#but one day it'll get better

[purplefeathersandblackleather]

Digital Art Logs/Community Picture

Well, there was intentions to draw Stephen a picture for his birthday, but my tablet drivers have decided to betray me, no matter what I do. The worst part of this is that I don't really know how to fix the issue, given that I've never had it come up that many times in a row. I had intentions of also starting on the other variants' sketches tonight as well, but with no solution that I've found in how to fix the driver, I'm feeling that it may be a bug that occurred when it updated earlier this week. I could still use it, but the fact that the pressure sensitivity would be absent makes the lines and edges of what I'm working on look like shit. I don't want to make my work look sloppy when I'm doing it for all of you as much as I am myself. Plus the children themselves wouldn't give me any peace if I did.

The best that I can do is say that I have poses for Sinister, Dark Suns and What If lined up. But I also have a bit of a request from all of you if you'd be willing to help me with something. I'd like to work on a picture myself of Damon moving on from Tony's death. But I would like all of you to contribute something to it, because I have only begun to heal since I joined this community and found my footing. There were struggles on the way, but I feel confident in the fact that I can only go up from here. I want this image to not just be a symbol of the healing I am going through, but a testament of the friendships I've made here.

Below I made a list for all of you that I've tagged. If you have multiple suggestions, I'll do my best to incorporate them, so don't hesitate to give me whatever comes to mind. Aesthetic (Such as warm lighting, pastels, sepia tone, etc) Colors (Nothing too dark, since this is about recovering and moving on) Flowers (Keep in mind that flowers have meaning, so be wary of the ones you choose for me to draw in here~) Environment (Weather, location, etc) Literary Line (Quote, poem or lyrics) Secondary characters (OC or a canon character, but they will be in the background a fair bit.)

@strangelockd @fanartka @sinisterstrange616 @sobeautifullyobsessed @harlekin6 @strangelock221b @icytrickster17 @the-eldritch-sorcerer All of you have helped me so much, I can't imagine not including you all in this picture, or something to remind me of you at least. I look forward to hearing what all of you choose. Also remember that you're each more than welcome to pick more than one thing and I will do my best to incorporate it cohesively. Much love my dears! 💜💜

[wasyago]

a random cleo in armor

[frozenhi-chews]

Did

Are they ENFORCING Tumblr Live to be on all the time down there?

No! Nononono! Staff, what the heck. You should KNOW by now that no one uses Live, no one likes Live, and forcing it like this is absurd and insane! No!

[mokeonn]

I think the most upsetting thing about being a recovering addict is seeing how other people talk about addicts. A vast majority of Americans fucking DESPISE addicts and they are constantly demonized at every turn, God forbid that addict is homeless. It's honestly shocking to see how fast addicts are brought up as a "gotcha" to shoot down arguments for social or housing programs.

Like damn, I'm already dealing with trying not to abuse this substance and getting my life together, which is hard enough on its own, I don't need the knowledge that the average person thinks I am the scum of the Earth. I don't like knowing that if I am ever homeless or in a tough living situation, I will be one of the first people thrown under the bus. I'm already going through enough, I'm already the victim of a very upsetting illness, I don't need to deal with the vile hatred of the average person in my country, too.

[brooklynisher]

Flat colors down!

Now it's just line cleanup, hands, and shading.

[donnyclaws]

I was gonan make a post apologizing for lack of regular art but I feel like jts already clear im sporadic and in and out of it bc chronic pain and circumstances. So for now I'm gonna hibernate, get my health steady again, deal with money issues, and art will happen when it happens.

[front-facing-pokemon]

[lunar-wandering]

i survived my first day of college!!!

[ratthumbsup]

in many ways starting a new job is the it's so over/we're so back meme.

[begaana]

i dont think the solution to any sort of pain is 'oh wait for a while it'll go away on it's own' it has been over two years.

[kakusu-shipping]

God I love Valentines (I've had a migraine for two days now)

[b4kuch1n]

learning how to color with my new screen tablet. turns out people still zoom in digitally and dont put their face up to ~.3 cm from the screen

[not-poignant]

very, very late question to an old work and I will perfectly understand if you don't want to reply to this and prefer not to bring the discussion toward your old works.

out of curiosity, how much did the hunger games, divergent, maze runner or other dystopian YA works of the time influence TGATNW?

the curiosity stemmed from the fact that while my initial perspective on your works were that they were a complete divergence from mainstream media due to its rawer, kinkier nature, a thought popped up that your works might have (purposefully?) satisfied the trends of the times they were created. the golden age (and fae tales soon after) was an appropriate dystopian rebellion story in the midst of the YA fever in 2014-2015 containing similar tropes.

On the other hand, falling falling stars and other efnisien centric works which address mental health and recovery more heavily than other works were published in the present day while shows on mental health discourse (for instance sex education and euphoria) are increasingly more popular. there are definitely exceptions, but those mentioned are some of your most prominent works.now that I think about it, my question might actually be: if at all, how do current trends influence your narratives? I think I remember a mention of these works' influences being old tales, so it would be interesting to hear how contemporary works have inspired you as well if it all.

thanks Pia! even if you don't reply, thanks for all the time and effort you've put into these works. they mean a lot and so much more to a many people.

This one is easy to answer:

my question might actually be: if at all, how do current trends influence your narratives?

So the TL;DR upfront -> I don't read, and often don't know about current trends. I have zero interest in writing to market. I hadn't read any of those books you mentioned when I wrote The Golden Age that Never Was with the exception of The Hunger Games, which came out over half a decade beforehand (except for the last installment in the trilogy, which was my least favourite lol).

In more detail:

I was inspired to write The Golden Age that Never Was - I can't believe I'm saying this - based on a dream I had in August, 2015.

I read Divergent for the first time in 2016 (er, so after I'd started TGATNW). I read book 1, gave it 2 stars, and don't remember anything about it. I haven't read Maze Runner and I know nothing about it.

Going back through my Goodreads account in 2013 and 2014, I read what looks like almost no books actually published in those years. I read books on cod (literally, the nonfiction book Cod, it's really very good), I read Manna Francis (defo not YA), I read nonfiction books on trauma, I read a bunch of Tricia Owens (M/M not YA), I read Eleanor & Park (YA but contemporary), I read a bunch of M/M, Hagio Moto's Zankoku na Kami ga Shihaisuru manga took over my life for a few months, and then I read a bunch more BL manga (none of it recently published that year) for consecutive months and checked out of anything written in the western world for almost half a year.

I got back into M/M at the end of / beginning of 2015 and it looks like that was all I was reading through all of 2015 with very few exceptions (one more Rainbow Rowell book, Station Eleven by Mandel, and nonfiction). I read no dystopian YA in the 2 year lead up to writing The Golden Age that Never Was. Not a single title. Out of like 200 titles. I didn't even read historical dystopian YA. I think we can safely say that was in no way a direct influence and I can bet you around $500 I had no idea it was a trend lmao.

I do not know exactly how to convey how little I give a shit about reading or responding to publishing trends. I don't care and have never cared. No, wait, I think I attempted to care for about 2 months after seeing a Facebook post about it and then was like 'wait, this is extremely demotivating' and stopped. There are some - few - absolute favourite authors who if they release a book, I will read it that year. (Like the latest Murderbot by Martha Wells). Otherwise I prefer generally not knowing what the trends are, and I don't read author blogs etc. that keep me updated on this. New genres rise and fall and by the time I hear of them, they've either already vanished, or new names have been invented for them.

I feel the same way about music and a lot of television as well. I started watching True Detective for the first time this year. A lot of the music I've listened to and discovered didn't release that music this year. And while I have watched and listened to things that did release this year, it was less because it was 'trendy' and more because they are musicians I've always listened to (Manchester Orchestra) or TV shows I would have wanted to watch anyway.

Also The Golden Age that Never Was isn't dystopian YA. But I wasn't reading much by the way of any dystopian romantic science fiction anyway (and certainly nothing released in those years), and no space operas or anything like that. If TGATNW synced up with any trends at all, it was a happy coincidence. But given I don't think it's YA, if people who only wanted to read dystopian YA found it, they were going to be really disappointed! Lmao.

Around 2013 I also just stopped reading anything heterosexual because I had a choice in the moment and exercised that choice. And I tell you - it's low key hilarious how much you get locked out of almost all the trends (certainly almost 10 years ago) anyway, if you exclusively read same sex.

I also just have general disdain for the idea of purposefully satisfying any kind of fiction trends in fanfiction. Like, no, that's not for me. I think that's a waste of my time, and it's not why I write fanfiction. I write fanfic for fun, and to me, looking at trends and writing to trends is one of the least fun things I can actually think of doing.

(Re: Your Sex Education / Euphoria example, I had to laugh. I haven't seen the latter, and the former I only watched for the first time late last year, when I'd already finished Falling Falling Stars.)

No trend has ever inspired anything I've ever written. And no book / show has ever directly inspired anything I've ever written too. I definitely have inspirations - everyone does - but like, yeah no, one of the reasons I let other people rec works similar to mine is because I can never think of any, because I write because of a perceived vacuum providing what I want to read. If what I want to read is already present and there's a lot of it, I won't write anything, because I don't need to. I am the opposite of an 'adding my book into the pile of a trend' author, like literally, that's a reason to not write for me.

I write what I don't see in the world, and it's pretty much that simple.

[clenastia]

i dont know why the running joke of this chapter is kakashi fearing for his kidneys. where did that come from. WHY did that come from.

i should probably cut that in editing it's a little ridiculous.

except it makes me giggle every time so maybe i should leave it there.