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Them

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i miss them

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lil sketch of my babies

everyone say f u netflix

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Lucy and Lockwood

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I'm not familiar with the fandom, but this is absolutely despicable and has, unfortunately, but understandably, also made authors in our fandom feel unsafe to post a lot of their lovely work.

🚨 E-BOOK "AUTHOR" IS PLAGIARIZING PILGRIMAGE FICS 🚨

Buckle up, folks, this is gonna be a long one.

Our prolific author, @relicshamecircle (aka EnduringParadox on ao3) has been made aware of an e-book "author" named Layla Moran who has been blatantly plagiarizing her Diarmute fanfics and just changing the names and a few words around. This is absolutely unacceptable. I always like to think of this fandom as a safe haven and an accepting, kind community. But this is disgusting.

These are the three specific works listed on Layla's account that have been plagiarized from EnduringParadox:

This seems to be the work of someone within the fandom, because how else would she have found these fics and read them and decided to pass them as her own? So Layla Moran, if you follow me and you're reading this, you have made Pilgrimage fanfic authors, who are already so few and far between, feel unsafe to post without you getting your greedy hands on them and trying to take advantage of a small fandom for your own profit. Did you think you would never get caught? My advice to you would be to take down the works yourself before this has to get nasty.

To everyone else, I urge you to report and/or leave one-star reviews stating that they're plagiarized from fanfic. Links and proof below the cut:

The summary of The Beauty and His Beast:

Which is CLEARLY An Invitation to Happiness:

Ugh, Everild and Camdyn... what ugly names. But I digress. Here's the link to the GoodReads page if you feel so inclined to leave a one-star review and report.

An excerpt from An Invitation to Happiness, EnduringParadox:

"David hadn’t fought for glory or gold. At the time, he thought he’d stood for God—that the king’s cause, which he so readily made his own, was not only legitimate but justified both on earth and in the eyes of Heaven. More than five years later, carved into adulthood by the sword’s blade, his body a hardened knot of scarred skin, his throat ravaged by his own roars of rage and anguish, David knows better. That he had gone to war simply because he had been foolish. Because he’d been a young man but had still looked at war with a boy’s eyes—half a solemn duty, half a game. Something that would be done and done with satisfaction."

An excerpt from The Beauty and His Beast, Layla Moran:

"Everild Reed hadn't fought for glory or gold. At the time, he thought he'd stood for God--that the king's cause, which he eagerly made his own, was not only legitimate but justified both on earth and in the eyes of Heaven. More than five years later, carved into adulthood by the sword's blade and burdened with the weight of his choices, his body a hardened knot of muscle and scarred skin, Everild knows better now."

--

The summary of The Rancher's Mail-Order Husband:

Which, obviously, is Bluebells and Daylillies and Wild Roses Running Rampant:

Come ON, even naming Diarmuid's character "Ciarán"???? (And misspelling it Ciarian in the summary??) Here's a link to the GoodReads page. You know what to do.

And THIS ONE she's making money off of. You can buy it for $2.99 on Amazon.

Here's a link to the Amazon page, please report.

An excerpt from Bluebells and Daylillies and Wild Roses Running Rampant, EnduringParadox:

"David had almost joined their company. He’d gone nearly the entire war without being shot and damned if near the end of it all someone hadn’t gotten him right in the leg. The surgeon had told him they needed to take the entire limb. David had grabbed his collar, pulled him close until they were nose-to-nose, and gritted out that he’d break every one of his fingers if he tried it. He kept the leg, earned a limp, and found later, when he was beset by memories and the scent of blood and gunpowder, dizzy, pulse racing, that he’d gotten what they called the soldier’s heart, too."

An excerpt from The Rancher's Mail-Order Husband, Layla Moran:

"Graham had come close to joining the dead himself, narrowing surviving a gunshot wound to the leg near the warn's end. The surgeon wanted to amputate, and Graham, fueled by desperation, had snarled at him through gritted teeth, threatening to break his fingers if he so much as tried. He kept the leg but earn a limp that followed him everywhere, along with something the doctors called 'soldier's heart'--a condition that left him shaking, sleepless, and burdened with memories of blood and gunpowder."

--

And, finally, a summary of The Warrior and The Monk:

Which is just Temu how rich the earth, how bright the stars:

Here's a link to the GoodReads. Rate, report.

An excerpt from how rich the earth, how bright the stars, EnduringParadox:

"One morning, strangers in longships stepped onto the shore. Their arrival was no surprise. Along the sea's coast they drifted, slow, languid, in their monstrously large and narrow vessels with their monstrously large, woven sails dyed in bright, garish colors, a beacon to all that saw them, telling them—as their longships loomed like a pack of wolves stalking their prey—that they were coming."

An excerpt from The Warrior and The Monk, Layla Moran:

"One early morning, strangers in longships silently stepped onto the shore, their presence casting a heavy weight upon the land. Their arrival had been anticipated for days, maybe longer, and was no surprise to those who dwelled in the monastery overlooking the coast. The ships had been visible for miles as they drifted slowly, languidly, along the sea's edge, cutting through the waves like beasts with a purpose. They moved in their long, narrow vessels, which seemed both too large and too lean, with sails woven from thick cloth and dyed in bright, garish colors that stood out against the pale sea and sky. The sails themselves were like beacons, drawing attention,"

--

This is all so blatant and egregious. Shame on Layla. EnduringParadox is a kind and dedicated person writing all of these wonderful stories for our small fandom for FREE and Layla has taken advantage of that. We are small but we are mighty and protective of our own. Let's make Layla regret fucking with Pilgrimage.

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Lucy and Lockwood

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Lucy and Lockwood

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fanfic writing culture isn’t “oh dang! I wanted to write about this prompt with this character but someone else already wrote it, so now I can’t”.

fanfic writing culture is always “two cakes is better than one. the more the merrier. there can ever be enough fics of this character with this prompt!”

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Of course I’d love to see the “regular” merch ideas like T-shirts, socks, PJs, sketchbooks/notebooks, blankets, Skull in a jar decorations, costumes, phone cases & all that, not to mention DVDs & soundtracks, but I also have bunch of more specific ideas for the Lockwood & Co merch contest. For the board game there are still some variables and maybes, mainly because it would probably take a bit of playing to figure out what's best, but I think it could be good fun.

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Table of contents:

Introduction

Chapter 1: The Benefit of the Doubt - Or How to Master Job Interviews - by Lucy

Chapter 2: Avoiding Brain-ache - Or How to Keep a Casebook - by George

Chapter 3: Cake is Life - Or How (Not) to Stay Healthy - by Holly

Chapter 4: Almost Never - Or How to Master Communication - by Lucy

Chapter 5: Normal Has Never Fixed Anything - Or Reasons Not to Fire Your Colleagues - by Lockwood

Chapter 6: Trousers Are For Wimps - Or Talking Dress Code - by Kipps

Chapter 7: Just Reckless Enough - Or Ten Ways (Not) to Get Yourself Killed - by Lucy

Chapter 8: My Name is on the Sign - Or How to be a Leader - (Later edited to: Or I Would Have Had a Plan by Lucy) secretly drafted by Lockwood, published without permission by George

Chapter 9: Where is His Slap? - Or Ten Signs There Are Double Standards at Work - by George

Bonus:

I Don't Need Looking After - Or a Guide on Lucy Joan Carlyle by everyone

Two by my Count - Or a Guide on Quill Kipps by everyone

Just Think About it - Or a Guide on George Cubbins/ Karim by everyone

I Declined Them All - Or a Guide on Holly Munro by everyone

I'll Fix It - Or a Guide on Anthony John Lockwood by everyone

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F/M Couples

Semifinals

Anne and Gilbert :

"The ultimate enemies-to-friends-to lovers ship!"

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F/M Couples

Round 3

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F/M Couples S2

Round 2

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I SO agree with this. If I see an interesting-sounding fic and see that is has 10k+ words I'll just deflate and resign to probably never getting around to read it. My attention span is not that long. My eyes need breaks. I need breaks. I can't even hype myself up to read it (though that might be ADD) because I just dread reading such long things in one go because I know I'll loose focus. If it's one big thing, it's so hard to find where I left off or even remind myself what happened! For chapters, I can easily make a bookmark noting which chapters I've already read.

Another thing from an author's point of view (at least mine) is: why would I post it in one big chunk, for a lot of people to probably skip or take a long while to read it, to possibly get one interaction out of it, when posting in several chapters might increase traffic and the number of comments/interactions? (Though this also applies to chaptered fics that are still posted all at once, but at least in terms of readability that's easier to handle for me.)

I get that sometimes it's difficult to find the right place for a chapter break, but I'd rather take a scene continuing after a break than being overwhelmed by super long chapters.

Where have all the chapters gone

Something I've noticed over the past year with fanfic is, there's a tendency to post fics in one big chunk, rather than breaking the story into chapters. I don't know why that is, if it's due to a more "instant gratification" posting model, or if people don't know how to break the work into chapters anymore or find it stressful, or maybe they find it a hassle to have to do more than one post on AO3. I don't know. I don't get it.

Combined with that, I keep thinking about this post from a few weeks ago, about the longest fics people had read, because those were all multi-chapter works. And not just split into parts, but they all had approx. standard length chapters - that is, the 1-5k words per chapter that is the publishing industry standard, with the majority falling into the 3-4k range.

Part of the point of fic is that it isn't subject to those standards, of course. Fic writers can write whatever they want and post it however they want.

That said, the industry standard for chapter length isn't arbitrary. There are some good reasons for it, which can be summed up as: readability and accessibility. For the reader.

Because it's as a reader that I've noticed the above patterns. I find it really hard to read fics on AO3 that have individual parts over 6000 words. If it strays over 8k, it might - maybe - go on my Marked for Later list.

If an individual chapter - be that 1/1 or 1/100 - is over 10k, I actually will typically ignore it altogether.

For writers I already know and love, I will probably put the long ones on the Marked for Later list, and at some future point, I may put in the preparatory effort it takes me to be able to read such a large chapter. I also might not be able to read it, and if I'm not familiar with the writer's work, well, I'm not going to be, either.

And yes, this is absolutely a "me problem". No one is obligated to post fic in a format that is more friendly to me as a reader. I completely acknowledge and accept that.

But I'm also a writer, who posts stories because I want people to read them, same as most other writers. So for me, if there's something that's preventing people from reading my fic (other than disinterest in topic, pairing, etc.), then I'd like to know about it, so I can evaluate my own posting practices and try to include those readers if I can.

And as a reader, well, I ain't that special. If a 15k single chapter fic presents accessibility issues to me (because I find it overwhelming; because I look at how long it is and even if I want to read it and open the page in the browser, my brain says no, cannot commit), then it will be doing the same for other readers, too. There will be a set of people who would like very much to read that fic, who simply aren't able to cope with it in one great big chunk.

Something to maybe think about if you are one of those lovely individuals who write longer fic. :-)

ETA: to clarify, I mean completed works, being posted once the entire thing has been written. No WIP nervousness, just several smaller chunks posted in one go.

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35 Portland Row

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Oh to have one of those friendships where people are surprised that you’re not dating……

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Here's the Locklyle edit I made for @islayhawkin as her Secret Spectre gift. I hope you all enjoy it as well and would love if you left a comment if you did. 🥰