#and it is ever evolving

[quincywillows]

as i reflect more, i have to say one of the biggest aspects that turned me away completely from traditional publishing is the social media prevalence. there was such a clear expectation, literally from the moment you submit your manuscript for consideration, that you either already had a following on insta/the-platform-formally-known-as-twitter or would be committed full throttle to creating one. there was no question about it. the idea that you would sell not just your book, but yourself, online was baked into the very potential of your manuscript seeing the light of day. and i remember lurking in those spaces and seeing every single aspiring author regurgitating the same plucky, quirky posts, and sharing the same "friends" on the platform, and justifying x y z aspect about themselves as an author rather than telling me anything substantive about their novel (no true synopses in sight here -- just a quippy, 240-character logline usually filled with tropes). it literally felt like being surrounded by clones, or generic-writer-bots, and i was supposed to be inclined to show interest in their writing because of their PRESENTATION on the-platform-formally-known-as-twitter, rather than the actual writing itself. it's even worse now with tik tok and "booktok."

every single book i have ever loved, have ever called a favorite, always grew from the book itself. not the author. most of the time, i didn't know who the author even was, and i rarely take the time to go investigate further. the value and heart of a book lies in the words on the page, the content inside the manuscript -- not the name printed onto the spine.

i just really hate this trend in publishing where the author has become more of a draw or more important than the story itself. we are writers, we're sharing our writing. the story is what it's supposed to be all about; if that isn't connecting with the readers, what else matters? certainly not that -- and it's simply not worth commodifying your literal personhood just to get another click.

[clumsypuppy]

wait for me

[bruciemilf]

“Bruce is emotionally incompetent and can’t step outside his own morality” yeah it’s a character flaw.

“Dick is extremely stubborn and thinks he’s right all the time” yeah it’s a character flaw.

“Jason has hypocritical tendencies” yeah it’s a character flaw.

“ Tim is entitled and doesn’t think about people when seeking results, and often acts uncaring” yeah it’s a character flaw.

“Damian is rude and bratty” yeah, it’s a character flaw.

Also, some people may not even regard everything listed above as flaws.

Having negative traits allows incredible flexibility within your characters, what makes them intriguing, what makes them easy to relate to. If you want to write people, then write people. But they can’t be good and clean all the time.

[milkbreadtoast]

A little late but HAPPY BDAY HAN YOOJIN...🥹❤️

[nouverx]

Day 1 and Day 2 of RadioStatic Week

First Meeting and Sharing a meal! I like the idea that Alastor is the one who approached Vox first because of how unique he looks eheh

[aroaessidhe]

aro & ace books: trans aspecs

trans rights readathon is on now, and I realised it's been a minute since I made a trans aspec books post, so here's some of the latest ones I've read!

previous posts: part 1 / part 2 / nonbinary YA / nonbinary A

Pluralities - contemporary/sci-fi novella - aro-coded transmasc MC

Compound Fracture - YA thriller - arospec trans boy MC

The Sapling Cage - YA fantasy - demisexual trans girl MC (+aroace SC)

The Evolving Truth of Ever-Stronger Will - YA contemporary - demi-aroace nonbinary MC

The Summer Love Strategy - YA contemporary - demi-aroace trans girl LI

Life Underwater - contemporary - grey-aro ace trans man MC

Be The Sea - scifi - nonbinary demisexual MC

Blessed by the Cupid Distribution System - romance novella - demisexual trans girl MC

The Space Ace of Mangleby Flat - contemporary - demisexual trans woman LI (& ace MC)

#aspec books / aspec database / tumblr masterpost

info included here is brief! please see my database for full details of the books

[randomness-is-my-order]

it is actually so difficult to insult a guy like wei wuxian because even below-the-belt insults make nary a dent on him. people can call him names, disparage him, ruin his reputation, but his self-image is NOT affected by it. he knows himself and his values. there is a way to get a rise out of him but that usually involves insulting the people he cares deeply about (jiang yanli, lan wangji for example) instead of himself (which is not about having a low self-esteem but having his own boundaries and principles, mind you), but try to spew out hate and he will laugh directly in your face before moving on. someone might be like, “oh, you’re fengmian’s bastard child—” and wei wuxian will just go, “aHhahhahHAHA, nice one. have a good day!” or someone might say, “you’re a filthy, no-good demonic cultivator,” and he’ll just go, “now, filthy is a stretch. i take great pride in my personal hygiene!” come at him with your wittiest or your most ruthless insult and he will summarily dismantle it before disregarding your opinion entirely. which i think is just another piece of wei wuxian’s mindset that actually allowed him to stand before the cultivation mob and make a stance—he’s always been one to think for himself and not let others and their words colour his perception of wrong and right, possible and impossible, good and evil, especially when it came to him and his actions. to hell with their narrow-minded judgements, wei wuxian knew where he stood and why he stood there.

[thebramblewood]

I think one of the hardest things as a writer posting a story serially is accepting that readers come and go naturally over time (if you're lucky enough to have readers in the first place, which is its own uphill battle) and that it's not necessarily a reflection on yourself as a creator. People have lives, and a years-long story is a massive commitment. They might stop reading for any number of totally valid reasons! But it's always a bit bittersweet to see people fade along the way. I still think often about how certain readers might react to certain developments, even if they haven't commented in months. I just hope they know how much I appreciated the time they did spend with it, and I hope they're doing well wherever they are. 💕

[rot-to-the-core]

i really like the headcanon that aventurine texts like a boomer because he doesn't spend time with teenagers and mostly uses tech for work purposes and dr ratio has picked up some slang from his students

that being said i can't stop laughing at the idea aventurine discovering stickers on microsoft teams and whatsapp good morning gifs and texting like this as a result

vs ratio 😭

[celestielbeing]

eddie having a ring pop and bucks sitting there like wait what flavor is that lemme try, and eddie just holds his hand up, fingers curled like a fist, doesn’t even look up from his book, and buck grabs his hand, pops the ring pop in his mouth, just casually says oh that’s good. And eddies like right? and brings it right back to his mouth…

[nailsinmywall]

Tiny celegorm VS maglor 1:0

[clownsuu]

This is so real though obsessing over characters (especially old farts) goes a loooong way for getting through it. I had the same thing but with semi-eldrich monsters during my worst points.

Through the power of old men and medicine, be proud of how far you've come and how long you've lived because we'll be rooting for you the whole way. We're all proud of you even if we don't know what's going on (and that's okay! You don't owe anyone explanations!).

On a more silly note, may all your enemies shit their pants.

Omg that fuggin reminds me that for a good while during my rougher days, I got OBSESSED with the “Omnitome” book weapon JDHDHDJJS

like look at that grumpy lil sad guy,,,,,, my wol goober would 100% keep it moisturized and warm during trips to colder climates

[mangaka-neko-chan]

Quick Dune reference but Rogue Trader.

[revvethasmythh]

it's so funny to me that caleb and veth really did just trade off the job of intensely pining for the other at like the halfway point of the campaign. like, imo, nott in the early days did not behave in any real romantic or even romance-adjacent ways toward him--I imagine it would be very hard to even think in that way when you hate what you look like so much, have such low self-esteem, and are actively lying about your entire past, including a secret husband. caleb, on the other hand, is kind of diving directly back into the sort of relationship he had with astrid and eadwulf. very close, very intimate, we-huddled-for-warmth-together-and-oops-it-led-to-something-else sort of thing. he is the one who expresses that he's fine with it if people think he and nott are romantically together when they're talking to keg. nott is the one who pushes back on that. he calls her his life partner. unknowingly, he compares his feelings for nott to nott's feelings for yeza. his behavior only really starts to change after he finds out about veth's husband because suddenly all of that other stuff is rendered inappropriate in retrospect. but even then he compliments her to yeza over dinner in the most awkward of ways, he admits to being jealous, he calls yeza "a lucky man" to have her, he stares at veth and yeza closed bedroom door for far too long, he creates an entire arcane tower with room for her family just so she'll stay with him. in general, his behavior is not, um, totally and completely platonic about it, you know?

like, veth's feelings for caleb are canonical and therefore indisputable in their existence, but caleb in the early days was not that dissimilar to how veth was acting near the end of the campaign. it really paints a picture of "right person, wrong time" in the way things just didn't line up for them. or, as veth would say: "in another world, maybe"

[puppetmaster13u]

Still Thinkin of Yokai Amity

Y'know, where all of Amity have pretty much become yokai creatures. I might be weak for Japanese mythology and cryptids. Or really all mythology and cryptids, but Japan has a lot and it's near never-ending meaning it's fun to continue discovering and learning stuff. But anyway!

Amity Park, practically empty of humans now. Not even following the usual rule that things do thanks to how malleable ecto is. Along with how a form usually depends on ones own thoughts, feelings, and Core.

But anyway, Amity? Kind of having some trouble now that, again, no one there counts as human. Visibly so. Which, yeah the GIW is sort of incompetent, but it's also kind of... not?

Let them reiterate, individually or even in pairs, they can easily deal with the Guys in White. Heck, even a small battalion is easy enough- but they have... a lot of people. And the backing of the government. So.

Plan B? Escape. Where to?

Well, see, they've all had to interact more with the Realms, not to mention that well, the entire town was pulled into it at one point. Which was how everyone got that last bit of ecto to push the transformations from contaminated to Liminal.

Which means? Time to escape through the Realms to somewhere, maybe even somewhen else. But they also can't stay in the Realms indefinitely. Because even with their own Cores, most of them are still Living.

But they also can't agree on a World to settle down in, not with how they're still wary of reactions. So what's a city to do?

Why, pop into multiple worlds of course. A wandering city, the entrance shifting through gates and alleys and doorways that appears through time and space.

Sometimes another haunted being finds their way through, sometimes they visit one dimension more than another- sometimes they leave one behind forever. But tales still spread of the wandering city that flickers through existence.