#Traditional publishing is fucking hard

[dandthegods]

It’s LIVE!!!

my updated website with all the short stories I’m super proud of is live! there’s a lot of myths, monsters, and a few ghost stories. (and there’s a couple Batman fan fictions too)

and please please please check out Kim Holm’s art (@denungeherrholm). He’s super gracious and generous with the use of his work and I’m so glad to have it paired with my stories.

hope you enjoy!

[badlydrawnronpa]

hi anon ty for sending the message! I did look through their blog and they very obviously use AI - I would've published the ask normally to let other people know but I decided against it in the end because after a closer inspection I noticed that all commissions are fake (besides being fake art I mean) and they're not actually scamming anyone because. uh. literally most of the blogs I saw interact with them are empty rp blogs that are blatantly controlled by them and one of the commissions I saw on their patreon was for a defunct ohsc rp blog from 2014??? Which honestly was really funny.

so yeah, they're very much not pulling any money from that, and on top of it all they posted pics of themselves sooooo yeh, not going to blast them on a blog with a big following for trying the 'i dont use ai im a real artist' but ultimately not scamming anyone out of their money. They're also not the best at like... hiding they're using AI because you can see their traditional art in other posts, and the style or experience level doesn't match at all.

I will post some of their AI stuff underneath the read more and point out the inconsistencies tho, to help out other people in spotting out ai shit (esp non artists that might have an harder time figuring things out). If you find out the original user that posted these, please don't harass them, be civil.

BTW I'M SAYING THIS NOW: if you see something I point out and say ''ah, I do that, I'm in trouble" - no you're not, if you actually draw the stuff yourself. You can see when an artist's work (and mistakes!) are genuine. Beginner's mistakes can be made by experienced artists too, but if you look at their entire body of work you can see when something doesn't add up.

to start off, I saw anon calling them out on this one so I'm just reiterating some of the points, but here's some junko 'art' they made

when confronted abt it, they said that the fingers look weird because they can't control their shaky hands and drawing small is hard. anyway if you draw digitally you can zoom in on the canvas and work on a detail as big as you need, so that excuse doesn't hold

this other post was basically what made me just say 'yep thats ai' and it was just the second 'art' post I saw from them

while taken alone they could've been a little harder to spot as AI, with them all bundled together you can easily see they came from the same prompt; the user tried to justify the inconsistencies saying it was because they were 'experimenting' with the design of their oc and gundham's scar but I'm telling you now, no sane artist fully renders four pieces that are basically the same concept while changing the design of the character just slightly in every single one of them. anyway, here's the breakdown of every piece:

another that was way easier to break down because it's so full of inconsistencies the moment you really take a look at it

also let's be real if you render art like that you're not gonna put a bright purple unreadable text on your supposed vtuber "art"

let's end this with the AI "commission" that could be harder to break down as AI if seen in a vacuum now, shall we? esp because our friend, the fucked up melty finger, isn't there

I honestly had to look for a while at this one because if you had shown it to me and I didn't see the other stuff this person posted, I could've just chalked up a lot of these mistakes to human error. Tangents between lines, scribbles for details, forgotten uncolored sections is all normal stuff. BUT we know this person used AI in all the other posts, so we know what to look at:

again, some mistakes the AI does can be also mistakes actual artists do: be sure to check the other art the user makes before throwing accusations

they also posted a fake speedpaint that is so embarassing it made me laugh but if I start pointing out inconsistencies in an AI speedpaint we're gonna be here for a long time, so.

TL;DR AI 'ART' SIGNS:

The classics: hands and fingers don't make sense, there's additional weird lines and they melt into other part of the drawing

long hair strands and other long or flowy elements can suddenly disappear behind objects and not reappear where they should

jewels, intricate details, hairpins and other accessories bend and melt into each other and other part of the design

the resolution of the image is very low and/or grainy - a lot of artists post lower res pieces online, but again: look for a pattern and combos of all the other signs

inconsistencies between multiple art posts, character designs constantly being different, sudden art style changes - while this can also be found with real artists, this is an additional tell of someone using AI, when combined with the stuff I mentioned above. humans mistakes usually have a reason for what they happen, AI makes them because it doesnt understand what it's doing most of the time

[batboyblog]

Your posts do more to promote the good democrats do than any sitting democrat does.

well thats very kind, thank you.

I think it's more we, all of us, live in an age of intention media and social siloing. We have blinders on, we put them on ourselves over years, we only go onto 2-3 web sites, get our news from one maybe two places and talk to people who already agree.

there are studies that show social media intentionally place negative stories in front of users because if you feel shitty you stay on-line scrolling. The traditional media is much the same, if it bleeds it leads, they've long been conditioned to view good news as basically boring and reporting on the good any administration does as serving as the White House's mouth piece

On top of which it's hard to escape the feeling that the media actively misses Trump. He was very good for business, meanwhile books on Biden's well functioning administration of people who get along and work well together are being straight up dropped by publishers because they think no one wants to read that. Trump had all the drama a reporter looking for a book deal could ever want.

All by way of saying Democrats are trying, or some of them are, but people choose not to look, and also social media isn't going to feed it to people by algorithm and the traditional media will at best cover It briefly in passing

also sadly for Tumblr everyone assumes we're dead. So no news organizations have active Tumblrs, no politicians or campaigns. Misinformation from other web pages, bots, and trolls have kinda free reign here

so I'm chugging along with my happy little counter programing because facts fucking matter (and it pisses some people off a lot lol)

[joyburble]

So, we see Donfang Qingcang reading on screen several times, and I think it's an important character message.

On encountering a problem, in episode 4, that can't be addressd by violence, what is the first thing our character does? He RTFMs. He sends Shanque to fetch the Fucking Manual, and he Reads It. What. In fact, they both read it, at least until they find the right bit.

Iconic. And adorable.

Definitely much less surprising in a Chinese genre than it would be in any English-language genre. But this section is so spectacular I want to give it a lot of weight.

The scroll is extremely long. He baulks, for a second, at the length,

but this, his face says, cannot possibly defeat him: he backs himself (I love it) and gets down to work.

It's illustrated. I'd love to hear from someone who can read any part of the text. He engages in detail with the content.

He continues in episode 5, having made some progress, and still backing himself to work out what it all means.

He takes it out on the balcony to study it by daylight. When his plans don't succeed at first, he doesn't reject the information, he thinks about it harder and compares it with the data.

Then something interesting happens: after making Orchid's tummyache better, he sits down, and without any stated reason tries to read something else, which looks like a completely normal book:

He can't focus because she's so sad, but we get a glimpse of the corner of a title label. When he puts it down, we can see it's a paperback stitched in the traditional Chinese manner.

It could be anything, but looks a reasonable size for a novel. There are also some other books on the table. Maybe they're technical works from Xiao Lanhua's library, and he's just bored and curious?

This wouldn't be as clear if it was the only example, or if we saw other characters repeatedly reading. But I don't think we do.

In episode 18 post-whump we learn again that what he does to relax and distract himself, when in pain and/or wanting attention, is read a book. It's a slim volume with a vertical format and a pretty, embellished cover. Perhaps a book of poems?

In Episode 26, now knowing he is loved, he is reading for fun again, with no explanation asked or given. Another sewn book, but in this case it has a hard cover with a shiny and colourful design. What could it be? Who knows? It seems to be making him smile a little.

The message we are getting, here, is that what he does when he wants to relax and enjoy life, is read. We’re supposed to understand that in his natural disposition, minus his father’s crimes and his profession of violence, he is a gentleman and a scholar. He is curious. He is capable of handling new information. He has brains and capabilities and ingenuity. He has a big ego, but he can put it in the engine room, not the driving seat. It's a gently-delivered message, but I think it contributes a lot to our perception of the character.

In dream-world episode 31, he is reading a scroll with Xiao Lanhua. Are they reading a story to each other? Doing the voices?

So apparently in his imagination it's a bonding activity too: you can read together with a person you love and share your reactions. A bit like you and I are doing now.

Finally, I think they published this behind-the-scenes shot for a reason (thank you @moonsupremesblog, and I'm sorry this probably should have been a reblog of this post but I got too far in before I remembered)

We can see it's Dylan Wang referring to a script, but we do a double-take because it's totally in character, the lighting, composition, and depth-of-field intentionally reinforce that effect, and we have to look at the plastic cover and the little place-tags to realise it isn't.

[tyetknot]

I thought you were joking when you said that the Farrar's books were outdated but holy shittt, even for 1970s wicca/witchcraft those guys were like full gender heterosexual white magic ye harm none thing, I was also seeing their interview were christian kids interview them, and boy it is hard to watch, but on to my question kskk, do you know if they changed later down?,like Janet seems to be okay sometimes,I can't find anything of them on their "controversial views" except their later polyamorous relationship (wich come to think of it I would love to hear their gender rationale on that), and also, how do you personally (if you do so) reconcile this type of author?, like there is no doubt that they are important in craft history, but now they kinda do more harm than good.

Hi Anon! I'm sorry if you've been waiting for a bit, you know how Tumblr is.

So one thing it's important to remember is: back in the 1970s and 80s a religion where women run the show was very progressive. Feminism got bolted onto Wicca pretty quickly once it hit the American West Coast and Starhawk wrote The Spiral Dance. Things like worshipping a goddess who didn't need a man around to tell her what to do were really unusual for the time. All this hippie-dippy shit like being naked in your rituals and such was far out, man, not like those totally square and boring Christians.

The problem is that, like many older people who were once cool and progressive, they just kind of stopped where they were in the 70s and 80s and didn't really......well, progress past that point. This leads to things like statements like that one in A Witches' Bible where they think that actually gay people are perfectly OK in ritual (this was a bit of a controversial point at the time) as long as they act like their biological gender, which is hilarious to us in 2024 because they obviously conflate being gay with being trans in some bizarre fashion. This was progressive for the time. It comes across as incredibly ignorant today. And of course, if their ideas did change, well, the book is already out there, people are reading it, and you can't go back in time and change something that's already been published. You can add notes or amendments to further editions, but I don't believe they ever did that, and Stewart Farrar died in the early aughts.

I find the polyamory thing to be pretty cringe, NGL, because I am a judgmental and suspicious piece of shit and think that an awful lot of the time polyamory is a tool used to make younger women sexually available to older men - good Lord, the age difference between Stewart and Janet - and that's very distasteful.

In my opinion the Farrars are probably the stodgiest and most conservatively-written books you'll find from that time period, and they're a good example of what coven-based Alexandrian Wicca looked like at that time, but there were a lot of more relaxed writers out there at the time and LOTS more a few years later. My primary complaint with A Witches' Bible is rather specifically that asinine Oak King / Holly King thing which they made up entirely and then ineptly shoehorned into the Wheel of the Year, where it just doesn't fucking work, and then everyone else just kind of went with it. No! It sucks and is bad, don't do it!

Do I think they do more harm than good? No, I don't. I think that anyone fairly new to Wicca shouldn't read this book first thing out the gate because it sets a lot of very unrealistic expectations, and because it's pretty old - Eight Sabbats for Witches was published in 1981, which makes it a few years older than me, and The Witches' Way in 1984, which makes it a year younger than me, and TBH there's much newer and fresher material being published every year. I would much sooner recommend someone like Thorn Mooney to new person interested in traditional Wicca.

[ponett]

hello!

Happy Birthday and Merry Christmas 🎄🎁🎉 😄

I was gonna ask when the series had gone on a little longer, but since you got gifted "Do A Powerbomb", I was wondering if you'd checked out DWJ's Transformers run?

Have a wonderful day! 🌠

I have! I've been following it as it comes out and was completely enamored with it by the end of the first issue, which is why I wanted to read Do a Powerbomb (which also completely owns)

After IDW lost the Transformers license I kind of dreaded what a new publisher might do with the property. IDW had pushed Transformers into so many new and exciting directions over the years, giving me some of my favorite Transformers stories ever and shaping other parts of the franchise for years to come (and also making a ton of Transformers canonically queer). The last thing I wanted was for a new publisher to throw all that out and just go back to square one with easy G1 cartoon nostalgia. Especially after I ended up being really unenthused with the post-continuity reboot "IDW2" era, I worried that it could be years and years before we got another new Transformers comic that really spoke to me like the MTMTE/RiD era did

And then Daniel Warren Johnson's Transformers dropped from Skybound. Despite leaning so hard into G1 cartoon aesthetics, and despite being part of a new shared universe with the okay-but-not-amazing Void Rivals by Robert Kirkman and some GI Joe comics I don't really care about, I was cautiously optimistic because I'd previously heard really good things about DWJ's other work. And I've just been absolutely blown away by it. It's already one of the greatest Transformers comics ever made

From the very first page you can tell it's doing new things with the traditional Transformers iconography, while also tapping into the heart of the series better than anything else I've seen in years. The hand-inked art can be a little loose and messy, but that helps give it so much energy, ESPECIALLY in the inventive fight scenes. Whether it's vehicle mode action, Optimus doing literal wrestling moves on Decepticons, or even just a panel of someone transforming, there is SO much life in all of DWJ's drawings. But he also cares about tying things to the human cast in really compelling ways. We've already gotten so many good scenes between the robots and the humans that give it so much heart. The deer scene with Optimus and Spike went viral for a reason, it was instantly one of the best Optimus Prime scenes ever written. It's not just about the robots or the humans, it's about the dichotomy between them. He gets it

I love a lot of IDW's comics that are just about robots interacting with other robots many light years from Earth and barely ever even transforming on the page, but like. This is the comic you wanna hand to someone to be like "This is what Transformers is about. This is why it fucking rules"

Seriously, though. Anyone with even a passing interest in Transformers should be reading these. I am constantly on the edge of my seat waiting for the next issue these days. Look, Optimus literally suplexes Starscream in the first fucking issue YOU HAVE TO READ THIS

[grison-in-space]

I'm increasingly unconcerned about linking up my professional and personal names lately. Like... fuuuuuck it. I've already had my grad supervisor freak out and try to murder my fledgling career once. I don't ever say shit I don't reasonably think I can justify, and I'm willing to say I'm wrong when I am. Who cares if those things blur together? The autism is the biggest, deepest, darkest secret I have. Whoopee, I'm working on autism now and there's a little knot of us to make friends with.

It's not hard to figure out who I am, but it's also not like I'm hot shit. I'm recovering from a really, really shitty PhD over eight years culminating into the worst of COVID, and I move a lot slower than I used to. I have like four published papers, of which I am the first author of three, and they span a bewilderingly disconnected range of fields. (Evolutionary biology, neuroendocrinology, acoustic communication, same-sex reproductive behavior as a concept, and an unpublished paper about eavesdropping and audience selection.) There are throughlines but I can't emphasize enough how weirdly field spanning my background is. And I'm doing neurodivergence across axes of motivation and how that impacts movement thresholds right now, geometric measures of animal motor behavior, and machine learning.

What the fuck is my life, and also, it's not like I'm the kind of person who fits a normal academic tenure track and like. Gets a job specializing in that thing. Fuck knows if I'm going to get to stay in the field, but I can't move again so if my postdoc runs out and I can't get a tenure track job at my current institution, I'm going to get out of the traditional academia game and do something mindless like going to be a data scientist somewhere. Ideally somewhere remote where I can be a pretty severely disabled scholar who is now riddled with PTSD on top of AuDHD and, like, have that matter to literally anyone.

Also, I played a foundational role in community building in the asexual community about ten years ago, although I'm a big old burnout on that front [see here "riddled with PTSD"]. So I know I have more than a few pseudonymous literary citations in that vein, too.

Fuck it. What have I got to lose?

[safarigirlsp]

🌭🍔🥑 for the fic asks! Love ya!!

This was such a fun couple days thanks to you @babbushka ! We need to keep this up! It’s beyond wonderful to have you back! 💗💗💗

🍔What's a headcanon that hasn't made it into a published fic yet?

Ok this is the most fun question! We should just have a weird and random HC day lol!

Flip loves vintage advertising. Those old sporting calendars you used to see in hardware stores and sporting goods stores that have nostalgic paintings or action scenes from the old west with cowboys and gunfighters and hunters and mountain men. They're his primary decor in his cabin. Walking through that heavy wooden door, you could just as well be stepping back one hundred years, especially since it's far enough from town that no lights shine at night and there are no sounds other than those made by the forest and wildlife.

Flip loves dive bars. He can take you out dancing or wine and dine you somewhere swanky, and he does often. But there's something about the gritty familiarity of a dive bar - the neon lights, the bad taxidermy, the sticky floor, the smell of greasy food, whiskey, and smoke, Johnny Cash playing on the jukebox - that really gets him riled up and hot under the collar.

Friday nights after he gets off, he asks you to meet up with him and the guys for some greasy food and a beer. Work weighs heavily on his shoulders and he takes it seriously. His usual approach to stress is to sweat it out with a vigorous workout. Weights, running, or punching a heavy bag are best. A vigorous fuck works too. He tries to get his heart racing with one method in the morning and the other in the evening. But he takes Friday nights to unwind in more traditional ways, out someplace with friends and his girl. In a dive bar, he can be boisterous and crude, laugh loud and tell raunchy jokes with Ron, make you sit on his thigh and shamelessly grab your ass, kiss your neck and growl absolute filth in your ear. For his money, it beats the hell out of going someplace he actually has to behave and act civilized.

Challenging you to a game of pool is a favorite go-to. He usually throws the game just to watch you gloat. And more importantly, to watch you bend over the pool table and stretch out prettily to make a shot. It makes his blood run hot, makes him hard in his jeans, when he looks down your shirt or eyes your ass like a dirty old man. He loves that you're all his to eye all he wants. You know this, of course, and naturally play it up a little extra for his enjoyment. When you draw attention from other men in the bar, you know that too, but it's just so much fun to see Flip puff out his chest a little and glare at your fan club. Once or maybe twice according to Flip's count, this has culminated in a bar fight with you icing his bruised knuckles and kissing his bloody lip late into the night. But you should see the other guys. According to a more accurate and unbiased count - yours - this happens almost annually. It's a nice treat to look forward to once a year or so. And the fireworks he gives you afterwards are a helluva lot better than the Fourth of July.

🌭Do you have any writing rituals to help 'get in the zone'?

I really like watching movies with the vibes I’m going for while I’m writing or having them play in the background. I've currently exhausted my Victorian watchlist while I've been working on my current fic. I also like to read similar things too but that's obviously more time consuming. I recently discovered a fun series you might like with campy Victorian antics by Evie Dunmore.

When I'm a little stuck or need to picture something better, something physical helps my brain function a little. Lifting weights works for me and although I truly hate cardio, it helps to get my thoughts churning. Probably because I'm so bored and miserable, but I'll take what I can get xD.

Then there's always good ol' maladaptive daydreaming.

Omg all the edits that have been coming around the last couple years have really helped keep me rabid. Especially during these content dry spells when there's no new movies on the horizon to look forward to.

I love making aestheics/moodboards for myself and I have a ton that have never seen the light of day because they're just for me or to scratch an itch. It's extra fun because it satisfies both an artsy urge and helps stay in the zone for fics. But sometimes they also derail me with a new idea and I deviate to write a fic for the moodboard xD

These are some of my favorites that don't go with a posted fic. I may have a problem!

This is my recent desktop backgrounds:

🥑What are you currently working on?

I have one big fic that I'm currently focused on. Which is really the biggest challenge for me, just staying focused on any one thing OMG. But I'm right at the finish line for this one, then I have to chose which idea to focus primarily on next. I'm trying really hard to get some bigger projects done just because they have a chance of potentially being serious writing. And frankly because the engagement is down here, but if that changes, I'm more than happy to change with it and get rabid again. Even these HCs today are such a fun little burst of creativity!

Wargrave Hall

Victorian haunted house and occult story with romance of course. I have about 1/3 of this posted now publicly but its gotten too big to update my fic post now, which really pisses me off actually xD. I'm very near the end and it's just under 100k now, so it will probably finish somewhere around 110K and then I'll post it all. I'm having a lot of fun with it and it's much better than I thought it'd be when I started it. In my humble, biased opinion anyway.

Annees Folles

Roaring Twenties adventure story with a love triangle and plenty of romance and treasure hunting. This is hovering around 150k now and has never been published, although I've sent it to my friends here who have shown interest. I'd be happy to send it to anyone who's consistently supported my insanity. It's definitely my favorite thing I've written so far and has everything I love. After I finish the Victorian fic, my goal is to get this one finished too so I have two big quality fics in the bank, then start a new project. I'm probably 7/10 done with this one, so it will be a big one when completed.

I might be obsessed with the aesthetic...

[pathogenflock]

Name: Rafael

Pronouns: he

Interests: Nathan Pandit

adults, minors, employed people, unemployed people, chronically online people, acutely offline people, ai artists, traditional artists, digital artists, bots, real people, aspiring authors, published authors, starving artists, well-fed artists, nsfw accounts, sfw accounts, people who think in black and white, people who acknowledge nuance, neurotypical people, neurodivergent people, blond people in romantic relationships with other blond people, polyamorous, monogamous, polygamous, men, women, everyone between and outside of that, anyone to whom that spectrum as a whole does not apply, people in healthy relationships (mutually toxic ones are fine as long as you let me watch ^-^), allocishet people, aroace trans gay people, pregnant people of any gender at their late 2nd- early 3rd trimester, French people (Quebecois people are on thin ice, but the rest of Canada also DNI), my 5th grade english teacher, gays, lesbians, bisexuals, pansexuals, polysexuals, omnisexuals, police without a warrant, police with a warrant, drunk driving antis and neutrals, woke moralists, asleep degenerates, people with blue or green eyes, people with cavities, small business owners, megacorp CEOs, microorganisms that cannot breach the blood-brain barrier, vivisection antis, fandom elders, fandom middle-aged, fandom youths, people who dont read DNIs if theyre "too long," people with long DNIs cus im not reading that shit, people who send death threats, discord e-daters (i hope you break up), selfship haters bc why do you hate fun, medical malpractice lawyers, my ex-wife Miranda and her stupid fucking lawyer you can keep the house but you'll never have my dignity you stupid assholes 🖕🖕🖕🖕, my beloved son Eduardo except on weekends, flat earthers, globe earthers, earth "neutrals," people who hate on online relationships or think they dont "count," pro shippers, pro kayakers, and pro skaters, people who donate to ao3 (this one's for real), monolinguals, trilinguals, selfshippers lmaoo thats so cringe sorry, transphobes (homophobes are fine), anyone located within 50 kilometers of -57.40378, 118.63882, twinks, bears (person not the animal), activists, staticists, gambling addicts but if you send me $50 i may or may not take you off this list, autism moms, autism dads, autism parents who lost it all in the divorce (now demoted to neurotypical parent), autism not the step dads but the dads that stepped up, people who think women can get pregnant (only men do that), people who cant solve my riddles three, bears (the animal), The Bear (the show), people with "ironic" dni lists who are trying way too hard to be funny, debt collectors, toothpaste flag users, toothbrush flag users, "we live in a simulation" dumbasses, anyone whose high school mascot was that shitty bulldog png (you know the one), furries (scalies are fine). may add more

People with the first name "Nathan" and the last name "Pandit."

[ladamedusoif]

Books (Professor!Ben x OFC Lydia)

A Merry Fic-Mas - December 14

Part of A Merry Fic-Mas: A Holiday Fic Calendar - click for masterlist.

Follow @ladameecrit for my writing updates!

Pairing: Professor!Ben x OFC!Lydia (part of the Visiting universe)

Word count: 848

Warnings: Language, angst, pining

Rating: Teen

Summary: What’s the harm of imagining an alternative future, when you’re lonely this Christmas?

This Fic-Mas story can be read as an add-on/deleted scene to Chapter 8 of Visiting, 'Sister Winter'.

Iceland has this thing called Jolabokaflod - literally, “book flood”. It can mean the rush of new books published for Christmas gifts, or it can mean the tradition associated with them. 

Put simply, the idea is that on Christmas Eve, you exchange books with your nearest and dearest. And then everyone snuggles up in bed, armed with hot chocolate and candy, and reads their new book. 

It sounds like heaven. 

The book flood tradition pops into your mind as you place a neatly-wrapped selection of books under the tree at your parents’ house on Christmas Eve. And with it, a pang, and another thought. 

Ben would love that. 

“Fuck,” you mutter to yourself, trying to fend off the thoughts of him. “I think it’s time for bed.”

You creep up the stairs, last one to turn in for the night, and nestle in with your hot water bottle. 

You wish he was keeping you warm, girl. 

“Fuck.”

Sleep doesn’t come easy. And you begin to imagine, to let yourself daydream (if one can call it that) about an alternative reality, an alternative future, if only for the night. 

It is Christmas, after all. It’s canonically a time for what might have beens, for counter-factuals. What was A Christmas Carol, if not that? And - even more obviously - what of It’s A Wonderful Life?

Alright, you think, maybe it’s not quite the same. Clarence the Angel had to show George Bailey how much better he made the world, and how wonderful his life actually was. And Dickens showed Scrooge terrible things, to help him change - a far cry from the cosy scene you were about to conjure up. 

Still, the point stands. What if things were different? What if things could be different? 

You close your eyes and let your mind wander, telling yourself it’s just idle fantasy. It’s not hurting anyone. Right?

So indulge. Find comfort in thinking about how it might be, could have been. Imagine the comfort of books, of warmth, of him.

You had thought for a long time about the book for Ben. Eventually, you settled on a personal favourite, one that reflected your personality, your interests, yourself: The Belly of Paris, by Émile Zola. You knew he hadn’t read it - “just Thérèse Raquin and Germinal”, he’d told you as you raved about Zola’s books - and you wanted to see what he thought. 

The edition is a recent translation, a handsome paperback, and you wrap it up in brown paper and add a length of dark red ribbon, placing it under the tree to await Christmas Eve. 

The next day, it’s joined by a matching book-shaped gift: this time wrapped in dark green paper, your name written in his distinctive handwriting on an old-fashioned gift tag. 

Christmas Eve is idyllic: mulled wine, old movies, talking and preparing food for the next day’s meal as the snow falls softly outside. By about 8 that evening, you’re settled cosily on the couch and your eyes land on the little packages. 

“Time for book flood, I think.”

Ben smiles as you reach under the tree and retrieve the gifts. “You want to open them here?”

“I’d rather do it in bed, baby. C’mon, grab some hot chocolate.” 

He follows you upstairs to bed, making you giggle as he purrs in your ear: “Gonna make you read soooooo much, Lyd. We’re gonna read so hard.”

You wiggle your eyebrows at him as you join in the suggestive jokes, pulling him close to you. “Well, you know I can keep reading for hours, Benjamin.”

You can. And you do. 

Ben’s book gift to you is a gorgeous vintage copy of Love in the Time of Cholera, which you clutch to your chest in delight. He opens his parcel carefully, a wide smile spreading across his face as he recognises the title. 

“Émile. Of course.”

And now it’s just the two of you, side by side in bed, the only sounds the occasional crackle from the tall candles you’d lit in the bedroom, one or both of you sipping your hot cocoa, and the turning of the pages. 

Without lifting his eyes from Zola, Ben’s left hand finds your right, and holds it: safe, secure. Your thumb traces over his tattoo, making him hum quietly with pleasure. 

“Imagine if we hadn’t figured things out”, you muse, eyes still fixed on Garcia Marquez. 

Ben turns and looks at you, eyes warm and expression most serious. “Not figuring things out was never an option.”

When you wake in the grey light of Christmas morning, it takes a moment for you to remember.

The pain hits you all over again. The fantasy - simplistic and all as it might have been - had been too convincing, and facing reality feels even harder. 

You can hear your family already waking and pottering about the house, little nieces stampeding out of the spare room they’re sharing with your sister and brother-in-law for the holidays. 

Craving the warmth of a familiar hand on yours, you turn over and cry into the pillow. 

[postal-ech]

Alright, I need to throw some more shit on here because once again, Metroid has an iron god damn grip on my brain.

If there is something I truly wish nintendo would accept for once in their lives, its bringing in some fan talent to work on metroid - much like how sega has brought on fan talent for sonic.

Because jesus fucking christ, there are some music artists out there that make some genuinely good covers and original tracks.

Take for example, Seregoss - This absolute mad lad makes some high energy remixes of metroid alongside his own tracks for some original projects, and they slap SHIT!

Like this S.E.R.R.I.S remix he's made. holy FUCK IT FUCKS HARD.

Or one of my absolute favorites, SynaMax

He does more than just make original tracks, he has straight up gone into the rabbit hole of finding the source of EVERY SINGLE SYNTH INSTRUMENT EVER USED IN THE PRIME TRILOGY.

NOT ONLY THAT, he has made MANY tracks with this library, and even released the information on the sources to the wide web as well as most of the samples that can be used! Now the downside of course is that he hasn't published ALL of these found samples yet, and I really hope he does, cause god dammit

Metroid Prime has such a unique soundscape that no other franchise has ever managed to captured, even with later metroid games as well, and I NEED MORE PEOPLE TO MAKE MUSIC WITH THIS SHIT.

He nails the vibe, so much so that I wish Retro picked him up to make music for Prime 4 cause god damn, it fits REALLY well.

For those aspiring musical artists out there, sincerely take a gander at the sample library of the Prime Trilogy, this shit needs to spread further out on the internet cause it is CRIMINAL that a lot of these samples had nearly become lost media in their own right.

That also leads me into the second portion of this blog, god fucking dammit I just love the Trilogy's music. I could go on, and on, and ON about my favorite tracks in the entire series - from the Chozo Ruins and Overworld of Prime 1, to fucking EVERYTHING in Prime 2 (Yes, Prime 2 is my favorite despite the keyhunting bullshit, and the music is peak to me), and Prime 3's mix of orchestral instruments alongside those classic synths we've come to know and love.

The highest peak of the trilogy if you ask me is Sanctuary Fortress.

No matter what, I always remember the first time reaching that area and hearing that techno-like, harsh yet almost spiritual vibe of the Fortress, and GOD - seeing that skybox on the outline, it always made me wish you could go down there to explore the Luminoth city that was abandoned so long ago, yet remains lit and functional to this day.

Prime 2 if you ask me has the better soundtrack in the trilogy just due to the sheer amount of original tracks, but also torvus bog and the flooded temple area too, its just too god damn good.

God, I really hope Prime 4 keeps to the tradition of god tier music, and reincorporates some of the instrumentals that the trilogy is known for.

[pridepages]

Give and Take: A Power Unbound

I finished A Power Unbound by Freya Marske. I have thoughts...

Here there be spoilers

What do we know about love?

No, seriously, I'm asking. The more stories I hear--both real and fictional--the less sure I am that we have any idea what it is we're talking about.

Because love may be patient and kind...

But it also might be dirty degrading sex and someone to argue you into submission.

Meet Jack Alston and Alan Ross: the last couple in the found family of disaster gays trying to save the magical world in Freya Marske's The Last Binding trilogy. The third volume, A Power Unbound, centers the love story of Jack and Alan amidst the final confrontation that will decide the fate of the magical world.

(I actually find the magic and politics the least interesting thing about these books, so let's stick to kinky sex and power dynamics.)

At a surface level reading, Jack and Alan are an opposites-attract trope. Jack was born to power and privilege in every sense, titled and magical, while Alan scrambles to survive in a world where he literally repels power (both figurative and literal). Rather than fall into the temptation of a beauty-and-the-beast narrative or a cinderella story, Marske has the two of them lean into their inequality.

They get off on power struggle.

These two have the kinkiest role-play I've seen in traditional publishing. Full credit to Marske for writing a romance that says: "You can have all the deviant sex you want between safe, sane, consenting adults." (A radical notion when we're reluctant to increase the perception of gay sex as 'deviant,' but seriously, fuck respectability politics!)

But the mastery of character development here is how the push-pull of their chemistry translates outside of the bedroom.

When we first meet Jack Alston in book one, he's cast in a more villainous light. He's nasty and hurtful to his ex, Edwin Courcey. It would be easy to write Jack off as simply cruel, but from his perspective, the whole dynamic translates differently.

Jack is a "mean friend." His love language is to tease, to bait, to skirmish. He grew up jabbing his way through life, all knees and elbows. But every time he tried to draw Edwin out...he only ended up pushing him away.

It couldn't be more different with fiesty Alan. "They fit in ways they shouldn’t ever have fit. Even when they fought, they fit–there was no mockery falling on soft, malleable ground…Only the knowledge that any volley would be met and thrown back, brighter and better."

Jack and Edwin were fundamentally wrong for each other, their chemistry toxic. By contrast, Alan understands the love language of insults and banter. He's strong enough to take it.

But strength and weakness are their own sort of power, and both Jack and Alan are keenly aware of it. During one of their intimate scenes, Jack cuts the moment short because he realizes they are not in a moment of mutual pleasure. "When I fuck, it's because it's what I want. Not because I'm punishing someone, or too angry to be safe." Nor will he let Alan turn their intimacy into self-harm, refusing to be "used...as a rod to make stripes on your own back."

It's a critical piece of self-awareness. Jack knows he has a responsibility to use his power with the utmost control to create mutual pleasure and do no harm.

If Jack's journey is one of learning how to share power, then Alan's arc is about learning how to accept it. "Size and strength, station and wealth. All the advantages possible," Alan marvels as he looks at Jack. "Do you know how hard it is to believe someone won’t use it against you? To put your heart into someone’s hands knowing that?"

Alan may like to play at being overpowered, but that play is a consensual illusion: he knows that at any time he can voice the safeword and end the game. When it comes to sex, he can maintain control. But you can't safeword out of falling in love with someone. "Alan had never needed to lean on anyone. It was intolerable that he now kept turning out the pockets of his soul and finding caught in their seams the desire to let someone take his weight. The desire to be held, even kissed."

It's safer to lock yourself up: to stay in control by keeping the rest of the world out. But you can't have love without putting your innermost self on the line, making yourself as vulnerable as possible.

To take of someone else, you have to give everything of yourself.

I don't think it's a binary switch. The ways and means of how we create a give-and-take change depending on the people involved. Some people need soft and gentle love. Some need bright and sunny love. And some people need to be "kissed like an argument. Alan slid his hand to the nape of Jack’s neck and argued fiercely back."

All of them are good. Because all of them have the power to give and take what we need...and what we want.

Jack can be "masterful in the bedroom" and "take your heart between my ribs and guard it like my own." Alan can be a fighter and submissive, can hold his own and still want Jack to "kiss me until you know me, and unmake me, and love me anyway."

I don't know anything about love. But I think these guys just might.

When it comes to love, you'd better give as good as you get.

[precious-little-scoundrel]

Can I just say. I think all the love that Sanchez gets is SO cool. Because we haven’t seen that much of her? Especially for people who missed female complaints since it was a shorter instalment. But mostly because, she’s not “likeable” in the traditional sense. She’s strong and cool as hell and those are absolutely things to admire and adore about her but the fact that she’s grumpy, withdrawn and spends most of her time scowling and complaining in all the fics we’ve seen her in? And yet people STILL love her? I just adore that. It’s so hard to create a character that is like that and have people so obsessed with her 😭😭 And I will always find that so cool. As a latina I was always gonna love her but I truly thought that I would be in a minority for that. So to see people loving her makes me sooooo happy

NOTE FOR READERS: this is a older ask, just now getting to it

But oh my gosh I’m so happy you sent this in, anon, and I’m so fucking proud and privileged to have a Latina reader in the house. When I learned about the Aztec Eagles I was just like —yeah I’m gonna snag that thanks.

And I’m starting to weave (this will soon get published) a storyline for her that will in many ways utilize her grumps. And I love that. Becasue hey, in war films there’s often that guy who is such a downer but he’s also a badass and he’s also perceptive and valid and I think women should be able to be all of that as well, dammit☺️

Thanks for dropping by. Makes me spastic you’re enjoying this and her

[whatever-you-can-give-me]

fic recs from bookworm's bookmarks

@trigunfanfic

i wanted to do more for trigun fic appreciation week, but uh... life happened. a lot. so here's some recs from my bookmarks!

as a happy accident of my waxing and waning fic-reading habits, a lot of these fics are from a while ago, months or years old, so hopefully this spreads some love further back in the tag!

Ebb by auroralightss - tristamp, wolfwood-centric. post-episode 7 hurt/comfort that feels like it was pulled right out of my soul and left me with some brand new feelings. i want to eat this fic like a bowl of warm soup.

I don't feel so good by Kaijuscientists - tristamp, wolfwood-centric, mid-canon. maybe it's just because i care way too much about wolfwood, but the setup (hurt) of this fic made me ache so deeply with such a straightforward premise that the payoff (comfort) was twice as sweet.

river of dreams by fleurmatisse - trimax, vashwood, post-canon fix-it. a wonderful little series in which wolfwood comes back from the dead. deeply emotionally resonant in such a restrained way. i would use these fics to teach creative writing.

Carry Me Home by beelzebby666 - tristamp, vashwood. i have this bookmarked for the crime of eliciting an audible noise of distress from me, but you should read everything fly has written. they're a gift.

Stella Maris et Regina Celorum by WateredMyCrops - trimax [original trigun manga, technically]. you should also read everything peregrine has written, especially the Write Your Ticket series, but this fic stands out for delightfully gruesome straightforwardness. this should be required reading if you're a knives main.

Tuesday's Gone by DJubilant and InfiniteInMystery - tristamp, vashwood. the dove is dead, drugged, bloody, and miserable. some of my favorite wolfwood whump. mind the tags, but if you want an absolute treat of vashwood in compromising and horrible situations, this is it.

YOU ARE HERE; or, How to Get Lost in the Desert Without Really Dying by fathomfive - trimax, vash wolfwood and livio, post-canon fix it. thoroughly, stunningly in-character. fathomfive's dialogue is deft and uncompromising and i would be jealous if i weren't busy enjoying the hell out of it. one of those fics that got stuck in my teeth in the best way.

Sundew by TruckThat - tristamp, vashwood, xeno smut with thoroughly delightful character voices. i love everything going on in this fic.

dress me in red and throw your roses by catachresis - tristamp, s2 vashwood reunion speculation, plus sex. an absolutely delightful little what-might-be of vash and wolfwood's reunion and some of the two year timeskip. quietly and thoroughly excellent.

God knows I know I've thrown away those graces by Obtenebratia - tristamp, vashwood, absolutely terrible kink practices. i can't explain just how much i think about this fic. another one that feels like it was pulled right out of my hindbrain. soggy, pathetic, emotionally ravaged wolfwood.

HARD-SOLE by junuve - trimax, wolfwood-centric. a delightful crunch of characterization. realism as a chaser to a solid shot of character voice and introspection. delicious.

a vehicle to know embrace by megumis - trimax/tristamp crossover, livio and wolfwood (& livio and wolfwood). characterization you can get your teeth into. everyone in this fic is fucked up in a lot of the ways you'd think and some more to boot. thoroughly excellent.

Est vera secta? by mephistopheles - trimax/98-themed au. i wish i could gift you all the experience of reading this as it was being written and published. watching this fic unfold from a creative setting au with immaculate vibes to a sprawling epic through all its twists and turns was absolutely delightful. take your time with this one. have fun.

Fill the Void, Lest The Void Fill You by InfiniteInMystery - trimax, vashwood, non-traditional omegaverse. i fucking love this fic. i don't even have any clever wording to describe it, i just absolutely love everything it has going on. mind the tags, because this fic delivers on everything it promises and then some. good food for the "monster vash overwhelming wolfwood's every sense" enjoyers.

Becoming Eden by Lenipez - needs no introduction. if you're intimidated by the length and scope, read everything else leni's written. no one inspires me to challenge myself to improve as a writer like leni does.

the song echoes onwards by verboseDescription - trimax, post-canon. a really, deeply good look at a post-trimax world: feelings, politics, identities, things that change and things that stay the same. faithful and inventive characterization at once.

fool in the moon by arahir - tristamp, vashwood. such a good fic. rich and deep in characterization and implication. wolfwood in this fic is such a deep cut of devotion as self-punishment, i adore it.

The Loneliness of the Long Distance Traveller by TiggyMalvern - trimax, vashwood first time fic, spiced with dramatic irony. another "just go read everything they've written, it's all a treat" rec. one of the classic trigun writers. POV-fic like no other.

something eluding you, sunshine? by ShastaFirecracker - trimax, the rare and delightful instance of vashwood being neither good nor bad but straightforwardly decent at sex. or, in this case, an attempt thereat. i don't need to rec shasta's fics, because if you have anything close to my taste you've read everything she's written twice, but i'm still gonna. :]

The Only Nice Thing That Follows by hellogaywatson - trimax, vashwood. this fic is unfinished — and while i hope it's eventually completed, what's there is undoubtedly worth a read. vashwood that cuts like a knife. sharp and memorable.

[warvariations]

my paper got rejected by the journal i submitted it to bc it was slightly off topic / it doesn't engage with critical geography scholarship directly (what the journal is about) which is totally fair and i was aware it was a long shot but i don't really have a plan b tbh. suggestions welcome. hard to find somewhere to publish traditional academic papers that are also a little bit weird. it's either "we don't do traditional" or they're so fucking serious and specific that they feel unapproachable

[hyunpic]

Hiii Vilma ✨ I’m sorry I don’t want to be a bother but would you mind listing some books that Hyunjin recommended at some point please? If you have some time?

I know some threads are very easily findable online so I don’t want you to think that I’m using you bc I know Google exists but the thing is that those threads are only visible by people who have Twitter / X and I don’t have an account so I can’t see it :( (with all not-due respect, fuck Elon Musk) Really feeling like the beggar ant meme lmao I’m so sorry

Thank you so much 💕

i got u!!!! don’t worry about about using me or anything 🫡💘💘 i put down some synopsis of the books too. i hope u can find something to read from there 🥹 also this probably isn’t a full list but i tried to include as much as possible!!

fire salamander by han kang: a collection of seven short stories tied to one keyword "recovery". the author shows the issues of a human's suffering and loss, as well as a human's will to lead a life without giving up despite the pain and frustration.

i want to die but i want to eat tteokboki by baek sehee: a successful young social media director at a publishing house begins seeing a psychiatrist about her depression. it is a book to keep close and to reach for in times of darkness. it will appeal to anyone who has ever felt alone or unjustified in their everyday despair.

temperature of language by lee kijoo: the author of this book claims that language has temperature. he encourages us to use words that can comfort others with warmth instead of cold words that hurt them.

the setting sun by osamu dazai: the setting sun deals with the decline of japan’s aristocracy in the wake of world war II, and portrays characters adrift in a world that no longer feels familiar.

no longer human by osamu dazai: the poignant and fascinating story of a young man who is caught between the breakup of the traditions of a northern japanese aristocratic family and the impact of western ideas.

almond by son wonpyeong: it tells the story of yunjae, a young boy born with a difference. yunjae has a brain condition called alexithymia that makes it hard for him to feel emotions like fear, anger, and empathy.

contradictions by yang guija: contradictions is a coming-of-age tale that explores the paradoxes and contradictions of the human condition and delves into the meaning of personal happiness

proof of gu by choi jinyoung: a heart-moving novel written with beautiful sentences, which questions the meaning of life or the meaning of death through the death of a lover and the subsequent feelings of loss and condolences.

the old man and the sea by ernest hemingway: through his struggle, santiago demonstrates the ability of the human spirit to endure hardship and suffering in order to win. it is also his deep love and knowledge of the sea, in its impassive cruelty and beneficence, that allows him to prevail

someone harmless to me by eun young choi: the novel collection portrays various relationships, especially relationships of women including a love story of a lesbian couple, a story of two girls who grew up in oppressive patriarchal atmosphere and a story of two sisters who spent their childhood persistently fighting but sometimes understanding each other.

the preciousness of everyday words by kim eana: through the use of everyday words, lyricist kim eana finds solutions to the complex emotions and frustrations in relationships encountered in life. (<- this was recommended to him by stay but he ordered it so i included it here too )