lamuradex

[lamuradex]

No one has any idea who invented the machine, because sooner or later, every operator enters their own name.

You are the sole operator of a machine that intercepts and prevents natural disasters, but each use erases one random person from existence, memories and all. A category 5 hurricane is heading for your hometown. The machine is asking for a name.

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I love the dramatic irony of this moment too.

Angua starts on about it, but then she mentions Gaskin - Leggy Gaskin, the very man The Watch were mourning back in Guards! Guards!

It’s enough that the audience gets there before Angua does. She wasn’t to know, but it means we’re right there with Carrot during one of the few moments that Carrot seems actually upset.

He knows Vimes is a good man. In ways, a better man than even Carrot himself.

The moment where we get to see exactly why Carrot has such a deep admiration for Vimes is so amazingly done! *spoilers for Men at Arms*

This scene from Men at Arms has to be one of my favourite moments in the entire series, It's not only where we get to see exactly why Carrot has such an deep and unshakable admiration for Vimes, but also one of the few moments where I think he was genuinley angry.

'Will you look at this? No wonder he never has any money!' 'What d'you mean?'

'He spends it on women! You wouldn't think it, would you? Look at this entry. Four in one week!'

Carrot looked over her shoulder. On the bed, Vimes snorted.

There, on the page, in Vimes' curly handwriting, were the words:

Mrs Gafkin, Mincing St: $5

Mrs Scurrick, Treacle St: $4

Mrs Maroon, Wixon's Alley: $4

Annabel Curry, Lobfneaks: $2

Annabel Curry couldn't have been much good, for only two dollars,' said Angua.

She was aware of a sudden drop in temperature.

'I shouldn't think so,' said Carrot, slowly. 'She's only nine years old.' .

One of his hands gripped her wrist tightly and the other prised the book out of her fingers.

'Hey, let go!'

'Sergeant!' shouted Carrot, over his shoulder, 'can you come up here a moment?'

Angua tried to pull away. Carrot's arm was as immovable as an iron bar.

There was the creak of Colon's foot on the stair, and the door swung open.

He was holding a very small cup in a pair of tongs.

'Nobby got the coff—' he began, and stopped.

'Sergeant,' said Carrot, staring into Angua's face, 'Lance-Constable Angua wants to know about Mrs

Gaskin.'

'Old Leggy Gaskin's widow? She lives in Mincing Street.'

'And Mrs Scurrick?'

'In Treacle Street? Takes in laundry now.' Sergeant Colon looked from one to the other, trying to get a handle on the situation.

'Mrs Maroon?'

'That's Sergeant Maroon's widow, she sells coal in—'

'How about Annabel Curry?'

'She still goes to the Spiteful Sisters of Seven-Handed Sek Charity School, doesn't she?' Colon smiled

nervously at Angua, still not sure of what was happening. 'She's the daughter of Corporal Curry, but of course he was before your time—'

Angua looked up at Carrot's face. His expression was unreadable.

'They're the widows of coppers?' she said.

He nodded. 'And one orphan.'

'It's a tough old life,' said Colon. 'No pensions for widows, see.'

He looked from one to the other.

'Is there something wrong?' he said.

Carrot relaxed his grip, turned, slipped the book into the box, and shut the lid.

'No,' he said.

'Look, I'm sorr—' Angua began. Carrot ignored her and nodded at the sergeant.

'Give him the coffee.'

'But . . . fourteen dollars . . . that's nearly half his pay!'

Carrot picked up Vimes' limp arm and tried to prise his fist open, but even though Vimes was out cold the fingers were locked.

'I mean, half his pay!'

I also love this moment for Angua, where she finally gets to see just what being a "good copper" means, and just how much Vimes cares about his officers. And I think it also gives her a greater respect for Carrot since she thought he was just being naive for admiring Vimes as much as he does when Vimes had earned every bit of it.

Also what this says about Vimes that he keeps this secret, he doesn't go around advertising the kind act he's doing, or ask the others to chip-in, he just quietly give up half his pay (which already isn't that much) to help the families of those officers who died and If you've read Night Watch you'll recognise some of these names

[lamuradex]

Here it is. The Beast.

(With a Fanta can for scale)

The pages are wafer thin. Like you can see through them thin.

Okay I am super duper curious now.

Reblog game! Give a shoutout to some of your favorite monster-sized novels!

Whats the biggest doorstopper book on your physical bookshelf, and what was the original price (MSRP) for that book when it came out?

Right now it's a two-way tie between:

1) "Out of Oz" (the wicked years, book 5)

MSRP: $26.99-- 568 very large pages (~410+ words per page)

And

2) "Murtagh" (The Inheritance Cycle... Book 5?🤔 Limited Edition Hardcover with full art and page edging)

MSRP: $35.99-- 705 pages (350+ words per page)

I've delightedly read Out of Oz while devouring the 1000+ page Wicked Years series, and I'm waiting to read Murtagh until after I've re-read the first three books in the Inheritance Cycle and finally read the last book!

Uh .. that will probably take me awhile to get to them lol. I know I have an ancient omnibus edition of Eragon & Eldest somewhere, which is quite the feat considering they're both doorstoppers in and of themselves, let alone together in one volume!

So, what's the biggest doorstopper you own? Have you read it yet? Read it *multiple* times?

[lamuradex]

Huh. Funnily enough, some of the runners up for me are the same series, Eldest, Brisingr, and Inheritance. (I should get round to finishing that series too. Read them when I was much younger...)

But my novel winner is: The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas, at a whopping 1,065 pages. Listened to the audiobook a couple of times, and refer back to the physical for bits I want to reread. Original price... No clue. I'd be measuring it in old money. But the edition I've got was like £40 online?

I do love it this edition though. The story and the book itself. The book's royal blue with a faux-gold edging on the pages. It looks so cool!

But, while it might be my favourite, and the biggest novel, it isn't the biggest book on my shelf. Oh no.

At a GARGANTUAN 3,419 PAGES is my Norton Shakespeare Collection, containing all the works of Shakespeare, that I bought ages ago for Uni like a decade ago. Apparently it's priced at around £20 now. I can't imagine I would have paid more than that for it back at Uni age.

Okay I am super duper curious now.

Reblog game! Give a shoutout to some of your favorite monster-sized novels!

Whats the biggest doorstopper book on your physical bookshelf, and what was the original price (MSRP) for that book when it came out?

Right now it's a two-way tie between:

1) "Out of Oz" (the wicked years, book 5)

MSRP: $26.99-- 568 very large pages (~410+ words per page)

And

2) "Murtagh" (The Inheritance Cycle... Book 5?🤔 Limited Edition Hardcover with full art and page edging)

MSRP: $35.99-- 705 pages (350+ words per page)

I've delightedly read Out of Oz while devouring the 1000+ page Wicked Years series, and I'm waiting to read Murtagh until after I've re-read the first three books in the Inheritance Cycle and finally read the last book!

Uh .. that will probably take me awhile to get to them lol. I know I have an ancient omnibus edition of Eragon & Eldest somewhere, which is quite the feat considering they're both doorstoppers in and of themselves, let alone together in one volume!

So, what's the biggest doorstopper you own? Have you read it yet? Read it *multiple* times?

[lamuradex]

I’ll be keeping an eye on all this, but I can’t promise to participate in every event. A lot of my work is still in progress, and editing is taking a lot of my time.

As for the other stuff:

I’ve got no properly published work… yet.

I’ve got no ko-fi or patreon… yet.

BUT I did post a collection of Short Stories not too long ago, so I’ll link to those:

Final call for writers looking to reconnect, get inspired, and boost one another.

Summerfest isn’t just about the playing games and taking part in writing sprints. In fact, that was never the main focus! The goal of Writeblr Summerfest is to create a place to help you build a community, meet new friends, and make new fans.

That's why, along with the games and events, we'll also have:

Reblog chains

Indie author boosts

Writing resource shares

Tag events for mutual-finding

Gift-making stations

And because community and sharing is such a huge part of what we do here, I want to give you the chance to reblog this post and tell me about your published work, your ko-fi, and your patreon! If it's writing based, share a link in the reblog of this post so I can boost it during the event.

[lamuradex]

I've already got a few short stories under my belt. Might give this a go.

Okay, shorter post lol. I've been seeing a lot of people tearing down the very concept of "short stories" in weak attempts to defend badly-edited, over-priced traditionally published books, so here is a writing prompt for you:

Over the next month, challenge yourself to write a short story that is under or around 10,000 words that has a clear arc and a conclusion.

Any topic.

Any genre.

If you're like me, you struggle to keep things short and sweet, so this is a fun challenge to write things with brevity!

[lamuradex]

WEBSITES FOR WRITERS {masterpost}

E.A. Deverell - FREE worksheets (characters, world building, narrator, etc.) and paid courses;

Rach Academia - FREEBIES (workbook, notion template, games, challenges, etc.);

Hiveword - Helps to research any topic to write about (has other resources, too);

BetaBooks - Share your draft with your beta reader (can be more than one), and see where they stopped reading, their comments, etc.;

Charlotte Dillon - Research links;

Writing realistic injuries - The title is pretty self-explanatory: while writing about an injury, take a look at this useful website;

One Stop for Writers - You guys... this website has literally everything we need: a) Description thesaurus collection, b) Character builder, c) Story maps, d) Scene maps & timelines, e) World building surveys, f) Worksheets, f) Tutorials, and much more! Although it has a paid plan ($90/year | $50/6 months | $9/month), you can still get a 2-week FREE trial;

One Stop for Writers Roadmap - It has many tips for you, divided into three different topics: a) How to plan a story, b) How to write a story, c) How to revise a story. The best thing about this? It's FREE!

Story Structure Database - The Story Structure Database is an archive of books and movies, recording all their major plot points;

National Centre for Writing - FREE worksheets and writing courses. Has also paid courses;

Penguin Random House - Has some writing contests and great opportunities;

Crime Reads - Get inspired before writing a crime scene;

The Creative Academy for Writers - "Writers helping writers along every step of the path to publication." It's FREE and has ZOOM writing rooms;

Reedsy - "A trusted place to learn how to successfully publish your book" It has many tips, and tools (generators), contests, prompts lists, etc. FREE;

QueryTracker - Find agents for your books (personally, I've never used this before, but I thought I should feature it here);

Pacemaker - Track your goals (example: Write 50K words - then, everytime you write, you track the number of the words, and it will make a graphic for you with your progress). It's FREE but has a paid plan;

Save the Cat! - The blog of the most known storytelling method. You can find posts, sheets, a software (student discount - 70%), and other things;

I hope this is helpful for you!

Also, don't forget to check my gumroad shop, where you can find plenty of FREEBIES (from notion templates for writers to workbooks and sheets).

-> Check out my freebies

Happy writing! <3

[lamuradex]

5 Tiny Writing Tips That Aren’t Talked About Enough (but work for me)

These are some lowkey underrated tips I’ve seen floating around writing communities — the kind that don’t get flashy attention but seriously changed how I write.

1. Put “he/she/they” at the start of the sentence less often.

Try switching up your sentence rhythm. Instead of

“She walked to the window,”

try

“The window creaked open under her touch.”

Keeps it fresh and stops the paragraph from sounding like a checklist.

2. Don’t describe everything — describe what matters.

Instead of listing every detail in a room, pick 2–3 objects that say something.

“A half-drunk mug of tea and a knife on the table”

sets a way stronger tone than

“There was a wooden table, two chairs, and a shelf.”

3. Use beats instead of dialogue tags sometimes.

Instead of:

"I'm fine," she said.

Try:

"I'm fine." She wiped her hands on her skirt.

It helps shows emotion, and movement.

4. Write your first draft like no one will ever read it.

No pressure. No perfection. Just vibes. The point of draft one is to exist. Let it be messy and weird — future you will thank you for at least something to edit.

5. When stuck, ask: “What’s the most fun thing that could happen next?”

Not logical. Not realistic. FUN. It doesn’t have to stay — but chasing excitement can blast through writer’s block and give you ideas you actually want to write.

What’s a tip that unexpectedly helped with your writing? Let me know!! 🍒

[lamuradex]

Do you ever hear a song, but it doesn't quite fit your character's story, imagining them to it?

So you find yourself crowbaring them together in your head?

Fit, goddamnit! This is your song now! No, the lyrics don't make sense but just try it, would you? The vibe is right! Please!

[lamuradex]

No idea if any of my followers are UK residents, but this is pretty important.

ATTENTION UK MOOTS AND FOLLOWERS!

[ pt: attention uk moots and followers! ]

please sign the petition below to stop the bullshit “Online Safety” act. this post (embedded link: https://www.tumblr.com/spinnysocks/789152953351192576?source=share) has the basic info.

if you can, share with everyone you know who is a UK resident. this affects us all. if you're not a UK resident, please share this if possible! /srs

[lamuradex]

This is good to know, as a writer. One of my main characters in Madman and the Princess was born with one arm and a stump, and she doesn't bandage, because why would she? She was born with it. She later has a prosthetic with a liner, but that's it.

It's always useful to learn more about this stuff. I didn’t even know Bandaging a Stump was such a common trope.

Tips for Writing and Drawing Amputees: Bandaged Stumps

When writing and drawing amputee characters, unless your character only just lost their limb, they don't need to wear a bandage over their stumps.

to be clear, eda's depiction in the show was fine, since she'd only just lost her arm and went (presumably) without any medical attention, but because the show didn't have much time to show her afterwards, I've noticed a tendency of the fandom to draw her wearing the bandage permanently, so that's why I'm picking on her for my example lol.

It's a bit of a trope at this point, and I think it comes from one of a few different places:

Amputees do wear bandages on their stumps, but usually only for the first 6-12 weeks post-amputation, sometimes longer if the amputation was a result of a burn. It's possible people saw this though and assumed it was permanent.

Most amputees wear a sock made of either cotton or silicone under their prosthetics to provide them with some extra padding. These socks, called liners, often stick out from the top of the prosthetic socket and could possibly be mistaken for a bandage from a distance.

Some amputees will wear compression garments for a few months to a few years after their amputations which could also be mistaken for a bandage from a distance. These garments are designed to stop swelling and reduce phantom pain, but they aren't bandages.

Stumps get cold easier because their circulation typically isn't as good as the rest of the body, so some amputees will wear socks over them even if they aren't wearing a prosthetic to keep warm, which again could be mistaken for a bandage from a distance.

This one is funny, but in my experience unfortunately, it's the most common: people think the end of an amputee's stump is just a perpetual open wound that never heals. Meaning to avoid "gore" it needs to be covered. I've met fully grown adults who believed this until I showed up to work/uni without my prosthetics or socks on.

People are uncomfortable with seeing an uncovered stump and so put bandages over it to avoid confronting their biases.

Some combination of these points.

But yeah, unless your amputee has only just lost their limb in the last few weeks, they don't need a bandage.

The ironic thing too, is that for most amputees, bandaging a stump is nearly impossible. I've been in and out of hospital since I was 1 year old and only ever met 3 nurses and no doctors/surgeons who could successfully bandage my stump in a way that the bandage would even stay on. This is because stumps are usually tapered in shape (meaning they are wider at the top, closer to the body, and thinner at the bottom), so gravity will pull the bandage off 9 times out of 10.

On a final note: it's ok to show your amputee's stump, it's not gore, there's no blood, it just looks like a regular limb that just stops early. In fact, if you are writing/creating anything for kids or that is likely to be seen by kids, I encourage you to show your amputee's stumps at least once. I used to work on a disability awareness program for kids, and I lost count of the amount of times kids were terrified of me, because they all expected my leg to be bloody and gory. For a lot of kids, I was their first real-life exposure to an amputee, meaning they'd never even heard of people like me, or they had seen an amputee on TV, but because the show went out of its way to avoid showing the person's stump, they assumed it must have been because there was "something scary at the end" that they weren't supposed to see (kids are surprisingly perceptive, they will pick up on stuff like that without you realising). And scared kids aren't good at articulating why they're scared, and would often say really mean or hurtful things to me. I knew not to take it personally and learned how to handle those situations, but not everyone is used to dealing with kids. For a new amputee (or anyone who's less confident in their disability), the kinds of things those kids would say could be absolutely confidence destroying. I never blame the kids, it's not their fault, but the whole situation could have been avoided if they had seen people like us before they had the chance to hear the wrong info. Good representation like this can be the difference between a kid crying, making throw-up sounds and calling an amputee "disgusting monsters" (all things I've had kids do/say) and them just being like "oh ok, cool."

[lamuradex]

i hear a good lyric and start mentally holding up blorbos like im in the home depot paint aisle comparing swatches

[lamuradex]

I don't know what to post about now.

I finished posting Tales of Hero City, and I've taken a break after finishing that, but I've got no idea what to do now. I've got stuff to edit, of course, but there's not much to post there.

Just a little lost right now.

[lamuradex]

Could the writer have a little bit of validation?

As a treat?

[lamuradex]

Never. I even try to ignore the automatic AI search result summary on Google, and actually look at the pages provided.

Might not be much more accurate, but I didn't ask it to summarise it for me. I don't want it.

Here's a test poll.

[lamuradex]

My Tales of Hero City Banners: Part 4

All were made in Photopea, using stuff from Google Images and my own hamfisted attempts with image editing.

I'll be posting them in short story order, so my skill level will jump up and down drastically in places, but oh well. Some of them are a mess, but I'm still proud of them. Enjoy!

16. Conflict of Interest

And the cloud squiggles are back. And they're red this time. I was trying to added ominousness for the approaching finale, but I think I failed. Reused Judgement, as usual, but then I had to make both Cosmo and Henchman 14 from scratch. 14 would later be reused for the remade Last Resort, back in part one. I think I did well on them both, Cosmo in a standard business pose, and I'm very happy with 14's gear themed Hawaiian shirt. Had to make the pattern myself. But, he is also doing the Justice Man pose, reused base again, which feels wrong somehow. 14 should never mimic Justice Man.

17. Cosmo's Story

I originally planned to have this one be just symbols, not people, Lucy's badge and Cosmo's logo. But, I forgot to put Cosmo's brand on the previous one, so I hadn't introduced it earlier, and so... I just didn't. I lessened the cloud squiggles, which is good, but Lucy flipped looks off for some reason. It's the hair and the legs I think. She looks like she's levitating. Passable but not great.

18. Final Retreat

I think I forgot to mention in the Post Match, but Final Retreat is a play on Last Resort, my first Tales story. Retreat as in a holiday. Anyway. This was just a big collage piece again, the background from Apocalypto Incident, and heroes from all the others, and I darkened the letters for drama. The hardest part was deciding who went where, to try and keep some balance. And I had to give subtle prominence to Henchman 14. I think it came out very well, ominous and busy, but I also don't know why Justice Man looks sorta blurry. It's odd. Maybe it's that backlighting I gave him.

19. Epilogues.

There's no story here. Take it back to basics for the end, use the red cape, done. The hardest bit was aligning some stuff. It all felt off.

20. Old Justice

And here we come to the end, or perhaps the beginning. The original was maybe the third banner I made, just going with a duller version of Last Resort. Remade however, I faded Justice Man's look, and even gave Henchman 14 a new shirt, harkening back to Last Resort with the layout. Nothing ground breaking, but I think it works. Solid B.

And that's it. All the banners I made for Tales of Hero City, apart from the one used for the W.I.P pages.

I still think this base one looks good. Quintessentially heroic.

And at least I caught that bloody typo that made its way into some of the early designs... eventually.

I'd posted several of these before I spotted that. Had to go back and fix them all. Maddening, I can tell you.

So, yeah, this was my foray into art to help advertise my stories, I have no idea how effective it was, but it was sort of fun. I'll most probably keep doing it if I ever get around to posting collection two... or finish writing collection two.

But that's all for now. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Toodles.

[lamuradex]

My Tales of Hero City Banners: Part 3

All were made in Photopea, using stuff from Google Images and my own hamfisted attempts with image editing.

I'll be posting them in short story order, so my skill level will jump up and down drastically in places, but oh well. Some of them are a mess, but I'm still proud of them. Enjoy!

11. Day of the Demons

I still like this one, but I'll admit it's a bit messy. Another collage piece, with more added to Hand of Fate, but I think that transparent Sanctimony looks snazzy. Not bad.

12. Jack's Story

How do you do a superhero banner for a story with no superheroes in in? The answer: You apparently make some rather crappy clouds. And that badge isn't brilliant either. And the Jack silhouette, which is just a vaguely darkened Detective. Honestly, I had no idea what to do for this and this is the best I could do. C-. Next.

13. Start of Watch

This is the last of the original batch I made back in March, and that Stealth Watcher is too wide. And too bright. And that cape is not aligned properly. I'd narrow Watcher in the future, but the colours I'll put down to this being his origin story, so he's still a novice. Yep, that's the explanation. Not me being bad at art.

14. Sidekicks Club

Oh, wow, this one turned out pretty bad. Justice Girl is alright, kind of, apart from those glasses (her mask) but that Night Guard. Oof. That cowl... She is supposed to be in shabby gear, but come on. I am impressed I managed to vary their builds, though still using the same pose. But then we get to the logo. That Sidekicks pasted on top looks terrible. And the light blue background does it no favours. This one's a mess. I'm sorry.

15. Lucy's Story

Okay, proud of this one. The cloud from Jack's Story is still bad, but I made it less bad. The badge is still awkward, but I the gun-metal silver does improve things. And then there's Lucy. That figure is actually an amalgam of other figures I found, one for the head, one for the raised arm with a cigarette, and I stuck them together myself, like Dr Frankenstein. I even made the little flame for the cigarette. Sure, the ponytail looks odd in silhouette, but I'm happy enough with that. I worked hard on this.