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shireness-says · 4 years

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Birthday fic recs: @welllpthisishappening

It was @welllpthisishappening‘s birthday yesterday! Laura is consistently one of my favorite authors, and a dear friend to boot. So, for her birthday, I’d like to recommend some of her deep-cut, hidden gem fics - favorites of mine I think everyone should be reading all the time. Go read them and check out her seriously impressive fic page. The organization is downright inspiring.

Thank you for your friendship and your fics and your willingness to listen to me have a conniption about not-your-hockey-team, darling - I hope the next year gives you all the joy that you deserve!

Start Spreading the News

Emma Swan is just looking for something that’s hers. She’s fairly certain she’s found it in New York, with a group of friends and a good job and picture frames on her apartment walls. But then the past she’s spent so long trying to ignore shows up where she least expects to find it – wearing pinstripes in right field at Yankee Stadium.

More Famous Than A Yankee Can

He knows it’s not a dream. He’s had this dream before. Finding her again and talking to her again and wearing pinstripes. They usually aren’t all the same dream. So this has to be real. But the last place Killian Jones ever expected to see Emma Swan was while he was wearing those pinstripes. With her standing on the bleachers in Yankee Stadium.

I’ve read these fics three times this year. Maybe four. I love it every time - there’s romantic type miracles and pining and fate and I can’t resist it. It’s everything you need to cheer yourself up in these weird stressful times. Every time I read one these, I immediately have to go tell Laura that it’s So Good because I just can’t resist. That good.

What Used to Be Limes

Killian Jones is ready for his rookie season in the NHL. He's got a hell of a shot. An almost acceptable amount of confidence. And a roommate he doesn't want to check. Plus, his best friend. Who he's hopelessly in love with.

A Rooting Interest

Emma's only doing Ruby a favor. And playing bartender is kind of funy — especially when the guy in front of her keeps smiling and looking up how to make drinks. She doesn't want to make a fool of herself. That seems inevitable, though. Once he leaves the tip. Two tickets to a hockey game. And the good-looking guy from the bar turns out to be the star of the New York Rangers.

Look, obviously Laura has proved she’s the master of hockey fics with her Blue Line stuff. But! These are a great pair of hockey fics not from that ‘verse. Disaster rookies! Emma who doesn’t know a thing about hockey! Flirting galore! If you haven’t read these already - you need to get on that right away. And then join me in my quest to remind Laura that if she ever has hockey feelings that don’t fit into Blue Line, she could totally add on to these ‘verses and no one would complain. Or at least I wouldn’t.

Feeling As Good As Love

Emma is excited about this weekend. It's always good — this thing they do, with the house and the ocean and the friendship that seems to stand the test of time. But now, there's an added bonus. Because this year she and Killian aren't just coming to the house on the beach with that friendship moniker hanging over them. They're coming as a couple. A real couple. That kisses. Regularly. And Emma's excited about that too. She just didn't expect her friends not to believe her.

I am, admittedly, biased, because I all but demanded that Laura write this. But that’s only because it’s so up her alley, as demonstrated by the masterpiece that ensued. The banter! The cliches list! Emma’s righteous (and warranted) anger! It’s everything the prompt demanded and more than I could have imagined. Perfect.

In Case of Emergency, Call...

Killian Jones does several things on Thanksgiving: breaks his ankle, meets a very loud redhead in the ER, tells his best friend he loves her. None of them were part of his plan. The plan only involved cookies.

This is a little bit of an odd one - because Emma’s not even there for half the fic. But her presence and her absence and her impact is just so palpable. That pining, man! I live for that pining. The best kind of friends-to-lovers, with plenty of Killian and Ariel banter and a little dose of fake married because why not. What else could you ask for?

Gone the Way of the Dinosaurs

Emma doesn't entirely understand the town of Storybrooke. It is, apparently, the kind of place with story time at the library and spring festivals on Friday night and unfairly attractive people with blue eyes who know all the words to the dinosaur song her kid is also inexplicably singing. She doesn't understand the town of Storybrooke yet, but maybe Emma is willing to do a little research.

I love librarian!Killian. I love tiny!Henry. Put them together? I’m a sucker for it. It reads so believably, both for Emma and for Storybrooke. And I think Laura might have been channeling her own shoe collection, which I find so charming. And you can learn about dinosaurs! And what names they have! Read it in the name of paleontology.

Wrap Around Your Dreams

Emma Swan is not a very good witch. She’s emotional and prone to immediate reactions and neither one of those things are currently helping her when the body count in Storybrooke is on the rise. And there’s far too much blood at each crime scene and far too much magic and Emma has no idea where to look next. So she does the almost human thing; she starts making a list. Of clues and ideas and the absolute desperate hope that the killer isn’t what she’s certain it absolutely has to be. The last thing she expects is for the notebook to start writing back.

This is a perfect Halloween-type fic. I love epistolary fics and pen pal fics, but I’ve never seen anything like this before or since. The idea of them reaching out across all kinds of magical barriers because fate just gets me, man. Plus, the suspense is absolutely palpable. And the ending! Perfect. Another of my regular rereads.

All Was Golden In The Sky

Magic is dying. Emma knows it. She can feel it, the emptiness rattling around in her, like it’s trying to make sure she disappears as well. What she doesn’t know is what to do about it, because, suddenly, there is a man in Storybrooke claiming she’s the Savior and a seeress certain a prophecy promises the same and the last thing she expects is for her minimal amount of lingering power to pull her away. To New York City. And another oddly familiar man with blue eyes and a smile that sinks under her skin and makes magic bloom in the air around her. Things are about to get interesting.

I was just enthralled the whole time this was posting. There were so many twists and turns, but everything still weaves together absolutely perfectly. Plus, canon has been adapted so well in this. I don’t even know how to start describing this fic - but trust me, you’ve got to read it.

Out Of The Frying Pan

Emma Swan is only doing this for one reason, well, make that two. To get her show's numbers back up and, maybe, impress her son. She doesn't like admitting to that second one though. Killian Jones is doing this for absolutely, positively, just one reason. To expand his restaurant. And maybe get Regina off his back. So that's kind of two reasons. Neither one of them is doing a year-long Food Network all-star competition because they're celebrity chefs and there's not really any other choice. Of course not. And neither one of them is enjoying it because they maybe, kind of, sort of enjoy each other. That would be insane.

Ok, this one may not be that overlooked as much as it’s my FAVORITE THING ON THE PLANET. This is a perfect fic. Every time she posts another sequel one-/two-shot, my heart sings. It’s so good. The way Laura paints this competition, and lets everything grow over the course of weeks and month, is perfect - plus, there’s all the romance and Captain Cobra feels you could ever want. If you haven’t read this yet - Get On It Today.

Check out her fics on Tumblr and Ao3, and make sure to give her and them lots of love!

#happy birthday babe friend #welllpthisishappening #cs fic recs

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twilightphasepodcast · 4 years

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If you like Twilight...

Twilight stans! We're always looking for our next read, and we're sure you are too. We've compiled a list of alternatives to the Twilight Saga in an effort to find some new unproblematic faves. This list includes both recent/upcoming werewolf and vampire novels, as well as ownvoices stories from indigenous creators (both genre and contemporary); most are YA, but not all. We haven't read all of them, so this is just a starting point for your TBR. Please report back on how they are! As a reminder, please support your local library or independent bookstore, or check out Bookshop.org. And, this isn't at all a definitive list, so feel welcome to add on!

In truly no order:

The Beautiful

by Renée Ahdieh

Published Oct 8, 2019

New York Times bestselling author Renée Ahdieh returns with a sumptuous, sultry and romantic new series set in 19th century New Orleans where vampires hide in plain sight.

The Marrow Thieves

by Cherie Dimaline

Published Aug 1, 2019

Humanity has nearly destroyed its world through global warming, but now an even greater evil lurks. The indigenous people of North America are being hunted and harvested for their bone marrow, which carries the key to recovering something the rest of the population has lost: the ability to dream.

Vampires Never Get Old: Tales with Fresh Bite

Anthology ed. by Zoraida Córdova and Natalie C. Parker

Publishing Sept 22, 2020

Eleven fresh vampire stories by YA authors both bestselling and acclaimed, including Samira Ahmed, Dhonielle Clayton, Zoraida Córdova and Natalie C. Parker, Tessa Gratton, Heidi Heilig, Julie Murphy, Mark Oshiro, Rebecca Roanhorse, Laura Ruby, Victoria “V. E.” Schwab, and Kayla Whaley.

Lobizona

by Romina Garber

Publishing Aug 4, 2020

An undocumented immigrant discovers a world straight out of Argentine folklore, where the seventh consecutive daughter is born a bruja and the seventh consecutive son is a lobizón, a werewolf.

Apple: Skin to the Core

by Eric Gansworth

Publishing Oct 6, 2020

The term "Apple" is a slur in Native communities across the US. It's for someone supposedly "red on the outside, white on the inside." Eric tells his story and shatters that slur, reclaiming it in heartbreaking verse and prose and imagery.

Fledgling

by Octavia Butler

for adults; published Sept 8, 2005

Seminal, foundational, visionary Black genre author Octavia Butler’s last novel. This is the story of an apparently young, amnesiac girl whose alarmingly un-human needs and abilities lead her to a startling conclusion: she is in fact a genetically modified, 53-year-old vampire.

The Fell of Dark

by Caleb Roehrig

Publishing July 14, 2020

Auggie Pfeiffer is a gay 16-year-old who lives in a decaying Chicago suburb with a vampire problem. When strange things start happening to Auggie, he harbors the hope that he’s been mystically chosen to slay vampires...but things aren’t all what they seem.

Tantalize

by Cynthia Leitich Smith

Published February 13, 2007

"Looking for something to read that will make your TV jealous? TANTALIZE has it all — hot vampires and wolf-boys, a super-cool heroine in cowboy boots, nail-biting suspense, romance, chills ’n’ thrills, and Austin, Texas. What more could you want?" — Libba Bray, author of A GREAT AND TERRIBLE BEAUTY and REBEL ANGELS

Hearts Unbroken

by Cynthia Leitich Smith

Published Oct 9, 2018

Winner of an American Indian Youth Literature Award New York Times best-selling author Cynthia Leitich Smith turns to realistic fiction with the thoughtful story of a Native teen navigating the complicated, confusing waters of high school — and first love.

#twilight #twilight saga #ya lit #YA literature #book list #book rec #book rec list #indigenous #native american #young adult #reading list #twilight phase talks

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mariacallous · 3 years

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Randy Nuñez and Sasha Nuñez-Carvalho were 4,000 miles apart on their wedding day. The couple, both of whom are in the Navy, had postponed their wedding twice before enlisting the help of Chris and April Coen, the owners of a wedding planning company in Montana that specializes in double proxy marriages. On Oct. 20, while Ms. Nuñez-Carvalho was deployed in Europe and Mr. Nuñez was quarantined with the coronavirus in San Diego, the Coens stood in their place and signed their marriage license from Montana.

Finally, a wedding featured in the NYT that doesn’t give me an aneurysm

And though this year has had its fair share of disappointments and disasters, many have learned to appreciate the small moments of joy that surfaced during quarantine. We asked readers to name one good thing that happened this year. One woman shared: “After 47 years of marriage, I learned to appreciate my husband.” Here is a selection of other silver linings from 2020.

Huh.

MORE MODERN LOVE

On this week’s Modern Love podcast, Paula McLain shares how her life has changed since publishing her essay “The Holiday of My Dreams Was Just That” in 2007.

Modern Love Podcast: ‘Desire Is Never the Mistake’

This holiday season, it’s OK to want more.

Tiny Love Stories: ‘Tears Start Before My Feet Stop’

Modern Love in miniature, featuring reader-submitted stories of no more than 100 words.

LOVE AND MARRIAGE

“We’ve fallen in love with each other all over again.”

A Power Couple Finds the Spark Once Again

Vows

Laura Stachel and Hal Aronson, who created the Solar Suitcase, had a Jewish wedding ceremony in 2000, but they never had a legal one. Twenty years later, it finally seemed time to be married.

By Alix Wall

Another Effect of Covid: Thousands of Double Proxy Weddings

Randy Nuñez and Sasha Nuñez-Carvalho were 4,000 miles apart on the day they were married. The couple, both of whom are in the Navy, were married when two strangers in Montana stood in for them.

By Jesse Klein

It Took Them a Couple Years to Become a Pair

MINI-VOWS

Kelly Connor and Noah Wunsch’s first meeting involved denim and discouragement. They had better luck down the line.

By Gabe Cohn

At the U.S. Women’s Open, a Love Story

They met playing against each other in rec league hockey. Now Alena Sharp and her caddie, Sarah Bowman, are honeymooning on the golf course.

By Karen Crouse

Okay, these ones aren’t too bad either, except for the one about the denim and discouragement because “Ms. Connor, 32, now the global director of brand relations for the fashion brand Thom Browne, and Mr. Wunsch, 31, a former senior vice president at the auction house Sotheby’s and now the founder of Ruby Hibiscus Water, a beverage start-up company in New York, were married Nov. 30 in an outdoor ceremony at Wind and Sea, a private estate in Big Sur, Calif. The wedding was officiated by Pippa Bianco, a friend of the couple who became a Universal Life minister for the event. Ms. Connor is taking the groom’s name.” makes me think it wasn’t just a small intimate get-together and they kinda give off Jarvanka vibes.

ASK THE EXPERTS

Your in-laws aren’t exactly your best friends, but that doesn’t mean you can’t get along.

It’s In-Law Season. Here’s How to Get Along.

In-laws are often thrust into life’s most intimate moments without much agreement on how things should be handled. It can make these relationships … complicated.

By Mara Altman

I Said They Didn’t Have to Come to My Wedding. But I’m Still Hurt.

Social Q’s

How to deal with declined invitations and delayed R.S.V.P.s in the time of Covid-19.

By Philip Galanes

How to Handle Bad Co-Workers of the Anti-Mask and Boyfriend Varieties

It isn’t all about you. Or your officemate (even if you are living with him).

By Roxane Gay

LOVE IN THE NEWS

And, remembering the matchmaker who helped thousands of dogs find their forever home.

She Saved Thousands of Best Friends. Then Covid-19 Killed Her.

Valerie Louie rescued dogs and matched them with families, including ours. These beloved pets helped countless people bear up during the pandemic, making her death a particular Covid-19 cruelty.

By Matt Richtel

‘I Learned to Appreciate My Husband,’ and Other Silver Linings From 2020

We asked readers to name one good thing that happened in an otherwise dismal year. Here is a selection from the more than 1,500 responses.

Show Us a Positive Moment From 2020

We want to see the good moments you captured in photos and video during this challenging year, and hear what they mean to you now.

By Hannah Wise

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quietya · 5 years

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31 Days of #quietYA with Julia Lynn Rubin

LIKE MANDARIN by Kirsten Hubbard. Set in the badlands of Washokey, Wyoming, the story follows 14-year-old Grace Carpenter, who struggles to find herself against the backdrop of her tiny town and cloying, beauty pageant-obsessed mother. Grace would do anything to be like 17-year-old Mandarin, the cool, seemingly effortless girl at school who plays by her own rules. But as the girls grow closer, Grace realizes there are darker elements to Mandarin's story. Her interests in Mandarin border on romantic, and there's so much amazing sapphic subtext that I'm still not entirely sure was completely intentional. The writing is also drop-dead gorgeous and hooked me from the first line.

CATALYST by Laurie Halse Anderson. While still known and beloved by her fans, this is probably one of Laurie's "quieter" releases, and arguably her best work following SPEAK (though her sophomore novel PROM remains a classic in its own right. I mean, hello, the main character worked as a knock-off Chuck-E-Cheese character!). I've read this one so many times and each time, I go through that same melancholic, disturbing, fascinating journey that only Laurie Halse Anderson can take me on. So evocative and voice-driven and painfully real. It breaks my heart every time in the best possible way, and is a great example of how to include subtle twists without ever cluing the reader in that there will be one coming.

CLEAN by Amy Reed. Hilarious, poignant, and a masterclass in writing YA in multiple-POVs, this book helped get me me into YA as a whole and introduced me to a world of "grittier" fiction for teens that never felt condescending or Lifetime movie-esque.

JUMPED by Rita-Garcia Williams. Rita is a brilliant and hilarious author, and not only tackles multiple-POV oh so well, but a fast-paced, urgent, thrilling plot that all takes place over the course of one fateful school day that culminates in a teen girl getting jumped by her classmates.

THE RULES OF SURVIVAL by Nancy Werlin. It makes me sad that Nancy isn't on more people's radars! This book deals with parental abuse and a teen boy's struggle to protect himself and his siblings, and is never overindulgent or soapy. The writing style is clean and efficient, making for a quick read that will stay with you long after you've finished.

LITTLE CHICAGO by Adam Rapp. This is, quite possibly, one of the most disturbing books I've ever read, but it also might be one of the best. Glittering with magical realism and a surreal style to help us cope with the horrors within, I'd include a very strong *Trigger Warning* for sexual assault, sexual abuse, and neglect. It sort of blurs the line between YA and MG, and is haunting and visceral.

TELL ME SOMETHING REAL by Calla Devlin. Featuring gorgeous, literary prose and a family-rich, family-centered story set in the '70s that left me breathless, this award-winning novel is an absolutely underrated gem. I won't say too much as it's best to go in cold.

THE SACRED LIES OF MINNOW BLY - This YA thriller about a girl who's escaped from the clutches of a cult and lacks both hands to show for it (literally, she had them removed in the most grisly, disturbing way) was one of my favorite releases of 2015. It was so good, in fact, I bought a copy for my friend.

WHAT GIRLS ARE MADE OF by Elana K. Arnold. Even though this was a National Book Award Finalist, it pains me how few people seem to know about it, and how few bookstores even seem to stock it! I read this in just a couple of days and wow, just wow. Definitely a feminist read.

REALITY BOY by A.S. King. If you share my dark, cynical sense of humor and obsession with reality TV and psychology, you'll no doubt enjoy this one about a teen boy haunted by his childhood reality TV infamy. A.S. King is an absolutely phenomenal character writer and has one of the strongest voices I've read.

WHITE LINES by Jennifer Banash. Set in 1980s New York City, this gripping tale follows seventeen-year-old club kid Caitlin, living alone in Manhattan and working in nightlife to escape and forget the severe physical and mental abuse and abandonment from both her mother and father. Caitlin is a fantastic character and the setting is so rich and atmospheric.

BONE GAP by Laura Ruby. This book needs to be read widely. It quite honestly defies genre and is nothing short of fantastic. Julia Lynn Rubin lives the writer's life in Brooklyn, where she received an MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults at The New School. She currently serves as a writing mentor for Girls Write Now, New York City's premiere writing program for high school girls. Her debut YA LGBT+, BURRO HILLS, pitched as THE OUTSIDERS meets PERKS OF BEING A WALLFLOWER, was released March 2018 from Diversion Books.

#julia lynn rubin #burro hills #book list #31 days of quietya #guest post #ya books #quietya

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doyouhearhepeoplesing · 6 years

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rules: answer 30 questions and tag 20 blogs you would like to get to know better.

I was tagged by @swansorceress

1. nicknames: loz or lozzie 2. gender: female 3. star sign: Libra 4. height: 5′6 5. time: 07:05pm 6. birthday: 19/10 7. favourite bands: this is really difficult emmm The Fray,Paramore and Lifehouse 8. favourite solo artists:I have too many but I guess Halsey,Lana Del Rey,Demi Lovato,James Arthur,Sam Smith,Jessie J just to name a few 9. song stuck in my head: New Rules-Dua Lupia 10. last movie i watched: Thor Ragnarok 11. last show I watched: The Punisher 12. when did i create my blog: 2011 13. what do i post: a very wide variety of things,honestly my blog is a mess but its mostly tv/movies and things I find funny or I agree with and lately a lot of stranger things related things 14. last thing i googled: sound systems for wedding (for a family member) how boring 15. do i have any other blogs: not that I use 16. do i get asks: on occasion 17. why i chose my url: I love les mis and I love the song 18. following: 2452 19. followers: 2925 20. average hours of sleep: lately 6 21. lucky number: 17 22. instruments: none 23. what I’m wearing: tracksuit bottoms and a graphic t 24. dream job: a stage manager for either theatre or tv or even a video editor as long as I am happy in my job I am good 25. dream trip: maybe another european country or new york 26. favourite food: mint choc chip ice cream 27. nationality: British 28: favourite song right now: Pretty Girl-Maggie Lindemann but Samantha Harvey’s cover (its beautiful) 29. last book I read: Bone Gap-Laura Ruby 30. top three fictional universe: marvel cinematic universe,Middle-earth and ermmm Wizarding World

I tag whoever wants to do this and @olicitylover15 ,@usnavisbubbly , @bigmoutheyebrows ,@luns-lovegood , @hogwartsconsultingtimelady, @theyounggods

#tagged #answered

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report47 · 4 years

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Grammy Nomations 2020 (see complete list)

The 2020 Grammy Awards nomination list has been released and its a big win for Nigeria because Burna Boy's boy 'African Giant' album made the list. Lizzo led the pack with eight nods, while Billie Eillish and Lil Nas X took the second spot with six nominations each for the 62nd Grammy Awards which will be held on January 26 at Staples Center in Los Angeles, California. Burna Boy was nominated in the World Music album category alongside African music legend Angelique Kidjo. See the complete list below; Record Of The Year “Hey, Ma” — Bon Iver “Bad Guy” — Billie Eilish “7 Rings” — Ariana Grande “Hard Place” — H.E.R. “Talk” — Khalid “Old Town Road” — Lil Nas X Featuring Billy Ray Cyrus “Truth Hurts” — Lizzo “Sunflower” — Post Malone & Swae Lee Album Of The Year “I, I” — Bon Iver “Norman F—ing Rockwell!” — Lana Del Rey “When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?” — Billie Eilish “Thank U, Next” — Ariana Grande “I Used To Know Her” — H.E.R. “7” — Lil Nas X “Cuz I Love You” (Deluxe) — Lizzo “Father of the Bride” — Vampire Weekend Song Of The Year “Always Remember Us This Way” — Natalie Hemby, Lady Gaga, Hillary Lindsey & Lori McKenna, songwriters (Lady Gaga) “Bad Guy” — Billie Eilish O’Connell & Finneas O’Connell, songwriters (Billie Eilish) “Bring My Flowers Now” — Brandi Carlile, Phil Hanseroth, Tim Hanseroth & Tanya Tucker, songwriters (Tanya Tucker) “Hard Place” — Ruby Amanfu, Sam Ashworth, D. Arcelious Harris. H.E.R. & Rodney Jerkins, songwriters (H.E.R.) “Lover” — Taylor Swift, songwriter (Taylor Swift) “Norman F—ing Rockwell” — Jack Antonoff & Lana Del Rey, songwriters (Lana Del Rey) “Someone You Loved” — Tom Barnes, Lewis Capaldi, Pere Kelleher, Benjamin Kohn & Sam Roman, songwriters (Lewis Capaldi) “Truth Hurts” — Steven Cheung, Eric Frederic, Melissa Jefferson & Jesse Saint John, songwriters (Lizzo) Best New Artist Black Pumas Billie Eilish Lil Nas X Lizzo Maggie Rogers Rosalía Tank and the Bangas Yola POP FIELD Best Pop Solo Performance: “Spirit” — Beyoncé “Bad Guy” — Billie Eilish “7 Rings” — Ariana Grande “Truth Hurts” — Lizzo “You Need To Calm Down” — Taylor Swift Best Pop Duo/Group Performance: “Boyfriend” — Ariana Grande & Social House “Sucker” — Jonas Brothers “Old Town Road” — Lil Nas X & Billy Ray Cyrus “Señorita” — Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album: Sì — Andrea Bocelli Love (Deluxe Edition) — Michael Bublé Look Now — Elvis Costello & The Imposters A Legendary Christmas — John Legend Walls — Barbra Streisand Best Pop Vocal Album: The Lion King: The Gift — Beyoncé When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go — Billie Eilish Thank U, Next — Ariana Grande No. 6 Collaborations Project — Ed Sheeran Lover — Taylor Swift DANCE/ELECTRONIC FIELD Best Dance Recording: “Linked” — Bonobo “Got To Keep On” — The Chemical Brothers “Piece Of Your Heart” — Meduza & Goodboys “Underwater” — Rüfüs Du Sol “Midnight Hour” — Skrillex & Boys Noize With Ty Dolla $ign Best Dance/Electronic Album: LP5 — Apparat No Geography — The Chemical Brothers Hi This Is Flume (Mixtape) — Flume Solace — Rüfüs Du Sol Weather — Tycho CONTEMPORARY INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC Best Contemporary Instrumental Album: Ancestral Recall — Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah Star People Nation — Theo Croker Beat Music! Beat Music! Beat Music! — Mark Guiliana Elevate — Lettuce Mettavolution — Rodrigo y Gabriela ROCK Best Rock Performance: “Pretty Waste” — Bones UK “This Land” — Gary Clark Jr. “History Repeats” — Brittany Howard “Woman” — Karen O & Danger Mouse “Too Bad” — Rival Sons Best Metal Performance: “Astorolus – The Great Octopus” — Candlemass ft. Tony Iommi “Humanicide” — Death Angel “Bow Down” — I Prevail “Unleashed” — Killswitch Engage “7empest” — Tool Best Rock Song: “Fear Inoculum” — Danny Carey, Justin Chancellor, Adam Jones & Maynard James Keenan, Songwriters (Tool) “Give Yourself A Try” — George Daniel, Adam Hann, Matthew Healy & Ross Macdonald, Songwriters (The 1975) “Harmony Hall” — Ezra Koenig, Songwriter (Vampire Weekend) “History Repeats” — Brittany Howard, Songwriter (Brittany Howard) “This Land” — Gary Clark Jr., Songwriter (Gary Clark Jr.) Best Rock Album: Amo — Bring Me The Horizon Social Cues — Cage The Elephant In The End — The Cranberries Trauma — I Prevail Feral Roots — Rival Sons ALTERNATIVE Best Alternative Music Album: U.F.O.F. — Big Theif Assume Form — James Blake i,i — Bon Iver Father of the Bride — Vampire Weekend Anima — Thom Yorke R&B Best R&B Performance: “Love Again” — Daniel Caesar & Brandy “Could’ve Been” — H.E.R. & Bryson Tiller “Exactly How I Feel” — Lizzo & Gucci Mane “Roll Some Mo” — Lucky Daye “Come Home” — Anderson .Paak & André 300 Best Traditional R&B Performance: “Time Today” — BJ The Chicago Kid “Steady Love” — India.Arie “Jerome” — Lizzo “Real Games” — Lucky Daye “Built For Love” — PJ Morton & Jazmine Sullivan Best R&B Song: “Could’ve Been” — Dernst Emile Ii, David “Swagg R’celious” Harris, H.E.R. & Hue “Soundzfire” Strother, Songwriters (H.E.R. Ft. Bryson Tiller) “Look At Me Now” — Emily King & Jeremy Most, Songwriters (Emily King) “No Guidance” — Chris Brown, Tyler James Bryant, Nija Charles, Aubrey Graham, Anderson Hernandez, Michee Patrick Lebrun, Joshua Lewis, Noah Shebib & Teddy Walton, Songwriters (Chris Brown Ft. Drake) “Roll Some Mo” — David Brown, Dernst Emile Ii & Peter Lee Johnson, Songwriters (Lucky Daye) “Say So” — Pj Morton, Songwriter (Pj Morton Ft. Jojo) Best Urban Contemporary Album: Apollo XXI — Steve Lacy Cuz I Love You (Deluxe) — Lizzo Overload — Georgia Anne Muldrow Saturn — Nao Being Human In Public — Jessie Reyez Best R&B Album: 1123 — BJ The Chicago Kid Painted — Lucky Daye Ella Mai — Ella Mai Paul — PJ Morton Venture — Anderson .Paak RAP Best Rap Performance: “Middle Child” — J.Cole “Suge” — DaBaby “Down Bad” — Dreamville ft. J.I.D, Bas, J. Cole, Earthgang & Young Nudy “Racks In The Middle” — Nipsey Hussle ft. Roddy Ricch & Hit-boy “Clout” — Offset ft. Cardi B Best Rap/Sung Performance: “Higher” — DJ Khaled ft. Nipsey Hussle & John Legend “Drip Too Hard” — Lil Baby & Funna “Panini” — Lil Nas X “Ballin” — Mustard ft. Roddy Ricch “The London” — Young Thug ft. J. Cole & Travis Scott Best Rap Song: “Bad Idea” — Chancelor Bennett, Cordae Dunston, Uforo Ebong & Daniel Hackett, songwriters (Ybn Cordae ft. Chance The Rapper) “Gold Roses” — Noel Cadastre, Aubrey Graham, Anderson Hernandez, Khristopher Riddick-tynes, William Leonard Roberts Ii, Joshua Quinton Scruggs, Leon Thomas Iii & Ozan Yildirim, songwriters (Rick Ross ft. Drake) “A Lot” — Jermaine Cole, Dacoury Natche, 21 Savage & Anthony White, songwriters (21 Savage ft. J. Cole) “Racks In The Middle” — Ermias Asghedom, Dustin James Corbett, Greg Allen Davis, Chauncey Hollis, Jr. & Rodrick Moore, songwriters (Nipsey Hussle ft. Roddy Ricch & Hit-boy) “Suge” — Dababy, Jetsonmade & Pooh Beatz, songwriters (Dababy) Best Rap Album: Revenge Of The Dreamers III — Dreamville Championships — Meek Mill i am > i was — 21 Savage IGOR — Tyler, The Creator The Lost Boy — YBN Cordae COUNTRY Best Country Solo Performance: “All Your’n” — Tyler Childers “Girl Goin’ Nowhere” — Ashley McBryde “Ride Me Back Home” — Willie Nelson “God’s Country” — Blake Shelton “Bring My Flowers Now” — Tanya Tucker Best Country Duo/Group Performance: “Brand New Man” — Brooks & Dunn with Luke Combs “I Don’t Remember Me (Before You)” — Brothers Osborne “Speechless” — Dan & Shay “The Daughters” — Little Big Town “Common” — Maren Morris ft. Brandi Carlile Best Country Song: “Bring My Flowers Now” — Brandi Carlile, Phil Hanseroth, Tim Hanseroth & Tanya Tucker, Songwriters (Tanya Tucker) “Girl Goin’ Nowhere” — Jeremy Bussey & Ashley Mcbryde, Songwriters (Ashley Mcbryde) “It All Comes Out In The Wash” — Miranda Lambert, Hillary Lindsey, Lori Mckenna & Liz Rose, Songwriters (Miranda Lambert) “Some Of It” — Eric Church, Clint Daniels, Jeff Hyde & Bobby Pinson, Songwriters (Eric Church) “Speechless” — Shay Mooney, Jordan Reynolds, Dan Smyers & Laura Veltz, Songwriters (Dan + Shay) Best Country Album: Desperate Man — Eric Church Stronger Than The Truth — Reba McEntire Interstate Gospel — Pistol Annies Center Point Road — Thomas Rhett While I’m Livin’ — Tanya Tucker NEW AGE Best New Age Album: Fairy Dreams — David Arkenstone Homage To Kindness — David Darling Wings — Peter Kater Verve — Sebastian Plano Deva — Deva Premal JAZZ Best Improvised Jazz Solo: “Elsewhere” — Melissa Aldana, soloist “Sozinho” — Randy Brecker, soloist “Tomorrow Is The Question” — Julian Lage, soloist “The Windup” — Brandford Marsalis, soloist “Sightseeing” — Christian McBride, soloist Best Jazz Vocal Album: Thirsty Ghost — Sara Gazarek Love & Liberation — Jazzmeia Horn Alone Together — Catherine Russell 12 Little Spells — Esperanza Spalding Screenplay — The Tierney Sutton Band Best Jazz Instrumental Album: In The Key Of The Universe — Joey DeFrancesco The Secret Between The Shadow And The Soul — Branford Marsalis Quartet Christian McBride’s New Jawn — Brad Mehldau Come What May – Joshua Redman Quartet Best Jazz Ensemble Album: Triple Helix — Anat Cohen Tentet Dancer In Nowhere — Miho Hazama Hiding Out — Mike Holober & The Gotham Jazz Orchestra The Omni-american Book Club — Brian Lynch Big Band One Day Wonder — Terraza Big Band Best Latin Jazz Album: Antidote — Chick Corea & The Spanish Heart Band Sorte!: Music By John Finbury — Thalma De Freitas With Vitor Gonçalves, John Patitucci, Chico Pinheiro, Rogerio Boccato & Duduka Da Fonseca Una Noche Con Rubén Blades — Jazz At Lincoln Center Orchestra With Wynton Marsalis & Rubén Blades Carib — David Sánchez Sonero: The Music Of Ismael Rivera — Miguel Zenón GOSPEL/CONTEMPORARY CHRISTIAN MUSIC Best Gospel Performance/Song: “Love Theory”– Kirk Franklin; Kirk Franklin, Songwriter “Talkin’ ‘Bout Jesus” — Gloria Gaynor ft. Yolanda Adams; Bryan Fowler, Gloria Gaynor & Chris Stevens, Songwriters “See The Light” — Travis Greene ft. Jekalyn Carr “Speak The Name” — Koryn Hawthorne ft. Natalie Grant “This Is A Move (Live)” — Tasha Cobbs Leonard; Tony Brown, Brandon Lake, Tasha Cobbs Leonard & Nate Moore, Songwriters Best Contemporary Christian Music Performance/Song: “Only Jesus” — Casting Crowns; Mark Hall, Bernie Herms & Matthew West, songwriters “God Only Knows” — for King & Country & Dolly Parton; Josh Kerr, Jordan Reynolds, Joel Smallbone, Luke Smallbone & Tedd Tjornhom, songwriters “Haven’t Seen It Yet” — Danny Gokey; Danny Gokey, Ethan Hulse & Colby Wedgeworth, songwriters “God’s Not Done With You (Single Version)” — Tauren Wells “Rescue Story” — Zach Williams; Ethan Hulse, Andrew Ripp, Jonathan Smith & Zach Williams, songwriters Best Gospel Album: Long Live Love — Kirk Franklin Goshen — Donald Lawrence Presents The Tri-City Singers Tunnel Vision — Gene Moore Settle Here — William Murphy Something’s Happening! A Christmas Album — CeCe Winans Best Contemporary Christian Music Album: I Know A Ghost — Crowder Burn The Ships — for King & Country Haven’t Seen It Yet — Danny Gokey The Elements — TobyMac Holy Roar — Chris Tomlin Best Roots Gospel Album: Deeper Roots: Where The Bluegrass Grows — Steven Curtis Chapman Testimony — Gloria Gaynor Deeper Oceans — Joseph Habedank His Name Is Jesus — Tim Menzies Gonna Sing, Gonna Shout (Various Artists) — Jerry Salley, producer LATIN Best Latin Pop Album: Vida — Luis Fonsi 11:11 — Maluma Montaner — Ricardo Montaner #ELDISCO — Alejandro Sanz Fantasía — Sebastian Yatra Best Latin Rock, Urban or Alternative Album: X 100PRE — Bad Bunny Oasis — J Balvin & Bad Bunny Indestructible — Flor De Toloache Almadura — iLe El Mal Querer – Rosalía Best Regional Mexican Music Album (Including Tejano): Caminando — Joss Favela Percepción — Intocable Poco A Poco — La Energia Norteña 20 Aniversario — Mariachi Divas De Cindy Shea De Ayer Para Siempre — Mariachi Los Camperos Best Tropical Latin Album: Opus — Marc Anthony Tiempo Al Tiempo — Luis Enrique + C4 Trio Candela — Vicente García Literal — Juan Luis Guerra 4.40 A Journey Through Cuban Music — Aymée Nuviola AMERICAN ROOTS MUSIC Best American Roots Performance: “Saint Honesty” — Sara Bareilles “Father Mountain” — Calexico With Iron & Wine “I’m On My Way” — Rhiannon Giddens With Francesco Turrisi “Call My Name” — I’m With Her “Faraway Look” — Yola Best American Roots Song: “Black Myself” — Amythyst Kiah, songwriter (Our Native Daughters) “Call My Name” — Sarah Jarosz, Aoife O’donovan & Sara Watkins, songwriters (I’m With Her) “Crossing To Jerusalem” — Rosanne Cash & John Leventhal, songwriters (Rosanne Cash) “Faraway Look” — Dan Auerbach, Yola Carter & Pat Mclaughlin, songwriters (Yola) “I Don’t Wanna Ride The Rails No More” — Vince Gill, songwriter (Vince Gill) Best Americana Album: Years To Burn — Calexico And Iron & Wine Who Are You Now — Madison Cunningham Oklahoma — Keb’ Mo’ Tales Of America — J.S. Ondara Walk Through Fire — Yola Best Bluegrass Album: Tall Fiddler — Michael Cleveland Live In Prague, Czech Republic — Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver Toil, Tears & Trouble — The Po’ Ramblin’ Boys Royal Traveller — Missy Raines If You Can’t Stand The Heat — Frank Solivan & Dirty Kitchen Best Traditional Blues Album: Kingfish — Christone “Kingfish” Ingram Tall, Dark & Handsome — Delbert McClinton & Self-made Men Sitting On Top Of The Blues — Bobby Rush Baby, Please Come Home — Jimmie Vaughan Spectacular Class — Jontavious Willis Best Contemporary Blues Album: This Land — Gary Clark Jr. Venom & Faith — Larkin Poe Brighter Days — Robert Randolph & The Family Band Somebody Save Me — Sugaray Rayford Keep On — Southern Avenue Best Folk Album: My Finest Work Yet — Andrew Bird Rearrange My Heart — Che Apalache Patty Griffin — Patty Griffin Evening Machines — Gregory Alan Isakov Front Porch — Joy Williams Best Regional Roots Music Album: Kalawai’anui — Amy H?naiali’i When It’s Cold – Cree Round Dance Songs — Northern Cree Good Time — Ranky Tanky Recorded Live At The 2019 New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival — Rebirth Brass Band Hawaiian Lullaby (Various Artists) — Imua Garza & Kimié Miner, Producers REGGAE Best Reggae Album: Rapture — Koffee As I Am — Julian Marley The Final Battle: Sly & Robbie Vs. Roots Radics — Sly & Robbie & Roots Radics Mass Manipulation — Steel Pulse More Work To Be Done — Third World WORLD MUSIC Best World Music Album: Gece — Altin Gün What Heat — Bokanté & Metropole Orkest Conducted By Jules Buckley African Giant — Burna Boy Fanm D’ayiti — Nathalie Joachim With Spektral Quartet Celia — Angelique Kidjo CHILDREN’S Best Children’s Music Album: Ageless Songs For The Child Archetype — Jon Samson Flying High! — Caspar Babypants I Love Rainy Days — Daniel Tashian The Love — Alphabet Rockers Winterland — The Okee Dokee Brothers SPOKEN WORD Best Spoken Word Album (Includes Poetry, Audio Books & Storytelling): Beastie Boys Book (Various Artists) — Michael Diamond, Adam Horovitz, Scott Sherratt & Dan Zitt, producers Becoming — Michelle Obama I.V. Catatonia: 20 Years As A Two-Time Cancer Survivor — Eric Alexandrakis Mr. Know-It-All — John Waters Sekou Andrews & The String Theory — Sekou Andrews & The String Theory Comedy Best Comedy Album: Quality Time — Jim Gaffigan Relatable — Ellen Degeneres Right Now — Aziz Ansari Son Of Patricia — Trevor Noah Sticks & Stones — Dave Chappelle MUSICAL THEATER Best Musical Theater Album: Ain’t Too Proud: The Life And Times Of The Temptations — Saint Aubyn, Derrick Baskin, James Harkness, Jawan M. Jackson, Jeremy Pope & Ephraim Sykes, principal soloists; Scott M. Riesett, producer (Original Broadway Cast) Hadestown — Reeve Carney, André De Shields, Amber Gray, Eva Noblezada & Patrick Page, principal soloists; Mara Isaacs, David Lai, Anaïs Mitchell & Todd Sickafoose, producers (Anaïs Mitchell, composer & lyricist) (Original Broadway Cast) Moulin Rouge! The Musical — Danny Burstein, Tam Mutu, Sahr Ngaujah, Karen Olivo & Aaron Tveit, principal soloists; Justin Levine, Baz Luhrmann, Matt Stine & Alex Timbers, producers (Original Broadway Cast) The Music Of Harry Potter And The Cursed Child – In Four Contemporary Suites — Imogen Heap, producer; Imogen Heap, composer (Imogen Heap) Oklahoma! — Damon Daunno, Rebecca Naomi Jones, Ali Stroker, Mary Testa & Patrick Vaill, principal soloists; Daniel Kluger & Dean Sharenow, producers (Richard Rodgers, composer; Oscar Hammerstein II, lyricist) (2019 Broadway Cast) MUSIC FOR VISUAL MEDIA Best Compilation Soundtrack For Visual Media: The Lion King: The Songs — (Various Artists) Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon A Time In Hollywood — (Various Artists) Rocketman — Taron Egerton Spider-man: Into The Spider-Verse — (Various Artists) A Star Is Born — Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper Best Score Soundtrack For Visual Media: Avengers: Endgame — Alan Silvestri, composer Chernobyl — Hildur Guðnadóttir, composer Game Of Thrones: Season 8 — Ramin Djawadi, composer The Lion King — Hans Zimmer, composer Mary Poppins Returns — Marc Shaiman, composer Best Song Written For Visual Media: “The Ballad Of The Lonesome Cowboy” — Randy Newman, songwriter (Chris Stapleton); Track from: “Toy Story 4” “Girl In The Movies” — Dolly Parton & Linda Perry, songwriters (Dolly Parton); Track from: “Dumplin’” “I’ll Never Love Again (Film Version)” — Natalie Hemby, Lady Gaga, Hillary Lindsey & Aaron Raitiere, songwriters (Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper); Track from: A Star Is Born “Spirit” — Beyoncé Knowles-Carter, Timothy McKenzie & Ilya Salmanzadeh, songwriters (Beyoncé); Track from: “The Lion King” “Suspirium” — Thom Yorke, songwriter (Thom Yorke); Track from: “Suspiria” COMPOSING/ARRANGING Best Instrumental Composition: “Begin Again” — Fred Hersch, composer (Fred Hersch & The WDR Big Band Conducted By Vince Mendoza) “Crucible For Crisis” — Brian Lynch, composer (Brian Lynch Big Band) “Love, A Beautiful Force” — Vince Mendoza, composer (Vince Mendoza, Terell Stafford, Dick Oatts & Temple University Studio Orchestra) “Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge Symphonic Suite” — John Williams, composer (John Williams) “Walkin’ Funny” — Christian McBride, composer (Christian McBride) Best Arrangement, Instrumental or A Cappella: “Blue Skies” — Kris Bowers, arranger (Kris Bowers) “Hedwig’s Theme” — John Williams, arranger (Anne-Sophie Mutter & John Williams) “La Novena” — Emilio Solla, arranger (Emilio Solla Tango Jazz Orchestra) “Love, A Beautiful Force” — Vince Mendoza, arranger (Vince Mendoza, Terell Stafford, Dick Oatts & Temple University Studio Orchestra) “Moon River” — Jacob Collier, arranger (Jacob Collier) Best Arrangement, Instruments and Vocals: “All Night Long” — Jacob Collier, arranger (Jacob Collier Featuring Jules Buckley, Take 6 & Metropole Orkest) “Jolene” — Geoff Keezer, arranger (Sara Gazarek) “Marry Me A Little” — Cyrille Aimée & Diego Figueiredo, arrangers (Cyrille Aimée) “Over The Rainbow” — Vince Mendoza, arranger (Trisha Yearwood) “12 Little Spells (Thoracic Spine)” — Esperanza Spalding, arranger (Esperanza Spalding) PACKAGE Best Recording Package: Anónimas & Resilientes — Luisa María Arango, Carlos Dussan, Manuel García-Orozco & Juliana Jaramillo-Buenaventura, art directors (Voces Del Bullerengue) Chris Cornell — Barry Ament, Jeff Ament, Jeff Fura & Joe Spix, art directors (Chris Cornell) Hold That Tiger — Andrew Wong & Fongming Yang, art directors (The Muddy Basin Ramblers) i,i — Aaron Anderson & Eric Timothy Carlson, art directors (Bon Iver) Intellexual — Irwan Awalludin, art director (Intellexual) Best Boxed or Special Limited Edition Package: Anima — Stanley Donwood & Tchocky, art directors (Thom Yorke) Gold In Brass Age — Amanda Chiu, Mark Farrow & David Gray, art directors (David Gray) 1963: New Directions — Josh Cheuse, art director (John Coltrane) The Radio Recordings 1939–1945 — Marek Polewski, art director (Wilhelm Furtwängler & Berliner Philharmoniker) Woodstock: Back To The Garden – The Definitive 50th Anniversary Archive — Masaki Koike, art director (Various Artists) NOTES Best Album Notes: The Complete Cuban Jam Sessions — Judy Cantor-Navas, album notes writer (Various Artists) The Gospel According To Malaco — Robert Marovich, album notes writer (Various Artists) Pedal Steel + Four Corners — Brendan Greaves, album notes writer (Terry Allen And The Panhandle Mystery Band) Pete Seeger: The Smithsonian Folkways Collection — Jeff Place, album notes writer (Pete Seeger) Stax ’68: A Memphis Story — Steve Greenberg, album notes writer (Various Artists) HISTORICAL Best Historical Album: The Girl From Chickasaw County – The Complete Capitol Masters — Andrew Batt & Kris Maher, compilation producers; Simon Gibson, mastering engineer (Bobbie Gentry) The Great Comeback: Horowitz At Carnegie Hall — Robert Russ, compilation producer; Andreas K. Meyer & Jennifer Nulsen, mastering engineers (Vladimir Horowitz) Kankyo Ongaku: Japanese Ambient, Environmental & New Age Music 1980-1990 — Spencer Doran, Yosuke Kitazawa, Douglas Macgowan & Matt Sullivan, compilation producers; John Baldwin, mastering engineer (Various Artists) Pete Seeger: The Smithsonian Folkways Collection — Jeff Place & Robert Santelli, compilation producers; Pete Reiniger, mastering engineer (Pete Seeger) Woodstock: Back To The Garden – The Definitive 50th Anniversary Archive — Brian Kehew, Steve Woolard & Andy Zax, compilation producers; Dave Schultz, mastering engineer, Brian Kehew, restoration engineer (Various Artists) PRODUCTION, NON-CLASSICAL Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical: All These Things — Tchad Blake, Adam Greenspan & Rodney Shearer, engineers; Bernie Grundman, mastering engineer (Thomas Dybdahl) Ella Mai — Chris “Shaggy” Ascher, Jaycen Joshua & David Pizzimenti, engineers; Chris Athens, mastering engineer (Ella Mai) Run Home Slow — Paul Butler & Sam Teskey, engineers; Joe Carra, mastering engineer (The Teskey Brothers) Scenery — Tom Elmhirst, Ben Kane & Jeremy Most, engineers; Bob Ludwig, mastering engineer (Emily King) When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? — Rob Kinelski & Finneas O’Connell, engineers; John Greenham, mastering engineer (Billie Eilish) Producer Of The Year, Non-Classical: Jack Antonoff Dan Auerbach John Hill Finneas Ricky Reed Best Remixed Recording: “I Rise (Tracy Young’s Pride Intro Radio Remix)” — Tracy Young, remixer (Madonna) “Mother’s Daughter (Wuki Remix)” — Wuki, remixer (Miley Cyrus) “The One (High Contrast Remix)”– Lincoln Barrett, remixer (Jorja Smith) “Swim (Ford. Remix)” — Luc Bradford, remixer (Mild Minds) “Work It (Soulwax Remix)” — David Gerard C Dewaele & Stephen Antoine C Dewaele, remixers (Marie Davidson) PRODUCTION, IMMERSIVE AUDIO Best Immersive Audio Album: Chain Tripping — Luke Argilla, immersive audio engineer; Jurgen Scharpf, immersive audio mastering engineer; Jona Bechtolt, Claire L. Evans & Rob Kieswetter, immersive audio producers (Yacht) Kverndokk: Symphonic Dances — Jim Anderson, immersive audio engineer; Robert C. Ludwig, immersive audio mastering engineer; Ulrike Schwarz, immersive audio producer (Ken-David Masur & Stavanger Symphony Orchestra) Lux — Morten Lindberg, immersive audio engineer; Morten Lindberg, immersive audio mastering engineer; Morten Lindberg, immersive audio producer (Anita Brevik, Trondheimsolistene & Nidarosdomens Jentekor) The Orchestral Organ — Keith O. Johnson, immersive audio engineer; Keith O. Johnson, immersive audio mastering engineer; Marina A. Ledin & Victor Ledin, immersive audio producers (Jan Kraybill) The Savior — Bob Clearmountain, immersive audio engineer; Bob Ludwig, immersive audio mastering engineer; Michael Marquart & Dave Way, immersive audio producers (A Bad Think) PRODUCTION, CLASSICAL Best Engineered Album, Classical: Aequa – Anna Thorvaldsdóttir — Daniel Shores, engineer; Daniel Shores, mastering engineer (International Contemporary Ensemble) Bruckner: Symphony No. 9 — Mark Donahue, engineer; Mark Donahue, mastering engineer (Manfred Honeck & Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra) Rachmaninoff – Hermitage Piano Trio — Keith O. Johnson & Sean Royce Martin, engineers; Keith O. Johnson, mastering engineer (Hermitage Piano Trio) Riley: Sun Rings — Leslie Ann Jones, engineer; Robert C. Ludwig, mastering engineer (Kronos Quartet) Wolfe: Fire In My Mouth — Bob Hanlon & Lawrence Rock, engineers; Ian Good & Lawrence Rock, mastering engineers (Jaap Van Zweden, Francisco J. Núñez, Donald Nally, The Crossing, Young People’s Chorus Of NY City & New York Philharmonic) Producer Of The Year, Classical: Blanton Alspaugh James Ginsburg Marina A. Ledin, Victor Ledin Morten Lindberg Dirk Sobotka CLASSICAL Best Orchestral Performance: “Bruckner: Symphony No. 9” — Manfred Honeck, conductor (Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra) “Copland: Billy The Kid; Grohg” — Leonard Slatkin, conductor (Detroit Symphony Orchestra) “Norman: Sustain” — Gustavo Dudamel, conductor (Los Angeles Philharmonic) “Transatlantic” — Louis Langrée, conductor (Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra) “Weinberg: Symphonies Nos. 2 & 21” — Mirga Gra?inyt?-tyla, conductor (City Of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra & Kremerata Baltica) Best Opera Recording: “Benjamin: Lessons In Love & Violence” — George Benjamin, conductor; Stéphane Degout, Barbara Hannigan, Peter Hoare & Gyula Orendt; James Whitbourn, producer (Orchestra Of The Royal Opera House) “Berg: Wozzeck” — Marc Albrecht, conductor; Christopher Maltman & Eva-Maria Westbroek; François Roussillon, producer (Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra; Chorus Of Dutch National Opera) “Charpentier: Les Arts Florissants; Les Plaisirs De Versailles” — Paul O’Dette & Stephen Stubbs, conductors; Jesse Blumberg, Teresa Wakim & Virginia Warnken; Renate Wolter-Seevers, producer (Boston Early Music Festival Chamber Ensemble; Boston Early Music Festival Vocal Ensemble) “Picker: Fantastic Mr. Fox” — Gil Rose, conductor; John Brancy, Andrew Craig Brown, Gabriel Preisser, Krista River & Edwin Vega; Gil Rose, producer (Boston Modern Orchestra Project; Boston Children’s Chorus) “Wagner: Lohengrin” — Christian Thielemann, conductor; Piotr Becza?a, Anja Harteros, Tomasz Konieczny, Waltraud Meier & Georg Zeppenfeld; Eckhard Glauche, producer (Festspielorchester Bayreuth; Festspielchor Bayreuth) Best Choral Performance: “Boyle: Voyages” — Donald Nally, conductor (The Crossing) “Duruflé: Complete Choral Works” — Robert Simpson, conductor (Ken Cowan; Houston Chamber Choir) “The Hope Of Loving” — Craig Hella Johnson, conductor (Conspirare) “Sander: The Divine Liturgy Of St. John Chrysostom” — Peter Jermihov, conductor (Evan Bravos, Vadim Gan, Kevin Keys, Glenn Miller & Daniel Shirley; PaTRAM Institute Singers) “Smith, K.: The Arc In The Sky” — Donald Nally, conductor (The Crossing) Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance: “Cerrone: The Pieces That Fall To Earth” — Christopher Rountree & Wild Up “Freedom & Faith” — Publiquartet “Perpetulum” — Third Coast Percussion “Rachmaninoff” – Hermitage Piano Trio — Hermitage Piano Trio “Shaw: Orange” — Attacca Quartet Best Classical Instrumental Solo: “The Berlin Recital” — Yuja Wang “Higdon: Harp Concerto” — Yolanda Kondonassis; Ward Stare, conductor (The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra) “Marsalis: Violin Concerto; Fiddle Dance Suite” — Nicola Benedetti; Cristian M?celaru, conductor (Philadelphia Orchestra) “The Orchestral Organ” — Jan Kraybill “Torke: Sky, Concerto For Violin” — Tessa Lark; David Alan Miller, conductor (Albany Symphony) Best Classical Solo Vocal Album: The Edge Of Silence – Works For Voice By György Kurtág — Susan Narucki (Donald Berman, Curtis Macomber, Kathryn Schulmeister & Nicholas Tolle) Himmelsmusik — Philippe Jaroussky & Céline Scheen; Christina Pluhar, conductor; L’arpeggiata, ensemble (Jesús Rodil & Dingle Yandell) Schumann: Liederkreis Op. 24, Kerner-lieder Op. 35 — Matthias Goerne; Leif Ove Andsnes, accompanist Songplay — Joyce Didonato; Chuck Israels, Jimmy Madison, Charlie Porter & Craig Terry, accompanists (Steve Barnett & Lautaro Greco) A Te, O Cara — Stephen Costello; Constantine Orbelian, conductor (Kaunas City Symphony Orchestra) Best Classical Compendium: American Originals 1918 — John Morris Russell, conductor; Elaine Martone, producer Leshnoff: Symphony No. 4 ‘heichalos’; Guitar Concerto; Starburst — Giancarlo Guerrero, conductor; Tim Handley, producer Meltzer: Songs And Structures — Paul Appleby & Natalia Katyukova; Silas Brown & Harold Meltzer, producers The Poetry Of Places — Nadia Shpachenko; Marina A. Ledin & Victor Ledin, producers Saariaho: True Fire; Trans; Ciel D’hiver — Hannu Lintu, conductor; Laura Heikinheimo, producer Best Contemporary Classical Composition: Bermel: Migration Series For Jazz Ensemble & Orchestra — Derek Bermel, composer (Derek Bermel, Ted Nash, David Alan Miller, Juilliard Jazz Orchestra & Albany Symphony Orchestra) Higdon: Harp Concerto — Jennifer Higdon, composer (Yolanda Kondonassis, Ward Stare & The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra) Marsalis: Violin Concerto In D Major — Wynton Marsalis, composer (Nicola Benedetti, Cristian M?celaru & Philadelphia Orchestra) Norman: Sustain — Andrew Norman, composer (Gustavo Dudamel & Los Angeles Philharmonic) Shaw: Orange — Caroline Shaw, composer (Attacca Quartet) Wolfe: Fire In My Mouth — Julia Wolfe, composer (Jaap Van Zweden, Francisco J. Núñez, Donald Nally, The Crossing, Young People’s Chorus Of NY City & New York Philharmonic) MUSIC VIDEO/FILM Best Music Video: “We’ve Got To Try” — The Chemical Brothers, Ellie Fry, video director; Ninian Doff, video producer “This Land” — Gary Clark Jr., Savanah Leaf, video director; Alicia Martinez, video producer “Cellophane” — FKA twigs, Andrew Thomas Huang, video director; Alex Chamberlain, video producer “Old Town Road (Official Movie)” — Lil Nas X & Billy Ray Cyrus, Calmatic, video director; Candice Dragonas, Melissa Larsen & Saul Levitz, video producers “Glad He’s Gone” — Tove Lo, Vania Heymann & Gal Muggia, video directors; Natan Schottenfels, video producer Best Music Film: HOMECOMING — Beyoncé, Beyoncé Knowles-Carter & Ed Burke, video directors; Dora Melissa Vargas, video producer Remember My Name — David Crosby, A.J. Eaton, video director; Cameron Crowe, Michele Farinola & Greg Mariotti, video producers Birth Of The Cool — Miles Davis, Stanley Nelson, video director; Nicole London, video producer Shangri-la — Various Artists,Morgan Neville, video director; Emma Baiada, video producer Anima — Thom Yorke, Paul Thomas Anderson, video director; Paul Thomas Anderson, Erica Frauman & Sara Murphy, video producers

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upshotre · 4 years

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Grammy Nomations 2020 (see complete list)

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nerdzewordart · 7 years

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The bookstore in my town has this thing where you can get advanced readers copies of books for a donation to a charity. So I picked up this book York:The Shadow Cipher by Laura Ruby, (who also wrote some of my favorite preteen books) and let me give you a few reasons why you guys should read this book as soon as it hits the shelves next month.

1. Non neurotypical characters. Seriously, all three of the main characters are different in some way, and it’s kind of incredible. 2. I honestly am not sure I can name even one character that isn’t POC. That’s how diverse this book is, and it’s excellent. 3. There are hybrid animals, and one of the main characters has a 45 lb therapy cat. What’s not to love? 4.There is a six year old who is honestly more metal than I am. 5.Ciphers galore. 6. Steampunk. 7. It’s in an alternate timeline where the US decided not to massacre the Native American people. And lots of other stuff changes too I guess. 8. It’s all about fighting corporate greed. 9. Secret societies 10. The characters think and act like real twelve year olds, despite the fact that they are all sort of geniuses. 11. Tess is constantly calling out people’s sexism in a non confrontational manner that I swear a lot of people can learn from. 12. Theo is precious and Jamie honestly kind of reminds me of myself at twelve.

Seriously guys, this book gives me life and hope for the future and you should all read it. It comes out on May 6th

#shadow cipher #york #laura ruby #tess biedermann #theo biedermann #jamie Cruz #book review #i guess #read it #you won't regret it #the shadow cipher

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blackkudos · 7 years

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Ossie Davis

Ossie Davis (born Raiford Chatman Davis; December 18, 1917 – February 4, 2005) was an American film, television and Broadway actor, director, poet, playwright, author, and civil rights activist.

He was married to Ruby Dee, with whom he frequently performed, until his death in 2005.

He and his wife were named to the NAACP Image Awards Hall of Fame; were awarded the National Medal of Arts and were recipients of the Kennedy Center Honors. He was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame, in 1994.

Early years

Davis was born Raiford Chatman Davis in Cogdell, Clinch County, Georgia, a son of Kince Charles Davis, a railway construction engineer, and his wife Laura (née Cooper; July 9, 1898 – June 6, 2004). The name Ossie came from a county clerk who misheard his mother's pronunciation of his initials "R.C." when he was born. So he inadvertently became "Ossie" when his mother told the courthouse clerk in Clinch County, Ga., who was filing his birth certificate that his name was R.C. Davis. Davis experienced racism from an early age when the KKK threatened to shoot his father, whose job they felt was too advanced for a black man to have.

Following the wishes of his parents, he attended Howard University but dropped out in 1939 to fulfill his desire for an acting career in New York; he later attended Columbia University School of General Studies. His acting career, which spanned eight decades, began in 1939 with the Rose McClendon Players in Harlem. During World War II, Davis served in the United States Army in the Medical Corps. He made his film debut in 1950 in the Sidney Poitier film No Way Out. He voiced Anansi the spider on the PBS children's television series Sesame Street in its animation segments.

Career

When Davis wanted to pursue a career in acting, he ran into the usual roadblocks that blacks suffered at that time as they generally could only portray stereotypical characters such as Stepin Fetchit. Instead, he tried to follow the example of Sidney Poitier and play more distinguished characters. When he found it necessary to play a Pullman porter or a butler, he played those characters realistically, not as a caricature.

In addition to acting, Davis, along with Melvin Van Peebles and Gordon Parks, was one of the notable African-American directors of his generation: he directed movies like Gordon's War, Black Girl and Cotton Comes to Harlem. Along with Bill Cosby and Poitier, Davis was one of a handful of African American actors able to find commercial success while avoiding stereotypical roles prior to 1970, which also included a significant role in the 1965 movie The Hill alongside Sean Connery plus roles in The Cardinal and The Scalphunters. However, Davis never had the tremendous commercial or critical success that Cosby and Poitier enjoyed. As a playwright, Davis wrote Paul Robeson: All-American, which is frequently performed in theatre programs for young audiences.

In 1976 Davis appeared on Muhammad Ali's novelty album for children, The Adventures of Ali and His Gang vs. Mr. Tooth Decay.

Davis found recognition late in his life by working in several of director Spike Lee's films, including Do The Right Thing, Jungle Fever, She Hate Me and Get on the Bus. He also found work as a commercial voice-over artist and served as the narrator of the early-1990s CBS sitcom Evening Shade, starring Burt Reynolds, where he also played one of the residents of a small southern town.

In 1999, he appeared as a theater caretaker in the Trans-Siberian Orchestra film The Ghosts of Christmas Eve, which was released on DVD two years later.

For many years, he hosted the annual National Memorial Day Concert from Washington, DC. His distinguished bearing made him a perfect choice for the concert. Following his passing, the hosting duties passed on to the twosome of Gary Sinise and Joe Mantegna.

Davis's last role was a several episode guest role on the Showtime drama series The L Word, as a father struggling with the acceptance of his daughter Bette (Jennifer Beals) parenting a child with her lesbian partner. In his final episodes, his character was taken ill and died. His wife Ruby Dee was present during the filming of his own death scene. That episode, which aired shortly after Davis's own death, aired with a dedication to the actor.

Honors

In 1989, Ossie Davis and his wife, actress/activist Ruby Dee, were named to the NAACP Image Awards Hall of Fame. In 1995, they were awarded the National Medal of Arts, the nation's highest honor conferred to an individual artist on behalf of the country and presented in a White House ceremony by the President of the United States. And in 2004, they were recipients of the prestigious Kennedy Center Honors. According to the Kennedy Center Honors:

"The Honors recipients recognized for their lifetime contributions to American culture through the performing arts— whether in dance, music, theater, opera, motion pictures, or television — are selected by the Center's Board of Trustees. The primary criterion in the selection process is excellence. The Honors are not designated by art form or category of artistic achievement; the selection process, over the years, has produced balance among the various arts and artistic disciplines."

In 1994, Davis was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.

Personal life

In 1948, Davis married actress Ruby Dee, whom he had met on the set of Robert Ardrey's 1946 play Jeb. In their joint autobiography With Ossie and Ruby, they described their decision to have an open marriage, later changing their minds. In the mid 1960s they moved to the New York suburb of New Rochelle where they remained ever after. Their son Guy Davis is a blues musician and former actor, who appeared in the film Beat Street and the daytime soap opera One Life to Live. Their daughters are Nora Davis Day and Hasna Muhammad.

They were well known as civil rights activists during the Civil Rights Movement and were close friends of Malcolm X, Jesse Jackson, Martin Luther King, Jr. and other icons of the era. Davis and Dee's deep involvement in the movement is characterized by how instrumental they were in organizing the 1963 civil rights March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, even to the point of serving as emcee. Davis, alongside Ahmed Osman, delivered the eulogy at the funeral of Malcolm X. He re-read part of this eulogy at the end of Spike Lee's film Malcolm X. He also delivered a stirring tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, at a memorial in New York's Central Park the day after King was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee.

Death

Davis was found dead in a Miami, Florida, hotel room on February 4, 2005. An official cause of death was not released, but he was known to have heart problems.

Wikipedia

#Ossie Davis

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ericfruits · 7 years

Text

Why everybody liked Norman Rockwell

WILL a truce ever be declared in America’s culture wars? One way to tackle that puzzle involves considering all-American icons of the past—figures who bridged social and political divides—and asking how they did it. That mission led Lexington to Stockbridge, Massachusetts, and the Norman Rockwell Museum. Modelled on a New England town hall, it is a handsome shrine to an artist whose work has hung in the Oval Offices of the past four presidents (though a Rockwell painting of the Statue of Liberty’s torch seems to have vanished from Donald Trump’s).

Rockwell lived from 1894 to 1978 and enjoyed popular acclaim for 60 of those years. He honed an image as an apolitical advocate of Yankee civic virtues, at one remove from the sordid business of party politics, even as he painted every major presidential candidate from Eisenhower to Nixon. His biographer, Laura Claridge, records his belief that the best way to reach a large audience was “to let people hope he voted their way”.

When Ronald Reagan, late in his presidency, explained how Rockwell’s art had captured America’s heart and soul, he might have been describing himself. The Great Communicator hailed the artist for portraying the country with compassion, humour and goodwill and for cherishing the values that give Americans strength, namely: “love of God and Country, hard work, neighbourhood, the family”.

Other Republicans have seen the same in Rockwell’s idealised paintings, full of roguish boys and pious grandparents, baseball games, kindly policemen, daydreaming adolescents, heroic workers and self-important intellectuals. Interviewed in 1994, on the brink of his elevation as Speaker of the House of Representatives, Newt Gingrich called his congressional district in suburban Georgia a “sort of Norman Rockwell world”, whose prosperity and safety reflected the worldview of the weekly magazine that made Rockwell’s name, the Saturday Evening Post. The artist himself could sound rather conservative, as when he recalled why he shunned New York city, his childhood home, for a succession of towns in rural New England. Rockwell cited “the American nostalgia for the clean, simple country life”.

Yet plenty of Democrats, too, see their principles reflected in Rockwell’s work. In 2011 Barack Obama offered a wall in the West Wing to display “The Problem We All Live With”, a painting from the civil-rights era depicting a young black girl, Ruby Bridges, being escorted to a newly integrated school by federal marshals. The image provoked shock when it was published in Look magazine in 1964, in part because it was so recognisably a Rockwell: the same precise brush-stokes depict the girl’s dress, her solemn expression and the racist graffiti behind her. The Rockwell museum’s archives hold a letter from a reader in New Orleans, accusing the artist of abetting the “vicious crime of racial integration” with the illustration. Another letter, from Chattanooga in Tennessee, thanks him for opening the eyes of “this White southerner”.

As social and political tensions roiled America in the late 1960s, Rockwell edged away from his studied neutrality. He chafed at editorial guidelines that non-white figures could not take centre stage in illustrations, unless they were portrayed as train stewards or in other service jobs. He urged Middle America to see the good in civil-rights workers, Vietnam war opponents and long-haired hippies, assuring fans that the young were “doing great, you just give them a chance”. This Rockwell is revered by such Democratic-leaning Hollywood types as the film directors Steven Spielberg and George Lucas, both of them Rockwell collectors. Mr Lucas, creator of the “Star Wars” films, also recalled his childhood as a “Norman Rockwell world” of Saturday morning bonfires in the back yard and long hours lost in books.

For those dreaming of bipartisan comity, the Rockwell museum is a bittersweet place. Distinctly 20th-century forces helped the artist rise, and are not coming back. Rockwell worked when illustrated magazines enjoyed vast market power and were trusted to help turn readers—whether residents with deep roots or new immigrants—into confident, robust, modern Americans. His covers were seen by millions, some of whom framed and hung them on their walls. In today’s fragmented media environment, says Stephanie Haboush Plunkett, chief curator at the museum, never again will “so many people see the same thing at the same time”.

Vote for Rosie the Riveter

The Saturday Evening Post was proudly middlebrow. Its editor scorned elites and worried that Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal safety-nets and public works might sap the country’s capitalist ethos. But the Post had the swagger to commission fiction from F. Scott Fitzgerald and William Faulkner. It also carried Rockwell’s paintings of the “Four Freedoms” that FDR vowed to defend in 1941 as he prepared public opinion for entry into the world war. Rockwell depicted a New England town meeting for “Freedom of Speech”, heads bowed in prayer for “Freedom of Worship”, a Thanksgiving meal for “Freedom from Want” and parents watching children sleeping in “Freedom from Fear”. A national tour of the paintings drew huge crowds in 16 cities and raised $133m in government war bonds, the equivalent of $2bn today.

Rockwell had to work at staying neutral during the class-tinged culture clashes of his day. He winced, discreetly, when his works were called intelligible and homely, unlike modern art. He confided to his youngest son: “Just once, I’d like for someone to tell me that they think Picasso is good, and that I am too.” He was attacked by highbrow critics as a sentimentalist and as a sell-out for taking advertising jobs. But crucially, cultural camps did not yet bear fixed ideological labels. This was a time of Eisenhower Republicans who took a liberal line on racial or social issues, and of conservative Democrats in Middle America. Deep down, Rockwell was a Yankee progressive whose work was loved by conservatives. Today’s partisans expect heroes to take sides.

This article appeared in the United States section of the print edition under the headline "Norman Rockwell’s lost America"

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amorremanet · 7 years

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11, 14 & 17? ^.^

asks for fanfic writers.

I did 17 over here, but!

11. do you listen to music when writing?

Sometimes, yes! It sort of depends on what I’m writing and what kind of mood I’m in, but I pretty much always listen to something. It’s more just a matter of whether I’m going to listen to music or TV/movies.

And then in each case, there’s the issue of like, “do I want to listen to the Twilight Princess OST or the Silent Hill 2 OST?” (because video game OSTs are great at both evoking mood and increasing focus), or, “do I want a video game OST, or my playlist for [character, ship, project, the mood I’m in, whatever; I have playlists for everything]”

—or if I’m going to listen to TV/movies, then it’s like, “TV or movies?” and then, “Disney movie or superhero movie? Marvel movie or DC movie? Pink Flamingos, Hairspray, or Female Trouble? The Prince of Egypt or Crimson Peak? Star Wars” or in TV Land, it’s more, “Well, I can’t work and listen to something relatively new [which is one of the biggest reasons why I’m perpetually late to everything new on TV], so… House or Criminal Minds? Yuri on Ice dub [because I can’t watch the subs and write at the same time] or SVU reruns? Firefly or Futurama?”

14. easiest character to write

Oh gosh, that’s…… hard. And it often depends on the fandom, and sometimes it depends on what kind of mood I’m in, but…

Barty Crouch Jr. has always been really easy for me (partly because he has Favorite advantage, and partly because I’ve put 16+ years into his character at this point, so like. JKR could drop all of her notes about his family and backstory and everything on us tomorrow — not that I really think said notes exist, but if they did — and I’d probably just go, “Yeah, that’s nice, but with all due respect, Mum? My version’s better, and I’m just going to continue treating it as if it’s canon because bite me, that’s why”).

AlSev Potter and Scorpius Malfoy are both really easy, too, but tbh, I think that’s because my versions of them are essentially glorified OC’s, since my attitude toward Cursed Child with regard to characterization is, “*nods mildly* That’s nice, but I’m going to pick and choose at my leisure, thanks. No offense, but I’ve been working on these kids since DH first came out, and I much prefer my headcanon Scorpius who is the biggest, loudest, gayest Drama Princess you have ever met in your life and has been trying to shock Lucius into having a heart attack and dying since he was like six,

“and my headcanon AlSev who’s sometimes Ruby Minerva Severus, most often genderfluid but sometimes a binary trans girl and other time a gay cis boy, loves Ginny but has a complicated and often strained relationship with her (but in fairness, AlSev-Ruby talks to Godfather Neville and Hagrid about their problems more than they talk to either Harry or Ginny), has a complicated relationship with Harry too but for other reasons and when Harry and Ginny eventually divorce each other, AlSev-Ruby is going to stay at their Dad’s more often than their Mum’s, and never lets anyone forget that their middle name is Severus because AlSev-Ruby likes pissing them off with that fact — especially their Weasley grandparents

“Ron but AlSev-Ruby usually feels bad about this because they know on some level that they’re usually lashing out at Ron unfairly because it’s not about their name in most of these scenarios and entirely about other emotions that AlSev-Ruby has no earthly idea how to handle or express in a healthy or constructive way, and they boil over very easily when people needle them about their name (and if it weren’t Ron on the receiving end of this, it would probably be James)

“and Snape’s portrait, whom AlSev-Ruby accidentally made respect them by going, ‘You’re a painting. You are oil on canvas, magically imbued with the real Severus Snape’s personality and memories. Snap at me all you want, but you can’t do anything to me that’s worse than what Rita Skeeter and Molly have been doing for my entire life so far. If you want to get to know me, instead of using me as some conduit for all of your lingering issues with my Dad, then cool, I’d like to get to know you, too. You’re the closest I can get to getting to know my real middle-namesake instead of the myth of him that’s been built up since the War. But if you’ve got nothing interesting to say, then please shut up and let me wait for the Headmistress in peace’ in their first year, if not as eloquently because they were eleven and being Sulky™”

As much as I still hate being compared to her, even accepting that I totally deserve it, Hermione Granger is another easy one for me to get into and always has been. The hard thing with her is not reducing her to either Perfectly Perfect Hermione (which JKR can even fall into some times, like when Hermione hexed the DA sign-up sheet and it scarred Marietta’s face without regard for how Umbridge is the one to blame in that situation and not Marietta) or some joke about some of the times in canon when she was Over The Top about something, in ways that Harry didn’t entirely get so the narrative treats them as Totally Hilarious, even though SPEW (for example) is actually not funny when held up to scrutiny and Hermione works so hard at school out of deep-set fear of failure and being dispensable, and probably also fear that maybe she doesn’t belong in the magical world

Luna Lovegood is also pretty easy for me, though the hard thing with her is trying to make sure that I write her thought processes honestly but in a way that makes sense for the reader (it’s a variation on the big problem of stream of consciousness writing, where writing actual facts stream of consciousness looks like Finnegan’s Wake and is tedious as fuck to read, so Luna has to be close to stream of consciousness but tamed enough so that the experience of reading anything written from her POV is more likely to be enjoyable, and less likely to be like getting hit upside the head with a tire iron labeled, “IT’S ART OKAY, IT’S NOT FOR YOU”).

Then, Remus Lupin is by far the easiest of the Marauders for me to write, and Andromeda Black Tonks can actually be pretty hard for me sometimes, but she’s easier than either of her sisters and still one of the easiest MWPP-era characters for me, period.

And as far as non-HP characters go: well, my other biggest source of fandom writing in the past while has been Teen Wolf, and the top five easiest kids for me there are Scott McCall (to the surprise of no one ever), Kira Yukimura (#still bitter),

“Camden Lahey (but lbr, he’s pretty much just an OC with a canon name because literally all we know about him in canon is, “Isaac’s older brother, on the 2005/6 swim team, died in the military” so the rest of it is shit that I wholesale made up and of course he’s easier for me to get into character with than, say, Allison — who is probably the third easiest of the ladies for me to get into character with, after either Braeden or Malia but it depends on the day — because Allison has, like, actual canon shit to deal with and Cam…… kinda doesn’t.

Like, all of the vaguely Actual Canon shit that he has to deal with is stuff that’s off in the realm of extrapolation, interpretation, and, “Hey, nothing in canon says that he DIDN’T visit Derek and Laura in New York on his way back from his first visit home during his service, or that he DIDN’T drag Derek uptown to see Patti Lupone as Mama Rose because Cam is a Fanboy for reasons relating to his and Isaac’s late Mother, or that they didn’t argue at the intermission about how IT’S A MUSICAL DEREK STOP TRYING TO QUESTION WHY THE CHARACTERS SING JFC IT’S LIKE I DON’T EVEN KNOW YOU”

or, “lbr, Derek is as subtle as a brick hitting you in the face at 5,000 mph and Paige canonically figured out that he was a werewolf anyway, so I don’t think it’s entirely implausible that, if we accept the idea of him and Cam being friends — and Cam being one of the only people who, like, genuinely likes Derek, instead of tolerating him because he’s okay at basketball and his family is rich — then Cam probably figured out that Derek and Laura are werewolves, and if that’s the case, he probably got trotted over to the Hales’ place so Talia could give him third-degree about whether or not he’s with the Argents or any other hunters.

“And, because he was like fifteen and had literally just found out that supernatural shit is real, Cam probably showed that he wasn’t a hunter by getting way too excited about hearing which magical creatures are real and temporarily shelving his hate-on for Talia to be all, ‘oh my god, are vampires real? can they infect werewolves? could Derek be like, a vampire werewolf, how would that even work’ or, ‘so silver bullets don’t hurt you, but what about someone saying your True Name? is True Name magic real?’ or, ‘do seances actually work? I’m totally not asking because I want to try and perform one to contact my dead Mom, I just want to know, like. For curiosity’s sake. Yeah……’”

[spoilers: Cam was TOTALLY asking because he wanted to try and use a seance to contact Eleanor. Derek and Laura had to stop him from trying to do the thing no fewer than eight times before Cam and Derek graduated. To his credit, Derek at least skipped trying to give Cam any kind of lecture, but tbf, he did that because he knew Cam would argue back at him about how Derek had no right to tell Cam that he was doing something stupid and dangerous and playing with things that he didn’t understand, and that Cam’s argument would probably be more than fair.

This did not stop Laura from giving Cam the lectures that he completely deserved, though, because: 1. he was essentially walking up to a big red button labeled, “do not push” and trying to push it without even reading the owner’s manual or the informational plaque on the wall that had a full explanation of why you shouldn’t push the button, and he KNEW that he was doing this, but he felt like it was all going to work out TOTALLY FINE because he wanted his Mom to be not dead and in lieu of that, why can’t he have a seance, Laura, UGH;

and 2. because, unlike Cam and Derek, Larua generally doesn’t do shit that’s too horribly stupid or that has completely awful consequences (…mostly), so she had an actual high-ground from which to give Cam these, “don’t screw around the magic, what the fuck are you thinking” lectures and wasn’t intimidated by Derek’s loudmouth little friend who, like, actively repels everything that even vaguely resembles chill.]

—so, anyway, the point is that I can pretty much do whatever I want with Cam and it makes him a lot easier to write. Laura is a similar case of, “this character is easy for me to write because I made her up,” and in fairness, a lot of my characterization for Braeden is headcanon, too. It’s just headcanon that has more of a basis in canon than Camden and Laura do.

I mean.

Except for parts like Braeden’s twin sister Belladonna who is a ballerina because fuck Jeff Davis, that’s why and also the only family member Braeden still talks to on any regular basis, and their parents who teach at Miskatonic University because I’m pretty sure it’s in the public domain at this point so nyeh, I’m gonna use it, and also they’re in the know about the supernatural but part of a group who has a policy of strict non-intervention, which Braeden thought was bullshit so she set out to do her own thing, which initially involved more plans to help people…… but then she learned that a girl’s gotta eat, and the mercenary work got started.

Also, she will wipe the floor with you at karaoke. Because I felt like it, that’s why.

Yeah, that’s all pretty, “this is not even remotely implied by canon and I wholesale made it up because canon wasn’t giving me like any damn Braeden backstory beyond the barest implications and I fucking felt like it, so there. PS: fuck Jeff Davis.”)

Derek Hale (I’m not always proud of this fact or entirely thrilled about it because when I get into Derek’s head, I take a lot of things from his canon characterization — especially in earlier episodes, before he started trying to be less of a jerk and discovered that: 1. he sucks as an Alpha, and 2. he loves Scott sooooo much — to their logical conclusions and his head is usually not a very pleasant place to be.

Like, he’s my werewolf disaster and I begrudgingly love him but we’re still talking about a guy who, when I write him, makes leaps of logic like, “Well, Cam said to look out for Isaac because he’s not here to do it himself. That is totally the same thing as giving me verbal permission to stalk his baby brother and manipulate him into accepting the Bite, very good plan, way to go, Derek!! :D” and thinks that, “Scott kissed ME first and didn’t explicitly SAY that he’s NOT 17, therefore I’m totally not obligated to ask him shit about shit or consider whether or not he’s having sex with me as a form of emotional self-harm” is a completely valid conclusion and way of doing things

He’s also a guy who would do things like cheat on Braeden with Cam and Cam with Braeden, while telling neither of them about this, and then when he gets arrested for doing something ridiculous, he would call both of them to come get him at the Sheriff’s station because he’s pretty sure that one of them will be mad and decide to just leave him there to think about what he’s done this time — which would end up in both of them coming, and figuring out that they’ve both been getting cheated on, and skip right past the, “being mad at the other cheated upon party” part to the part that’s more like,

“going for coffee and complaining about the fuck-up they’ve both been dating and making fun of things like his secret One Direction blog, or the Star Wars fanfic he writes where his blatant self-insert OC gets to bang Han, Leia, Mara Jade, Lando, both of the Solo twins, and Padmé (in some wonky shenanigans involving time travel) — oh and sucks for Derek, but Cam and Braeden decided to tell Parrish to just leave him in his holding cell because fuck him, they’ve been getting cheated on so he can just call Laura and beg her to come save his ass tonight”

negl, one of my favorite places to put Derek in non-supernatural AUs is prison. How he wound up there usually involved him killing Peter, and it sometimes involved him panicking and hiding Peter’s body under the floorboards because he’s a loser who thinks Edgar Allan Poe is actually a good model for How To Handle Murdering Someone, and…… yeah, I just. I love Derek, he’s easy for me to write, but he’s a disaster in ways I don’t always feel like dealing with, so sometimes, he gets to just go the fuck to prison so I don’t have to deal with him today.)

and……… ugh, I can’t pick between Danny Mahealani and Jackson Whittemore for the number five spot, but both of them are really easy for me, and like. Jackson, I am still vaguely ashamed of, but I don’t feel that bad about it because I got here by virtue of writing him when Astrid and I RP’d TW stuff together and she didn’t want to just talk to herself for ages by writing Isaac and Jackson, and I refused to half-ass it with Jackson and found a way into his head and here we are.

And Danny as I write him is, in a lot of ways, only somewhat less of an OC than Cam and Laura, so…… basically, that.

And bonuses, because I like talking about my legitimate OC’s, oops: Margot, Pete, and Sebastian are the easiest for me to write at the moment but in fairness, that’s largely because I’ve done the most work developing them as characters, relative to everyone else in the cast.

Like, Todd (who is officially Seb’s “it’s complicated,” and Seb’s Gawain Stacy, if you ask Pete — or sometimes even if you don’t ask Pete, because he will totally tell you this whether you like hearing it or not, especially if your name is Sebastian) — Todd has this notion that he, Margot, and Seb are basically gay boy!Hermione (Todd), lesbian!Harry (Margot), and, “Ron but like what if his family had Malfoy money and he was gay” (Seb). He’s not entirely wrong (and their Houses map onto the Trio’s secondary Houses because of course I know my OCs’ Hogwarts Houses, like why would I not know that)

(This whole Thing of Todd’s actually STARTED because I knew that he is a Ravenclaw, Seb’s a Hufflepuff, and Margot’s a Slytherin, and went, “lol, it’s like the Golden Trio in an AU where none of them wound up in Gryffindor, heh”)

and it makes sense that this is how Todd sees things with them because the three of them found each other in undergrad (though Seb found Margot when their RA paired them up for some “getting to know you” thing during orientation because they were the tallest and the shortest people on the hall, and he found Todd at the first meeting of the campus LGBTIQ students organization, had a crush at first sight on the cute chubby guy in the hot pink t-shirt with the screenprint of the Pink Flamingos poster, and totally meant to go be Super Cool about asking Todd out……

……buuuuuut he got excited and instead it came out like, “Hi, oh my god, I love your shirt, you like John Waters, I love John Waters, he’s my hometown hero, oh my god hi hi hi, my name’s Sebastian what is yours do you want to go get coffee, please be my friend, do you like Rocky Horror too? there’s a theatre a couple blocks from here that does a regular shadow-cast, we should totally check it out, I have just met you and I like you please be my friend” instead of like an actual date invite. And he totally called his Mom later that night to go, “MOM, I MADE ANOTHER FRIEND. TWO IN TWO DAYS, MOM. yeah no i still kind of hate my roommate he’s a jerk BUT I HAVE TWO NEW FRIENDS MOM”

………He was very lonely before undergrad because his only constant friend who wasn’t one of his siblings and didn’t shun him after he got outed at Catholic school [though technically, he sort of outed himself in an attempt to spare his boyfriend/best friend from being outed because Seb’s parents already knew he was gay and were totally cool about it, but Damian’s parents believed in reparative therapy and his uncle was the priest at their Catholic school, so him getting outed was really not an option]? Yeah, that only friend was Pete. But I digress.)

Anyway, Todd’s view of things is a little skewed by how he’s lived them, and strictly speaking, trying to map any of my kids onto the Golden Trio and Company is going to end up being a discussion of archetypes and tropes more than anything else because…… But they’re not the Golden Trio and Company.

There are some similarities, but they are mostly in the realm of archetypes AND the ones that aren’t quite as trope-y happened by accident (like, when I noticed that Seb actually does have quite a few similarities with Ron, aside from having Malfoy money — right down to his dad having an A name (Abraham) and his mom having an M name (Marceline) — I went, “well, FUCK” and started trying to get some of those similarities to be…… less so? Because…… Seb’s not Ron. And I don’t want him to be too overly similar to Ron because I want him to be himself, in his own right.

Fortunately, though, Ron isn’t a filthy rich, gay recovering addict who’s been living with undiagnosed major depression for his entire life and sort of accidentally stumbles into finding his mutant superpowers, and whose abusers aren’t his parents — because Abe and Marceline are pretty chill and have been fab to all four of their kids — but rather a series of douchebag ex-boyfriends who [unlike Molly and Arthur] are for real in-text acknowledged as being abusive jerks, and that’s a pretty solid start on Seb Is Not Ron)

But if you were going to try to do the Golden Trio And Company map here, then Todd would probably be Ginny, actually. They don’t have a lot in common, but there are some points of crossover, and the biggest one for me at the moment? Is that right now, I’m guilty of something that I bag on JKR for doing all the time, which is, “Ginny is a great idea for a character but you didn’t fully actualize her like she deserved in the text, you regularly reduced her existence to being Harry’s Significant Other, and it’s frankly bogus, Joanne” — and I’m aware of this, so I’m trying to fix it by working on Todd as a character

But I’m also trying to not spend forever fine-tuning every last detail about a story and then not having a draft of it so much as I have a two-foot stack of print-outs about different parts of it that kinda sorta look like a complete picture when you arrange them just so and tilt your head slightly to the left. So, basically, at the moment? Getting Todd to be more fully realized is on my List Of Shit To Do, but it’s way less of a priority than, “actual complete draft of this train-wreck” because I can do some of this work in revisions and rewriting

But since I opened this door anyway and want to complete the thought for the amusement factor:

Seb, obviously, is Harry in the bigger picture, even if this is mostly based on, “Harry is The Protagonist of his series, and although MY series is ultimately going to be more of an ensemble cast thing, Seb is the focal character for the first book because, in fairness to all the others, he was here first”

Todd is Ginny for the reasons that I just said

Pete and Margot both have very fair claim to being either Ron or Hermione, so they could arguably take turns, and ultimately, the big reason why I’m going to say Pete’s Ron and Margot’s Hermione?

is that Pete has two older siblings and some Issues with both of them (though he’s working them out with his sister, and not so much with his older brother) and has been Seb’s friend longer

while Margot’s an only child and they have totally used the, “we’re both gay, we love each other like brother and sister” line when they don’t feel like explaining their no romo soulmates kind of relationship to people (and sometimes when trying to make Seb’s siblings be less…… not pleased that Margot is so important to him, because to varying degrees, all three of them kinda sorta blame her for some of his problems in ways that she doesn’t entirely deserve)

Lucy is Neville but, like, a plucky ginger lesbian. This is probably one of the comparisons that looks a lot more like reaching, because on the surface, Lucy has a lot more in common with Ginny outside of their roles in the plot — but the thing is?

Even once I get Todd to be more developed, and even if he and Seb aren’t endgame (which was my original plan and I might stick to it but they have a LOT of shit to work on before they can go there so we’ll see how that goes), Todd is still going to be Ginny’s closest analogue to me because the ideas of them and their arcs are closer than anyone else’s (though in fairness, my idea of Ginny and her arc isn’t necessarily anybody else’s because JKR botched writing Ginny so much that this is almost, “room for wild mass guessing” instead of, “room for interpretation”)

Whereas…… yes. Lucy comes on strong, she’s a plucky go-getter who would probably try to fight the sun if she thought the sun was looking at her girlfriend funny, she’s a complete loudmouth and not always in ways that are conducive to anything, she’ll call you on your shit but usually without realizing that she’s saying something she needs to be hearing too, she tries too hard to do everything on her own and usually needs to experience some kind of big setback before she’ll consider accepting help with anything, and she will probably shout at someone while telling them to go calm down because they told HER to calm down.

Also, she’s the only one in my main ensemble cast who’s a legit Gryffindor, for better and for worse (Pete is a Slytherin — though in fairness, Gryffindor is his secondary House [he is aware of this, thanks to an ex of his who made him get Pottermore Sorted and was dead shocked when he wound up in Slytherin, but he has no idea what this means but he’s offended by it because Gryffindor’s colors are red and gold and no thanks, he doesn’t like how he looks in red and gold. He loves how he looks in green and silver, though] — and Josie’s a Ravenclaw)

—but a lot of how Over-The-Top Extra™ she is? that comes out of insecurity and trying to be various things that aren’t true to herself, because she deeply believes that she isn’t good enough. Granted, a big difference between her and Neville is that, while Neville spends a lot of time in the early books being terrified of his potential because he might screw up and prove right everyone who’s ever called him useless, Lucy instead tries to outrun her all of feelings of self-doubt and self-loathing instead of dealing with them, and basically plays a game of, “if I ignore them and just act like the popular idea of me — or like the me I want to be — but louder, maybe they will go away!!”

She’s going to be shocked when this catches up to her, because when she first shows up in the story, she’s of the mind that hey, she has accepted that she’s a lesbian — even if she’s only out to a small handful of people because…… uh, she’s Damian’s baby sister and their parents are still Not Really Very Safe to come out to. Their dad is probably going to die without Lucy coming out to him and she has VERY fair reasons for being afraid that he’d disown her for this — but!!! She has still accepted this!!!! Clearly it was the ONLY THING in her life that she wasn’t at peace with and now she IS so everything is going to magically be ALL BETTER NOW RIGHT!!!!!

No, not really, Lucy. Your sexuality is just one of the things about yourself that you aren’t at peace with.

Lucy’s response: *throws herself even harder into trying to outrun her self-doubt and being completely disingenuous to herself in the process, while trying to smile and laugh like nothing is wrong even though it really blatantly is*

So, that’s all going over about as well as you’d expect (i.e., not very well, not even a little bit whoops), and a lot of her arc in the series is going to be about finding peace with herself and finding her own ways of being a hero that may not necessarily line up with any more conventional expectations thereof, or even her own preconceived ideas of How To Hero Good, and yeah. She’s Neville, but like, a plucky ginger lesbian.

Also, she and Seb are foils for each other in a loooooot of ways that make them mapping onto Harry and Neville make more sense than trying to make Lucy map onto Ginny, in structural terms

Josie is Luna, and I’m short-changing my genderfluid empath child a lot right now but I’ve also been writing this post for WAAAAAY longer than I intended and ahahaha, everyone’s probably bored

And Conrad is Draco Malfoy, but absent any of the excuses that fans love making for Draco (especially not the age thing, like. Draco behaves in a LOT of ways that are completely unacceptable for any person of ANY age, but I will acquiesce that his age is a contributing factor in some instances because he’s a freaking CHILD. Conrad’s not, though. Like, Conrad is 46 and the oldest member of the main cast in the first book. Conrad gets no excuse for his bullshit based on his age.

He also doesn’t get to claim anything about being terrified for the safety of the people he cares about, because…… uh. While I think that the HP fandom oversells that point re: Draco in HBP because at first, he was completely gung-ho and proud of himself for joining a group of Pureblood supremacist domestic terrorist fascists, Draco was still abused and manipulated by Voldemort here — and during the entirety of HBP and DH — and…… well. Conrad was lied to and played by people who are even bigger douchebags than he is, yeah. But he wasn’t sold on joining the neo-fascist supervillains by having his loved ones threatened; he was sold on it by having his ego stroked and only giving a fuck about how this could benefit him)

So, basically, Conrad is Draco with even fewer redeeming qualities

Given that I think Draco only has, like, TWO redeeming qualities, or maybe three on a good day (and that’s debatable because at least one point here is, “it’s not really a quality of his own so much as the fact that I hate victim blaming more than I dislike Draco”), uh

Yeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaah, no.

Conrad is only not The Literal WORST EVER because there are other douchebags in his neo-fascist supervillain club who are even worse than he is.

i just love my oc mutant weirdos a lot, thank u for reading

#bizeke #that story with the mutants that i should find a working title for fml #mine: asks #memes for ts #mine: writing #mine: teen wolf #mine: hp #mine: headcanons #mine: meta #(for a very very loose definition of the term 'meta' oops)#sebastian moncrieff: mutant disaster #pete arden: dramatic disaster #lucy murphy: hemokinetic disaster #todd burroughs: art film disaster #josie quinn: empath disaster #margot gabriel: chainsmoking disaster #kassie hush #opinions for ts #asks for fanfic writers

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