malcolmschmitz

[malcolmschmitz]

The one thing C.S. Lewis said that I still categorically agree with is that every age has its prevailing - he calls it "sin", I'd rather call it a "failure mode"- and people will try to paint that sin's opposing virtue as a vice.

In an age where people are cruel, people will try to paint kindness as weakness. In an age where people are greedy, people will try to call frugality tacky.

... I think our time's failure mode, at least in America, is despair. And people sure are quick to paint hope as complacency.

One of the major dividing lines of our age is between those who think it's worthwhile to cooperate and work with other people, accepting their flaws and limitations, to build something larger than ourselves, and those who think everything is fundamentally hopeless and that other people are corrupt, degenerate, and suspect. And the latter is not conducive to having any kind of culture at all.

[malcolmschmitz]

Burnout: Once I start in on a problem, I don't let go, regardless of the consequences.

I'm Okay, You're Okay: I have anxiety and am very good at calming myself down at this point.

It's For A Book: I write fantasy mysteries; if I was in the Eurekaverse I'd probably be a little more open about MY RESEARCH (TM) so I could Sleuth.

My Glasses!: Self-explanatory. My glasses are like an inch thick and I cannot see without them.

Showboater: as much as I hate it, I'm more than a little self-centered and like to be the center of attention, at all times, always.

The Other: Obligatory Autism Trait.

Fun Game: Make Yourself in 3-6 Eureka Traits!

There's a bit more to Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy character creation than just picking Traits, but this is a meme not a serious character creation session.

Make yourself in three to six Eureka Traits. Here's a big list of them. This isn't literally all the Traits, just the ones that have finished art. If you want to pick from all the Traits, feel free to download the free rulebook linked above! If you want to go a little further, you can explain your reasoning for why you picked each Trait and what they mean to you and about you.

Tag us, or just reblog your results onto this post! You don't have to make yourself either, it could be a character from pop culture, your friend, your OC, whatever! We wanna see what you do with it!

List of Traits (Non-Exhaustive)

Ambidextrous

Are You Thinking What I’m Thinking

Arithmomaniac

The Ascot

Ask Questions Later

Believer

Blissfully Ignorant

Bumbling Detective

Burnout

Cheerleader

Comfort Item

Dangerprone Damsel

Death Wish

Did You Know

Elementary!

Femme Fatale

Final Girl

Hard-Boiled

Hardy

It’s for a Book

I’m Okay, You’re Okay

Just Built Different

Just One More Thing

Kleptomaniac

Lovecraft Protagonist

Lover

Moneybags

My Glasses!

Night Owl

Nightstalker

Ninja

Not Finished Yet

The Other

Perfectionist

Push It

Predictable

Quick Draw

Renaissance Man

Rumbler

Showboater

Skeptic

Sleep on It

Smalls

Technically

Therapist

Unpredictable

Wicked

Wizened

Woo-Woo

[malcolmschmitz]

Gussie Fink-Nottle would do fucking numbers on this site

[malcolmschmitz]

saying ao3 needs to censor certain content is like saying a museum can't have still life art that includes strawberries because you don't like them.

these are not real strawberries. you do not have to, and in fact cannot, eat them. no one with a strawberry allergy will be harmed by looking at them. no migrant workers were exploited in the picking of these strawberries. there were no questionable farming practices or negative environmental impacts from growing or transporting them.

because - and i cannot stress this enough - they are not real strawberries.

if you don't like strawberries, you don't have to look at the paintings. in fact, you can get a map of the museum that lists what works are in what rooms and just. not go in there. if you see one by mistake, you can look away. just keep walking. there's plenty of other stuff to see.

yes, real strawberries can cause real quantifiable harm to real people.

but again. these are not real strawberries.

you may have whatever feelings you like about strawberries, and so can i. you can draw and write about whatever fruit floats your boat, and so can i, even if that happens to be strawberries. and we can hang our art side by side in the same gallery, provided you understand that my strawberries are not about you (and your kumquats are, shocker, not about me) and that - and this is true - neither are real.

and when the fascists break down the doors and grab all the strawberry paintings and heap them in the street and set them on fire, please know that they are coming for your kumquats next.

so if you want a place where you can show off your beautiful kumquat art safely, you're gonna have to tolerate having some strawberries in the next room.

and that's okay. because the strawberries aren't real.

[malcolmschmitz]

On top of that? Writers tend to get *better* with age. Being a writer requires a lot of reading, a lot of observation, and a lot of .. well... living.

If you're still in your 20s, you're only just getting started. You ain't seen nothing yet.

Anxiety: You're almost 30 and haven't published a single book. You wasted your chance to become a successful author!

Me: Stan Lee created Spider-Man at age 40. George R. R. Martin wrote A Game of Thrones at age 48.

Anxiety: Oh fuck nvm you do you, king.

[malcolmschmitz]

[malcolmschmitz]

ANNOUNCING: BRIGHT YOUNG THINGS

Hey, friends! I've got an exciting new announcement for you- the Super Secret Project that's been taking up most of my writing time is (starting to) come to fruition!

I'm partnering with Choice of Games to bring you an interactive fiction story called Bright Young Things: a game of justice, heroics, and an ever-widening gyre. It's a 1920s superhero story- think one part Jeeves and Wooster and one part The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

The world’s hung over from the War and the Flu. But the night’s young, the music’s loud, and you’ve got a city to protect… During the Great War, both sides used xyltraxazine- a dangerous new chemical weapon- to incapacitate the enemy. After the War, people who’d been exposed to xyltraxazine began to change, and not all for the better. Some of them gained strange abilities- incredible strength, inhuman speed, flight, shapeshifting, invisibility, or even mind control. The zills walk among us, and you never know who is one until they lift a motorcar. Some lost their minds, becoming anti-social, vicious, or outright murderous. The d—-ed blighters want to destroy the world for the fun of it.   Unfortunately, these two categories overlap… and that’s where you come in. London needs a hero; you need a distraction.     Discover your superpowers in 1920s London. Choose your past- were you a poor soldier? An ambulance driver? A rich kid in the officers’ tents? Choose your powers- are you a Herculaen, a speedster, an icarus, a skinchanger, or an invisible? Help the citizens of London - for fame, fortune, or the joy of doing the right thing. Fight petty crime, stop a runaway train, and kick the blighters into next week. Keep up a double life- or don’t. As a widowed person of quality, you’ve got to keep up appearances. Lords and ladies don’t acknowledge all this super-hero rot– and they certainly don’t participate in it. Will you hide behind a mask, or defend your do-gooding? What will you do when you have to be in two places at once? Fend off your feckless “friends” and hangers-on… or convince them to help you stop the end of the world as you know it.  Romance a messy young lord, an excitable pilot, your steadfast valet/lady’s maid, a canny cub reporter, or your childhood friend turned anarchist blighter. Or love them all, come what may. Balance Society’s expectations on your love- or flout them, and pursue forbidden romance. Uncover a blighter conspiracy that reaches the highest levels of government… or discover the method to the blighters’ madness, and join them. Save London from utter destruction, or rebuild it in your image in the aftermath. 

I'll talk more about this project on Patreon (and on Tumblr) as it progresses. Release date TBA- keep an eye on my Patreon (and/or email list and/or Tumblr) to see when it's coming out!

[malcolmschmitz]

i have a storytelling thing i like to call "making the jailer". its based on world of warcraft where in its eighth expansion shadowlands in order to up the stakes of the world it was decided that all of the previous villains where just pawns of a bigger badder guy called The Jailer. and it was terrible. it retconned so many previous storylines because none of that was ever planned. people hated the jailer. live service and long running series's will inevitably run into the moment where they want to up the stakes even further and when this time comes they may be tempted to create the jailer. You must avoid making The Jailer at all costs

[malcolmschmitz]

today’s my birthday 🎂

if you’d like to support me all I ask is that you buy and read my trans magical girl stories, tell your friends about them, and help me achieve total global magical girl literature domination 🥹👉👈

[malcolmschmitz]

[malcolmschmitz]

At this point we basically need to rebuild our literary-artistic culture from scratch, as if we all just lived through a very small apocalypse.

[malcolmschmitz]

The veneer was strong enough that the KGB and Soviet scientists were *also* studying this stuff, to be clear.

I love that psychic powers are still "allowed" in science fiction. They're an acceptable part of the aesthetic. Like you can't have magic, but you can have brain magic, because it's more Science.

[malcolmschmitz]

I've talked a little about the gods of THE CROWNKNAPPERS on here- especially Cymera, the goddess-god of death, change, metamorphosis, and trans people. And you seemed to like it and wanted to hear more, so....! Let's talk gods a little more, starting with more of Cymera.

Cymera is often depicted, in art, as a pair of figures- a male and female, holding hands or entwined. They're always wearing masks, or (rarely) carrying them. The Kingdom has had a run of nastily conservative Kings, but older depictions of Cymera tend to portray the duo as cymerans (read: trans people).

No two depictions of Cymera look the same, because Cymera rarely uses the same face twice. She appears to people on their dreams, more often than any of the other gods- but she often looks like *you*, or a recently deceased loved one. In particular, when your egg cracks, Cymera will show up to congratulate and comfort you... and they'll wear the face of your future self.

Cymera uses any pronouns, but people tend to refer to her as "she/her" most often. In-universe, this is because the temple of Cymera has taken up most of the kingdom's social services and charity- people see Cymera as a nurturing, motherly figure.

[malcolmschmitz]

It's me y'all, I'm bitches

[malcolmschmitz]

Hi! I recently came across a post you reblogged, the one about queer characters in a fantasy setting. I was curious, is the story you mentioned out? I'm very excited to read it if so!

Unfortunately I'm trying to traditionally publish it, so it's not going to be out (unless you know an agent? haha).

I've got other books for sale right now, so you can check me out on Amazon or Smashwords.

[malcolmschmitz]

...in other news, someone called The Misadventures of Sawbones and Its Menagerie "cozy fantasy" and now I'm actively offended.

[malcolmschmitz]

Thinking about the difference between "coziness" in cozy fantasy vs. cozy mysteries, and realized that the difference is basically the difference between a line and a veil in a TTRPG.

If you don't play indie TTRPGs- veils and lines are a way of curating your players' experience. At the start of a game that might contain difficult or triggering content, you lay out what you can and can't handle playing through "onscreen". If there's something you don't want to play through- bigotry, triggering situations, or just something that squicks you- you can choose to put it behind a veil or a line.

When you put something behind a veil, you're willing to acknowledge that it exists in the world, but you're not willing to engage with it extensively. There might be, say, transphobia going on in this world, it might even factor into another character's backstory, but you're never going to have to run your character interacting with a transphobe.

Conversely, if you put something behind a line, you're removing it from your game entirely. If transphobia is behind a line, it doesn't exist in your game world at all, no one is a transphobe, no one has transphobia in their backstory, etc.

I feel like... cozy mysteries tend to use veils to create their coziness, and cozy fantasy tends to use lines. And this leads to a mismatch in reader expectations that can really screw over writers who are writing (fantasy) (cozy mysteries) as opposed to (cozy fantasy) (mysteries).