a-crack-in-the-universe - Tumblr blog

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Everyone in Eloise’s life wants Eloise to talk less, to be quieter, to not go on about feminism. Even her so called friends like Penelope. Benedict is the one exception.

So is it a wonder that one of the most romantic moments in the series is someone giving her books and telling her he wants to hear her thoughts? Who cares just as much as she does, who does not love her despite her talking, but because of it.

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I love Charmed (1998) as a cosmic horror story.

You are a powerful witch destined for Good. You are descended from the one Actual Witch killed by the Salem Witch Trials. You live in a house, an ancestral home of a century or so, where her descendants eventually fled to escape persecution. It sits on a powerful Nexus of magic power, which hides from plain sight in the basement. It draws evil like moths to a flame. These evils have haunted you, literally, since your earliest childhood memories. They can appear suddenly in your home at all hours, on any day, and attempt to slaughter you all without warning.

You have a book. It is written by the hands that came before you. Written in their blood, in their sufferings, in their death. Tips and tricks, potions and spells, marking out methods to defeat each of the almost innumerable horrors that stalk you and yours. For they cannot be truly killed. Only banished, for months or decades, before they come again. Come again to invade your home and take your power. To eliminate you to the last.

This book is considered the greatest of its kind in the world. Witches of other lines covet it. But do they know what it cost? The suffering that begets its necessity? This book is magical, and it’s essence it tied inextricably to yours: if it is stolen, corrupted, so are you. It is also tied to the house. It cannot be taken from the premises by any means not by your hands. You can sense if it’s gone. It is part of you, your blood, and your line. Just as the house is. Just as the Nexus you defend is.

It is your family’s duty to protect them from falling into the wrong hands. You stay. Generation after generation stay, write new entries in the book, and raise their families inside the walls of The Manor. The power of the Nexus seeps into their blood, your blood, each generation gaining more and more power. Power to face the evils that come to take it. They come with poison and knives, crossbows and fire, all intent on murdering a suburban San Francisco family in their home. They invade, plot, scheme, work their evil magics on your bodies and minds. You fight and fight and fight for your lives. You live and you learn. You die and you learn. You suffer and you learn. But in the end, you are powerless against them. They are too numerous, hour after hour, day after day, year after year, decade after decade.

The evils came, and they killed your ancestors. But they did not get what they came for, so they tried again. And again. They killed your mother. They killed your grandmother. They killed your sister. They killed your memories, your childhood, your friends, your lovers, your guardian angels, your spouse, your children. They killed you. Over and over. But they do not win what they seek. At least not permanently. So each time, the power of the Nexus, steeped in blood and in your blood in return, drags you back. It bends the laws of dimension and time, forcing you through endless sufferings only you and yours remember, and it brings you right back to where you started: living in your ancestral home, fighting for the power, set in place as sentinels to shield it from Evil.

Sometimes, one or more of you will move out, try to make a life away from magic, the book, The Manor, and the Nexus beneath it. Sometimes, a child of your line is given up for adoption the day they are born. Sometimes, your memories of magic are erased and you scatter to the winds to live mundane lives. Sometimes, you move across the world to be with the one you love. It never works. None of it ever sticks. You always return. Like moths to a flame. Drawn in by death, the collapse of a relationship, by attacks or spells or magic gone awry or signs that appear to be from the very Universe Itself. Every Warren Witch ends up returned to sender. Always, a Halliwell must remain in the Manor. So you stay, and you protect it. (The House always wins.)

There is a Final Battle. Everyone you love is dead. You are dead. The house lies in ruins. Until it doesn’t. And everything returns to the way it was. You think it is over. That Good has won, once and for all. That the Evil has been defeated, the Nexus destroyed. But your children have power. The Nexus is in their blood. So the Evil will come. Like moths to a flame. And someday, you, and they, will die. Your unending string of death and resurrection will cease. You become another generation sacrificed to feed the great beast that waits below. And another generation destined for Good will in turn rise to protect it. And someday they too will die. But the line, book, the house, and the power will continue. And so too will the sacrifice.

That is the story of Charmed.

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My language (Polish) - So beautiful

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Hmm yes tancred torsson

16 and still obsessed with Charlie Bone what a life

Theres a Children of the Red King server and thats where i usually post all my art and headcanons but I’ve decided to start posting here sometimes too. Not sure how large the community here is though

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The Cursed Heart - Lore - Book 1 Chapter 3

The Winter Knight

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The Cursed Heart - Lore - Book 1 Chapter 5

Kieran The Heartless

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Fantasy books written by women are often assumed to be young adult, even when those books are written for adults, marketed to adults, and published by adult SFF imprints. And this happens even more frequently to women of color.

This topic’s an ongoing conversation on book Twitter, and I thought it might be worth sharing with Tumblr. And by “ongoing,” I mean that people have been talking about this for years. Last year, there was a big blow up when the author R.F. Kuang said publicly that her book The Poppy War isn’t young adult and that she wished people would stop calling it such. If you’ve read The Poppy War, then you’ll know it’s grimdark fantasy along lines of Game of Thrones… and yet people constantly refer to The Poppy War as young adult – which is one of its popular shelves on Goodreads. To be fair, more people have shelved it as “adult,” but why is anyone shelving it as “young adult” in the first place? Game of Thrones is not at all treated this way…

Rebecca Roanhorse’s book Trail of  Lightning, an urban fantasy with a Dinétah (Navajo) protagonist has “young adult” as its fifth most popular Goodreads shelf. The novel is adult and published by Saga, an adult SFF imprint. 

S.A. Chakraborty’s adult fantasy novel City of Brass has “young adult” as its fourth most popular Goodreads shelf. 

Tasha Suri’s Empire of Sand, an adult fantasy in a world based on Mughal India, has about equal numbers of people shelving it as “adult” or “young adult.” 

Book Riot wrote an article on this, although they didn’t address how the problem intersects with race. I also did a Twitter thread a while back where I cited these examples and some more as well. 

The topic of diversity in adult SFF is important to me, partly because we need to stop mislabeling the women of color who write it, and also because there’s a lot there that isn’t acknowledged! Besides, sometimes it’s good to see that your stories don’t just end the moment you leave high school and that adults can still have vibrant and interesting futures worth reading about. I feel like this is especially important with queer rep, for a number of reasons. 

Other books and authors in the tweets I screenshot include:

Witchmark by C.L. Polk

A Ruin of Shadows by L.D. Lewis

The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern

The Day Before by Liana Brooks

A Phoenix First Must Burn edited by Patrice Caldwell

Shri, a book blogger at Sun and Chai

Vanessa, a writer and blogger at The Wolf and Books

TLDR: Women who write adult fantasy, especially women of color, are presumed to be writing young adult, which is problematic in that it internalizes diversity, dismisses the need and presence of diversity in adult fantasy, and plays into sexist assumptions of women writers. 

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Sir, don't. Show them who you are. This is who I am. No, it never has been. We hold the line, if you cross it now then there's no way back.

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I regret to inform you that Discord's new Terms of Service includes an arbitration clause. You can find it here https://discord.com/terms/#16. This clause includes an opt-out, which I have transcribed here:

You can decline this agreement to arbitrate by emailing an opt-out notice to arbitration-opt-out@discord.com within 30 days of April 15, 2024 or when you first register your Discord account, whichever is later; otherwise, you shall be bound to arbitrate disputes in accordance with the terms of these paragraphs. If you opt out of these arbitration provisions, Discord also will not be bound by them.

These clauses are underhanded ways that corporations seek to deprive you of your right to participate in class-action lawsuits and your right to a jury trial. (This does only apply to us users ,other people still spread the word though )

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emperor palpatine is so fucking cringe dude he doesn’t even have a court jester

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oh this is evil

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Yeah, I like their romance well enough (it’s clear they do care about each other) but I agree that it could’ve been done better. I mean, they go from not talking to each other to marrying each other surprisingly quickly and we never get to see how/why Julia managed to forgive Paton for abandoning her when she needed him.

The romance makes sense to me, though. Julia is pretty, smart, kind, and she loves books like Paton does. It’s not surprising that Paton fell for her so quickly. And Paton is tall, dark and handsome. No surprise that Julia is attracted to him.

Lyell/Amy is my favourite, because I love the angst of them being separated and Amy believing Lyell is dead when he’s actually not. And the little things that show their love for each other.

There are… several reasons why I don’t find Paton/Julia to be compelling but I think the biggest, most textually relevant one is that I’m just super not into people getting with the first person they meet and that’s basically what happens with Paton. It’s implied within the story that he likely hasn’t interacted with much of anyone outside his family for years. Julia is the first available woman he has met in a very long time and she is also the only one he gets to interact with for most of the story. (As far as we see the same goes for Julia, but her life is much less constrained than Paton’s so who knows.) Tbh when he meets Julia, Paton isn’t even that close with any members of his family yet. He has barely started actually talking to Charlie. He has no friends, no real peers, just a ton of self-esteem issues.

Julia is the first person outside his family he can form a connection with and it is just so incredibly boring to push it as romantic so quickly. I would find them infinitely more compelling if they were friends, even a friendship that built up slowly and more subtly into romance over the series, but as the instant romance it is? Nothing.

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I wouldn’t be surprised if they just told Harold that Bartholomew abandoned him. They don’t need to lie when the truth hurts a lot already.

I don’t think there’s any character who’s a worse father than Bartholomew in the series. Maybe Lord Grimwald?

I totally forgot that it the only word we have to go on for how Harold Bloor felt about growing up with Ezekiel was from fucking Grizelda Bone. Grizelda “sure you can kidnap my son if he doesn’t cooperate” Bone. Grizelda “my grandson only matters if he’s got magic powers” Bone.

This bitch has been involved in the attemped/successful “doing away with” of at least five members of her own family and we are just meant to take her word that this little kid was totally happy with believing both his parents were dead and he was being raised by her and his creepy grandfather? And Bartholomew actually does believe it??

Bart is strong contender for Worst Father in this series I swear to god

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OKAY NOW I CAN POST MANFRED THOUGHTS.

I think part of what I find so compelling about him is that in a lot of other stories he would have the right ingredients to be redeemable, but with the whole Some People Are Born Evil shit that this series subscribes to, that just can’t happen.

His backstory is horrific, but it’s just portrayed as him being So Evil he was even a creepy evil kid. But that’s not how kids actually are. He was raised as a weapon and it is all he knows how to do. If Ezekiel wants that baby, Manfred gets him the baby. If Ezekiel wants that man to forget, Manfred makes him forget. If Ezekiel wants those people dead, Manfred makes them die. If Ezekiel says Manfred’s mother can’t leave, Manfred will make sure she can’t leave. And then Manfred has to go on with all of it- maintaining long term control over two people from the time he’s 9 years old, knowing his powers are waning, Ezekiel constantly asking for more, and that his own mother wants nothing more than to get away from him. I haven’t even touched on how messed up his relationship is with his dad (because I’ve touched on it elsewhere), but there’s that too.

And it’s like. Yeah he’s a Villain, it’s undeniable. He is basically structuring his life around his family’s goals of villainy. But he’s also just a kid. He thinks his classmates clothes are ridiculous but he also has to wear his hair just so. He’s a thespian. He bullies younger kids for missing their moms then sobs when his own gets away. He sleeps in on the weekend. He had one friend ever and treated him like shit. At least two girls had crushes on him. He never got to go to college.

He was a teenager who was raised in the worst environment and made to do terrible things his entire life and not a single adult ever gave him guidance to live any other way. And then he dies in a ridiculous way, and the only person in the world who might have cared apparently doesn’t. I’m going to be insane about him forever.

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In case anyone’s curious about the end scene :)

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A narrative