#being published is still mostly awesome

[syntax6]

Some Truest Truths about Publishing

Being a published author is a lifelong dream of mine, and many aspects of it are indeed awesome. I love telling stories and sharing them with the world. Seeing my books in a bookstore or a library will always be thrilling! Meeting new readers from all over the globe is huge fun. But there have been a bunch of “being a published author is bad for your mental health” threads lately, and I think part of why this is true is that people don’t understand how the industry works before they get into it. So, here are some things about how publishing functions that I did not know before I became part of the machine:

1. You can know your book’s likely trajectory at the time you sign the contract. The publisher decides how well your book will sell. Large publishers sell more books than mid-sized publishers, which sell more books than small- or micro-publishers. A large publisher doing minimal publicity for your book will probably still sell more copies of it than a small publisher, simply because they already have the machinery in place. But, if your large publisher does not offer you a large advance at the time of signing, they are not going to do much more than their basic-level publicity for your book. They are going to focus their efforts on books they paid a lot of money to acquire because they want to get that money back. So, if your large publisher is not offering you at least a quarter of a million dollars to acquire your book, they aren’t going to be gunning to make it a NY Times Bestseller.

2. Books are a hit-driven industry. Most books lose money so everyone is counting on the few bestsellers to finance the whole industry. This is why big names like Stephen King or Danielle Steele suck up huge amounts of the publicity budget. Publishers need their books to sell sell sell, which means reaching fans who only buy Stephen King and Danielle Steele books. These fans aren’t paying a lot of attention, so publishers need to get that “GO BUY NOW” bat signal into the sky to wake up these fans. They pull out all the advertising stops. This is why big-name authors eat up so much of the publicity budget despite being household names. Publishers need to reach those fans for each new book to ensure the book makes the $$$$ that the publishers are counting on.

3. Everyone who is in the industry is riding the same train. So when the large publishers decide which books to push (because they have paid a lot to acquire them and/or the author is already a household name), booksellers and librarians have to get on board too. Yes, librarians and independent booksellers can also promote smaller titles that they really love, and that’s GREAT, but they mostly have to march to the tune set by the large publishers. Bookstores are usually operating at razor-thin margins. They need to sell the books that people want to read. Which books do people want to read? The ones they have heard of! How did they hear about them? The big publishers spent the $ to advertise! See how it’s all connected? Libraries, too. They need to stock the titles that will rotate well; books people want to check out and read. Which ones will they stock? The ones that the large publishers are pushing, because these are the titles that people will ask for.

4. Almost nothing good happens to your book without your publisher paying for it. Often, even things that look like awards or editorial decisions involve money changing hands.

5. Because of points 1-4, the author can do very little to influence the sale of their book. Giants like Amazon or Barnes and Noble already know which books are going to be the lead titles because the publishers told them so. Outlets like the NYT know too. Libraries, indie bookstores...they all know the signs of big publisher investment. For example, if the publisher says they are going to print 250,000 copies of your book, then everyone knows the title is going to be pushed HARD. If they say they are publishing 10,000 copies, then the author has no hope of competing with the lead title. So, the author can’t, on their own, do anything to change the fate of their book. However, the author is held accountable when their book doesn’t sell, despite the fact that everyone in the industry does understand that publishers sell books, not authors.

6. Because of points 1-4, how well a book is written or how talented the author is has not much to do with how many copies the book sells. Often bestsellers are really great and the authors are extremely hardworking...but not always. And there are zillions of hugely talented, diligent authors whose books don’t sell well at all because a large publisher has never shone that kind of spotlight on them. To exist in an industry where talent and hard work don’t influence the results is maddening, and a big part of why authors go a little insane.

[indie-ttrpg-of-the-week]

Trans made TTRPGs

Due to… recent events that I would rather not talk about, today's post is a highlight of different tabletop games made by trans peeps! These games are fantastic in their own right, of course, but you can also know that they were made by incredibly cool and attractive people

(Also, these are flyover descs of the game, they'll get more in-depth singular posts later, this is because I am lazy)

Perfect Draw is a phenomenal card game TTRPG that was funded in less than a day on backerkit, it's incredibly fun and has simple to learn hard to master rules for creating custom cards, go check it out!

Songs for the dusk is fucking good, pardon my language, but it's a damn good post apocalyptic game about building community in a post-capitalist-post-apocalypse-post-whatever world. do yourself a favor and if you only check out one game in this list, check this one out, its a beautiful game.

Flying Circus is set in a WW1 inspired fantasy setting full of witches, weird eldritch fish people (who are chill as hell), cults, dead nobility, and other such things. It's inspired by Porco Rosso primarily but it has other touchstones.

Wanderhome is a game about being cute little guys going on a silly adventure and growing as the seasons change, its GMless and very fun

https://weregazelle.itch.io/armour-astir Armour Astir has been featured in here before but its so damn good I had to post it twice. AA demonstrates a fundamental knowledge of the themes of mech shows in a way that very few other games show, its awesome

Kitchen Knightmares is… more of a LARP but its still really dang cool, its about being a knight serving people in a restaurant, its played using discord so its incredibly accessible

https://grimogre.itch.io/michtim Michtim is a game about being small critters protecting their forest from nasty people who wish to harm it, not via brutal violence (sadly) but via friendship and understanding (which is a good substitute to violence)

ok this technically doesn't count but I'm putting it here anyways cuz its like one of my favorite ttrpgs of all time TSL is a game about baring your heart and dueling away with people who you'll probably kiss 10 minutes later, its very very fanfic-ey and inspired by queer narratives. I put it here because its made by a team, and the expansion has a setting specifically meant to be a trans "allegory", so I'll say it counts, honestly just go check it out its good shit

https://willuhl.itch.io/mystic-lilies

Mystic Lillies is a game inspired by ZUN's Touhou Project about witches dueling powerful foes, each other, and themselves. Mystic Lillies features rapid character creation and a unique diceless form of rolling which instead uses a standard playing card deck.

https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/141424/nobilis-the-game-of-sovereign-powers-2002-edition I… want to do a more general overview on Jenna K as an important figure in indie RPG design, but for now just know that Nobilis is good

https://temporalhiccup.itch.io/apocalypse-keys Apocalypse Keys is a game inspired by Doom Patrol, Hellboy, X-men, and other comics about monstrousness being an allegory for disenfranchisement. Apocalypse Keys is also here because its published by Evilhat so its very cleaned up and fancy but I love how the second you check out the dev's other stuff you can tell they are a lot more experimental with their stuff, this is not a critique, it is in fact a compliment

Fellowship! I've posted about this game before, but it is again here. Fellowship has a fun concept that it uses very well mostly, its a game about defining your character's culture, and I think that's really really cool

Voidheart Symphony is a really cool game about psychic rebellion in a city that really does not like you, the more you discover for yourself the better

Panic at the Dojo is a phenomenal ttrpg based on what the Brazilian would call "Pancadaria", which basically means, fucking other's people shit up. Character Creation is incredibly open and free, meaning that many character concepts are available

Legacy 2e is a game about controlling an entire faction's choices across time, its very fun

remember to be kind to a trans person today! oh also don't even try to be transphobic in the reblogs or replies, you will be blocked so fast your head will spin

[gender-trash]

(i am seriously late in posting about this due to The Problems BUT whatever! its here now!!)

somewhere around late november 2022, i asked my dad "hey are there any out of print technical books you'd like a reprint of for christmas?"

he linked me to a dubious black-and-white pdf of Foundations of Mechanical Accuracy. now, i wound up checking out a copy through link+, and the original edition is a really nicely put together book! the chapters are themed around various types of measurements (length, angle, etc), and they all have these cute little diagrams which the endpapers reuse in a lil repeating pattern... the image captions are done in this really lovely dark red that did not scan for SHIT... tons and tons of diagrams and illustrations and images (both color and b&w)... just, all around, a fucking nice book!! (see also @morrak's post about it here.)

and that made me feel kind of bad about the crappiness of the pdf, which is where the Problems began. i used my phone to take pictures of all the photos and color diagrams in the original and went about replacing them in the pdf, using what turned out to be the world's worst pdf editing software (i also got through replacing all the image captions in chapter 1 of 5 before my dad convinced me to give up). i did NOT finish the pdf editing before christmas 2022 (i was going somewhat off the deep end, because both my housemates were away visiting family and i had zero external structure in my life so it was just me and my cat and this stupid FUCKING pdf wrecking my sleep schedule together); i poked away at it for most of the rest of my time off and then got so goddamn sick of it i put the project away for months. "it'll be a birthday gift instead", i said optimistically (my dad's birthday is in april! it should have been enough time!)

gentle readers, i did not finish the pdf editing by april. mostly because it was such a miserable slog that i put it off until the last possible moment and then tried to make up for it with another death march.

hating both myself and the project again, i decided i was Not going to let myself typeset Anything Else before it was done, and then took a break to bind my immortal (using the renegade publishing typeset! i didn't do any typesetting!!). SURELY, i said, i can finish this in time for christmas 2023.

i'm sure you know where this is going.

in my defense i DID finish the pdf editing by christmas, despite first doing every other possible procrastination project (including a second edition of the little second century warlord book), because by this point my dad had managed to convince me to lower my standards. on the evening of the 22nd i kicked off the print job and said to myself "this will finish printing overnight and then tomorrow i can work on sewing the textblock!"

late on the 23rd, after lots of babysitting and using at least one cartridge of every color ink in my printer, the print job was finally done. (my sweet and lovely cat wants SO BADLY to hunt and stalk the printer while it is printing -- more specifically, the printed pages, i think because they tend to make noise and move and then STOP moving. for this reason, the printer is kept in the craft room, because the cat can be shut out of the craft room and thus prevented from chewing on the pages when i have an all-day book printing job going. unfortunately the craft room was also being pressed into service as a guest room at the time so 80% of the floor space was consumed by an air mattress which i had to repeatedly trip over in order to reach the printer and replace the ink cartridges.)

then i went to my parents' house on the 24th and 25th and apologized to my dad (again) for not having the book finished. but this worked out well because we finished putting together my awesome new book clamp:

(the feet still aren't done being painted so they're just dry-fit on for now but you can still clamp books in it and that's what matters!!)

i came home, sewed the textblock (french link stitch over four linen tapes, with sewn endbands made of variegated embroidery floss over linen cord, and kozo paper glued over the spine)

... and promptly realized i SHOULD HAVE PUT IN MORE OF A GUTTER because some of the text was getting reeeeeeal close to the spine. "it's fine!" i said. "i just have to make sure it lays flat!! what better time than to try out K118 binding, a technique i have literally never done before and which people on the bookbinding discord notoriously have a hard time pulling off first try! i even have tyvek tape for it!"

so it turns out that tyvek tape isn't actually tyvek with glue on it, it's tape FOR attaching pieces of tyvek TO EACH OTHER, which maybe i could have guessed if i'd done even the slightest amount of research or planning. at this point i think it was the 27th and i was still angling to get this thing done by new year's, so no time to order Actual Tyvek.

fortunately, i had ALSO received An Package in the mail with yarn for a totally unrelated knitting project... shipped in a tyvek envelope.

i peeled all the shipping labels and stickers off my tyvek envelope, cut that shit up, and glued it on there.

and THEN it was time for gluing on covers, which i thought was going to be easy because i had actually thought ahead and ordered materials (specifically acid-free museum board), except when i cracked open the box of museum board i decided i Didn't Like It because the surface was too soft and easily dented, so i glued onto it the too-thin board material i'd previously been using (so that the cardboard goes on the outside of the book). this worked super well (the cardboard stuff has a tendency to curl up from the glue moisture, but the museum board doesn't!) and i'll probably use it on other stuff in the future.

i thought the blue bookcloth i used was kind of boring but i showed my dad the available cloth options and he really liked it, so... what do you know? i cut the piece i used on the back cover very slightly too short but it wound up being covered by the leather, so you can barely tell.

and the leather... a scrap just baaaaarely big enough from my bag of leather scraps from discount fabrics... and this the first time i'd ever attempted to put leather on a book... AND YET the only complaint i have is that i didn't manage to put an even amount on the front and back. it's reasonably square and straight!! amazing!!

i am super super happy with how this project came out (especially given the number of problems i encountered) and oh my god check out how much the spine bends

AND, AS A NEW YEAR'S PRESENT, I FINALLY MANAGED TO GIVE IT TO MY DAD

[ask-whitepearl-and-steven]

Would you mind sharing your planning process of the comic? I'm starting to brainstorm a fiction idea and right now the ideas are very messy and I wanted to know if you could show how you plan what happens on a season and on an episode, maybe with an example of a season episode you already published, so I can learn how to organize myself?

I really, REALLY appreciate you coming to ask me for help with this. It's awesome to hear that you respect my writing enough to seek me out as an authority on such things, or at least enough to ask for advice.

But I'm gonna be real with you - what you're asking for is not a quick slapdash reply that I can whip up in my free time. What you're asking for is an hour long video essay (with examples) on the level of an educational creative writing online course.

And I--I don't know if I have it in me to do that right now. Not with everything else I'm trying to do. (Sorry.)

BUT.

What I can give you instead is a basic rundown, and maybe some recommendations for where to this stuff.

To be absolutely brief: For me, the best way to visualize how I plan would be to make a flowchart.

Keep in mind that....... I don't ever actually.......MAKE. A flowchart.

Mostly, I am just using this as a visual representation of how my ideas flow from and to each other in a coherent way. The reality is that this skill is something you have to develop until it becomes second nature.

As an example, let's take the episode(s) where I introduced Seaglass.

This little arc was planned in season 3, but really started to come into play in Season 4.

To make it happen, I started with the obvious main idea: SEAGLASS.

I then broke it down into multiple smaller ideas:

If you notice, the main plot of this doesn't even start when the Seaglass exposition does. Steven makes Seaglass back in season 3, but doesn't know about it. But these ideas are still important to acknowledge as being a part of the main plot.

I then fill in MORE space between these larger ideas.

This whole set of steps is just a logical progression of me playing 'how do we get there'. I make up plot points and say 'what happens to get from A to B?'

And keep in mind - this may seem kinda obvious. That's because... it should be! But that's how the planning happens.

Realistically, it's just a bunch of asking myself questions. The same exact questions I refuse to answer in asks.

"What happens next? What would happen if....?" "Why doesn't Steven know about ....?"

"How would Steven find Seaglass if he doesn't know she exists?"

Well she's small and green, kinda like Peridot. So he goes looking for Peridot and mistakes Seaglass for her.

BAM! You've got yourself a plot point. That's a plan, baybee!

And then just kinda rinse and repeat.

And eventually, you want to make sure that you have some sort of connection back to the main plot point. In this case, it's the realization that Steven CREATED LIFE.

Again, I want to stress - I don't actually........plan.... by writing this down.

I do this process in my head. Often, multiple times per chapter, writing and editing to make it make more and more sense. The important part is about asking yourself questions. The same questions your readers should be asking.

"Why is this character doing this?" "Why is this event happening NOW?" "How will A find out when they realize what B has done?" "What is the BEST time for B to find out...? What is the WORST time?"

All of this takes imagination. It isn't about organization. It's moreso about learning to tetris plot events into their most snug spaces. It's about thinking of events as a staircase, which eventually leads to a larger staircase of plot arcs.

And as a final note, I will say that someday, when I'm less busy, I may make a video about plot. But it will take more time and effort, and for now, please just watch videos by other creators! I'm sure they're just as good at it as I am.

[wuffgang-ameowdeus-moozart]

Aren't you tired of forced romances with no chemistry that only take away from the actually interesting plot? Don't you just want media where romance isn't portrayed as being superior and more important than (queer)platonic relationships?

Well, my exhausted aro ass is too, so here are a few tricks and wisdoms I've gathered over my years of being a-spec (which is all of them) on how to avoid romance (in media) in a very allonormative society 💚🤍🩶🖤

(this is a rec list btw. no I am not shitting on the shows that I tagged, quite the opposite)

1. Middle Grade

I get if you aren't really into that, because it is kind of annoying to be pointed to literal children's literature when all you want is a story that isn't constantly being interrupted by describing the main guy's heated eyes for the twentieth time.

However.

It is true that in middle grade, friendship is always more important than romance. Because, let's face it. Making two eleven year old characters kiss is kinda weird. So even if there is a romance, it isn't very prominent and treated more like friendship and/or a puppy crush. Plus some stories get surprisingly dark?!?!

Examples

- Howl's Moving Castle (Diana Wynne Jones), technically a romance in the end, but mostly focused on found family, shenanigans, and finding your own value

- House of Many Ways (DWJ). Yes, again. I really like her books okay? They always have something so fantastical and whimsical about them. This is my other favorite book by her and it has literally no romance at all. Plus a hmc cameo that is so fun !!

- Coraline (Neil Gaiman). Maybe this is cheating because I never actually read it. However. a) the movie traumatized me. b) Wybie was added to the movie, he doesn't exist in the book, so if "power of friendship" isn't your thing this will be great. Probably vibes over plot.

Flyte (Angie Sage). Technically this is the second book, but I never read the first one and still understood everything. Once again, no romance at all. A fun read, which can get surprisingly dark at times.

2. Short Story Collections

Once again, I get it if it isn't your thing. Short stories are - as the name reveals - short. Which means: no worldbuilding, very limited narrator, open ending, no time to really get attached to characters, etc.

But.

The cool thing about collections, is that they always have a certain theme. And as long as the theme is not romance, romance will not be the focus. Even if there is a romantic relationship, it will be used to explore this theme since there simply isn't time for anything else.

Examples:

Life Ceremony (Sayaka Murata) This is the book that actually made me figure out: hey! I do actually like short stories !! The main theme is basically about being different and it plays a lot with body horror and the perception of your own body in contrast with how society sees it. There is even a story about two women who platonically live together and raised multiple children!

Canterbury Classics: Classic Tales of Horror (introduction by Ernest Hilbert). As the name suggests, this is a collection of horror short stories, featuring well-known authors such as Bram Stoker, Edgar Allan Poe or Charlotte Perkins Gilman. As these are classic old tales, the language is a bit complicated at times and you can read them for free on Gutenberg. However, the book is very very pretty and the introduction is very interesting (Origins of the genre, specific tropes and monsters, etc.)

3. Podcasts

PODCASTS!!! If you follow me, you are probably already aware of those. However, in case you don't, let me introduce you to the wonderful world of Audiodramas.

The cool thing about Podcasts is that pretty much anyone can do it. All you need is an idea, a mic, a lot of motivation, and you're pretty much set to go. No producers or publishers you need to get approval from. So it is only natural that this medium is filled to the brim with queer creators. Basically every character is somewhat queer. It's awesome.

Examples:

- The Silt Verses. I adore TSV. I listened to the first season like, four times. (the second one is good too but OH MY GOD THE FIRST ONE). And one of the main characters is canonically and explicitly aro!! Sister Carpenter, I love you with my whole being. And the great thing is, it is very clear that the writers love her, too!! There is a lot (like a LOT) of body horror so it isn't for everybody. But if you think you can handle it I really recommend it. (Plus, not any romance plotlines at all !!)

- Wolf 359. This is one of the older ones and it is really good. It's a bunch of restless and very unwell people stuck in a spaceship under the unforgiving rule of capitalism. However bad you imagine it, I can assure you it is worse. But the really cool thing is that there literally isn't any romance at all. Like, there are great m/f friendships but they never even hint towards a romance. Some people are so unused to that that they literally ship the main dude with the fucking robot AI. (don't worry, not an actual romance plot).

- Girl in space. I am sure you will be absolutely shook to know that this one also takes place in space. It is about a girl. In space. Shocking, I know. Except that she has been on her own for well over a year when suddenly a fleet of strange ships arrive and kidnap her. There is also a very asshole-y robot. And questions about what makes us human. And found family!! And a goat. And cheese. Just go listen to it okay. This is also one of the shortest ones of the list, so maybe a good start.

- Malevolent. I have to confess that I personally am not a huge fan of this one? Like the premise is really cool - a detective who wakes up blind and with a demon in his head who can see through the detectives eyes. What the fuck?, you may ask yourself. So does Arthur Lester. Mysteries and other dimensions and a whole lot of pain ensues. Harlan is undeniably an awesome VA and a great writer, but his stories just seem a bit too repetitive to me? Nonetheless I know of lots of people who enjoy it a lot. Trying to define the relationship between Arthur and John (his demon) is perhaps the biggest mystery of them all. (Jk. there are multiple murders and stuff. they've really got other priorities)

- Middle:Below. This is another short one and probably the least famous of this list? It's about this funky lil dude with a ghost roommate and a cat who can talk (.....or can it?). There is a m/f friendship but it never turns into a romance (wow it is possible!!). They all go on adventures on the dimension between life and death. Despite the description, this is literally just a comedy. A bit spooky at best. Reminds me a bit of scarier kids cartoons like gravity falls.

4. "Gay" movies/series in countries with homophobic censorship

Now you may think, "hey that seems like a bit of an asshole move!". And you would be 100% correct in thinking that.

However.

It does also mean that the main relationship of the story can never be explicitly romantic. They can allude to it, they can try to show it. But they can never confirm. So it is very easy to interpret them as having a QPR. (because tbh I don't think I've ever seen one on television.)

Examples:

The Untamed. Look. I am aware that the first episode is so fucking atrocious, all right? And no, the CGI does in fact never get better. And sometimes the translated subtitles are a bit awkward. But I swear that it is so good. Trust me on this one, okay? Just make it through the first ep. It's a wild ride. Lan Zhan I love you. (However the book it is based on (written by a woman) depicts them being in an explicitly romantic relationship, with lots of very inaccurate and badly researched smut, so the fandom pretty much sees them as exclusively romantic.)

- Word of Honor. Very much in the same vein as The Untamed. Except that the first episode is less horrible. And the one dude has a very fruity fan. And they also raise a kid together. And the costumes of the villains are really fun!! I actually never finished this one tbh. I know that the book it is based on has one very extremely terrible ableist plot point, but I don't know if that made it into the show since I never got that far

The Devil Judge. The last two were fantasy, this one is a dystopia. Very tense and interesting. There is a romantic subplot (typical childhood friend vs bad boy love triangle), but he rejects the childhood friend and they can't exactly show him and the "bad boy" (who is actually a judge. and also kinda his sugar daddy) as explicitly romantic for the reason above. They also live in the same house and cook together and take care of a child together. Can totally recommend.

Assassination Classroom. A bunch of students have to kill their teacher who is an alien. that's literally the plot. I cried so hard at the finale. Nagisa and Karma have MASSIVE vibes and you can't convince me otherwise. (There is a romantic subplot that does end in a kiss, but they agree to continue as friends since those were..... extenuating circumstances. The dude very clearly is not into her). Nagisa also very aro-spec coded imo.

5. "Straightbaiting" Anime

Sometimes Anime does this thing (which I personally find very hilarious) where a boy and a girl will have no other romantic involvements or love interests while growing closer and closer, but never get together. A bit like reverse queerbaiting.

Examples:

- Fairy Tail. The ultimate power is friendship anime. That is all you need to know. (I should also perhaps warn you that the end of the last arc (and the sequel series, but we don't talk about that) are huge letdowns. Like the buildup? So good. But....welp. If that doesn't bother you too much and the idea to have a group of people be the main character instead of one person only, this may be the series for you. Just do yourself a favor and skip all the filler arcs

Soul Eater. I really love the vibes of this one. Once again, most of the fandom likes depicting them as explicitly romantic, but they never canonically are. It also reminds me a bit of creepy children cartoons. It is also where the superior fictional school exists, Devon. Frankenstein teaches there (the dude, not the monster). People transform into badass weapons. Nobody can convince me that Make Albarn is not a trans woman. However the ending deviates a bit from the manga, and I personally think the anime one is a bit worse

Noragami. This one will always hold a special place in my heart because it was the first anime I really watched. This one also has people who transform into weapons, but the vibes are very different. It goes a bit more into Japanese folklore in case that interests you.

Bonus: Canonically Aro/Heavily Aro-Coded Characters

They were not anywhere above because the stories they are in didn't really fit any of the categories. But they exist!

Wolf (Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts). I adore Wolf. There is also barely any romance. Like, it will seem like it at first, but don't worry, it's only straightbaiting. There is a romance subplot but it's very brief and very much in the background. Overall very good aro show 👍

Isaac (Heartstopper) Very queer show, very high likelihood that you already know of it. The series per se is very romance focused, but as far as I've heard the a-spec rep in S2 is really good

Georgia (Loveless). Actually never read it. But, well. Title pretty self-explanatory dare I say. By the same author as Heartstopper (Alice Oseman)

Chance/Chris and Shadow/Ryan (woe.begone) Are explicitly in a QPR together !! they are also probably the healthiest couple in the podcast lol

Henry Clerval (Frankenstein). Henry is the "a couple of besties!!" to Victor's "we look like a couple <3"

Barbie (Barbie 2023) If you've seen it you know what I mean.

Jo Marsh (Little Women). I never read the book, but Jo in the 2019 movie??? very sus.

I would also recommend checking out Japanese books! I personally think they are much better at writing romance than the western people lol. It's more about knowing each other and sharing your views of the world, thus changing each other and leaving a mark forever, even if the relationship ends. (studio ghibli romance vibes). My favorite Japanese book doesn't have an English translation :(

aber an alle Deutsch-Sprecher*innen: Die Katzen von Shinjuku (Durian Sukegawa) -> og title: Shinjuku no Neko

Can't think of anything else right now, but please leave some of your own recommendations! Hope this helps ^^

[dayseternal-blog]

hi days the recommendation queen in NaruHina fandom☺️ I am looking for a fic one shot but a multiple chapters have the same prompts like the "tale of two ninjas" by magmawrite I already scrolled my 3 accounts but I couldn't find it😭 thanks in advance for the help days😘

hmmmm same prompts as magmawrites's Tales of Two Ninjas? I don't know about the SAME prompts since magmawrites's fics weren't exactly prompted by an event. So no fic would have all the exact same prompts as magmawrites's stuff.

I will take this opportunity to now list every single one-shot collection that I can find/think of. This will be very long.

One-Shot Collection NaruHina Fics

"Naruhina Month" by NaniMok - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Fluff, fluff and a little bit of something else. One shots written for Naruhina Month 2014.

"Sunbeams" by Mangospoons - Rated T, Canon-Divergent AU, Related one-shots. Someday Hinata would know what it was like to run that hair through her fingers, liquid gold. Sunbeams - A continuation of Moonstruck. Drabbles of Naru/Hina Based on the DA 100 Themes

"Postscripts" by Waterrolls - Rated T, mostly Canon-Divergent AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Drabbles of the NaruHina kind. A collection of unrelated short stories prompted by the wonderful and creative readers of tumblr, FFN, AO3, and Wattpad :) Mostly humor but will have occasional drama. Slice of life, romantic fluff, family bonding, what-ifs, AUs, angst.

"On Being Brave" by Mintacia - Rated T, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of unrelated one-shots (mostly). Honestly, Naruto thought Hinata's nervous behavior was kind of cute. He liked the way her cheeks turned pink and her eyes widened. Slowly, he starts to realize it's all because of him. / ONE-SHOT COLLECTION; let's explore how love develops; NaruHina.

"Of Parallel Lines and Intersections" by mysterious intentions - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. No matter the time, place, or world, their parallel lives always found an intersection. A series of NaruHina AUs.

"Between the Trees" by @utsus - Not Rated, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. A collection of naruto prompt responses I have written, and will continue to write. These and a few other stories I have not published on ao3 are all originally posted on tumblr. The stories here are all NaruHina in different times, places, situations, and understandings of one another.

"People Like Her" by @happyocelot - Rated T, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. ...were super weird. Naruto didn't know why Hinata was so shy all the time, why she always covered her mouth when she laughed. He wished she wouldn't. He was sure she had a nice smile. (Just a bunch of NH drabble requests.)

"A Book He Desperately Wanted to Read" by Happy_Ocelot - Rated T, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Never in his worst nightmares did he ever imagine that he'd be watching a live-action adaptation of Icha Icha Tactics with Hyuuga Hinata of all people. She was a book whose contents he could not decipher.

"When I Look At You" by Happy_Ocelot - Rated T, Canon-Compliant, Series of unrelated one-shots. ...I get an intense feeling in my heart. For NaruHina Week 2021.

"Sunny Days" by Happy_Ocelot - Rated T, Canon-Compliant/ Divergent AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. "Naruto sometimes couldn't believe that there was ever a time before he knew that Hinata could eat forty-six bowls of ramen without puking, before he went on missions with her and found out that shy, dark weirdos were actually kind of cool and brave and awesome. It was like a seismic shift." One-shots for NaruHina Month 2021.

"Still Falling For You" by @chloelapomme - Rated M, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. All written for the NaruHina year 2020 event

"Switching Positions" by ChloeLaPomme - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. A collection of 10(0)1 NaruHina short one shorts. Broke into several parts for a better understanding.

"Some Type of Love" by ChloeLaPomme & Imanga - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. All written for the NaruHina month 2022 Tumblr event.

"Small Doses" by ChloeLaPomme - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. All written for the NaruHina month 2021 event

"With You in the Future" by ChloeLaPomme - Rated E, Canon-Compliant, Series of one-shots. Back at Konoha from their moon mission, Naruto and Hinata learn to know each other, how to live with each other, how to solves problems together, and how to start a family. With their past behind them, their future is right before them.

I just want to take a pause here to admire all of the one-shot series Chloe has written 😮

"The Little Joys and Sorrows of Everydayness" by Imanga - Rated M, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of one-shots. A series of unrelated one-shots about domestic life, written for the NaruHina Week 2021 event.

"Lips, Tongue, Teeth" by @wickermayne - Rated E, Canon-Compatible, Series of unrelated one-shots. One month of wet blowjobs, messy pussy eating, and all other sorts of oral fixations. Welcome to Sucktember. All NaruHina.

"naruhina oneshots" by @powerful-niya - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. I will look for you in every lifetime until we finally stay.

"when love lasts - 2022 naruhina month" by Powerful_Niya - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. To love is nothing. To be loved is something. But to love and be loved is everything.

"kiss me, thrill me - naruhina" by Powerful_Niya - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. An inside look at Naruto and Hinata's lives as they navigate the complex world of sexuality and grow more intimate than ever.

"heartbreaks & heartaches" by Powerful_Niya - Rated M, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Welcome to the NHPrompts22 Tumblr Event! I have created several different one-shots according to the prompts listed within this event! All are different in their own way. But they can either make you leap for joy or weep in sadness. I truly hope you enjoy.

"NaruHina Month December 2022" by @sessakag - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. A collection of one-shots written for the NaruHina fair on tumblr!

"NaruHina Month 2023" by Sessakag - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. A collection of one-shots written for the NaruHina fair on tumblr! Enjoy!

"secret lovers" by @quirrrky - Rated T, Canon-Compliant, Series of one-shots. After the Fourth Shinobi War, Naruto was gradually falling in love with Hinata and the whole village of Konoha knew it…Well, aside from him.

"star vessel" by quirrrky - Rated T/M, Canon-Compliant, Series of one-shots. From a jealous boyfriend to missions together, honeymoon, overprotective husband, nightmares and reveries. Everything from the moon and back.

"eclipses" by quirrrky - Rated M, Canon-Compliant, Series of one-shots. A Collection of NaruHina and/or Sunshine Family Drabbles, One-shots and Headcanons

"Orange and Lavender" by ReadingBennie - Rated M, Various AU, Series of one-shots. A collection of one shots for Naruhina month 2016.

"Oranges and Lavender" by @journalist298 - Rated M, Various AU, Series of one-shots.  A series of oneshots for the NaruHina fan needing a fix of their favourite pairing. Whether Narutoverse or AU, there should be something for everyone.

"Celebrating the Festivities" by journalist298 (Wandering Wonderer) - Rated M, Canon-Compliant AU, Series of related one-shots. It was to be the most eventful time of her life. Her favourite festivities, Christmas, Birthday and New Years just got a whole lot better. From first date, to first love, Hinata finds happiness.

"NaruHina Erotica Oneshots" by Makuro767 - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. No summary.

"The Wonderful and Heartfelt Times of NaruHina" by @journalsofagoddess - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Today we celebrate the month of our canon ship, NaruHina. And as a way to celebrate, I present to you thirty one prompts all filled with lovely tender moments, hilarious, and heart warming NaruHina. [2015]

"A Love Story Like Never Before" by jojo07 - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. To be loved by someone you love is the most beautiful thing you can ever experience. No words can describe the magical experience you're going through. And who's better to prove this than Naruto and Hinata? 31 prompts of their love will never be enough-but it'll show how strong and amazing their love really is. For NaruHina month [2016]

"My Name on Your Lips" by katarinahime - Rated M, Canon-Compliant, Series of related one-shots. Hinata calls Naruto a plethora of different names, some he enjoys more than others.

"Proud Failures to Proud Parents - NaruHina month 2016" by xHinaLovex - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. My contribution for NaruHina month 2016. Some cute, some not so much, some canon, and some AU. Just a smattering of stories to celebrate my favorite couple.

"A Celebration of All Things NaruHina" by xHinaLovex - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. My contribution to NaruHina month 2015.

"A Story of Extraordinary Love" by petrichorlullaby (Stillers) - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. A series of one-shots for NaruHina Month 2k15.

"NaruHina 2020" by @angelicalixx - Rated E, Canon-Compliant, Series of one-shots. A collection of short NaruHina fics for NaruHina 2020.

"NaruHina Week 2017" by @hinatamyqueen - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Little and silly drabbles for the Naruhina Week of 2017.

"The sweet, shy, innocent, Kunoichi" by @tjtheanimelover - Rated E, Canon-Compatible, Series of one-shots. See Naruto's point of view as he and Hinata partake in some naughty activities

"NaruHina Oneshot Prompts" by TJtheanimelover - Rated E, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Series of Prompts for the NHPrompts2022 event on Tumblr. There will be angst, smut, and fluff. Pairings are Naruhina and MenHina

"NaruHina & MenHina Lemons" by Veradux - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. First time writing NaruHina & MenHina smut one shots.

"Tales of the Seventh Hokage and the Byakugan Hime" by Nihal Tonks-Lupin - Rated E, Canon-Compatible, Series of one-shots. Short stories about Naruto and Hinata's love and sex life, this is my contribution for NaruHina Smut Month! [2015]

"love incredible" from @ellaroundpanda - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. A collection of seven oneshots for the naruhina smut week event by @browniefic

"They Define Us" by gl22 - Rated M, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. For NaruHina Month 2015. There will be drabbles, short one-shots, and long one-shots. Some will have spoilers to Naruto: The Last. Some will also feature the future generation, mostly Boruto and Himawari.

"Endless lemons" by agitosgirl - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. This is just a bunch of lemony oneshots rolled into one story! From a foxy Naruto, to a cute little bunny Hinata! Do you have an idea for a lemon that you want to see typed out? Well then, come on in and you just might find it!

"Walking Beside You" by @spyder-m - Rated M, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. My contributions to NaruHina month. Individual summaries inside. [2016]

"All the Rage" by spyder-m - Rated M, Various AU, Series of related and unrelated one-shots. Naruhina oneshots and drabbles of all shapes and sizes, inspired by articles of clothing. Fluff, citrus, humour, family, friendship and angst. Canon compliant stories and AUs. Individual summaries inside.

"Day After Day" by spyder-m - Rated T, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of one-shots. Oneshot series exploring the day to day life of Naruto and Hinata post-The Last. Headcanons about them dating, living together and starting a family.

"Your Hand in Mine" by spyder-m - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. My contributions to Naruhina Week, 2017. Individual summaries inside.

"In your eyes" by @char-lotteral - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. "I feel like a part of my soul has loved you since the beginning of everything. Maybe we’re from the same star." -Emery Allen. A collection and series of Naruhina One shots, drabbles and snippets for Naruhina month 2021

"Sol and Luna" by charlotteral - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. a collection of one shots and drabbles for NHWeek 2021

"Shorts" by breakfastinbed - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. a collection of naruhina shorts.

"Nice Legs, Daisy Dukes" by Star-Child-Yeci - Rated T, Various AU, Series of related one-shots. One Shot, Drabble Collection / Because Menma is strangely territorial and Hinata has better things...people to do.

"you still get my heart racing" by mellieforyellie - Rated M, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. i've spent my whole life trying to put it into words. — naruhina month 2015

"Sunshine Snippets" by Szajnie - Rated M, Canon-Compliant, Series of one-shots. bits of pieces for my OTP

"Lives of Konoha's Couples!" by Satoorihoya - Rated M, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Short stories written for the Konoha couples. Some AUs, some Naruto centric.

"Sunshine Tales" by blossomdreams - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Naruto and Hinata fell in love with each other in different ways that only strengthen their bond through time. The bond that follows them through their life in the village and at time different universes. With appearances from their friends and family. My entries for NaruHina month. [2015]

"The Sun and The Moon" by MoonPheonix - Rated M, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. A series of short stories involving Naruto and Hinata

"Lost and Found" by @matchaball - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. We could meet a thousand different ways in a thousand different times but I'll always know I'll find you.

"Pearl Eyes and Moonlight" by MateriaFlower1-1 - Rated T, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of unrelated one-shots.  A collection of one-shots, detailing the life, times, joys, and troubles of Naruto and Hinata. Follow them from their youth to their old age, seeing how their relationship evolves over time, peace and war. This will follow several timelines through non-sequential one-shots.

"Working Class" by unfitpuzzle and LovelyLori - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. A collection of one-shot's featuring NaruHina in the workforce; inspired by cup-of-hot-coffee's Job AUs on Tumblr.

"A Collection of Stories (NaruHina)" by HoneyWriter78 - Rated E, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. A collection of Stories involving my ultimate favourite pairing.

"Closer" by Lynns - Rated E, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of related one-shots. Relationships are slowly built from the ground up and it is something that you simply do not rush into. Naruto was flattered after hearing Hinata's confession and the two of them will take the small baby steps that will lead them closer together.

"True Sight" by hinatasgreatestfan - Rated M, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. This is my series of NaruHina drabbles.

"One Small Step" by Shawny Wong - Rated T, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of related one-shots. What if Hinata had actually found the courage to approach Naruto at the Academy? How would befriending him change their lives? Drastic changes are the result of one small step.

"Ten Defining Moments" by Shawny Wong - Rated T, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of related one-shots. Fluff, angst, drama, and a whole lot of sappy romance. Stir well. A story that spans 10 special events in Naruto and Hinata’s lives. Written for the Thirty Kisses community on Live Journal.

"Lord Hokage" by EroPrincess - Rated E, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of one-shots. To commemorate NaruHina becoming canon in Naruto, here's my smutty contribution.

"NaruHina Oneshots" by OrenjiRabenda - Rated M, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. A collection of NaruHina one-shots and original art drawn by yours truly!

"A Month of Moments" by @tenney-shoes - Rated G, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. My submissions for NaruHina Month. Most will be very short little drabbles based on the prompt for each day. [2015]

"Tumbler prompts and dabbles" by @linisen - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Collection of dabbles from my prompt list on Tumblr containing mostly NaruHina fluff.

"Bound" by suryass - Rated M, Modern AU, Series of related one-shots. Mafia AU-Collection of oneshots.

"it's only us" by monkkeyslut - Rated T, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of related one-shots. A series of kisses that Hinata and Naruto share.

"Blue and White Eyes" by kiiam - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Some NaruHina drabbles written for people to enjoy.

"Walk with you: Naruhina month prompts" by theidealist21 - Rated G, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots.  A collection of stories I made for Naruhina Month. [2014]

"Naruto Drabble Series" by InTheMist032000 - Rated M, Various AU, Series of mostly unrelated one-shots. A drabble series of various ratings and characters. Mainly NaruHina and SasuSaku, Rating T-M.

"Moments" by Awkward Inc - Rated T, Canon-Divergent AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. We tend to remember our lives based on the most important events, but life is constructed mainly of insignificant moments.

"NH Month 2023" by @opttagoyeo - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Scribbles/Drabbles for Naruhina Month 2023.

"NaruHina Month 2023" by @diyas-diaries-98 - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. No summary.

"Memories of NaruHina Month 2022" by diyas-diaries-98 (Narutos_girl) - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. These are my first works for NaruHina Month 2022 event.

"onsra" by niege1010 - Rated M, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Onsra (n.): bittersweet moment when you love for the last time or realize your love won't continue. Drabble collection for NaruHina month

"idyllic" by niege1010 - Rated T, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. Idyllic (a.): an idyllic place or experience is extremely pleasant, beautiful, or peaceful. Drabble collection for NaruHina month [2022]

here are all of mine:

"Shared Vows" - Rated E, Canon-Compliant, Series of one-shots. A series of one-shots concerning the highs, lows, and in-betweens of their romance, not in any chronological order.

"love letters" - Rated M, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. A series of very short concept fics.

"Perfect Clarity" - Rated G, Various AU, Series of unrelated one-shots. A series of fluffy short one-shots of Naruto and Hinata making each other blush in Modern AU. Written for badluckbrebis (Imanga) for Tumblr's NaruHina Secret Santa 2020!!

I hope you already found the fic you were looking for or that the one you're thinking of is somewhere in this huge list!

[fantasyfantasygames]

Doorkickers

Doorkickers, Kevin "Spike" Boots, 2017

Doorkickers is a punk-ish dungeon crawler. It's not "dungeonpunk", as the modern D&D/Pathfinder aesthetic has been called. It's not all the way over in Sigmata/Misspent Youth territory. It's approximately as punk as Gutterpunk. Yes, I am the arbiter of what is punk now; come at me and my semicolons.

I started writing this review with a lot of that kind of comparison - not as complex as X but more than Y, not focused on money like A or fame like B, etc. - but that sort of approach robs Doorkickers of what it actually is. Here's the gist.

You are terminally pissed off people at the margins of society. People who are just barely better off than you have asked you to help. The default setup is that their friends or family have been kidnapped into the bowels of a nearby catacombs. The guards won't help, the authorities don't care, so they turn to the only people that the guards and the authorities won't touch: you.

The system is basically an OSR-ified version of True20. Classes are Marauder (fighter), Lurker (skill monkey) and Devil (caster), but with stronger niches. If you don't have a Marauder, do not attempt to maraud. It will not go well. Spells come with drawbacks, but there's no backfire roll until after the fight, when your massive built-up stash of chaotic power either subsides or explodes.

Monsters are entirely non-humanoid, and mostly non-sentient. Spike's take on the monster/person divide is pretty similar to my own - if you can have a conversation with it, it's a person. The monster art is great. The character art is not as great, because while the artist was awesome at drawing oozes and monsters made of chains and manacles, their grasp of human anatomy is lacking. The cover is done by a different artist, and it fucking rules - door blasting open in splinters, boot coming straight at your face, knives and talismans being brandished in the darkness behind the axe-wielding maniac in the foreground. Great stuff.

I say the game is punk-ish rather than punk because you never end up causing problems for the people whose fault this really is - the guards and their masters, those in power. The game could have done with a "second stage" where you bring the problem to the guilty. But you do play some pissed-off people putting it on the line to help others, and damn if that isn't a core piece of the punk ethos.

Spike self-published Doorkickers on Lulu for a while. Lulu does decent PoD, but you'll never see it in stores because their printing costs are too high. Still, the quality is good, so if you track one down they won't fall apart.

[the-real-lyra-vale]

Writeblr Intro

Hi everyone! I’ve had a writeblr blog before, but I’m trying to get published now, so I thought it better to make a new blog with my pen name rather than my real one. I love ask games and tag games, and feel free to interact with this post if you want me to check out your Writeblr!

About my writing:

I write mostly fantasy, but I’m dipping my toes into mystery. (Obviously there’s still magic!)

I also generally include anti-capitalist save-the-earth type of themes, not as a main plot, but interspersed into the world.

My stories tend to be character-driven, and relationship driven. Not romance necessarily, but familial and friend relationships too.

About me:

My pen name that you can call me here is Lyra Vale. I’m 24 and I live in Missouri, USA. I’m non-binary (any pronouns are fine), and I’m the parent to an awesome 1 year old boy. I love reading, watching TV (my favorite shows are Steven Universe and Supernatural.), painting, journaling, and intensely planning and goal-setting. I’m rarely ever very far from a glass of sweet tea, and I like to draw or paint my characters sometimes.

I’ve been writing ever since I was a little kid, but my childhood home was burned down in an accidental fire when I was a teenager and I lost all my old writing. It took me a long time to heal enough to begin writing again, but now I want to publish my stories. I’m done being a cog in the capitalist machine (if only it were so easy to escape) and my lovely spouse agreed that I could try to make writing work as a career and quit my crappy service industry job that I had before. I’m chronically ill so as you can imagine, quitting instantly gave me tons of energy for writing.

Anyway, I’ll stop oversharing now…

WIPs:

Odd Token:

fantasy setting, but mystery genre;

(I’m very early in the planning stages, so I will come back and update this when I have more.)

[frostfire-17]

hello! i have two questions for you:

how did the hittites(?) adopt gods into their pantheon? did they change any major parts of the myths or was it just eating them whole? something else?

what was the phd-obtaining process like?

I have two answers for you! They are both long; brace yourself.

1. The short answer is: yes, they totally changed all sorts of stuff, except when they maybe didn't. The long answer is complicated and difficult, because we have almost zero examples of the original myths/rituals/etc: most of the people from whom the Hittites adopted gods didn't keep written records of their own. So we can't do a side-by-side comparison of, say, a myth from Kizzuwatna (a territory in southeastern Turkey that was conquered early on) and the same myth from the Hittite archives, because the Hittite documents are the only ones we have - the origins are lost. We also don't actually have much straight-up narrative myth; there's a lot more ritual description and incantation (sometimes involving bits of myths along the way). But! We can still work with what we've got.

So, for example, there are some rituals that exist at Hattusa in a shorter form in Hurrian (the language of Kizzuwatna), and then in a longer, modified form in Hittite. Our understanding of Hurrian is not awesome, and all of these texts are super broken and incomplete, but stuff has clearly been changed and added and moved around between the two versions. There's also a record of Puduhepa, a Hittite queen who was the daughter of a Kizzuwatnean priest, attempting some syncretism: that is, she states that the Hittite Sun-Goddess, the female head of the pantheon, is the same as the Hurrian head goddess Hebat. She just goes by different names in the different places, says Puduhepa. So here the two traditions are being fully merged.

This is a pretty extreme example, because Kizzuwatna was incorporated into the Empire quite early, and because there was a lot of intermarriage, so the Hurrian traditions/language ended up deeply interwoven with the central Anatolian traditions by the end of the Empire (at least in the upper class). There are other rituals attested at Hattusa - for example, ones with incantations in a language called Palaic - that don't seem to have been modified in the same way? We have Palaic incantations (which we mostly cannot read) bracketed by pretty basic ritual acts (offerings, libations, etc). These seem to have been adopted into the Hittite festival calendar without much modification. But we can't really know that, because we don't have the original rituals from Pala - and further, there could have been a modified Hittite version with translated incantations and we just haven't found it.

A final example is the one single text that we can compare to a native version, which is Gilgamesh! There is a Hittite version of Gilgamesh, and it is SO GREAT: the Hittites skip the whole beginning part at Uruk. They could not give LESS of a shit about Uruk. What do they care about southern Mesopotamian cult cities? NOTHING. But the bit where Gilgamesh and Enkidu come north into Syria to face Huwawa/Humbaba, up near Hittite stomping grounds, gets lots and lots of attention. Such beautiful country! Such impressive cedar trees! They really linger over it and it is fantastic.

2. The PhD-obtaining process was pretty gruelling! as PhDs always are, really. I did a combined MPhil/PhD, and all told it took eight years, which is pretty normal for the field and even kind of speedy for my university. (Though it is still longer than any human being should spend in graduate school.) First two years were coursework and the Master's thesis - I did an edition of a text for my Master's, which is like - you look at all the fragments of your text, including copies if any. (You are looking usually mostly at published drawings of clay tablets, with reference to photos where available; if you and/or your project are big and important you might go to visit some of the fragments in person if possible.) You make a composite transliteration, which is a transcription of the cuneiform into Latin script, where you match up the fragments as best you can and restore gaps based on copies if they exist, and then a translation. Then you write a commentary where you talk about any difficult grammatical stuff and say whatever you have to say about the content. If you're doing graduate work in cuneiform studies - and other kinds of philology too - you gotta learn how to do this and do a good job at it, and it is incredibly painstaking and difficult, woof.

So then! Two more years of coursework! It's a hell of a lot of coursework; most doctorates do not make you take this much. But you have to learn so many, many languages. I did Akkadian, Sumerian, Hittite, Hurrian, Luwian, and then the more minor Anatolian languages (Lydian, Lycian, etc.) which are only very poorly attested and so you just kind of do your best with what's there and move on with your life. I also had to know how to read French (which I came in with) and German (which I came in with a tiny bit of) and Italian (which I did not know) for research purposes, which was extremely necessary - most of the secondary sources for my dissertation were in German. Those three languages had to be done outside of regular coursework. (Also sometimes other languages! One of my favorite grad school stories is when I was taking a class that was just two of us in my advisor's office, doing abovementioned obscure Anatolian languages, and he turned around at the end of class with two hefty printouts in his hands and said, "Do you two read Spanish?" and we were like, "no," and he was like, "Well, you're going to have to! Read this for next time," and handed us each a forty-page article in Spanish. GOOD TIMES.)

Anyway. After coursework came comprehensive exams, which are almost as fun as they sound - ours were four eight-hour tests, to be taken over seven business days, covering what we had learned in class the previous four years. Then I had to prepare a dissertation topic - this was also when my funding was starting to run out, so I had to start working as a TA and writing instructor, and as a copyeditor for a journal published out of our department. So I proposed my dissertation at the end of my fifth year, and then worked and wrote for three years, which: every year of the last three years was more difficult than any that had come before it. But then I finished! And now I am Doctor Frostfire, the end.

So yeah, it was really - it was quite tough. I don't regret doing it, but it would be hard for me to in good conscience recommend that anyone else do it, because it's really not very good for you to do all that. I was certainly in a much, much worse state of physical and mental health at the end than at the beginning. But I am very proud of it; I wrote a really good dissertation, and one of the nice things about such a tiny obscure field is that you can really witness your own impact on it, even while still a graduate student. And! I am now in a position to dispense Hittite facts basically endlessly, because eight years teaches you A LOT. Hooray!

[aaronsrpgs]

DAWstruck

A Quick Look at Sci-Fi/Fantasy Publisher DAW and My Desire for Cheap Entertainment

If you've ever been to an American used bookstore, flea market, etc., you probably recognize the distinctively uniform yellow (or faded-to-brown) spines of the DAW books pictured above.

From Wikipedia: "DAW Books is an American science fiction and fantasy publisher, founded by Donald A. Wollheim, along with his wife, Elsie B. Wollheim, following his departure from Ace Books in 1971. The company claims to be 'the first publishing company ever devoted exclusively to science fiction and fantasy.'"

Wollheim was active in sci-fi publishing and fandom circles; he published the Ursula LeGuin's first two books at Ace, and as a youth, he was kicked out of the New York Science Fiction League club for getting a group of unpaid authors together to sue writer/publisher/organizer Hugo Gernsback after they weren't paid for published stories:

"It grieves us to announce that we have found the first disloyalty in our organization… These members we expelled on June 12th. Their names are Donald A. Wollheim, John B. Michel, and William S. Sykora—three active fans who just got themselves onto the wrong road."

I've worked in bookstores and libraries for decades, and my eyes always glossed over the shelves full of yellow spines. But I started to reconsider after listening to Sean at SFUltra talk about Electric Forest by Tanith Lee. (Once you're equally convinced, go back his Patreon, which is literally my favorite criticism on the internet.)

I started devouring Lee's work. In my opinion, she outstrips most of the "greats" of that era of sci-fi. Her prose is awesome, her plots are great fun, and she's prolific across science fiction and fantasy. Had I been sleeping on DAW Books? Were they all this good?!

They are not all that good.

DAW Books books run the gamut of sci-fi and fantasy, from alternate histories to barbarian tales to postmodern reactions to the post-war West. And taken as an overview of the sci-fi field at that time, they reflect the good (Tanith Lee) and the bad (libertarian cryto-fascism, coercive sex freaks, tired cliches).

So why am I writing about them? Because they represent a type of publisher that, as far as I know, doesn't really exist anymore. They published authors who'd never been published before, and they printed straight to paperback.

I have no idea if anyone was making a living being published by DAW, but I assume this was a foot in the door for lots of these authors. And the books were so cheap! The one I have on hand was $1.25 in 1976. Adjusted for inflation, that's $6.93.

And listen, I read difficult books. I read literary fiction and academic histories and complicated, confusing cross-genre works. But I also like to read trash! I think everyone deserves to read some trash. But I want that trash to be cheap and easily accessible.

And with modern publishers focusing on established authors and Next Big Things, it's hard to find trash! And when you do find it, it's often dressed up to look like a Next Big Thing and priced accordingly.

Please give me more cheap trash.

And god, look at those covers. Again, I don't know if any painters were making a living by selling work to DAW, but they were definitely putting in the work. You got classic Frazetta horniness, you got '70s psychedelia, you got "what if the Bible was weirder?" classicism.

I want to decorate my walls with these.

The nice part is that they're mostly shorter than 200 pages, and I've never spent more than $5 on one of these, and I can usually find them even cheaper. So next time you're at a library sale and you see a faded yellow DAW spine, take a closer look.

Just stay away from Gor.

(DAW is still in business today, as a subsidiary of Astra House Publishing. I would say they occupy the same spheres as Tor: popular, readable, and usually left-of-center science fiction and fantasy. Such as The Forever Sea, a sapphic ecological fantasy book about sailors on a sea of plants. They cost, unfortunately, more than $7.)

[sophiainspace]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

Thanks for tagging me, @crestfallercanyon !

How many works do you have on AO3? 82.

What’s your total A03 word count? 648,300 (quite pleased with that - a lot of words of fic in six years!)

What fandoms do you write for? In terms of what I've published - Mostly Arrowverse, with a little bit of Buffy and the Good Place (and I'm currently dipping my toe into Star Trek: Strange New Worlds for a fandom event). In terms of what I have not published - so many fandoms. Way too much Star Trek and, again, Buffy.

What are your top five fics by kudos? - Can’t Take That Away From Me (Coldflash identity porn). - Better Latte Than Never (the meet-cute prequel to the above Coldflash, and I actually hope to finish that series soon!) - [A fic that I'm embarrassed to have as 3rd highest kudos so eh] - The Bed (The Good Place, Chidi/Eleanor/Tahani). I'm really pleased that's still high on the list, because I think it's for the writing as much as the ship. - Unspeakable (DCTV Coldwave). I think the high kudos is mainly because it's been published so long - I wrote it years ago.

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not? Always. And I say so at the end of every fic. I adore comments, so I feel like I should acknowledge them. Even if my thanks are really boring some days!

What’s the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? So many to choose from! But in terms of angsty endings, probably First Time (Westhallen time travel post-Eddie's death).

What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? It might be the Stealing Time/Saving Time series (Coldwestallen, Len with Oculus powers), where Barry, Len and Iris kind of get everything they want, in a way I think makes sense for this version of them.

Do you get hate on your fic? Only once, and I don't know if it even counts as hate, but it was someone who got mad about one of my neurodivergent headcanons - which was more of a surprise than anything, as those usually get great comments. I got so much support from my fandom friends about it that I felt much better. :D

Do you write smut? On occasion, but I try not to. No one needs to read my grey ace ass trying to write sex in a vaguely convincing way (and failing).

Do you write crossovers? Not yet... but let's say I've been working on a Faith Lehane/Leonard Snart fic for ages, that will probably never see the light of day at this point. It's fun though!

Have you ever had a fic stolen? Not that I know of, but I can't imagine anyone bothering with my fics!

Have you ever had a fic translated? I don't think so, but I've had podfic made <3 The awesome @litrapod turned Fireworks (Coldwave) into a great podfic, which made me so happy.

Have you ever co-written a fic? A few times! Including with @achangeinpriorities. Top tip, beta readers can make great co-writers!

What‘s your all-time favourite ship? That question is too hard and I will never answer it but also it's Coldwave. Or Faith/Buffy. Or... Nope I'm not starting down this road :D

What’s the WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will? I *really* wish I'd been able to finish Take The Keys (And Drive Forever) - Lisa Snart/Caitlin Snow, spooky fic - but I just ran out of ideas for it. Maybe one day...

What’s your writing strengths? Questions about my strengths are a challenge! I've had some nice comments about my writing of character dynamics.

What’s your writing weaknesses? I really struggle with dialogue. You'll see me try out many different ways of writing it, throughout my fic back catalogue, as I attempt to make it work. I think I'm getting better, but slowly!

Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic? If it was a good fit for a character - like if Hartley Rathaway was being snarky in Latin - I might give it a go, but I wouldn't try it very often. Too easy to get wrong, in too many ways.

First fandom you wrote for? Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but I never shared those early fics anywhere. It's for the best!

Favourite fic you’ve ever written? I've written 82 fics this is very difficult! This answer would probably change if you asked me another time, but I think it might still be the Retired Rogues series, in which Coldwave retire and hijinks ensue. Both were early fics, so my style has changed a lot since then, but they stick in my mind as being a lot of fun to write. I'm not sure who's done this already, so sorry if I tag you and you already have... Tagging (totally obligation-free, of course) @habibialkaysani @coldflasher @kittsfics @joanthangroff @sugar-haus @strangebrainrot @achangeinpriorities @blueelvewithwings

[sunnycanwrite]

I love learning things about characters I didn’t know and not just canon stuff but history of publishing and what goes behind the scenes with editorial. Originally Barbara was created for the the tv show to replace the love interest role for Catwoman. They had casted Eartha Kitt as the new Catwoman and since segregation was still happening in certain parts of the country they wanted to cast a white woman to play a love interest so their show could continue to be played in certain states. Catwoman went from love interest to a more villainous role and Barbara was introduced. Instead of being Bruce’s love interest she set herself apart and really shinned on her own to the point that she ended not as the love interest but and icon in her own right. When they made the move to comics there were still comics that paired her with Bruce (they are married in one of them) and in another she briefly dated Clark Kent. She was given a couple of backups and was the reason comics started using The Batfamily. Before she was introduced, Jim Gordon had a son who accompanied him but he was written out. Another son existed that was an older brother to Barbara but was written out as well. Later a younger brother would be added but he comes and goes given the continuity.

Ohhh! I didn't know that's why she was created I was aware that originally in the comics she was Commissioner Gordons niece, whom he adopted. And that her brother James Gordon Jr in a serial killer, which is very interesting.

Im loving hearing all this Barbara history! I mostly focus on her post injury. As I relate to get heavily as a wheelchair user. But that means I've never really dove into her before than so all this bee info is awesome, truly it is just great!

[readingrobin]

Ooof this was probably my roughest month when it came to reading, Didn't really get a lot read since my schedule was jam packed and I didn't get as much reading in as I thought I would during vacation. To top it all off, the things I did manage to read mostly fell on the meh side of things, so I can't even say it was worth it for a few good reads. Oh well. I think I'll have better luck in November.

Total Books Read: 5

Total Pages Read: 1,713

Books Read:

Nightshade by Andrea Cremer (2.5/5) -

This book has been collecting dust on my bookshelves since the great vampire/werewolf YA fiction boom of the early 2010s. Really the only thing that's been keeping me from reading it has been circumstance and a deluge of other things I'd rather be reading. Big note to self, if the synopsis describes one of the teenage lead characters as "sexy," there's a good chance that I, an almost thirty year old adult, will get one of those ick feelings along my spine. It's one thing if it's coming through the perspective of a teenaged character, and another when you know it's more than likely coming from some middle-aged editor in a publishing office cubicle.

Now if I had read this over a decade ago, odds are I would have loved it. Awesome werewolf mythology that seemed very unique, a badass lead character that's not here for your girly dresses or makeup, sarcasm galore, oh yeah teen me would've eaten it up. While I can still appreciate the lore aspect, there are some qualities of the book that just tire me out.

Love triangles are always going to be some dodgy ground, particularly when you don't care for them or either of the love interests. Shay seemed so irresponsible and okay with constantly putting Calla in danger, even if it had the intention of trying to get her to see the truth behind the Keepers. Rey, though slightly better, made some comments here and there that set my teeth grinding, but at least it felt like he actually respected Calla at times. Pretty sure with how the story is going that Shay is ultimately going to win out in the end, which doesn't really encourage me to read any of the sequels.

At least pour one out for the gay werewolf representation in a time where queer characters, even queer side characters, were in short supply.

While I really liked the werewolf lore, the book also reinforces my least favorite werewolf trope, which is reinforcing incorrect "facts" about actual wolf pack dynamics to explain the weird sexism of the werewolf packs. I know it's all to make the term "alpha wolf" look cool and intimidating, but they literally do not exist. Wolf packs are made up of a mated pair and their kids/extended family. There's very little dominance involved. I know bringing actual reality to this werewolf book means absolutely nothing, but they did it first.

There's also an absurd amount of sexism, misogyny, and slut-shaming going on here and yes, I know it's all for us to realize that werewolf society is corrupt and has this weird propaganda thing going on to keeps the wolves in line, but god it's overbearing at times. It's really just a me thing, but I had to visibly cringe when one of the adults told Calla to "keep her legs shut." I don't know, maybe it was too much just because all the characters are like 15-17 years old and I'm entering my "old person yells at YA for being YA" era. God help me.

So yeah, lots of emotions with this one and I'm not sure if I want to continue the series just to get closure or not.

Don't Turn Out the Lights: A Tribute to Alan Schwartz's Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark edited by Jonathan Maberry (3/5) -

Seeing as I was a giant scaredy cat as a kid, I didn't really grow up with Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. I tried once, but Stephen Gammell's haunting illustrations proved to be too much for little me who already had an overactive imagination. Now that I have a little more stamina when it comes to horror and spooky pictures, I figured to give this collection a try to find some worthwhile middle grade horror. There are definitely strong contenders in this collection, some that'll even unnerve some adults. Others, well, they're there to give a little variety when it comes to the type and tone of the stories.

My favorites would have to be:

"The Carved Bear" "The Golden Peacock" "The Neighbor" "The Bottle Tree" "The Tall Ones"

I don't know if the collection decently balanced between the light spooky stories that were more humorous and the more traumatizing tales. There are two that sort of stick out like sore thumbs, those being R.L. Stine's and Sherrilyn Kenyon's contributions. Stine is known for his off the wall twists, but this one being a little bit more silly, yet typical for his kind of work, doesn't really make it mesh well with the majority of other stories that want to leave you with a shiver down your spine. Kenyon's poem has the same effect, having more of an innocent, playful tone that sets it apart from the other stories, but not in a memorable way. I think if the collection offered a few more stories like these it wouldn't be so noticeable. Each are completely fine on their own, but not when integrated into a collection that aims to leave lasting scares.

Also, it's REALLY noticeable that some of the writers are writing stories centered around certain cultures that aren't their own or that they have done very little research on. I may be as white as winter snow, but even I know that the Devil has nothing to do with Dia de los Muertos. 

The Ravenmaster: My Life with the Ravens at the Tower of London by Christopher Skaife (3/5) -

I have such a great fondness for corvids, be they crows, ravens, magpies, or even blue jays, so I figured this book would be right up my alley. Skaife delves into the history behind the ravens' presence at the Towers, which I was surprised but maybe not too much that it holds a legend that may not be as old and revered as once thought.

I've been to the Tower of London, which helped me visualize some of his stories. The ravens there are definitely a quirky bunch. I remember one that graciously allowed a seagull to peck a bit at their raw chicken lunch, only to shoo them off a few seconds after. This cycle would actually repeat itself a bit, a little nibble and then a shoo, it almost seemed like a sort of game. Anyway, they are very amusing birds and Skaife really does make their personalities shine in this book.

There were moments where the book lost a little steam or included something that seemed a bit superfluous. The chapter on ghosts around the grounds seemed a little out of place in a book about the Tower ravens and the stories get a little repetitive once you edge closer to the end. But if you have an interest in the Tower and its inhabitants, I recommend picking it up.

The Oddmire: Changeling by William Ritter (2.5/5) -

I'm not sure if this is a case of me reading this book at the wrong time or I'm just getting more picky with my middle grade fantasy, but I never really felt very invested in this one. It's a great setup for a story, two brothers venture into a dark magical forest to learn which one of them is human and which is a changeling left by a goblin one long ago night. They meet various friends and threats across the way, culminating in a wonderful depiction of family bonds and loyalty. I appreciated how involved their mother was in the story, who had absolutely no qualms about going into the dangerous forest to save her kids. I love seeing more competent parents in fiction, if only just to show kids that some grownups are capable of being helpful at times.

But, other than that, I didn't really get much out of the story. The brothers seemed very interchangeable, not really having distinguishable personalities so that ultimately it doesn't really matter who is human and who is the changeling. They both have the same worries and fears, the same goals, so there's nothing really to set them apart.

The writing style didn't really pull me in either, to the point where by the last couple of chapters I was doing more skimming than actual reading.

I will say that it is a decent fantasy for younger readers looking for a bit of adventure and magic. It twists some fairy tale conventions just enough to feel fresh while holding onto a few just for good measure. I've probably just read too many at this point to really appreciate it.

Watership Down: The Graphic Novel by Richard Adams, adapated by James Sturm, illustrated by Joe Sutphin (5/5) -

I stumbled upon Watership Down a little later in life, knowing full well of its status as one of those "Top 10 Films that Scarred You As A Child." At some point, I had seen the glorious intro to the film, where Frith bestows various gifts to the animals and El-Ahrairah displays his tricks and cunning, and that immediately sent me to the novel. It's a beautiful story, with lush descriptions of the downs and adventure that, while coming from so humble a place, keeps you interested from beginning to end. By some magic, James Sturm and Joe Sutphin managed to capture everything about this story that has delighted readers for decades.

Sutphin goes for a more naturalistic style, keeping the rabbits and other various animals expressive, but not too cartoony. It mostly keeps to a certain realm of reality, with colors that are more muted, but never do any sort of disservice to the setting. While I am a fan of styles that bush boundaries, this style is perfect for Watership Down that, while seemingly fantastical at times, is a very down to earth tale. There's a certain charm to it that comes from the simplicity of its setup, that is a group of animals just trying to survive.

Of course, not every plot point and character makes it through the process of adaptation. I am thankful that Sturm was able to include some of the folk tales of the rabbits, which was one of my favorite elements of the story. Naturally, to keep this story to a single volume and maintain a sense of flow, things would have to be reworked and shifted.

In my opinion, this graphic novel is an exemplary transfiguration on the original story that will please fans and hopefully entice new readers to the book.

Rating Average 3.2

[rozunderpressure]

Always awesome to see someone else's brain works spilled out! Up=aged voices are interesting to play with. I've done a couple up-aged stories. For Chloé(one was at 25 one at 28 I believe) I always keep the word 'sharp' in mind. It suits a lot of what I see as her core traits. Sharp- Clears the path, removes obstacles

Needs to be handled carefully, can injure you, even accidently, very quickly

Is a state of being, not an intent. Something sharp cuts because of how it is, not because it desires to

can be a part of healing as much as hurting. You want something sharp for surgery, right? 🤣 Sharp can mean fragile. The finest edge is also the one that dulls the easiest from use.

There are more ideas around that core, but it's getting late for me here. You'll post when you finish your fic right? I'm very curious to see it! I'm also wondering how the relationships of all the characters have developed. I love having something to look forward to :)

Oh, I love your definition of her, I am terrible with names, but I believe you wrote this really fantastic future fic where Chloé is sick and passed out sleeping in Mari's room, they are happily married and stuff, and I remember that edge in that one and how their relationship is described... I love that fanfic!

But Chloé in this is just a little more-- chill? If Chloé Bourgeois could even EVER be chill? This is as chill as she gets anyway, mostly due to influence of quasi-surfer dude Jack Lee-- (They have a very odd relationship, very "28 year old full adult Chloé Bourgeois and her 46 year old teenage son Jack Lee", and his mom full on applied the transitive property of "well, she is my granddaughter's sister, therefore she is also my granddaughter"), but she still has an edge, obviously...

My favorite aspect so far, is the complete flip on power dynamic, because Mari is most certainly on top and that has been interesting, because while we know Mari uses power responsibility, all Chloé can do is hope she did not became a vengeful bitch-- And Mari is in the Fashion industry now, so in Chloé's eyes--

And yes, I will publish it, if I finish it, and I hope I will! I just really need to get this idea out of my system!

ANYWAY, thanks for the ask!

[vanlegion]

TL;DR script 1?

I'm getting the urge to write my first RVB fic. Yet, I've been going back and forth about how I actually want to handle it. Directly after Restoration, I had a lot of " EMOTIONAL DAMAGE " and whipped up a seven page comic i've yet to publish (and still am debating about at this point because I dont feel its very good and I lost a lot of the anger that spurned it but GODDAMN do I want to keep pump the RVB tag with more Grimmons Art JUST BECAUSE) along with a few other pictures and feels and ideas of other WIPS that also came from that anger and angst... But now that it's been some time and I've cooled down and have been able to process and ALSO come to understand that 19 could be taken as another Simulation, and that ALSO RVB gave us the unique gift of letting us CHOOSE where our canon story ends (Be it at S10, or S13 or for the very few of us S17) ... My brain has slowly been allotting, plotting and working its way towards writing a story that could be a more realistic take to an ending. I've never written 'Fix-It fics' in my life. Mostly because I don't really believe in them that much, personally, for me. ( I'll read them if the premise sounds awesome, and I'm curious how people switch things up. I just have a hard time writing them myself.) For me I do 'Mend-It' fics. Which means I keep what was considered 'broken' in canon, but then find a canon way to fix it BEYOND the breaking point. . . . . So now I am conflicted because as I stated before - RvB is a Choose Your Own Ending series. S19 does have some concepts I'd like to play around with and explore further and expand on. But I'm also an enjoy of have S17 as my ending. Never getting the SoC fight feels wrong. But maybe, maybe. . . I've got a way to have my cake and eat it too. Ya know, before Grif finds out I had cake.

Anywho, this was a quick Outline for the first draft of a Fic I was planning, but am now thinking of scrapping maybe for what's now brewing in my brain. I might flesh this back out again but this was what I came up with about some odd hours after finishing Restoration day of. "First Nights"

How often does Simmon's second guess himself? By nightfall, when he see's Grifs unmade and trashed bed - because you KNOW Grif left him one last mess to clean up, he's going to bitch about it, bitch about the trash and . . . probably put it off for the morning. Being so fucking tired after surviving all of that. And then when he starts to ask a question. . . realizing he wont get an answer, he'll choke. Tucker's acting all 'Yeah I'm fine sure' but he's probably struggling a fuck of a lot right now and trying to do it all himself - and Wash is still learning how to let go but he's got Carolina for support so he can be Tucker's support as well. Them learning how to heal together is very viable. Grif is probably going to run off disbelief for a few hours, along with adrenaline to figure out his immediate living situation as soon as he gets back home. But it's gonna sink in pretty quickly that he's alone, and it'll hurt when it hits. He didn't even tell Kai he was leaving to go back home cause he was still waiting for a second shoe to drop, but it didnt and now he's back in Hawaii.

Caboose is gonna wonder the canyon. He'll be quite. Probably ends up in front of a broken Simmons, and is just there to be supportive. Because Simmons also, in a way, also just lost his best friend. So he'll offer a shoulder and a hug and let Simmon's have his emotions. Because doing the right thing is the sad thing. He'll probably say thank you to Sarge's grave. It'll inspire him to make one for the Epsilon Unit, but the grave stone will be carved with ALL the names ... Church, Tex, Alpha, Beta, Epsilon and the rest in their Greek Lettering. He'll put the Sniper Rifle on it. Tucker leaves with Wash and Carolina because the trauma does finally hit him and hard, and he needs a doctor. Carolina tires to convince Caboose and Simmons to go with them but they both stay behind - Simmon's claiming some kind of bullshit technical reason and Carolina know's he's lying but doesn't push, just leaves the invite open. Caboose and Simmons sit atop Red Base and talk into the night, watching the stars and recounting things again. The first night alone is rough, and it hurts. It gets easier each passing night, but it still sucks when it feels you no longer have a purpose. They started as pawns in a fake war, and it feels like after everything that's happened, they're still just pawns the UNSC would rather push into the shadows. At least here. Maybe there's somewhere they could actually make a difference, or that their help and experience would be beneficial. It takes time to find that place. But eventually, they do. A new training facility/liaison office looking for experienced vets is being built. Simmon's files the paperwork immediately, because Red Tape bullshit requires these thing be done ASAP and he's taking no chances. Takes time again, but eventually, the new facility is finished and they're paperwork is accepted. They clear out Blood Gulch. They leave it behind for good. (Debating Simmon's having rigged the bases to explode or not - sees on brand for him, but also he may just leave it derelict because Sarge) Simmons, anxious but excited, turns to Caboose and see's the other's excitement. He's going on about how "It'll be great!" and all the things he wants to see and do and all the new friends he could make, but then grows kind of quiet and look over to Simmons. "It will be great, right?" "Going to Earth? Yeah. I think it will." Last scene is just them talking while the data-pad next to Simmons shows a readout of the New Facility they're transferring to, " RTB: ODST - Red Team Base: O'ahu Division for Science and Technologies"

[blujaishah]

hi! How’s it going?

This is a good opportunity to explain why I haven't been posting art dont read any of it if u dont want to it's more for me

Aside from normal academic stuff it's mostly because my school's literary magazine is allowing submissions and I really want to get my art in it (you're a published artist/author if you get in it)

Thing is last year I didn't get my art in it (I made a self portrait titled 'hearts' that I stupidly never took a picture of because I never got it back) but they had too many art submissions and not enough literary submissions so most of the art got cut from the magazine

So I think you can tell that I was pissy bc I really need to get my art in this thing

So now I have been focusing a lot on my submission because I'm writing something with it, it's gonna look like a children's picture book with multiple drawings and a story

I might post it here if it doesn't end up being too personal but prob not

It's taking me a while because one i want it to look good and two i want it to look painted and that isn't my normal style and three because I am not a writer

Another reason as to why I'm not posting is because I'm looking for jobs because ur girl does not have money and that's something I wanna prioritize

And the last reason is less fun and something that I genuinely need to type out and admit in writing is that my parents are absolute batshit crazy and I want nothing more than to complete my high school credits and leave my home town

My sister didn't mind leaving like I want to in fact she wanted to get as far away from us (specifically my dad) as possible but she has no problem having me with her and husband because they've somewhat settled down

She's traveled the world and she's pretty cool, she's at a very prestigious university, she went to Thailand in high school, she's been to Jordan, Lebanon, and a couple years ago she went to Palestine for a year and became a high school teacher there she's awesome

It would be amazing to go to college where she is (i'm in a position financially and academically where going out of state for college is very possible ESPECIALLY where she is) and also to get to know her husband more would be great cause we barely got to know each other when he was here

My brother on the other hand didn't want to leave our mom but really needed to get out of the house because of our dad so now he's in this really awkward position where he lives in an apartment literally a 15 minutes walk from our house and by extension his very comfortable bedroom, and also he comes home every night to see our mom

It absolutely sucks and I very much want to leave my home even though I say what my parents want me to say I'll do after high school when I'm around them

My dad is demented and I have no problem admitting that he's never abused me physically but he has verbally quite a few times and hinted at physical abuse and it gets to me a lot

mostly it's about academics which he is quite literally insane for thinking I don't do well academically

There's a lot of stuff with him that's god awful and i wont get into it because that's what I do in a therapeutic environment which I cant get without being gaslit by my family so yeah

I can't draw anything except what I have to with all this it's a lot to be thinking about because I'm still just a kid and idk i can't handle it maturely so I have to write about it on tumblr lmao