lethargicdragondoodles

[lethargicdragondoodles]

A return to our favorite boys and gal, dedicated to @chdarling who's on her very well-deserved break, hope she's doing well!

[lethargicdragondoodles]

I know it’s not hard to point out reactionaries hypocrisy when it comes to like safe spaces or hug boxes or whatever but genuinely how much of an echo chamber do you have to exist in for you to think this is a reasonable thing to say

[lethargicdragondoodles]

You're FOUL

I know everyone is looking forward for Jily to be all lovey-dovey and whatnot. But I am actually looking more so forward for them to become a thing, so I can get to see them interact with their families.

I just want to see what George thinks about James, especially in comparison to Vernon, and him seeing his little girl being all grown up and actually happy with someone. I also can't wait for James to interact with Petunia and her not so charming husband to be, and see how he actually handles himself within a Muggle environment, it certainly would be a step outside his familiar comfort zone. 😅

Same with Lily, I can't wait for her to meet the Potters, especially Fleamont. I can see him being absolutely charmed by Lily, he loves stories and Lily loves her books, I just imagine Lily sitting next him and reading to him to him old Muggle tales he never heard before and them bonding over it, while later telling his son of what wonderful young lady he has found himself with Euphemia smiling at them witnessing before her eyes of how her baby boy has grown up. 🥰

Yeah, don't mind me I'm just domestic slut here. 😂

🥺🥺🥺

I’m not crying

[lethargicdragondoodles]

Need to update those old covers I made for TLE and do this too

Finished translating to Italian (+ bookbinding) this masterpiece as a birthday present to my mum. Only took 4 months! Thought you might have enjoyed seeing the result!

Ps: she read the entire thing in 4 days. Better start translating Dark Marks now lol

Oh, my GOD?

????????!!!

This is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen and also made me a little weepy (in a nice way!). I don’t have words. I’m sitting here trying to find this words and all I got is fodisosjskkandksksbdksks SO PRETTY 😭😭😭

Thank you so much for sharing, I’m a little emotional right now hhahaha

❤️

[lethargicdragondoodles]

It's a mark of how utterly enamored I am of your writing and this story that I'm so stoked to read even Regulus's POV, who after Snape is probably my least favorite "main" character of this era, and yet you write him in the most fascinating, layered and nuanced ways.

“Okay, Reggie, you stand here.” Two hands landed firmly on Regulus’s shoulders as Cissy directed him a few steps to the right until he stood centered before the nursery windows. Bright, afternoon sunlight sloped into the room. “And Sirius, you stand there.”

They’d been dropped here at Black Hall for two weeks over the summer while their parents went off to France, and though Regulus had always founds his cousins’ home to be a daunting labyrinth of discomfort and confusion, he liked the nursery all right. He understood its rules.

Bella and Andy were home for the summer holiday, but they seemed to have better things to do than play nanny to Sirius and Regulus. Cissy, however, hadn’t hesitated to quickly integrate the two boys into all her favorite games of make-believe, most of which usually involved some form of dress-up.

“Why do I have to marry you?” complained Sirius, fists shoved into his pockets as he glowered at his cousin.

“Because,” Cissy’s reply was sharp, impatient, as though this were a completely stupid question, “Reggie’s too little.”

“This game is stupid.”

“That shows what you know,” said Cissy loftily. “A girl’s wedding is the most important day of her life. Now stand there, and I’ll get my veil and walk down the aisle.”

Read on AO3.

[lethargicdragondoodles]

"An old colleague of my father’s is rather high up in the Department of Magical Commerce and said they’d love to have me as a Junior Officer. Daddy wanted me to work for his business for a few years, but I rather stuck my nose up at that, to tell you the truth. He means well, but honestly, I think he just wanted to keep an eye on me for a few years before he could make sure I settled down. And I am not interested in that, thank you very much.”

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“I’m about to graduate, all right? I’ve got a handful of months left in this castle before they kick me out on my Muggle arse into a world that hates that I exist. I don’t have a job lined up. I don’t even have the hope of a job lined up. ‘Old Sluggy’ didn’t get me a cozy internship, or even so much as a handshake. Seven years of schooling, and I can’t even get anyone to look at me long enough to do me the honor of rejecting me. And on top of all that, there’s a fuckin’ war going on, right? Every day, people like me are being murdered, but at least my head of house gave me some fuckin’ pamphlets on my fuckin’ career prospects.”

A parallel I couldn't stop thinking about, from @chdarling's The Last Enemy: Dark Marks.

[lethargicdragondoodles]

WAIT FUCK IT'S ALREADY OUT AAAAAAAAAAAAAA

I remembered that I promised to give a warning, so, uh, a weekend forecast: Cloudy with a chance of new TLE ⛈️⚡️🌪️

[lethargicdragondoodles]

If we get TLE this weekend I'll draw my favorite scene from the chapter

I remembered that I promised to give a warning, so, uh, a weekend forecast: Cloudy with a chance of new TLE ⛈️⚡️🌪️

[lethargicdragondoodles]

I remembered that I promised to give a warning, so, uh, a weekend forecast: Cloudy with a chance of new TLE ⛈️⚡️🌪️

[lethargicdragondoodles]

AI "art" is not innocuous. It is having real negative impact on the arts. From magazines and book publishers deciding to use AI "art" instead of hiring illustrators, to literary magazines having to close down submissions because they've been swamped by AI "stories," to art contests being won by AI "art," opportunities for artists to make a living are already being cut, especially for newer, less established artists. Even for me, with a 20 year career and an agent, I'm seeing fewer avenues to paying work. I can't imagine being 18, wondering if there will be any way to get a job in the arts when every entry level art job will be taken up by AI by the time they're halfway through art school.

So many AI "artists" have this idea that real artists have had it too good for too long, holding creativity hostage somehow, living easy lives, when most of us have to constantly hustle just to stay regular poor instead of homeless poor, our mental and physical health in rough shape all the time. To work so hard not only to hone our skills but to take on the equally hard second job of chasing down opportunities for work, only to see those opportunities go to someone who told a computer to do all their work for them, who then turns around and says we artists don't deserve money or even attention... it's such a slap in the face. It's such a breathtaking insult added to grievous injury.

It's not that these people are using AI to *assist* the creation of their work. This isn't like Photoshop, which is a tool. PS might make some aspects of the work easier or faster, but it's still a lot of work, a lot of time, a lot of skill. AI does it all for you. AI "artists" are no different from clients who commission me. If a client describes to me in great detail what they want me to draw, and then I draw it, are they somehow the artist? No! Telling it to a computer instead of a person doesn't change that.

I know AI "art" can be interesting. It's nifty to see what we've taught computers to do. It's funny to laugh about how many fingers they have. But it's really having such a huge negative impact on the creative world right now that the drawbacks far outweigh the curiosity of it. I wish I saw more people outside of artist communities thinking about this, caring about this, talking about this.

[lethargicdragondoodles]

Reminder that Sirius was twenty-one years old when James died.

He was eleven when he met James.

He knew James for ten years.

He lived in Azkaban for twelve.

Through reading TLE I’ve become really invested in James and Lily’s story.. then the other day on Tumblr I saw these beautiful pictures from @blvnk-art where James tells Lily to run while he holds Voldemort off… and it really brought back the realisation that the James and Lily I love are doomed. 💔😭

So I was wondering how far you’re planning to go (I understand if you can’t answer for spoiler reasons) and how you feel about potentially having to kill off these characters you’ve spent so much time with?

(Sorry to be so bleak)

It’s cool I’m in a bleak mood

First of all, obligatory shout about how much I love blvnk and her jily art. So so good.

I’m not going to say exactly where I plan to end the series, but I will say that there’s a reason I have both a canon and AU ending planned haha. I definitely get emotional when thinking about writing their deaths (actually, I’ve already written the big ones), but I also really love the tragedy of the canon story and how that informs the narrative the whole way through. Kind of the way I love listening to Hadestown over and over again…what’s the quote from that song?

Cause here’s the thing To know how it ends And still begin to sing again As if it might turn out this time… I learned that from a friend of mine

I’m a sucker for a good tragedy, and I love that with the marauders we all know how the story ends, we’re here for the characters and the journey. That’s so lovely.

That said, I definitely rely on my AU ending sometimes when I get too sad haha. Oddly enough, the deaths aren’t the part that devastate me. It’s what comes after. I genuinely can’t think about Sirius in Azkaban or Remus during the lost years for long without absolutely losing it lol.

[lethargicdragondoodles]

One minute she was standing on her doorstep, watching him walk away, and the next, she was dashing down the alley after him. She caught up and clasped her hand gently around his wrist. “James.”

He turned in surprise, and his eyes widened slightly at the sight of her. They were standing much, much too close.

“Yeah?”

Lily searched for something to say. She hadn’t thought this through at all. Disaster. So she did the only thing she could think to do: She stood on tiptoes and kissed him softly on the cheek.

“Happy Christmas, James.”

From The Last Enemy: Dark Marks, by @chdarling

I'm not obsessed I swear

[lethargicdragondoodles]

Cover concepts for The Last Enemy by @chdarling

I was bored.

[lethargicdragondoodles]

"Everyone knows they're the biggest pure-blood ponces in this school."

Padfoot & Prongs, inspired by @chdarling's incredible The Last Enemy fanfic series.