#and then write the most terrible fanfiction I have ever seen

[beneathashadytree]

HEY GUYS! LONG POST HERE, BUT PLEASE READ🙏🏽

I am genuinely appalled by the discourse ongoing in the LNDS fandom these past few days—but above all, I am severely disappointed in what had started out as one of the most inclusive and sweet fandoms I’ve ever been in. I have a few things to say, so in this post I’m trying to put all my thoughts to words. Apologies if I sound harsh, but I’m genuinely livid. Also, please ignore any typos. I’m not wearing my glasses while word-vomiting.

First off, for a fandom that is composed of mostly adults, you guys have been acting terribly childishly. It’s 2024, and yet people are still unironically shaming others for “switching up on their favs” as if a person owes 2D characters any loyalty. Let people enjoy things. The novelty of Sylus and how he’s quite literally 6 months behind the other 3 love interests makes people want to catch up on the enjoyment of him all at once. He’s still such a brand new character and concept, so there’s no wonder everyone’s hyped up over him.

I’ve seen people get genuinely mad at other players and writing whole think-pieces about this. I promise you guys, the company making this game is still benefiting whether you’re pouring your money into Sylus or any one of the previous 3. We’re all happy to have an interesting character pop up among the roster now, and we’re taking our time getting to know him. Doesn’t make any of the first 3 any less loved. I genuinely don’t remember this amount of nastiness when solo events for each of the guys used to drop.

In fact, if the popularity thing is worrying you, going off MLQC (the company’s past game) the character who was last added was—eventually, after the initial hype died down—kicked off to the sidelines in most major events and was given the least content, and was the least favorite of fans.

Secondly, and this has my blood boiling, there is an insane amount of entitlement and rudeness I’ve seen on my timeline concerning how people characterize the men—particularly Rafayel.

Absolutely nothing warrants this shitty attitude towards other creators for how they depict characters in their fics. It seems you guys feel protected behind a screen and think it gives you the right to bully strangers online. Fanfiction is for fantasizing about your favs; for letting your imagination run wild. If this were a character analysis, then yes, maybe I’d agree that inaccuracies are aggravating. However, in fanfiction, there are zero rules, especially when it comes to smut.

Sexual preferences are not equivalent to a person’s whole personality—so whether he’s written as a dom, a sub, a switch, or whatever the fuck you wanna call it, this has nothing to do with his kindness, gentlemanliness, passion, power, ruthlessness, snark, or whatever minuscule aspect of his character makes up his lovely whole and matters to you.

I think this circles back to a lack of ability to separate sexual matters and personality, because how else do people interpret fics depicting him in a certain manner as them erasing his character? They might overlap, but they can very well be mutually exclusive. I’ve seen incredibly sweet and gentle men irl who were absolute doms in bed, and I’ve seen powerful and passionate men who were reduced to tears between the sheets. There is barely any correlation whatsoever, and if anything, claiming otherwise is what I consider piss-poor media literacy and reading-comprehension.

My third point is that for some reason, there have been many, many posts and replies on here where I’ve seen people just straight-up spread pure hate for the characters. Maybe this bothered me in particular because I’m an OT3 (OT4 now!) and absolutely adore all of them, but I find no logical reason for “yucking someone’s yum” when we’re talking about liking the characters of an Otome game—a genre of video games which is made to literally cater to the tastes of as many people as possible.

It’s especially disheartening to see when it’s at a time like this, when new content is about to drop, and you find in the replies of every other post/discussion at least a few people spewing hate and disgust at Sylus. Again, so many people are incredibly excited about him. Why is there a need to rain on everyone’s parade, especially in such an unsolicited manner?

This fandom originally started as a safe space for people of all races, backgrounds, genders, sexualities, and personalities to bond over our mutual love for characters. All I’ve seen on my TL lately (in terms of discussion) is negativity, and it’s such a fucking let-down. I hope whatever the fuck has happened to this fandom cools down after a bit. It’s probably exaggerated and very in-your-face rn, cause more and more people are downloading LNDS, so the probabilities of finding people being nasty are increasing. But I seriously don’t want to grow to resent this fandom and find myself distancing myself from it to protect my peace.

Let’s all remember to be kind towards other players, to not act entitled or bratty about the characters, and to try and mind our own business if we see content that doesn’t suit our tastes.

[thatuselesshuman]

Casper's 101 guide to improving your writing

So uh I'm not at all qualified to tell you how to write but someone irl told me I should make a guide so here it is. This is how I learned to write, and I like to think I'm not that terrible

Step One: Read

It's difficult to learn to write if you don't have the base material. It's like cooking, if you never eat different foods then your food will be bland cause you don't know what flavors are out there. Reading is the best thing you can do to when you start getting into writing. It'll tell you what your preferences are and it'll expand your vocabulary (both very important steps!). It'll tell you what POV you want to write in, certain words that give you the ick, plot points you enjoy, genres you like, how many mistakes you can tolerate, styles of writing you enjoy, etc.

Note: don't just read prim and proper books. Read fanfiction, read manga, read manhwa, read webnovels, read anything and everything that catches your eye. They all have their different qualities, and they're all better at doing one thing or another. Read, read, and read some more.

Step Two: Start Small, and Start Enjoyably

No sane person starts out writing massive novels out of the gate. A novel is a massive undertaking, and if you do it incorrectly it's a great way to kill your enjoyment though writer's block. What you're going to want to start with is short stories, one shots on Ao3, etc. Write small stories that are manageable and write a lot of them. Write stuff you enjoy as well, since you're not trying to impress anyone. This step is to dip your toes into the world of writing and kindle a good starting flame so you don't crumble into the ground the first time you hit writer's block.

Note: Don't be afraid to start with nitty gritty stuff if that's what you enjoy writing. I personally started with heavy angst, whump, torture, and the like because that's what interested me. That's what I wanted to write. There's nothing wrong with writing whatever the hell you want. I stand by the fact that censorship is the death of art.

Step Three: Practice Detail

Have you ever looked at a passage while reading and thought 'huh, this description is really bland'? Well I have. A mark of a good writer is being able to describe everything down to the dirt (not that you always should, but that's another lesson for another day). You may think that it should be easy to describe things in detail, but trust me when I say that it's a skill. Some ways you can practice are:

Describe your room in excruciating detail through brush strokes (like you would a painting)

Describe a mundane object through the lens of someone from the far past

Describe the nature around your house in abstract shapes

Describe a waterfall through the perspective of someone who has never seen one in their life

There are plenty more, but here are some to get you started.

Step Four: Grammar

Trust me when I say this is most people's least favorite step. It's boring, I know, but knowing how to utilized commas, ellipses, — <- these things, semicolons, etc, is a relatively easy way to instantly boost your writing. No one likes to read a story where it seems like the author hasn't seen a period in their life.

Note: This is just general advice, but if you wouldn't want to read it, then don't write it. That's another reason why the first step of reading is important.

Step Five: Share Your Writing With People

Whether you share it with strangers (like I did) or people you know, sharing your writing is an amazing way to get advice and feedback. It's also a great way to meet people who have the same interests as you. Writing is a bubble with no outside interaction makes it harder to get better at writing because it's easy to have rose-tinted glasses about your writing. It's also easy to think your writing is ass, even if it's really not. Having people around you who will tell you the truth is great as a reality check whenever you're blind to how things are.

Step Six: Write Until Your Hands Hurt

This is the step that always shows up on writing how-tos, and I'm not immune to it either. The reason everyone says to write a ton is because you're never gonna get better or have a passion for writing if you never do it. It's like art or a sport, how the hell do you expect to get better if you never touch a pencil or never pick up the ball? Divine intervention? I mean that is possible but unless you're writing the Bible then I don't think God is going to bless you miraculously with amazing writing skills. It's like anything in life, practice makes progress.

Everyone starts out terribly, and there's always going to be that 8 year old prodigy who's better than you, but that's not why writers write. We write because if we don't, the voices hunt us down-

Anyways, jokes aside, that's my guide to writing. I don't think it's too terrible, but that could just be the glasses I mentioned in the fifth step speaking.

[superfallingstars]

Hello, do you have any marauders fic recs? I’m a big marauders fan but I’m so tired of reading fics where they feel completely out of character, and I feel like you might know something I don’t

Aw man I’m the wrong person to ask for this, I don’t really read fics very often lol. I’ll try to enlist the help of some people whose Marauders opinions I trust and who might have better recs than me (tbh I’m also curious to hear), but I’ll share the few that I’ve come across, too. Apologies if you've already read them.

I think my most relevant rec is The Night Will Always Win by betweenfactandbreakfast, which is a canon-compliant Marauders era fic from 1975-1981. Admittedly I haven’t finished it – tbh I liked it so much that I had to stop reading it, which sounds so incredibly dumb now that I wrote it out, but I was legitimately getting pissed off that I had to do things in real life instead of reading it lmao. Time to take a step back...! Either way, I’ve really enjoyed it so far. And I’ve seen @seriousbrat's inbox turn into a battleground of endless Snape vs. Marauders discourse, so I know their feelings on the characters are pretty similar to mine lol (and hiii I know you have been in this fandom for much longer than I have, so maybe you have some good recommendations?). Basically this is a good fic if you want everyone to be a terrible person <3

The other fic I can rec is Have Your Cake and Eat It by cunegonde, aka my favorite fic of all time (that I could scream about literally foreverrrr but I’ll try to reel myself in!). This is a good fic if you want everyone to be a good person. Also this fic has time travel in it, so it’s like, kind of Marauders era, but not quite? Even though it’s kind of cliche, it’s also incredibly earnest and thoughtfully done, and it has interesting (and imo, realistic!) characterizations of each of the Marauders. Tbf I’m definitely biased toward this author’s work because they basically only write Snupin (my personal fave pairing), but reading their stuff is like, genuinely why are you writing Harry Potter fanfiction and not a full-length original novel, because holy fuck I think you could actually pull that off. Like, I loved this fic so much that I (person who doesn't read fanfic) immediately read everything else they wrote and finished it all in two days... Also this fic made me cry for literally an hour straight (probably the strongest emotional reaction I’ve had to any piece of media ever lol) – even though I knew what was coming. It was just that good.

Unfortunately that’s literally all I got lol. I’m going to tag some people who I think have similar takes on the Marauders as I do – @seriousbrat @remus-poopin @big-scary-bird @saintsenara – hiii, add on if you’d like. And anyone else who has recommendations of Marauders fics with good characterization, feel free to chime in!

[m1dnight-blu3]

Gamilith an amrâl: A letter for a lover

Hello, hello!! Here's the first chapter of my new fanfiction - my first AU, my take on the Alternative Meeting AU from the Bagginshield Year.

Tags:

Alternative meeting;

Blacksmith Thorin;

Letters;

Exiled prince Thorin;

Slow Burn;

courting;

happy ending;

meet cute

angst and fluff;

I said I wouldn’t write angst you know like a LIAR

Summary:

Bilbo Baggins’ letter was different from all the others Thorin had received at that time. First, Bilbo actually got his name right. Very little people cared to learn Thorin’s name those days, so most of his packages were sent as “to the blacksmith in the woods”. He used to have a name, a title and a kingdom. And then, after the dragon fire, all was left were ashes, a hunted kingless kingdom and the bitter taste of defeat. Yet, somehow as if a miracle, there is was: “To Mister Thorin, Blacksmith from Erebor”. or Alternative Meeting AU where Blacksmith Thorin meets the most curious hobbit by pure luck. And they fall in love with each line of their letters to each other.

preview of Bilbo's first letter:

“Greeting, Master Thorin. My name is Bilbo Baggins, the rightful heir to Bag End – the loveliest place on Shire, in my most humble opinion.

With winter dreadfully stretching its claws into the Shire, I was reminded of some long awaited repairs that must be done until the longer, colder months come. While chatting with some of my neighbors, your services have been very much recommended – a blessing of Yavanna herself.

You see, we do have a family of barely decent Blacksmiths here in good old Shire. However, all of them are related to Lobelia.

If you are not familiar with that name, and I must add how I envy you for this ignorance, Lobelia Sackville-Baggins is, much unfortunately, my relative. That dreadful, nightmare born of a woman is married to my cousin, Otho – who is just as much of bad news as Lobelia, I must warn. Her greediness knows no limits – always scheming, plans born from her endless gold lust, that terrible woman. Please do apologize what I am about to say – I can swear to you that I was raised to become one of the finest gentlehobbits this blessed Shire has ever seen – However, I would much rather crew off my lovely feet with my own bare teeth than give any of my coin to Lobelia – directly or indirectly. As I worry that even being at the same room as her, breathing the same air and sharing space, would stain my soul.”

Thorin has to stop his reading to take a breather. He hadn’t realized how hard he was laughing until his cheeks started to hurt. Who on Earth was this person?

[cyberfanzz]

A Nightmarish Christmas (PT. 1)

a/n: No joke this probably sucks bc I didn’t check anything and I haven’t been good at writing recently. A ‘Nightmare Before Christmas’ themed Dazai fanfiction. Sorry for not posting for so long. <3 also idk why but I feel like Dazai would be so funny as Jack Skeleton, that’s literally how I got the idea for this. this is only part one bc I’m lazy-

pairing: Dazai x GN! Reader.

Chapter one: Halloween is Over.

The air is cold and crisp on Halloween Town. Ghosts and Witches fly through the sky, strange demons are in place under beds or stairs as per usual, vampires roam the streets, along with many other beings that humans would usually call, “Unnatural.” The Mayor stands atop his vehicle stating random nonsense that not many understand but still go along with.

The wind blows through your hair as you look up at the moon, seeing the shadow of the boogeyman, his potato-sack like skin and animated looking facial features can be clearly seen on the glowing circle in the big night sky. Bats fly toward you so suddenly as you watch the town, you see a decapitated head rolling in the floor as the children watch and laugh, having the time of their lives. The pumpkin king comes into town on a horse that looks to be made of sticks for whatever reason. You go behind a talking tree of which skeletons hang from by the neck, watching the Pumpkin King grab a torch from a civilian in a swift movement, lighting himself on fire before jumping into a fountain of greenish water coming from a well carved statue of a dragon. When he came out, you could see him in his usual suit with the collar spiked outwards, his wavy, short brown hair flows in the wind and you see the bandages under his sleeves, ones of which you’ve heard people talk about before and theorize about why he wears them, it’s Dazai Osamu in the flesh. The crowd erupts in laughter and claps of pure excitement, you join them and start clapping joyfully. Everybody starts talking and celebrating the successful Halloween.

“Great job everybody! I think this year was our most terrible yet!” Dazai yells to the crowd, the Mayor speaks up, “Oh come on now, we couldn’t have done it without you, Dazai-“ “Oh, don’t give me all of that!” Dazai interrupted with a slightly higher pitched silly voice. You look over and see a friend, well at least that’s what Dazai would call him, of his, Kunikida letting out a heavy sigh and shaking his head at Dazais loudness that most found to be silly. The crowd starts to praise Dazai and you start to feel hypnotized by the crowd, without thinking you start to head towards it before being suddenly tugged back by your creator, starting to pull you away from the crowd as he rolled in his wheelchair.

“Come now. You’re not ready for all of that excitement.” He said in a old, stern voice. “But I am! I really am!” You protest, pulling back towards the crowd. “You’re coming with me!” “No I’m not!” You yell, pulling on your string and letting your arm be was holding fall off as you ran away, hearing him call you back to him at this instant. At a moment like that, you were glad you were a creation that was easy to take apart when needed.

The Award Ceremony starts off as Dazai runs away from the crowd, letting out a relieved sigh once he gets away. Though being heavily praised almost every year for Halloween, nobody ever seems to know much about him as a person, he was a mystery to all, though he could put on a silly and overly dramatic façade when needed. For a goofy suicidal maniac, he could come up with good plans each year for Halloween, even if most of them were jokes. He walked away, leaving the party behind.

another a/n: dang- didn’t realize I only wrote chapter one 💀 I’ll try to write more, just been in a slump lmaoo

[kaelidascope]

Dude, I love this fanfic so much! I just wanted to ask where you got the idea from. Did you have any inspiration from anyone? Also, what's your favorite fanfic? And want do you recommend ?

AWE bless!! Thank you so much I'm glad you're enjoying it <33

So actually a good 80% of this is written from personal experience LOL I used to dance and was into drift building/racing in my late teens/early twenties! Most of the references or scenes in Midnight Menagerie are references to things I've seen or done in real life, OR stories friends have told me within the same field. (Nora is literally just a rebranding of this one mutual friend we had who just. Absolutely fucking unhinged) Like for example, the anticipated Hangover Chapter is just a retelling of an insane Summer weekend I had in 2017 ☠️ it's a personal delight being able to translate things into the narrative, even more so knowing people find my stupid, terrible decisions as amusing as I do in current times lol

My general rule of thumb is to write from experience. Things I understand either on a technical point or emotional connection. So, if you've read it in my work, it's probably something I've done LOL

Another reason I find drive in writing this type of narrative is that MM!Blake's type of dissociative PTSD is something I haven't seen much in media in general. I've seen people depict her in various ways (some of them good!), but none of them ever really apply directly to me, so I wanted to make something that I could relate to and how to properly navigate life, given the environmental circumstances. Plus some us need better examples on how to juggle mental illness as adults and also be in healthy long term relationships because damn I have zero reference LOL

For the fic recs, oh boy I have so many LOL time to be a pathetic fangirl on main but okay here's the ones that immediately jump to mind (also heads up most of these are mature or explicit rating);

Certified Kaeli Fresh Fics

Let You See My Wilder Side (If I Can See Your Bones)

We all know this one but it is, hands down, my favorite piece of literature of all time. Masterfully crafted and a timeless classic worth several rereads (and I have. Embarrassingly so)

Written by @/lucytara on tumblr || @/explosive_sky on twitter

honestly all her works are immaculate and beyond compare. Also a major fan of I Have A Bullet With Your Mouth On It (That was first RWBY fanfic I ever read LMAO a friend recommended it to me before I even watched the show) I aspire to write like her some day. It's what got me writing fanfiction in the first place. So, credit goes to Erin for inspiring me to post my manuscripts at all. Words cannot express my gratitude and appreciation. I have two book series in the process of being published now and I wouldn't have had the nerve to do it had it not been for this specific fic.

2. One Day At A Time

Also one of the earlier fics I read before getting into the show LOL I love all of @/Frenchsoda 's work, the full list is also worth checking out. I'm a fan of disgruntled Blake who doesn't understand her attraction to Yang but it's so god damn sweet ugh

3. Fucking In Love

Written by @/Set_WingedWarrior and @/Softlight

This one circulates a lot in my social circles. Everyone I know LOVES this one and after reading it earlier this year, now I see why. As someone who worked in the sex industry for a brief period of time, this one's not only accurate but also A DELIGHT to read. The premise is fun, captivating, and worth the wait. I actually discovered a chapter update earlier this year and sent the gc into hysterics because we thought the fic was dead LMAO props to these authors!! They're doing an amazing job and deserve praise

4. You're A Mountain, Full Of Glory

written by champion author @/lescousinsdangereux

I should just preface already that every book Blake reads in MM is a fanfiction that exists because I love Easter eggs. Everyone knows I had Blake reference this in chapter 3 LOL but it's equally as immaculate as Erin's work. I LOVED especially the dynamic between Weiss, Yang, and Ruby in this one. Baby, we're complicated fucking murdered me 😭 also that fuckass Christmas scene, that's my favorite Christmas song LMAO

5. The Home Inside Your Head

Written by the ever skilled @/writeriguess . I found this fic by accident by seeing fanart for it floating around on this site. Got curious, picked at it, and. Oh, my god. It's not very often my brain gets scratched in the right way, but boy this one does it. This author does something specifically unique I haven't seen many do before, and I applaud them for it. There's great detail on the scenes that matter, and the fucking organic build up between Blake and Yang is just. God. Chef's kiss. Truly. It feels so god damn natural and healthy and it's already crossing off several of my agendas already. Give this one a read and give the author some love. SENSUAL FACE TOUCHING? CHAPTER 13????? BOOOOOOOYYYYYYY I'm normal about it

6. You'd Be Paranoid Too (If Everyone Was Out To Get You)

Written by @/WabaJaba_ on twitter

Okay so this one's completely different than what I've previously listed but HOLY FUCKING SHIT IS IT A THRILLER. It doesn't nearly have the amount of love and attention it truly deserves. A friend of mine recommended it to me because it shook them so fucking hard they were in total brainrot hell for a MONTH. NOW I UNDERSTAND WHY LMAO God I was obsessed with this for weeks myself. It obviously lives up to it's rating, horror fics aren't for everyone. But if you're able to read it, good lord you should. It's chilling, captivating, and had me on the edge of my fucking seat the entire time. Both endings are good, I still can't decide which one I prefer but RAH I will make sure this is seen god dammit

and last but certainly not least

7. You And Me and This Temptation

written by talented author @/ProfessorSpork

Okay this one was an accidental find as well. A friend sent it to me because THEY found it by accident, I clicked on it for later, went looking for a completely different fic that I mistook for this one, started skimming and realized 'wait a minute LMAO I don't recognize this'. But the thing you have to understand is I hate reading. I'm not a reader, I'm picky and it needs to be worth sitting down for long periods of time. This is one of the rare instances where I was so captivated by it I kept reading more and more from the middle where I landed, and eventually just said ykw let me just start from the beginning cus LMAO context.

This one is, by far, one the healthiest and loveliest depictions of first times I have ever seen. This shit was so inspiring to me that it literally kickstarted an essay in someone's DMs why depictions like this are so important. I didn't have this experience irl, and why MM is written the way it is is because its meant to serve as a lighthouse for those who, like me, haven't. This fic however I feel like should be a required read for anyone getting into relationships for the first time because if it's not like how these two interact, LEAVE IT. This is the standard. This is amazingly written, it's the closest I've ever seen canon Yang and Blake be written to date. The fucking souvenir bit 😭 NJKFGNFJKGNGJ killed me, I was kicking my feet laughing for a good minute. This is the kind of standard everyone should look at and go 'yeah, I want what they have' BECAUSE IT'S CORRECT. LOUD CORRECT BUZZER NOISES

Honestly everything in my bookmarks is certified Kaeli Fresh but these 7 are my top faves. They're probably also really commonly known I'm sure but LMAO like I said I don't read much 😭 which is heavily ironic considering I write myself. Anyway this ended up way longer than I intended but LOL <3 <3 go give these incredible authors love!!

[wannab-urs]

Gin's 2023 sappy post

It's hard for me to believe that at the beginning of this year, I didn't know a single one of my best friends in the world existed. But it's true!

How we got here

I'm not quite sure exactly when I started looking up Pedro Pascal on Tumblr, but it was sometime after February. I'd watched Game of Thrones and Oberyn was my favorite character, but I was in one of my periods of not being on Tumblr (I've had this account for about 10 years, but it's seen many fandoms and I haven't always been active).

I watched the first few episodes of The Last of Us that had come out - I was 3 episodes behind I think - and immediately looked up Joel Miller on Tumblr. How could I not? Anyway, give me ten minutes on this hellsite and a middle aged man with a huge imdb and watch me develop a hyperfixation.

So then I looked up interviews. I watched basically every interview this man ever did, but I remember that the Lie Detector interview and his appearance on the Talk Easy podcast are really what did me in. I went from admiring this man as an actor and thinking he's pretty to basically being in love with him.

Anyways....

I didn't mean to start reading fanfic? I come from the world of Destiel on AO3. I never wrote it, I just read copious amounts of it. I'd never read reader insert, much less straight reader insert, and I'd never written a word of anything even resembling a fanfiction.

But I found @prolix-yuy, @frannyzooey, @joelscruff, @fuckyeahdindjarin, and @ezrasbirdie (check the spreadsheet, y'all are at the very top!) and I was hooked.

Then I read Psychomanteum by @whatsnewalycat and Celestial Navigation by @write-and-buried and was inspired to parade my trauma around in a Dieter shaped trench coat: AGOY was born.

@beskarandblasters is the first person I really talked to on here. In fact, Kel is the one who introduced me to most of my friends on here. And we've been harassing each other on the daily since. I hope to 🦵 her in real life someday soon ❤️. I love you, bitch. You mean the world to me.

I could never ever ever list all of my dear friends I've made on here. Seriously, there are so many of you that mean the world to me. But I'm gonna list a few.

My cannibal crew @pr0ximamidnight and @atinylittlepain, without whom Love as Violence Dave (starving season), Head up his Ass Javi (in the a.m.), and the later editions of loser druggie Dieter (AGOY) would not exist - or at least they wouldn't be as good as they are.

My darling soup snake, the loml, my spider twin, my forever partner in making bitches cry (it's us, we're bitches, making each other cry in an endless loop) @ramblers-lets-get-ramblin. #1 AGOY stan forever, you may love my own magnum opus more than I love it. Thanks for listening to me scream about every pedro boy on the planet and thanks for screaming right back at me. I love you.

The random college student I found by accident, decided to take under my wing, and then was subsequently taken under their wing bc it turns out they have more fandom experience and life advice than I can ever hope to have @idolatrybarbie. Bea, my darling, thanks for always letting me bitch, for showing me fics I never thought I'd be into (The Santa Claus AU Frankie Morales Free Use Kink, anyone) but that I often was into, for encouraging my writing, and for being fucking real with me.

The pedrostories crew, but especially @pedrorascal - I love screaming about Pedro with you at... 2:30 in the morning my time (we love time zones!). Thanks for letting me be a terrible mod for your fic archive blog and never getting mad at me for not doing my job. And for being a wonderful, kind, amazing person all the fucking time.

I'm being so serious when I say I could list at least 20 more people. People who brightened my day with a reblog or a message. Or who wrote a fic I still think about at least once a week. Or who made a gifset that is permanently etched into my brain. People I talked to in discords and most likely trauma dumped on and they listened and they cared and they let me hold their trauma in return. I love you guys so fucking much.

Conclusion

I never could have imagined I'd be a writer and run a fic rec blog at 24. Especially not for Pedro Pascal Characters. But here we are -- and I can honestly say it has been the highlight of my year. And I bought a house this year.

I have so many new friends and a new hobby (I never wrote at all before this) just because I wanted to Fuck That Old Man. Incredible.

[princeescaluswords]

ur addition to ur post about scott being forced to treat derek terribly reminded me of the way ppl react to alina killing the darkling. like yeah her killing him was the only way to resolve the situation she'd been put in (by darkles himself). yet ppl keep doing rewrites where alina is meant to 'fix' him or joins his side like. Huh?????

(I must preface this with the reminder that I have only seen the Shadow and Bone television series. I know nothing of any differences that might be in the novels.)

There's nothing wrong with rewriting a story; that's what fanfiction is for, after all. But if someone wishes to write an ending where Alina Starkov chooses Aleksander Morozova, they have their work cut out for them. It requires them to alter the characters and histories of either the Sun Summoner or the Darkling (or both) so much that they literally become different characters. My concern (and I think you share in this) is that people believe that Alina, as portrayed, could easily have chose to be with Aleksander, as portrayed, and they could have a happily ever after.

I can't possibly see any scenario where this can be true. Let us propose, for example, that we vanish Mal Orestev. Poof! He never existed. Alina's early life would still have been dominated by oppression and prejudice, oppression and prejudice that exists in part because of Aleksander's choices, no matter how noble the motivations for those choices were at the beginning. While grisha have always faced oppression, Alina's youth was shaped by fear and disenfranchisement; her life was defined by either her race, her poverty (exacerbated by the Fold), or her potential as the Sun Summoner. This world, in turn, was shaped by Aleksander's actions. No matter how charming and passionate the Darkling is, Alina's history and her character would propel her to question her own feelings for him and his feelings for her. Alina would be betraying every part of herself if she chose the life promised by Aleksander, and I think the story, as portrayed, makes that very clear.

But let's say she did it anyway; with her strength of will, she decided that she would join with the Darkling and accept the injustice done to her (and everyone else) as insufficient to prevent her from being with him. There still can be no happy ending in sight. Nothing in the history or character of Aleksander Morozova indicates that he would be content or even able to treat Alina as an equal, as a real partner. He certainly didn't respect her when she defied him. Everything we see and know about him indicates a pattern of dominating everyone around him, from his loyal followers to his own mother. I don't feel that the fact that Alina is his equal in magical power would help their relationship in any way. Aleksander would see in the Sun Summoner a danger if he could not control her, and Alina would have to become submissive.

Again, fanfiction has great powers of transformation, but there is a limit to how far a writer can stretch plot, setting, and most importantly characterization before it must be questioned if there is still a meaningful connection to the original material. Once that point is breached, readers like you and me have to question if the writer is actually not a fan but only insincerely passing themselves off as one.

This is my problem with the many spiteful interpretations of Master Plan (2x12). For example, I often bring up that people rewriting that scene tend to ignore the immediate mortal danger Allison was in when Gerard demands Scott make Derek bite him. Their motivation is obvious. The know as well as I do that there is nothing in Scott's nature or history, as portrayed, would lead him to place place Derek's autonomy above saving Allison's life, especially when Scott knows that Derek's Bite will disable (if not kill) Gerard and thus save Derek, Allison, and Derek's pack as well? There is simply no alternative that makes sense.

Like Alina, Scott's decisions had been shaped by what he had endured for the previous twenty-four episodes. While, contrary to popular fandom interpretation, he didn't hate Derek, being honest with Derek would require him to ignore too much. Derek had concealed information from him (the alpha's very existence), manipulated him repeatedly ("It's not going to come for free"), disregarded his needs ("I can't let her live!"), and outright betrayed him three times (the locker room shower, the cure, Peter's resurrection). Derek had demonstrated that he would chose lethal violence repeatedly and -- what is arguably worse -- had been a spectacular failure every time he tried to do that. Gerard, on the other hand, had delivered on every single threat he had made. Peter himself made that point in Battlefield (2x11): "You weren't ready. Because of it, Gerard is winning." The wisest plan was the one Scott went with. The only possible counter argument -- Derek's terrible history with Kate -- was something that Scott did not know about. There's a reason Derek didn't hold Master Plan against Scott, and it wasn't bad writing.

I feel our dissatisfaction with particular fandom behaviors isn't about some insistence that canon is sacrosanct. To us, the transformation they are performing is incomplete and ill-wrought, like a badly Photoshopped picture where someone we appreciate ends up having three arms, because the writer/fandom isn't working with the whole subject but only the parts that they want to change, yet they try to pass it off as a real picture. For me, personally, this dissatisfaction also arises from the idea that there are not-so-hidden motivations for the transformation: racism, classism, decadence, and misogyny.

Fiction often portrays dark events as well as heroic events, and if it is quality fiction, all those events are clearly motivated and make sense according to the plot and within the setting. It's an organic whole. Alina would not choose the Darkling and be happy because it goes against everything we know about both of them; Scott created his Master Plan because it goes along with everything we've watched him experience. Different outcomes would require different stories.

[uchihakeimei]

Helloooo, hope it's ok if I reply here! Also I forgot to apologize in advance for my terrible English, hope it's understandable!

What a relief to find someone who actually understands Kaiser! He's one of my absolute favs together with Rin and Isagi, but I never really spoke much about him since I noticed the fandom has a bad habit of misinterpreting him. AND Kaisagi in general. No, Isagi is not his soft-uwu toyboy, he's a badass, a menace and if anything, it's him that would put Kaiser in his place. And yes, they totally hate each other. Like, super hate. And that borderlines on obsession from Kaiser's part. (Ngl, that's my favorite part in all Isagi's ships, how he's unbothered, moisturized, living his best life, and the counterpart is decaying in their obsession in beating him. God, he's such an icon.) Their mutual disdain is what makes the ship so balanced, and also the reason why I dislike Kainess, I don't really appreciate the power imbalance and how submissive Ness acts around him. He deserves better than that. Oh, how I would love to see him leave Kaiser in the dirt to fight alone: that would be such a great character development for both of them. Ofc I'm not judging anyone who ships Kainess, it's a perfectly valid ship! I just love both Kiis and Rnis cause they check all of the boxes of the chemicals in my brain. And when the Kaiser flashbacks drops? I'm gonna go absolutely crazy. I need to be the worm in his brain and understand him in a much deeper way than Kaneshiro ever could.

(Also, I love your headcanon about their alternative jobs. I tried to come up with something for Rin too, and I concluded that he definitely could only ever work in front of a computer, where he would never have to interact with people - and traumatize them with his weird bullshit, lmao). (Oh, and Kaiser would be an even worse boyfriend than Rin, let's be real. One small argument and he's dumping your ass to ""find himself"" like any mediocre fuckboy).

Yes, despite my BLLK obsession I'm keeping up with other mangas! I've been reading One Piece since I was a child, but lately I got invested in Chainsaw man, Choujin X, Kagurabachi, Bungou stray dogs and My hero academia, too. What about you??

Of course, it's totally okay!!

And hello fellow Kaiser fan, great to meetcha!!

And yes. A lot of people mischaracterise Kaiser- either as an Isagi simp (most common in fanfictions) or a complete asshole with no depth.

KaiSagi characterisation tends to be even worse (which, this is NOT me criticising authors at all, people are entitled to write what they enjoy!), but either Kaiser or Isagi gets reduced to a desperate simp trying to get into each other's pants (mostly I have seen this with Kaiser, actually) and that's not very likely.

The charm of KaiSagi is their mutual hate, and the ways they overcome that!

And yes. You hit the nail right on the head! Such unbalanced ships, like KaiNess (SasuSaku or NaruHina from Naruto) are the one kind of ships I can never get behind. Whether it's love or hate, it needs to be mutual for me to enjoy it. Power unbalance is not my thing but different strokes for different folks and all that

And yes, Kaiser currently obsessed with destroying Isagi while all Isagi wants to be is no 1 is a delicious flavour and Kaneshiro is cooking

I need an explanation. Of everything regarding Kaiser. That flashback needs to be longest flashback in the manga. I want a biography I can write a thesis on.

(True!! He definitely isn't a people person. He will most likely be doing a job that requires minimum human contact lol)

(And yeah, Kaiser is such red flag, we'd need rose colored glasses to date him 😝)

Hehe. Fellow CSM fan!! My fav is Denji, and I am eagerly awaiting Season 2!

And although I haven't seen the rest of them, I have they are very good anime as well!

My absolute favourite would be Naruto, as I have been in that fandom for years as well. Apart from that, I am currently keeping up with Solo Leveling and Windbreaker!

(Although listing all the animes I have watched will require a separate post, I watch a lot of them!)

Ps: Your English was lovely, no worries!!

[minthe-lover]

Lore Olympus is a lot like Twilight. There's Edward and Hades, two immortal beings eons older than their love interests and only actually like the idea they crafted in their heads about them, they're broody "sad bois" with no flaws who hate everyone ever and they're loaded as shit. Then there's Bella and Persephone, two unsympathetic, annoying, underaged, stronger-than-even-the-strongest-character, self-insert mary sues that everyone is in love with. X plot contradicts Y plot, Z plot is completely forgotten and the writing is just plain terrible. The main characters barely know one another and they're rushing to get married. They're both unbelievably racist, classist, have big bads that end up really not being a big deal like, at all, and the creator thinks they're the greatest thing since sliced bread. I have a separate tangent just about the vampires tbh. But then, there's their fandoms.

The Twilight fandom (or what remains of it) is more than aware that their chosen media sucks. They laugh at it, roast ReNameMe, write significantly better fanfiction than canon ever did, come up with fun theories, talk about how bad Bella and Edward are for eachother, simp for Charlie, and hear each other out on what they have to say. As far as I've seen, there aren't really any "antis" because everyone kind of just mutually love-hates Twilight. But the Lore Olympus fandom is so insanely different? They lose their minds if you so much as breathe wrong in H&P's direction, they think it's the most romantic thing in the world, and that it's accurate mythology? The slightest indication that Lore Olympus isn't good makes them froth at the mouth like a rabid dog and you get attacked from all directions by every stan in a hundred mile radius?

It's insane to me how two pieces of media that are so similar in their most basic form can have such dramatically different fandoms. Anyway Twilight stans are cool and LO stans need to chill the fuck out. Media can suck ass and people can enjoy it while criticizing it, the universe isn't going to collapse because someone doesn't like your chosen brain rot.

^^^^^ I'm admittedly not that familiar with twilight or it's fandom. so not much I can add to this.

[balsa-margarita]

Why I'm disappointed in Starbound (and why I still like it, somehow)

So, Starbound. It's an indie game you may or may not know of, whether you've seen it in furry art or heard people call it "ripoff Terraria" or something, or perhaps even played it. What is it, though?

To put it simply, Starbound is a 2D procedurally generated space adventuring game, created by Chucklefish. (I got some images from their press kit to show you what I mean.)

As you can see, there is a lot going on here. First off, there are multiple sapient alien species other than humans in Starbound (it's most obvious with the Floran in the third image) and there's also a distinct storyline to follow. All of that means lore, and this is where the issues start. Immediately.

Starbound takes the idea of "culture as costume" as a model to work off of, rather than a criticism. Take the Hylotl, a race of fish-people. Everything about their culture is taken directly from Japanese culture in real life - they have anime, samurai, and Japanese-inspired architecture. None of this, though, is very deep or well-thought-out. It's just kind of... there, you know? And this is how it is with most of Starbound's alien races (Avians are ripoff Mesoamericans in a lot of ways, Novakid are stereotypical cowboy Western characters) with only a couple of exceptions. At times, this weird lack of thought can be downright insulting, such as with the Floran - who are carelessly modeled after stereotypes of the "cannibal tribe." There are also over a dozen races in the game, and you can only play as seven of them. The others' lore is even less thought out.

Now, you would think that the actual story would be better, right? Well... sort of. The overarching enemy is an entity called "The Ruin," which is a literal living eldritch planet monster (which you kill at the end of the game in a scene much more badass than anything else Chucklefish came up with) which is being aided by a xenophobic human cult that is trying to wipe out all of the other races in the universe. Pretty interesting, aside from the very generic name... but the generic name gives it away. Not only is the Ruin one side of a pure good/evil dichotomy - which, in my opinion, is a bit of a tired way of doing things - but the rest of the writing just feels lazy. Not enough actual eldritch horror in the story where the big bad is an eldritch horror, and not enough focus on the space xenophobes' xenophobia. When you play through it, it feels kind of cheap, and as someone who talks a lot about lore (and writes fanfiction) I have issues with that. But the problems don't stop there.

Guess why it feels cheap? Because it is.

Starbound is one of the worst optimized games I've ever played, up there with things like Pokemon Scarlet/Violet - possibly even worse - and is riddled with half-baked mechanics and terribly shoehorned game progression and design. (Multiplayer in particular is horrific - the game has no strict physics update at all, which basically means people playing the game at different FPS play it at different speeds. As you can imagine, this ends terribly for all involved.) All this is because Chucklefish used unpaid labor - often from teenagers trying to get into the game industry! So, of course, when these people inevitably left because they weren't paid, no one kept working on whatever they had been in charge of... it was a disaster. A total, unmitigated disaster. That's where Starbound stands today.

Unmodded Starbound, at least.

The core concepts of Starbound - bumming around on procedurally generated planets, questing, and being a space landlord, among other things - are still really cool. But it could have been so much cooler! Wasted potential in a way that no other game I've ever played is. This is where mods - and one mod in particular called Frackin' Universe - come in. Frackin' Universe does its very best to fill in the holes left in the basegame, and add new systems that rival some Minecraft tech mods in complexity. It can't fix everything, but it's the closest Starbound will ever get to being a really complete game. (Part of me really wishes I could take the IP from the idiots at Chucklefish and give it to the Frackin' Universe guys. They could make an excellent remake.)

That's it. That's the rant. I just... I really wish Starbound was a better game with development that hadn't been led by a moron who bailed from Re-Logic.

[clearancecreedwatersurvival]

As a follow-up to my let people use fanfiction as narrative therapy post I would also like to state for the record:

Ain’t nothing wrong with self insert fanfiction. Or Mary Sue OCs that are basically self inserts. Also nothing wrong with people writing ‘bad’ fanfiction that has nothing to do with the canon really. I don’t give a shit. People are making art and that’s awesome. I may not read stuff that isn’t to my personal tastes, but I am Glad people are making their art regardless. Especially young people. Especially people who are otherwise new to writing. Hell yeah, Make Art.

One thing I have noticed about fandom on tumblr is that in very large fandoms with mass appeal, there are often a lot of kids and youths and young folk watching or reading and thus wanting to create transformative art about it. This also means that a high concentration of fic may tend more towards having less to do with the actual canon of the thing and being more focused on whatever those kids really wanted to write or read about it. To discuss one specific example, the largest subsection of fandom that currently exists around the DC batman franchises on this site is the batfam fandom, a fandom comprised mostly of younger fans who are fans more of the platonic ideal of batman and his adopted kids and close associates that only really exists in their own works and also the webtoon**** For most of those people the appeal is the found family aspect, and that’s what they want to read and write about. Hell yeah. Good for them. At least they’re writing. At least they’re making art.

****I know there are a lot of people in the batman comics fandom that have serious issues with the webtoon and the way that dc comics publishing agendas have begun to reflect more what people on the internet are talking about and less coherent storytelling that makes sense based on past canon. And this is a very fair criticism.

But this is not a problem limited to dc. This is a problem of all major production companies who produce art for mass release. TV shows being written in response to what people say on reddit has been ruining creative endeavors in an obvious way at least since Game of Thrones was airing. Books being published based on what will be popular on tiktok derived from the popularity of some frankly terrible novels (yes I do mean acotar) leads to some absolute drivel on the best seller list. Of course the comics industry is also fucking things up the same way.

Your enemy there are not the young fans new to fandom who are just discovering writing fanfiction and doing so by writing about whatever interests them most. Please stop blaming kids and other people who aren’t writing fanfiction close enough to your concept of canon for this problem, it is far bigger than that.

Let people make their maybe bad art in peace. Everyone has to make bad art on the road to learning how to make better art. I am glad they are making their art regardless.

Also no shade meant to those fans this is just an observation and I wish you all well, but I do find it a little funny that the people who Are experts on the dc comics canon who I have seen criticize the existence of the batfam fandom on here are also usually like ‘this is my favorite character, I hate every single run this character has ever been in except this one from 30 years ago and five panels of this one run that got cancelled early.’ Like, you don’t really like most of the canon you wish other people would familiarize themselves with right? Give new fans a chance to want to learn more about it. Most of the fans in that circle are pretty young, they’re gonna have kinda bad taste sometimes and that’s fine and good actually. They’ll grow out of it and maybe some of them will come to know the comics canon more closely.

This is also why even though I am vocal about personally disliking the works of SJM (acotar my beloathed) and its impact on the publishing industry, I am honestly happy for anyone that read those books and enjoyed them. Same for every other book I don’t like. If you read it and get something out of it hell yeah good for you. I was unironically into twilight for many years as a teen I am not here to pass judgement on teens or anyone for that matter for what they enjoy.

Most big fandoms I have dipped my toes into have this same problem. If there are a lot of young people in that fandom, there’s gonna be a lot of fanfic that is written by people just learning to write, and that’s great, I love that actually, good for them. But those are always the fandoms where I see people being perhaps more vitriolic than necessary towards other fans for not being up to snuff. Let people make art that you don’t think is good, please. It’s fine actually. If you don’t like it you don’t have to read it. Just be glad someone is making art that makes them happy and move on.

[mandy4ever69420]

i would like to see the og version :D

man if yr sure. anyway i do love fanfiction i think it's fun but i am the weirdest person to be talking about fanfiction.

i find fanfiction to be a really fascinating medium TBH it can tell you a lot about people what they look for and write about. and one thing i learned watching shameless is that the general vibe of shameless is pretty much what i want out of a fanfic. like, watching it i remember specifically thinking "this is what i'd been literally looking for reading xyz" which is a little weird for shameless fanfiction, no? fanfic as a medium has its own genre conventions so most (not all) (i <3 conceptual fic) fanfictions intentionally or not make their stories slightly more like fanfiction than like the source material. normal. Funny enough, the fanfic that's most closely ever actually matched the tone of shameless to me was written for homestuck

the MAIN THING i want to say about. the way i read fanfiction. and the fact that i am a lunatic. is that like. i kind of became an expert for some reason in sniffing out people's political and social biases really fast. and i can sometimes spend more time psychoanalyzing an author than i do worrying about the story. this comes up a lot when the law ever gets involved but also just.. you can tell exactly where someone is on their "how to be gay" journey by how they write it. i think what people write as escapism can in general tell you more about what they consider normal/safe/acceptable than if they just tried to explain to you their beliefs (see: are there royals/rich people as protagonists? what is the time period being discussed?)

BUT wrt fanfiction's genre conventions id make note that most fanfiction is very much in the romcom niche. which is a super disrespected genre in film/published lit in the same way and for the same reasons fanfic gets dismissed a lot. erotica is also a very frequently dismissed and disrespected genre. not only are romances seen as frivolous, but sex as shameful or cheap. <-also relevant to the way that sex work is dismissed when ex. working in an amazon warehouse takes as much or more of a toll on someone's body.

1 thing i love to see is weird niche interests and jobs. lots of opportunities in a fully freeform zero interest groups/showrunners/advertisers genre to get someone explaining the intricacies of being a mail carrier or quality controlling machinery. it's always frustrating to me to see rock stars and secret agents when we have all the time in the world to get sunshine cleaning (2008) with it.

it's also a good format for more or less endless speculation development and character moments. which is what fanfiction was built for. in published work there has to be a ticking clock to keep the audience's (and network exec's) attention, but you can assume if someone looked something up, you already have their attention. that's not to say not going for a plot-heavy conflictful story, just that there's no need to build in a requirement end/goal. you have all the time in the world because you're not batting to get a new season. no shark jumping required. <- this is somewhere that shows like mr. robot and the bear really fuck up i think. if your end goal would finish your story, you can't make meaningful moves towards it without losing your renewal & your plot is sort of barred from going anywhere or doing anything, while also demanding that you try every time

unfortunately for a lot of fanfiction FOR ME though is that sometimes the "make things sweeter" impulse that comes with the genre (part of the genre) (not necessarily a writing flaw) tends to put me off a bit. it's a big part of what i love in shameless: when someone is in the hospital it's a bit more "waiting room filling out forms and trying not to look at other people crying" and less "patiently waiting by your bedside with roses". something about detailing the shitty terrible sides of situations that pop up a lot in romances really scratches a specific itch in my brain. this contradicts the romcom genre in some ways (though there are romcoms that do this sort of thing)

i also happen to love AUs. im literally like an AU guy. though for me one of the most important things to keep in mind is matching tone, i really dont like when things get changed in terms of what they FEEL like. into like, something that isn't weird and pathetic and fucked up. SAD!

i'm also unreasonably resentful of retcons/AUs to avoid a sad thing happening. i think stories are better when all the horrible shit absolutely happened and the ending is good anyway. it's a kinder way to look at trauma to me. the person who lived through the worst thing you can imagine can live in a happy story! i also just love to feel a little bit like i'm eating glass with fiction.

(also, specifically for shameless, i've noticed this intense impulse some people have to definitively characterize mickey as not a rape or hate crime survivor. it's an attempt to make a story "happier" that also happens to ignore how horrifying to me mickey sleeping with women in other contexts is. what happened with svetlana is in some ways a literalization of the kinds of social pressure that mickey was always under. best description i can think of is "how far away is the gun?" -- a lot of the "reasoning" for AUs as to why mickey wouldn't have been hate crimed comes across weirdly like victim blaming - i know that's not what people mean, but it's what you're saying when you say "if it weren't for ian, mickey never would've let his guard down like that" - his guard wasn't down, he made all the right choices wherever he could, and ian canonically blaming himself doesn't mean he was right about it. i also think the idea that mickey would otherwise be too smart or too tough to make the "mistake" of getting caught shows some messed up ideas about what people think of real world people who do survive hate crimes and abuse.)

fanfiction is very much the sort of thing that is for having a mental breakdown of the eating ice cream on the couch variety. obviously talking about fanfiction having romanticized tropes is like watching a mob movie and being like "whys there so many italians here" so i'm aware that's just genre.

ANYWAY TO MY OWN PERSONAL INSANE NICHE: DIALECT!

this is about fanfiction, AND gif and television captioning. people mix up mickey's working class white dialect with AAVE a LOT. working class and Black american dialects certainly interact a lot and have similarities, but they're not the same. also AAVE has a lot of complexities and nuances that speakers of other dialects definitely borrow from where something like standard american is lacking. i'm not an L1 speaker of AAVE but i do notice myself borrowing where a structure is just much, much clearer than anything else. al7ayaa hek

there are ways in which an lot of these mixups make sense. especially with gifmakers/captioners/authors who happen to be british. mickey DOES use double negatives (btw, this is a feature of many languages, including closely related german) occasionally (i think), and famously "you ain't window shopping" but i can't think of any occasion where he uses a construction like habitual "be" or a "you been a pain in the ass the whole time i known you" (made up example) he also doesn't exempt "have" from "where the hell have you been", he just reduces it to a single schwa sound.

when mickey says "doesn't mean i'm gonna wear a dress" it's absolutely true that he's not articulating the "s" and taken purely literally "don't" is closer to what you heard. culturally, however, "don't" has a different pronunciation than "doesn't" in a way unrelated to the "s". the biggest difference is in the vowel. so mickey's "doesn't" is "glottal stop-schwa-syllabic N-glottal stop" where as "don't" written in that same spot gramatically will read as "d-oʊ-glottal stop"

shameless netflix captioners do something similar with lip. he gets captioned as "aight" a lot when he doesn't articulate "lr" - technically, literally, closer to his actual utterance. but the connotations bring up a different pronunciation entirely. lip isn't white boy carl.

i think unfortunately in addition to being mistakes made by people with little understanding of or exposure to the details of AAVE these can often be based on people's assumptions about what a poor or "criminal" or "uneducated" accent sounds like, moreso than on actual observation of speech patterns. which is just like. a slightly subtler form of racism

anyway. since i'm on this topic i just want to mention that i'm fairly sure ian's speech changes in s10/11 to be more similar to mickey's. i haven't been taking very careful note of his speech patterns but i think it's cute.

[breitzbachbea]

I'm not going on anon, and also not telling anyone to continue a chain.

Top 3 fics of yours that you wish everyone would read—GO!

Thank you, Darling! I will copy the explanations for the fics from a similiar ask I did already, if possible.

1.Perché in Sicilia i morti dovrebbe morire I am aware that there is technically a typo in here, but I don’t have the book I quoted around, so I don’t know if the typo is already in the source material. Either way, do you like ghosts? Do you like folklore? Do you like places haunted by the terrible things they’ve seen, objects filled with the absentminded crooked intentions of their owner? Do you like childhood friends, who are the only friends to trust each other with their terrible childhoods, but it doesn’t solve anything? Perché is the story you want. Herakles and Michele are sneaking around Michele’s house during a power outage, talking about the recent past and ranting about the distant one, while the are some parts in between those that are unspeakable. It weaves the past of Sicily on a whole, especially Palermo’s and its hinterland, together with the fate of the Vento family and clothes the terrors of Michele’s own psyche into the familiar appearance of the collective Sicilian folklore. Also, if you like two mediterranean guys being way too coddly and touchy-feely, you can give this one a go as well.

2. No Rest For The Wicked Tu non fermami se capita! Lo sai che il mare mi agita! Ti canterò di quelle notti ad orienteeee, di quella luna che danzava tra i bazaaaaar! If you are a fan of self-indulgent fanfictions, this is the most unashamedly self-indulgent thing I ever wrote.* This story has everything: The Chaos Seven (Team Sicily and Team Ireland) go on a Turkey Vacay with the Greeks and Turks. Paddy hits his head. Harry and Soph are 100% on their bullshit as if no one else is around. Argueing. Cursing. Flirting. Hera and Sadık so deeply in love in their twisted and yet so mundane way. Italian Music and Sexy Dancing. Bridal Carrying. Please go and read it, 🌀 ohhh you want to read about TurGre and SicIre and the O'Connels soooo badly. 🌀 *All my other OC fics don’t count, because I avoid tagging them Hetalia as much as I can, so I don’t expect anyone to read it. Even if they are tagged hetalia, no one specifically looks for my OC ships, so while I am glad for every reader, I never write with any in mind.

3. On the King's mind Am I very proud of this fic? Not really, but it's grown on me ever since I wrote it. I really like the story-in-a-story, mostly because it hits a lot of beats of the LFLS mainstory: The Anglo-Irish Antagonism, Robert and Charlie's enmity in particular, Charlie and Harry's friendship and. well. there's. SicIre :]. If you don't mind very stereotypical High Fantasy stuff, with a less conventional King/Adviser constellation, you should definitely give this one a go. I also just enjoy Harry, (High) King of Ireland a lot. We love an underdog, but sometimes I just want my kids in the cool positions of power they could definitely fill.

[septic-dr-schneep]

Twenty Questions for Fic Writers

Thanks for the tag, @sneakyfox55 :D This should be fun!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

It says 894 but I've anonymized some older/lower quality fics so those aren't accounted for in the public number. Including those, it's 1045!

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

At the moment it's 1,760,756!

3. What fandoms do you write for?

The big ones have been Tolkien, Transformers, JSE and Markiplier, Undertale and Marvel!

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Locks To Fit The Keys The Little Things Out of Suffering Come Strong Souls Tell Me Where It Hurts In All But Name

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Feedback is love, feedback is life! Comments fuel me to keep creating :D There are some I wasn't able to respond to at the time because I was too busy/tired/ill/etc. but I do my best to get to as many as I can!

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Wrong Turn, Dying Light and Last Words come to mind because they all involve everyone dying horribly. Sorry...

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Retrouvailles is just a ball of warm and fuzzy family feelings <3

8. Do you get hate on fics?

I have on a couple of occasions, usually because someone didn't like my characterization or I declined to write ships that made me uncomfortable.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I gave it a try back in the day before I figured out I was ace and sex-repulsed. Since then I've sworn off it :'D

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

I do! My Fran Bow + Undertale crossover is one of my favorites but the weirdest one was probably The Hobbit + Doctor Who XD

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of. I have seen another writer use my OCs without crediting me but when I brought it up, they were apologetic so it was resolved cordially.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

I have, I just can't remember which one it was at the moment asfjks

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes, I have, with a couple of different roleplay partners. It's been a while though; I've found I prefer art collabs over writing collabs.

14. What’s your all time favorite ship?

I don't know if I have an all-time favorite; I usually prefer platonic, QPRs and familial dynamics. Grillby/Muffet and Eowyn/Faramir come to mind, though; they're adorable!

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Just yesterday I was feeling guilty for the umpteenth time over leaving the tenth (and arguably most important) part of The Pacemakers series unfinished. I posted what I had of it so my readers could know how it would have gone but still...

16. What are your writing strengths?

I like to think I'm pretty good at detailing high-intensity emotions and the effects they have on the characters so the readers can feel them too.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Actually finishing longer fics :'D I have a terrible track record of cliffhanger WIPs and trust me, it frustrates me just as much as it does my readers. I'm not sure how to remedy it, unfortunately.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I've done it here and there with Dr. Schneeplestein's German and it's a lot of fun! Since I'm not fluent I have to be sparing with it, though; it'd suck to overestimate what I know and end up mistranslating something.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

I think I wrote something for the 90s TMNT movies? That was before I knew it was even called fanfiction or that there were websites for posting them XD

20. Favorite fic you’ve written?

That's such a hard question! I don't know if I could ever pick a #1 without second-guessing it later but In All But Name is pretty far up there <3

No pressure tag for @jacky-rubou! Have fun!

[nautilusopus]

20 questions for fic writers

Tagged by @subdee, may as well since it's been a while

1. How many works do you have on ao3?

40

2. What’s your total ao3 word count?

590,973

3. What fandoms do you write for?

FFVII mostly, but none of that spinoff bullshit. I have some stuff for XV in the works despite hating XV and the characters having zero fucking personality because this is just my grieving process I guess??? They're basically all crossovers with VII except one though so ¯_(ツ)_/¯

I've also got a couple things for Spy X Family I'm excited for but unfortunately am a bit hamstrung due to certain reveals and lack of reveals so it's on pause.

(Also Ever Crisis and Remake back to back have sucked all the fucking joy out of me in one fell swoop so I'm trying to remember why I even fucking like doing this when FFVII has effectively been erased.)

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

1)The Number I.

Go read it. I worked hard on it and it's very dense and heavily character-driven and a genfic focused on plot, and, most importantly, is complete. I'm going to shill this one directly I ain't give a damn:

Predominately involves Cloud, now four years out from Meteorfall, struggling to adjust to civilian life given he's still gene-spliced with an Old God, who begins losing control of his body to a heretofore seemingly unknown entity with inscrutable goals. As it gradually becomes clear that the events of the previous four years aren't as they seem in more ways than one, things start to go off the rails completely as Cloud winds up enmeshed in conflict between multiple parties: an international initiative studying cosmology and the two doctors leading it; the WRO, who has considered him a Jenova-based liability from day one; interpersonal friction with his newfound family stemming from the residual baggage of everything he went through; and reality itself beginning to deteriorate.

It's slice of life, it's cosmic horror, it's a character study, it's about grown men crying and legacies and grief and trauma and intimacy and autonomy and gender as a microcosm for broader truths about the nature of the self, it's got angry tearful fistfights, bottoms that haven't figured out you can take it in turn to service top, Cloud telling everyone his strong and correct opinions about magic and materia and bikes, found family shenanigans, and me talking about garlic for way way way too long. Something for everyone!

I wasn't kidding about any of that by the way, heed the warnings at the top of the chapters because I do NOT pull punches and we get into some heavy shit. Go hard or go home.

Originally it was a 500 word pee joke I was gonna show to two people in response to a terrible LTD argument I saw someone make and was sure I'd "wrap it up quickly". Oops.

2) An Idiot's Guide to Holding Hands. I wrote this in response to, I'm not kidding, the worst most hateful fanfiction I have ever fucking seen in my life. As big of a beef as I have with the Crisis Core fuckers treating the women like shit and being pretty hateful towards them as a whole, they're still at least clearly writing because they genuinely love Crisis Core and the characters in it for reasons that are presently unknown to me. This thing on the other hand was oozing contempt for the cast of VII and Evangelion and the women in particular and I genuinely don't know why someone would put that much fucking effort into making something like this and felt a sudden need to rebut everything it stood for. It's not super great as a fic tbh but y'all seem to like it so at least something came of it.

3) Don't Ask How The Job Interview Went. Harry Potter/VII crossover I shat out in like 6 hours on a whim because a Halloween prompt one year was "witches and wizards" and I hated all the existing crossovers (ugh again with the crisis core). Honestly had an entire multichapter fic as a sequel lined up that I was pretty excited for but as things went on I felt grosser and grosser about even making it. Maybe I'll do something with the outline one day, it was basically finished. Still kills me that this thing is so fucking popular but there you go.

4) What's Dead and Buried. This is literally just Chapter 18 of The Number I (which you should go read!). I wrote it, realised it worked great as a standalone fic and gateway drug, and published it as its own thing. If you're on the fence about TNI, maybe check out this oneshot. Features shitty gremlin child Cloud interacting with Vincent and a lot of grim implications about both their lives that Cloud is too young to really get. Very very black comedy.

5) Adjacent. I don't like this one sorry. It was a commission and while I like the individual headcanons of freaky shit Cloud is inclined to do and was chomping at the bit to use them somewhere I don't like how they wound up getting utilised. Feels like generic fandom fluff to me. I'd delete it but people seem to enjoy it and I don't want to take that from them.

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Always and as soon as I possibly can! I'm immensely flattered people actually take the time to comment on stuff and I enjoy getting to talk about the stuff I wrote in a bit more depth.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

It's Full of Stars easily. Fucked that dude up beyond repair. Also was considering a sequel for this one too so I could explore some of the stuff fueling what the fuck is going on here, though that might obviously ruin the ambiguity of said ending and what exactly was done to him.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

I'm a big baby I actually almost always try for happy endings, or at least bittersweet. Probably Tidewaters, nobody even gets pulped in that one.

8. Do you get hate on fic?

Basically no. I've gotten five negative comments in all the years I've been doing this:

Two were people whinging about how I made Aeris Jewish in a fic and how that was reverse racist against Christians (die mad about it lol).

Two were someone that wanted an in-depth essay over my right to use a slur within the context of a character talking about people calling him that slur in a character arc partially about feeling alienated from gender and basically demanded I out myself to "prove" I could use it while missing literally everything about why that word would be used to where they felt the need to send that shit to begin with (gee thanks did you do it did you make the queers feel comfortable). Reading comprehension is so so important you are all going to kill me.

The last one was a long six paragraph rant completely unrelated to the fic in any way because I joked in the author's notes about not liking a video game that they liked(????), followed by an even longer ten paragraph rant about how actually the unrelated game was "95% perfect" (lmaoooo) and how "5% of it being bad isn't a good reason to hate it". The first half of it's on there, I deleted the second comment because my fanfiction comments are not the fucking gamefaqs forums dude. (Also die mad about it lol.) That remains to this day the only comment I've ever deleted from any of my fics and that includes the one that literally just said "penis" and nothing else.

9. Do you write smut?

If you squint lol. TNI has a couple sex scenes in it. They're uh

they're in it.

Boy are they in it.

10. Do you write crossovers?

Hell yeah I do. Also I'm a purist about this term A CROSSOVER IS WHEN YOU CROSS THE TWO THINGS OVER BUT THEY ARE STILL THEIR OWN DISPARATE THINGS. A FUSION IS WHEN THE TWO SETTINGS ARE FUSED. WORDS MEAN THINGS. ALSO A DRABBLE IS 100 WORDS EXACTLY NO MORE NO LESS. I'LL KEEP SITTING ON THIS PORCH SHAKING MY FIST AT THESE CHILDREN UNTIL THEY FUCKING LEARN.

Anyway I'll dump FFVII on everything and nobody can stop me. FFXV. Mass Effect. Spy X Family. Aliens. Ellen Ripley can, should, must, and will fight Jenova with a power loader.   

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Nah I talk a big game but I ignore the Comp too hard to break into the mainstream. I'm small potatoes.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nah and no surprises why. Shit's too wordy.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Kiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiind of? Fuck I gotta finish that thing.

14. What’s your all-time favourite ship?

meh. Does Loid/Yor even count? Everyone keeps writing it wrong and we still haven't seen the penny drop but it's sweet in its extremely fucking dysfunctional way (which is the best way GO READ TNI COUGH COUGH).

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but probably won’t?

Frame-Perfect. Should not have started writing before finishing the damn outline, don't know how to resolve this thing without it being a massive downer any way you slice it. This is why you should never pants VARETH.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Dialogue babyyyyyyy. I literally won an award for it once lol. Probably also psychological horror. Those two things combined means there's a lot of stream of consciousness shit in nearly everything I do, and if that's not your jam you probably won't like it.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

It is so, so hard to get a character from a location to another location. It shouldn't be hard. Why is it hard??? I should be allowed to just go And then he went, in exactly that cadence every time and everyone should just deal with it UGH 

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

Extremely hit or miss and you can almost always tell if the person in question doesn't speak it. Use sparingly because you are playing with fire.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

FFVII. The Number I is technically my first fanfiction ever, actually!

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

Either TNI obviously, but also as a whole either Replacements or Tidewaters. Replacements I whipped up on the spot day-of in a few hours on a whim and it basically turned out perfect???? I've never been able to replicate that before or since. Tidewaters is Cloud Yuffie Nanaki shenanigans which I love, and I was shocked and horrified to learn I'm basically the entire tag of that as far as that's concerned (I'm working on rectifying that I promise shhhh).

Everyone I know that writes was already tagged basically uhhhhhhh

@varethinsilico, @denebolaleo-ffwriter, @spectroscopes, @terror-billie, @jenovacomplete, anyone else who wants to take a crack at this pretend I tagged you.