I would say you’re more of a Mr peanut butter type yeah
doggy doggy what now?
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thaliagrayce · 2 months
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Errand Boy, Assistant, Ambassador
Link: ao3 Pairing: Jason Grace/Nico di Angelo Fandom: Percy Jackson & the Olympians Tags: Pre-Relationship, Role Reversal, Ambassador of Pluto!Jason Grace, Champion of Hera!Nico di Angelo
Word Count: 7,835
Summary:
“Woah!” The other boy righted him and patted his shoulder. “Careful, you might…” The end of his sentence trailed off into nothing as he caught sight of the glower Nico was sending his way. He looked way too normal to be in a place like this. He had blond hair that looked like it was supposed to be short, but had been forgotten about for a while. His eyes were so blue they were almost electric, and they were getting wider and wider as he stared. Nico almost looked behind him to see if there was anything more interesting than a scrawny and hopelessly lost half-blood, but didn’t have time to get too confused. “Nico di Angelo,” the boy whispered.
(or; the first few meetings of Nico di Angelo, Champion of Hera, and Jason Grace, Ambassador of Hades.)
Hey y'all! I know I usually put the content of the fic itself here, but this one is a little long for tumblr, so it's just the link to ao3. Happy Jasico Bingo month! I hope you like it :3c
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starbuck · 3 months
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“bro, SHOULD we?”
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rainofthetwilight · 6 months
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alright so ive decided the first three chapters of as the years pass by are getting rewritten!!
updates with each will be slow, but ill try to somehow release them all at once to not confuse things since there are some things i need to add, plus i realized how i wasnt actually focusing on jenna and ethan properly so yeah a rewrite here we come lmao
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vampyrsm · 1 year
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polkadotpatterson · 1 year
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Sappy end-of-year-and-start-of-new-one post incoming! tl;dr life is so good now and I wish you all the same amount of happiness I feel <3
2022 was, no contest, the best year of my life, and it came after what was in many ways the worst year of my life. I never really let it show here, but I was barely a functional person in 2021. My physical and mental health were at their absolute lowest, and looking back I’m astonished I was able to get as many fics out as I did. Blaseball did so much to pull me through that year, from talking with the friends I made to pouring my emotions into writing to listening to garages songs that deeply resonated with me, and I’m grateful for all of it.
Things started turning around at the end of the year, and I went into 2022 cautiously optimistic. I started getting diagnoses and treatments, and went from miserable medical mystery to… functional person! I left an online community that was causing me too much stress, gained self-confidence and the brain energy for more introspection, figured out I’m aroace, and just in general feel like I understand myself a lot better now. Apparently it’s legal and normal to be this happy, and this is how people are supposed to feel! Who would have thought? Still sounds fake sometimes, but I’m sure not complaining. 
Ironically, with more energy I got less writing done, but I’m okay with that. I’ve gone from “gotta get words out everyone has to see my words” to just vibing. I still love writing and it’s still what I want to do forever, but I’m less concerned about doing it as an Actual Job someday, because there’s a lot more to look forward to in my life.
Plus, I still wrote some pretty cool stuff! Me and the blesties did a super awesome zine together and I’m so proud of us, so go check out The Salt if you haven’t already!
And I got cats! Kiki and Jasper are my sweet beloved children and they’ve been such wonderful additions to the family. The house felt so empty without cats, and having these two around has done so much to help heal my heart. I love them dearly, even though I worry about them; they had a rough start to life and they might never be fully free from health problems, but even just a little time with them has been a blessing.
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2022 has been my year of feeling just so incredibly happy and loved, and it was already the best year of my life even before the latest development! Because now I also have a partner, and our relationship has been even more wonderful than I could have ever imagined. Blaseball has given me a wonderful qpp in @mossy-kit​ and a wonderful blest friend in @kosmosxipo​ and a wonderful group of other talented writers who are also very cool people, and a wonderful group of Moist people to hang out in our brand new server with and get to know better and play games with! (If I’ve ever interacted with you, you are probably included in this list. Hi blesties.) I just. Man. I am so unbelievably grateful.
I hope everyone’s 2023, and every year afterwards, is as good as my 2022, because we all deserve it. If this was a rough year for you, know that the next one can always be better. It was for me! I spent so long believing things wouldn’t get better, and life proved me wrong. To quote my favourite blaseball song on this beautiful Sun 2 Sunday: Start to believe in getting by. 
And then, start to believe in so much more! Life can be so, so wonderful. May the new year be kind to us all <3
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todayisafridaynight · 9 months
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ORHGH YOU'RE SO RIGHT THE SEGA CARNIVAL LEVELS OF SONIC RIDERS HIT SO HARD they're so fun and cool and colorful and I love them 😭 anyway I remember idling in Yakuza 5 and looking at my phone for a bit while standing in a bar as Saejima and my head SNAPPED up when I heard Dreams Of An Absolution play in the bar because I was like SILVER THE HEDGEHOG'S THEME FROM SONIC 06??? (I was a Sonic kid growing up fjdjdk)
SONIC KIDS UNITE OH MY GODDDDD SIMILAR REACTION THO !!!!! I FORGET WHEN I REALIZED IT EXACTLY BUT I WALKED INTO THE STORE AS KIRYU AND THE SECOND I HEARD DREAMS OF AN ABSOLUTION I SCREAMED AND JUST STOOD LISTENING TO IT WITH A STUPID GRIN ON MY FACE (i also stood around Way Too Long Than What Was Appropriate when playing YK1 cause i just kept looking at the sonic displays in the sega arcade....) like oh my god......... THAT song that everyone memed on for a good half decade in MY yakuza game ??? i love you..
BUT YAYAYAYA I LOOOVVE THE CARNIVAL LEVELS SO MUCH THE MUSIC IS SO FUN TOO when i was growing up For Some Reason i had an allergy to just. Maintaining Save Files (im lying its cause we had like three memory cards and i wanted to keep makin animal crossing towns but you need A Whole Memory Card for one town) because i kept deleting my saves over and over HOWEVER the benefit to this is that i'd always be excited to do the grand prix and unlock the carnival levels
GENUINELY SO WORTH IT theyre so fun and cute and have SO MUCH LOVE for the other sega ips !!!!!!!
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[@sunsrefuge] Re: your tags about Onyx & Aurene; it sounds like their relationship develops very slowly but interestingly!! reading your tags on Onyx’s conflicted feelings about her being a dragon but also so innocent was a super good read!! <3
would you maybe wanna share more on how their relationship develops over the course of the story?? 👉👈 Are there any moments you’ve written in for them to bond extra??
AH TYYYYY!!! i love thinking about onyx and aurene i love them sm
ok so ngl, i kinda. just came up with that stuff? like, as i was typing on that post lol. but anyway, i do have more thoughts to ramble about!!!
so first off i think onyx’s caution comes from her having seen the worst of the dragons so far. so many people died to mordremoth and zhaitan, and so she’s determined to destroy every last one, both as revenge and bc she’s lost people close to her, with trahearne being INCREDIBLY recent. (onyx was in love with him and i haven’t decided if they got together before he died) she doesn’t want anyone else to go through what she has.
so she has a lot of reservations and is currently going thru a lot, but also aurene is just a baby! she’s so little and curious and sweet, and onyx doesn’t really know what to think at first. like i think she was surprised when aurene hatched that she was so… little. so fragile. so innocent. mordremoth’s magic caused her to hatch, but how can something that’s so small be just like the monsters she’s faced?
she isnt like mean to her tho. she treats her like, cordially at first, bc she knows that having aurene on their side is good practically and strategically, but then she gets Attached. having the telepathic connection helped a lot too! i think onyx could feel aurene’s general emotions a lot, like when she was having fun or how much she cared about onyx
i think onyx stopped by to see aurene more than in canon? like i’m pretty sure you only go to do the tests and stuff in game, but i think onyx liked to go and just. be there with aurene. like holding her in her lap as aurene slept and stuff. she probably said that she wanted to keep a close eye on her just in case, but i think she used a lot of this time to process trahearne tbh.. she’d sit there petting aurene, and just thinking. (probably also crying tbh)
it didn’t take very long for onyx to think of herself and aurene as mother and daughter. like i think she realized that she felt that way before pof. but i don’t think that onyx has like. verbalized that to aurene? like i think aurene kinda knows cuz of the whole mental link thing, but i think onyx doesn’t want to overstep. like, glint is aurenes mom! absolutely! but. she didn’t get to raise her, onyx did. but at the same time, she doesn’t want aurene to like. forget glint? (kinda a side note, but now i’m just thinking about caithe telling aurene about glint and agh my heart ;-;)
still, onyx feels like aurene and her are family, no matter what. now, i haven’t actually finished eod yet (i am on the last bit i know i should just finish it but also i changed onyx’s hair to look accurate while i finally play lws1 and i don’t want to use my statuettes on more hair kits :/ ) but! i’ve seen some of aurene and soo-won’s dialogue after the dragons end meta! and i think aurene feels lonely? cuz she’s the last elder dragon, the last of her kind. onyx’s heart breaks when she feels that from aurene. because she can imagine how painful that must be! (and also feel it from aurene…) but at the same time, i think onyx is going to want to sit down with aurene for a bit, maybe hold her head in her lap as best she can, and tell her that she will never be alone as long as onyx can help it. onyx and caithe are her moms and they love her! and onyx really wants aurene to know that!!! she may be big and sparkly and powerful now, but she’s still onyx’s baby, her daughter, and onyx will do whatever she can to be there for her.
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made-nondescript · 2 years
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crazy idea....what if emerald duo ask blog reboot but text based this time
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cats-inthe-cradle · 2 years
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To those who sent requests don't worry I am planning on doing them...eventually.
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iknityounot · 5 months
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(Long post, sorry y'all)
A little more than two years ago now, my grandmother passed away. She and my grandpa had moved down to my home town a few years before so we could take care of them. I brought them groceries once a week, helped them write checks, fixed tvs, and found lost things. I was really close with my grandma.
In addition to her hilarious personality and dry wit, one of my favorite things about her was that she was a painter and a crafter like me! She used to crochet, and I took her to the craft store a couple of times so she could get more yarn and books on crochet. But her arthritis and the shaking in her hands kept getting worse, so she eventually had to stop.
She kept her most recent project, a granny square blanket, safely packed away in a plastic bin. She told all of us she was going to finish it one day.
Her hands never got better, and when she got sick, and we found out it was cancer, she rapidly deteriorated.
After she passed, I went to work helping my mom clean out my grandparents apartment so we could move my grandpa in with her. In our frantic cleaning, I found that bin again:
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DOZENS of granny squares, dozens of half used skeins. I asked my mom what she wanted me to do with it, and she said she didn't care. I set it aside and later took it home.
Maybe a month later, that tumblr post about the Loose Ends Project was going around. It felt like a sign--I was never going to learn to crochet in order to finish my grandmother's blanket. But they might be able to help!
So I filled out the interest form. They got back to me SUPER quick. And maybe 2 weeks later, I was paired with volunteer in my state (only 2 hours away!) and the box of yarn, granny squares, and my grandmother's crochet hook were in the mail. That was at the end of January this year.
Over the next couple of months, my "finisher" emailed me regular updates on her progress, and asked me questions on my preferences for how she constructed the final blanket.
At the end of August, the blanket was done!
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I had always intended the blanket to be a gift for my mother. So I cleaned it up, put it in the only bag I had big enough to fit it, and drove to my mom's. I gave the blanket to her and she was gobsmacked. I explained to her all about Loose Ends, and how someone volunteered to finish the piece for us. She was speechless. (I was quite pleased with this, because I am not the best at giving gifts, so this was a pretty exciting reaction!)
She said that it was the most thoughtful gift she had ever been given. She said "your grandma would love this". To which I replied, "yeah, I know she really wanted to finish it a couple of years ago". But that was when my mom dropped the bomb of a century on me--she told me that my grandma had started making those granny squares OVER 30 YEARS AGO. She had started the blanket when my grandpa was staying in the hospital, but that was back when my mom was younger than I am now! My grandma had packed them all away, planning on finishing it, when my grandpa was sent home from the hospital. Then it went from house to house, from condo in Chicago to their apartment in my hometown. All that time and my grandma had wanted to finish it, but couldn't. First because she was busy, then because she forgot how to do it, then because of her arthritis, and then because of the cancer. My mom said she had given up on expecting my grandma to finish it. 
She said I brought a piece of her childhood with her mom out of the past.
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And really, all of this is to say, if you have seen or heard about the Loose Ends Project and have an uncompleted project or piece from a loved one who has passed away--these are your people. They were so kind and treated my project with such care. That box probably would have been found by my own grandkids one day if I hadn't heard about Loose Ends.
Five stars, absolutely worth it!
(From what I understand, you can sign up to volunteer too! If you have time to share, it might be worth checking out!)
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derinwrites · 4 days
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The Three Commandments
The thing about writing is this: you gotta start in medias res, to hook your readers with action immediately. But readers aren’t invested in people they know nothing about, so start with a framing scene that instead describes the characters and the stakes. But those scenes are boring, so cut straight to the action, after opening with a clever quip, but open in the style of the story, and try not to be too clever in the opener, it looks tacky. One shouldn’t use too many dialogue tags, it’s distracting; but you can use ‘said’ a lot, because ‘said’ is invisible, but don’t use ‘said’ too much because it’s boring and uninformative – make sure to vary your dialogue tags to be as descriptive as possible, except don’t do that because it’s distracting, and instead rely mostly on ‘said’ and only use others when you need them. But don’t use ‘said’ too often; you should avoid dialogue tags as much as you possibly can and indicate speakers through describing their reactions. But don’t do that, it’s distracting.
Having a viewpoint character describe themselves is amateurish, so avoid that. But also be sure to describe your viewpoint character so that the reader can picture them. And include a lot of introspection, so we can see their mindset, but don’t include too much introspection, because it’s boring and takes away from the action and really bogs down the story, but also remember to include plenty of introspection so your character doesn’t feel like a robot. And adverbs are great action descriptors; you should have a lot of them, but don’t use a lot of adverbs; they’re amateurish and bog down the story. And
The reason new writers are bombarded with so much outright contradictory writing advice is that these tips are conditional. It depends on your style, your genre, your audience, your level of skill, and what problems in your writing you’re trying to fix. Which is why, when I’m writing, I tend to focus on what I call my Three Commandments of Writing. These are the overall rules; before accepting any writing advice, I check whether it reinforces one of these rules or not. If not, I ditch it.
1: Thou Shalt Have Something To Say
What’s your book about?
I don’t mean, describe to me the plot. I mean, why should anybody read this? What’s its thesis? What’s its reason for existence, from the reader’s perspective? People write stories for all kinds of reasons, but things like ‘I just wanted to get it out of my head’ are meaningless from a reader perspective. The greatest piece of writing advice I ever received was you putting words on a page does not obligate anybody to read them. So why are the words there? What point are you trying to make?
The purpose of your story can vary wildly. Usually, you’ll be exploring some kind of thesis, especially if you write genre fiction. Curse Words, for example, is an exploration of self-perpetuating power structures and how aiming for short-term stability and safety can cause long-term problems, as well as the responsibilities of an agitator when seeking to do the necessary work of dismantling those power structures. Most of the things in Curse Words eventually fold back into exploring this question. Alternately, you might just have a really cool idea for a society or alien species or something and want to show it off (note: it can be VERY VERY HARD to carry a story on a ‘cool original concept’ by itself. You think your sky society where they fly above the clouds and have no rainfall and have to harvest water from the clouds below is a cool enough idea to carry a story: You’re almost certainly wrong. These cool concept stories work best when they are either very short, or working in conjunction with exploring a theme). You might be writing a mystery series where each story is a standalone mystery and the point is to present a puzzle and solve a fun mystery each book. Maybe you’re just here to make the reader laugh, and will throw in anything you can find that’ll act as framing for better jokes. In some genres, readers know exactly what they want and have gotten it a hundred times before and want that story again but with different character names – maybe you’re writing one of those. (These stories are popular in romance, pulp fantasy, some action genres, and rather a lot of types of fanfiction).
Whatever the main point of your story is, you should know it by the time you finish the first draft, because you simply cannot write the second draft if you don’t know what the point of the story is. (If you write web serials and are publishing the first draft, you’ll need to figure it out a lot faster.)
Once you know what the point of your story is, you can assess all writing decisions through this lens – does this help or hurt the point of my story?
2: Thou Shalt Respect Thy Reader’s Investment
Readers invest a lot in a story. Sometimes it’s money, if they bought your book, but even if your story is free, they invest time, attention, and emotional investment. The vast majority of your job is making that investment worth it. There are two factors to this – lowering the investment, and increasing the payoff. If you can lower your audience’s suspension of disbelief through consistent characterisation, realistic (for your genre – this may deviate from real realism) worldbuilding, and appropriately foreshadowing and forewarning any unexpected rules of your world. You can lower the amount of effort or attention your audience need to put into getting into your story by writing in a clear manner, using an entertaining tone, and relying on cultural touchpoints they understand already instead of pushing them in the deep end into a completely unfamiliar situation. The lower their initial investment, the easier it is to make the payoff worth it.
Two important notes here: one, not all audiences view investment in the same way. Your average reader views time as a major investment, but readers of long fiction (epic fantasies, web serials, et cetera) often view length as part of the payoff. Brandon Sanderson fans don’t grab his latest book and think “Uuuugh, why does it have to be so looong!” Similarly, some people like being thrown in the deep end and having to put a lot of work into figuring out what the fuck is going on with no onboarding. This is one of science fiction’s main tactics for forcibly immersing you in a future world. So the valuation of what counts as too much investment varies drastically between readers.
Two, it’s not always the best idea to minimise the necessary investment at all costs. Generally, engagement with art asks something of us, and that’s part of the appeal. Minimum-effort books do have their appeal and their place, in the same way that idle games or repetitive sitcoms have their appeal and their place, but the memorable stories, the ones that have staying power and provide real value, are the ones that ask something of the reader. If they’re not investing anything, they have no incentive to engage, and you’re just filling in time. This commandment does not exist to tell you to try to ask nothing of your audience – you should be asking something of your audience. It exists to tell you to respect that investment. Know what you’re asking of your audience, and make sure that the ask is less than the payoff.
The other way to respect the investment is of course to focus on a great payoff. Make those characters socially fascinating, make that sacrifice emotionally rending, make the answer to that mystery intellectually fulfilling. If you can make the investment worth it, they’ll enjoy your story. And if you consistently make their investment worth it, you build trust, and they’ll be willing to invest more next time, which means you can ask more of them and give them an even better payoff. Audience trust is a very precious currency and this is how you build it – be worth their time.
But how do you know what your audience does and doesn’t consider an onerous investment? And how do you know what kinds of payoff they’ll find rewarding? Easy – they self-sort. Part of your job is telling your audience what to expect from you as soon as you can, so that if it’s not for them, they’ll leave, and if it is, they’ll invest and appreciate the return. (“Oh but I want as many people reading my story as possible!” No, you don’t. If you want that, you can write paint-by-numbers common denominator mass appeal fic. What you want is the audience who will enjoy your story; everyone else is a waste of time, and is in fact, detrimental to your success, because if they don’t like your story then they’re likely to be bad marketing. You want these people to bounce off and leave before you disappoint them. Don’t try to trick them into staying around.) Your audience should know, very early on, what kind of an experience they’re in for, what the tone will be, the genre and character(s) they’re going to follow, that sort of thing. The first couple of chapters of Time to Orbit: Unknown, for example, are a micro-example of the sorts of mysteries that Aspen will be dealing with for most of the book, as well as a sample of their character voice, the way they approach problems, and enough of their background, world and behaviour for the reader to decide if this sort of story is for them. We also start the story with some mildly graphic medical stuff, enough physics for the reader to determine the ‘hardness’ of the scifi, and about the level of physical risk that Aspen will be putting themselves at for most of the book. This is all important information for a reader to have.
If you are mindful of the investment your readers are making, mindful of the value of the payoff, and honest with them about both from the start so that they can decide whether the story is for them, you can respect their investment and make sure they have a good time.
3: Thou Shalt Not Make Thy World Less Interesting
This one’s really about payoff, but it’s important enough to be its own commandment. It relates primarily to twists, reveals, worldbuilding, and killing off storylines or characters. One mistake that I see new writers make all the time is that they tank the engagement of their story by introducing a cool fun twist that seems so awesome in the moment and then… is a major letdown, because the implications make the world less interesting.
“It was all a dream” twists often fall into this trap. Contrary to popular opinion, I think these twists can be done extremely well. I’ve seen them done extremely well. The vast majority of the time, they’re very bad. They’re bad because they take an interesting world and make it boring. The same is true of poorly thought out, shocking character deaths – when you kill a character, you kill their potential, and if they’re a character worth killing in a high impact way then this is always a huge sacrifice on your part. Is it worth it? Will it make the story more interesting? Similarly, if your bad guy is going to get up and gloat ‘Aha, your quest was all planned by me, I was working in the shadows to get you to acquire the Mystery Object since I could not! You have fallen into my trap! Now give me the Mystery Object!’, is this a more interesting story than if the protagonist’s journey had actually been their own unmanipulated adventure? It makes your bad guy look clever and can be a cool twist, but does it mean that all those times your protagonist escaped the bad guy’s men by the skin of his teeth, he was being allowed to escape? Are they retroactively less interesting now?
Whether these twists work or not will depend on how you’ve constructed the rest of your story. Do they make your world more or less interesting?
If you have the audience’s trust, it’s permissible to make your world temporarily less interesting. You can kill off the cool guy with the awesome plan, or make it so that the Chosen One wasn’t actually the Chosen One, or even have the main character wake up and find out it was all a dream, and let the reader marinate in disappointment for a little while before you pick it up again and turn things around so that actually, that twist does lead to a more interesting story! But you have to pick it up again. Don’t leave them with the version that’s less interesting than the story you tanked for the twist. The general slop of interest must trend upward, and your sacrifices need to all lead into the more interesting world. Otherwise, your readers will be disappointed, and their experience will be tainted.
Whenever I’m looking at a new piece of writing advice, I view it through these three rules. Is this plot still delivering on the book’s purpose, or have I gone off the rails somewhere and just stared writing random stuff? Does making this character ‘more relateable’ help or hinder that goal? Does this argument with the protagonists’ mother tell the reader anything or lead to any useful payoff; is it respectful of their time? Will starting in medias res give the audience an accurate view of the story and help them decide whether to invest? Does this big twist that challenges all the assumptions we’ve made so far imply a world that is more or less interesting than the world previously implied?
Hopefully these can help you, too.
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renthony · 10 days
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In Defense of Shitty Queer Art
Queer art has a long history of being censored and sidelined. In 1895, Oscar Wilde’s novel The Picture of Dorian Gray was used as evidence in the author’s sodomy trials. From the 1930s to the 1960s, the American Hays Code prohibited depictions of queerness in film, defining it as “sex perversion.” In 2020, the book Steven Universe: End of an Era by Chris McDonnell confirmed that Rebecca Sugar’s insistence on including a sapphic wedding in the show is what triggered its cancellation by Cartoon Network. According to the American Library Association, of the top ten most challenged books in 2023, seven were targeted for their queer content. Across time, place, and medium, queer art has been ruthlessly targeted by censors and protesters, and at times it seems there might be no end in sight.
So why, then, are queer spaces so viciously critical of queer art?
Name any piece of moderately-well-known queer media, and you can find immense, vitriolic discourse surrounding it. Audiences debate whether queer media is good representation, bad representation, or whether it’s otherwise too problematic to engage with. Artists are picked apart under a microscope to make sure their morals are pure enough and their identities queer enough. Every minor fault—real or perceived—is compiled in discourse dossiers and spread around online. Lines are drawn, and callout posts are made against those who get too close to “problematic art.”
Modern examples abound, such as the TV show Steven Universe, the video game Dream Daddy, or the webcomic Boyfriends, but it’s far from a new phenomenon. In his book Hi Honey, I’m Homo!, queer pop culture analyst Matt Baume writes about an example from the 1970s, where the ABC sitcom titled Soap was protested by homophobes and queer audiences alike—before a single episode of the show ever aired. Audiences didn’t wait to actually watch the show before passing judgment and writing protest letters.
After so many years starved for positive representation, it’s understandable for queer audiences to crave depictions where we’re treated well. It’s exhausting to only ever see the same tired gay tropes and subtext, and queer audiences deserve more. Yet the way to more, better, varied representation is not to insist on perfection. The pursuit of perfection is poison in art, and it’s no different when that art happens to be queer.
When the pool of queer art is so limited, it feels horrible when a piece of queer art doesn’t live up to expectations. Even if the representation is technically good, it’s disappointing to get excited for a queer story only for that story to underwhelm and frustrate you.
But the world needs that disappointing art. It needs mediocre art. It even needs the bad art. The world needs to reach a point where queer artists can fearlessly make a mess, because if queer artists can only strive for perfection, the less art they can make. They may eventually produce a masterpiece, but a single masterpiece is still a drop in the bucket compared to the oceans of censorship. The only way to drown out bigotry and offensive stereotypes created by bigots is to allow queer artists the ability to experiment, learn through making mistakes, and represent their queer truth even if it clashes with someone else’s.
If queer artists aren’t allowed to make garbage, we can never make those masterpieces everyone craves. If queer artists are terrified at all times that their art will be targeted both by bigots and their own queer communities, queer art cannot thrive.
Let queer artists make shitty art. Let allies to queer people try their hand at representation, even if they miss the mark. Let queer art be messy, and let the artists screw up without fear of overblown retribution.
It’s the only way we’ll ever get more queer art.
_
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cheriladycl01 · 2 months
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Would you be up for writing a fanfic with Lando or Max x reader where reader also races but due to the training and harsh training her team and trainer are putting her through develops an ED (common among competitive sports and I’ve got experience 😭) maybe Reader faints or her bf finds out? No problem if not 😘 love your writing!
Those inward struggles - Max Verstappen x Driver! Reader
Plot: After having to change you diet and do more work after struggling in Singapore you spend a year on strict training away from your boyfriends knowledge. What happens when a year on and people are noticing how much more exhausted your looking after each race.
Warnings: Eating Disorder, Reader Being Sick
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Singapore and Qatar 2022 was extremely hard for you. Your body temperature in the car didn't regulate that well and you lost way more weight than any other driver.
You new that the 2023 season was going to be even harder with where the races were placed in the year.
Your physician wanted you to keep the weight off. The lower your body mass, the less you'd struggle with the heat. That was their thought process and that's what they deemed best for you as a woman. So of course, you trusted the team's decisions and you started to train more, and eating in a calorie deficit.
They'd come up with a plan for you to loose a safe amount in a safe amount of time, however it almost felt like a competition and you wanted to be as ready as possible.
At first it was hard, you craved sugar and grease the most but eventually once the majority was out of your system the vegetables and fruits started to taste like when you have a sip of that half stagnant water at 3am when your body decided to lower your thirst bar all the way down.
Max as a driver had also seen how much more you were with your personal trainer, and how it didn't just stop when you got home as you would often be in your home gym.
You'd serve yourself less and meals than him and he noticed these little things. Of course he did, he'd been obsessed with you since he was a 13 year old and both of you met in karting.
You started dating a year before he got into F1 quite literally being the definition of childhood romance. But this did mean that he knew you like the back of his hand.
"Baby, how about a sweet treat?" he asks holding up your fav type of cookie waving it in front of your face.
"I really shouldn't, I think the team wouldn't be happy if they found out I was eating more than i should!" you explain to him, continuing to wash the dishes from earlier that night.
"But... you didn't have much for dinner and you skipped lunch!" he asks remembering what you'd eaten throughout the day.
"Oh? So your keeping tabs on me now?" you ask looking him over with a soft yet teasing frown.
"Well, when your with me for a good portion of the day I notice" he grumbles making you turn your head to him at that tone, it wasn't one he used often.
"Huh?" you say leaving the dishes fully in the sink before placing a hand on your hip.
"Look, It's not just me noticing it but your not healthy right now!" Max offers and you turn back round to do the washing up.
Your trainer said you might feel a little tired and icky while you were on such a strict diet but once you'd got to your goal weight you'd feel better.
"Please just eat the cookie!" he smiles and you roll your eyes. You take the cookie and finish it off under his watchful eye. It tasted so good, but you almost gagged at how heavy the chocolate felt at the back of your throat and how you could feel the chunkiness of the chewed batter.
There wasn't that fresh aftertaste you been getting recently from the various fruits and veges you'd been relying on to get you eating something.
You gagged at something that used to be a delicacy too you, something that would excite you. However you finished it off to please Max. Once he was satisfied you had your filling he explained he was going out to a set with Lando, Daniel and Charles.
You'd already said you wanted to stay home today.
The minute he was out the door you were in the bathroom getting the sugary sweet treat out of your body, feeling disgusting from having had it.
The guilt was eating away at you the minute you had it, you knew just how unhappy the trainer would be. You spent the rest of the evening in the gym, weighing yourself before and after the session.
To your dismay there was no improvement and you sat in the gym crying over you predicament.
It was time for the 2023 Qatar Grand Prix, you were already struggling just walking round the paddock in the areas that didn't have aircon. When you'd done your track walk, you could feel the damp sweat on areas of your body you didn't know was possible.
However, you pushed and pushed yourself through the whole weekend, you drunk lots of water and made sure to keep up with the exercising and kept eating to a minimum.
When you'd got in the car for the first practice your hard work seemed to pay of, coming P4. Again in qualifying you'd had a fastest lap in Q2 and split the Mercedes up Q3 coming P3 behind Max and George. Both of these weren't too bad, it was in short bursts that didn't make you too hot.
However as the weekend moved forward, it was obvious to your team, to Max and to the media that you were becoming more and more exhausted. A lot of people noted that your tailored race suit was starting to bag in places it shouldn't and that you had sunken areas on your face, making you look all the more exhausted.
The Sprint shootout was awful, you placing 9th fastest overall, which compared to your earlier racing was no good for you or your team.
You only managed to move up one place to P8 in the Sprint, meaning you were in the points but you were taken to the medical tent after reporting feeling dizzy and your sight spotting.
Max had headed over to the Aston Martin garage asking for you, all the mechanics just saying you were still with medical. He rushed over, quicker than his car on a flying lap as no-body actually knew what was wrong with you.
"Y/N?" you'd heard as he'd come storming in looking around for you.
"I'm in here!" you said and he came over taking your hand in his.
"What's going on, what's wrong?" he asks looking over you.
"Nothing, just had a bit of a migraine. Apparently not enough water!" you lie, knowing the doctors were still doing tests but they said you were free to leave.
You'd left, he'd comforted you at the hotel making sure you had everything you could possibly need before you both slept away the tire of the day.
Sunday of course was a shit show. Medical still hadn't fully worked out what was wrong with you and they were debating pulling you from the race. You'd refused saying you were fine to race.
You were 20 laps in when your vision started to blur until ringing in your head occurred.
You tried to keep up with the fluids from your drinks tube but they were just heating up along with everything else in the car.
"Y/N are you okay. Medical have just deemed you should be racing. We want to retire you" your engineer comes through at lap 50.
"7 more laps, I'll be fine" you groan. You'd managed to stick to P4 for the majority of the race. But now that vision in your left eye was pretty poor you were taking turns a little more hesitantly meaning you were down in P6.
You defended from Ocon like your life depended on it, and finally pulled up to the area where the cars sit when the race it over. You sit in the car, in silence trying to get your vision back and stop shaking.
You body ran cold, you were shivering now and could feel the cold sweat in your suit, you wanted to reach up and take your helmet off more than anything but your arms didn't obey.
So you just sat there, until some Aston Martin mechanics came through with water. They helped you out and up handing you a bottle of water. But with the ringing not having stopped your vision completely went as you fell back onto the hard ground of the track.
Max once he'd found out his team and your team and pretty much everyone had kept you fainting from him a secret he had yelled, a lot, at anyone and everyone he could.
Even Lando and Oscar in the cool down room had to be at the receiving end of his wrath.
After his podium that he had tried to make as quick as possible he was right with you. Yelling at everyone while making sure you were getting the correct medical attention.
When he found out the reason behind you fainting and the fact that you drove the last few laps half sighted he was back to MAD MAX, and oh boy it wasn't a pretty sight.
He couldn't believe your team who were supposed to make sure you were in the best health had actually been hindering you and not helping you.
To say the he and Rupert his own personal trainer would be taking over from now on and he'd be hiring a private nutritionist to get you back on track to your starting F1 weight in 2022.
He loved you and would do anything for you.
Taglist:
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charliemwrites · 3 months
Text
A Thought™️ that I had yesterday after watching those AITA videos and babbling in the discord:
(This is also babble to be clear. I’ve been writing this throughout the morning so it might be a bit incoherent)
The 141 is shopping for a new team member, someone to round out their four person squad into five. They have a dozen candidates, pick one that looks promising, and transfer him over under the military equivalent of “probationary” status.
Pretty quickly they decide his personality alone might not make him a good fit but whatever, if he’s good at his job, they’ll suck it up. The “alpha male” posturing bullshit is kind of amusing in the meantime at least.
Well, first mission comes and goes. The guy isn’t too bad, honestly — apart from almost picking a fight with Gaz. Skills-wise he’s as advertised, so he gets to stay a bit longer while the 141 decides if they can stand him.
Post successful mission, though, they go out for drinks at the guy’s insistence. He invites his girlfriend — who he dragged along with him — to the bar to meet his new squad. (Because he thinks there’s no way they’re not making him a permanent teammate.)
And the 141 may be barely tolerant of him, but they decide almost instantly that they adore his girlfriend. She’s incredibly charming and bubbly, doesn’t even blink at Ghost’s mask. One of the first things she does is thank them for the opportunity they’re giving her boyfriend and for keeping him alive.
Which is about the time the real issue starts.
The boyfriend says some rubbish about “an alpha doesn’t need protecting, he does the protecting. He looks out for his pack.”
And you smile a bit awkwardly, looking embarrassed, and try to usher the conversation along.
It doesn’t take long for him to quickly fall out of what little favor he accrued. You’re a bright spot in their group, laughing and chatting with them all like you’ve known them for years. Incredibly sensitive to asking any hard questions and sort of forcing the conversation through the weird patches where your boyfriend interjects with some inane comment.
Eventually, your boyfriend gets sick of your chattering and tells you to fetch them more drinks. Soap instantly sits up, saying you don’t have to do that, but you gently wave him off. Chirp that you don’t mind doing it as a thank you for their service, and weave into the crowd.
The table goes uncomfortable quiet — apart from your boyfriend, who makes some ghastly comment about how you have a pretty face but an annoying laugh. When you get back, drinks expertly balanced in your hands, Ghost goes out of his way to drop puns that get you giggling like mad.
As the night ticks later, and your boyfriend gets drunker, he reaches the point you always dread.
“Garrick, le’s arm wrestle.”
“Baby, I don’t think that’s…”
“This is between us men.”
You groan a bit and sit back. Gaz looks befuddled but shrugs and agrees. It’s not even a contest; your boyfriend’s arm is flat to the table in all of ten seconds. Flustered, your boyfriend demands a rematch. And when he loses again, scoffs and demands a go with Soap.
You practically sink deeper and deeper into your seat before the secondhand embarrassment starts to weigh and you have to excuse yourself to the restroom. When you get back, the impromptu arm wrestling seems to be over, though your boyfriend is sulking in his corner of the booth.
When you gingerly slide back in, Price nudges you with his calf.
“Would you like a go, luv?”
You grin and shake your head. “I don’t fancy a broken wrist, Captain.”
“C’mon luv, you might surprise yourself,” he teases and you can’t resist the playful glint in his eye.
So you lock your thumb around his, elbow on the table, and push. And his arm incrementally goes down… down… down…
“Well would you look at that,” he muses.
You burst into laughter, flattered and endeared by his indulgence.
“That tough, eh?” Soap muses, arching an eyebrow. “Let’s see it, then.”
So you roll your eyes, fully expecting to get trounced. But just like with Price, he starts to relent when you put up resistance, making a show of straining and panting as he “loses.” When you’ve won, you finally play into the joke.
“Serves you right,” you tease.
By your side, you hear your boyfriend huff derisively. “Oh, come on.”
Before your fun can be ruined, though, Ghost is offering you his hand, dark eyes sparkling. You bite your lip, but it doesn’t hide your grin as you accept the unspoken challenge. His hand is huge around yours, but shockingly gentle. He goes down easiest of all, whistling in amazement.
“Look’it that, you’re a pro,” he says, “think we should all be buying you a drink.”
“She doesn’t drink,” your boyfriend interjects.
You huff and settle back into the booth. “Maybe some other time, Lieutenant Riley?”
“Count on it.”
You get into an argument with your boyfriend that night. He thinks you were “challenging his dominance” and “stirring the pot,” trying to sew discord and strife amongst the men to get them fighting over you. He says something about being the alpha of the group and that he would win but it’s insulting to him as your “provider” that you would question his authority.
He’s tipsy as he says it though, working himself up. You just follow the usual routine of soothing, reassuring, simpering — and then considering leaving when he’s finally asleep. But you’re far from home, don’t have the means to leave, and besides, you won’t be finding any support from your family on this front so…
Well, it’s not so bad, you remind yourself. He can be an asshole, but so can you and it takes two to fight. Besides, he only gets really bad when he’s been drinking and that’s only once a week? 1 out of 7 isn’t a bad ratio.
The 141 pretty much collectively decide that they adore you though. You get regularly invited to team outings, wherein your boyfriend keeps challenging (and losing) arm wrestling, while the boys coax you into “winning.”
They’ve also become rather adamant that you don’t bring them drinks anymore.
“You’re not our personal beer wench, yeah? We’re able to get our own pints,” Gaz soothes.
Your boyfriend chuckles and shakes his head, imparts his “wisdom” that it’s a female’s job to serve her man and his friends. As a sign of respect or something. You know it’s not an argument worth having and just sip at your drink in silence.
But you love going out with them. Love knowing the men keeping your boyfriend alive and they’re a good bunch. Respectful and funny and disciplined — you’re kind of hoping they snap your boyfriend out of this weird “alpha male” phase he’s been going through. On the other hand, you’re thrilled to be making something like friends. Sure, your boyfriend has made it clear that the 141 are his friends, but they’re always so conscious of keeping you involved and comfortable.
Then one night your boyfriend mentions what a “good little cook” you are and that instantly has all the boys perking up. Smiling, you offer to host during the Saturday League matches. They gleefully accept over your boyfriend’s protests about other men in his territory or something like that.
But when they do come over they’re horrified by the unspoken expectations. You tell them to sit, that you’ll bring them all drinks, with snacks on the way. They’ll be having none of it.
Ghost helps you with drinks, Gaz chops the veggies for snacks (and dinner). Soap pops in to keep you company while you babysit simmering pots. Price helps to tidy as you go, despite you’re fussing that he really doesn’t need to, he should be enjoying the games!
They end up spending more time with you in the kitchen than out in the den with their own teammate. You barely notice, swept up in the busy currents of playing hostess. When your boyfriend shouts that he needs another beer, you come back to find Price getting plates and utensils for dinner. It’s so thoughtful you could cry.
Even worse is when they help you clean up afterwards. Each of them taking and clearing their own plates. Soap on washing big dishes, Gaz on drying. Ghost is packing up leftovers. Price is turning over the dishwasher, asking you where dishes go and tutting when you insist you should be helping.
All the while, your boyfriend stands in the doorway telling you all the ways you could improve the meal next time. And how you definitely ate too much for your body size, etc.
He only stops when Price makes a pointed comment about standing around looking pretty.
When they leave, they each sweep you up in a hug and drop a kiss on your cheek, praising your home and cooking and hosting. Soap promises that he’ll get you a little souvenir on their next mission as a thank you.
And sure enough, three weeks later, the boys are coming by. Except your boyfriend is nowhere to be found — out with some other guys from the base that he says he hit it off with. The 141 insist that he agreed to a football watch again, the empty headed muppet.
And of course you’re not going to turn them away! They’ve brought you flowers, a little matryoshka set from their last mission, chocolates and wine. Not one of them is empty handed.
“Do you even like the game?” Gaz asks as you put it on.
“My favorite team isn’t playing until tomorrow but I don’t mind watching,” you answer, shrugging.
But somehow no football is watched at all. Instead they convince you to tell them your top three favorite movies, then claim none of them have ever seen any of them and they have to watch all of them.
Which is how your boyfriend finds his whole team enjoying a little movie marathon with you. You’re on the ground with Johnny (it’s Johnny now, for you) doing his eyebrows. Gaz is braiding your hair. Ghost (Simon) is sharing a bowl of candies with you. You’re sat against Price’s shins, the captain sitting in your boyfriend’s chair, lounging like a king.
When you welcome him back, telling him the boys are staying the night, he tries to throw a fit about it. How dare you let four strange men stay alone with you?! You calmly remind him that he promised he’d be home by 11 and it’s already nearly 1. And besides, he trusts them with his life, you’re allowed to trust them to be polite in your own home.
With all four of his teammates watching, tense and nearly hostile, he mutters something about being tired and storms off to bed. You end up falling asleep on the couch with ghost despite yourself.
And your boyfriend becomes absolutely haunted by his team’s (is it even his team? It feels more like yours!) affection for you.
They always invite you out even if he doesn’t plan to invite you. (When did you get any of their numbers?! Never mind Ghost’s. He doesn’t even have Ghost’s number.)
They stop by the flat constantly, sometimes dropping in. Other times staying for hours. Soap tells him that they’re all one big family; that includes you. (“Alright then why don’t we go hang out with one of your girlfriends?!” He had an actual nightmare about the laughter that gets him.)
And the fucking gifts. It’s not just soap bringing you things anymore. It’s all of them. Magnets, mugs, sweets, pretty rocks. Just garbage to your boyfriend but you treat it all like treasure. They’ve even got you sending them on hunts for specific things. Something blue, something with nuts, something with the flag.
Then there’s the base.
They bring you on one day — Price picks you up, the boys greet you at the barracks with coffee and breakfast. You’re put into a big 141 hoodie that says “Riley” on the back and toured around. You’re supposed to be “surprising” your boyfriend, but he’s busy with recruits and generally seems uninterested in being around you.
Not to worry though, the 141 is happy to show you a good time around base! Gaz and Johnny walk you through one of the obstacle courses, Simon lets you sit on his back for pushups during the last of his workout. Price takes you to the range and shows you the basics of shooting, then lets you catnap through the adrenaline drop in his office.
Your boyfriend only bothers to find you when Johnny and Simon are teaching you basic self-defense. Your boyfriend scoffs that you’re plenty protected by him, but you point out that he’s away too often to be of any real help — at which point Johnny tags you and bolts before your boyfriend can get all up in arms.
You only recognize that this little hurdle in your relationship has become a chasm when something happens. A big argument with your parents over the phone — you barely even remember what about. But instead of calling your boyfriend afterwards, your first call is to Gaz. (Because you know he’s the most likely to be free and paying attention to his phone.) You’re almost shocked when he picks up on the second ring. Your boyfriend has never answered on the first call.
When you try to explain through poorly-restrained tears, he coos at you to find a warm coffee shop and that they’ll be right there. “They” ends up being him and Johnny, since Simon and Price are locked up in an important meeting. They buy you hot chocolate and pastries while you vent to them, and end up leaving feeling better for once.
But you can’t break up with your boyfriend. Because if you do, the 141 will surely stop hanging out with you, and you value their company enough to put up with it.
At least until you come home one day to find all your little gifts gone. When you ask through a tight throat where everything is, your boyfriend says he was just making space. That you’ve been complaining that you two need a bigger flat, but now he’s solved the problem without wasting money.
You actually raise your voice for once, throwing an entire fit because this. This is the last straw. You storm into your bedroom, slam and lock the door, and call the 141.
A small part of you expects they’ll take his side or something. But nope. Simon soothes you on the other end, that the whole squad will be there in fifteen and to pack your stuff.
You do so while Price takes over and keeps you level. Reminds you of essentials to pack and explains that you’ll be coming to stay at his place, since he’s got off-base housing. It’ll be quiet and cozy and safe while you recover.
Five minutes away, they promise to be right there and end the call.
You could absolutely scream when your boyfriend — ex boyfriend — starts banging on the door. Demanding that you open the door to him. That you’re being over dramatic and blowing everything out of proportion. Using the “your emotional and irrational” line that you’ve heard a thousand times and are just about sick of.
Your heart stutters with relief when you hear the knocking at the apartment door, confused silence as your ex goes to see who it is. You take that moment to slip out, packed suitcase in hand.
You startle a bit at some commotion, round the corner to see your ex’s shirt bunched up in Johnny’s fists, looking ready kill him. No one seems inclined to pull him away; neither are you.
“How are you holding up, luv?” Gaz asks gently as Simon takes your bag.
“Been better,” you admit, sniffling as Price wraps you up in a hug.
“It was just things, luv,” he soothes, “we’ll get you a million more, if you like.”
You pull back to give him a miserable look. “But they were my things and they didn’t have to go anywhere. He just threw them out.”
Johnny snarls something out, but Gaz is already ushering you out the door. You tell your family about the break up through text and then shut off your phone, bundled into the backseat of an SUV with Gaz in the backseat. Price is in the front, all of you waiting for Simon and Johnny to come down.
“What now?” you ask quietly.
“Well, about time we cut that knob loose,” Price muses. “But that’s not your problem anymore.”
“Oh…
“And you, luv.” He looks at you through the rear view. “You get whatever you want.”
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