#faux book illustration

[datgreenmonstah]

Messed around with a sketch I had sitting on my tablet, will work on it more later, but this is how far I got.

One day I’ll illustrate for a book cover or something maybe

[rpgdreams]

[lindenwalker-studios]

This came to me in a vision.

Image Transcription:

[A faux book cover titled Peas; rendered in a green retro font, and sub titled Have You Considered Them? Below the title is a painting of green peas in their pods, some of which breaking the border of the square they are contained in. Underneath the bean box is the artist name, Linden Walker.]

End of Image Transcription:

[bogleech]

I talked a lot last year about how the "main" artwork (faux sugimori style) for Pokemon had gotten miserably stiff and boring - many of them just exactly the lifeless idle poses from the game - but a new book apparently just revealed the alternate internal art of every current Pokemon, what fans call the "dream world art" that they use on a lot of stickers and coloring books. This is the first time the public has seen this art for the last couple hundred new Pokemon.

These tend to have their own original poses and god WHAT a fucking improvement

Toxtricity's "main" illustrations were even fairly decent but the alternate art STILL shows off what they should have been:

[tadpolesonalgae]

The Libraries

Helion x reader

a/n: I haven’t written for him in a long time so I hope he isn’t insanely ooc! 🧡💛

word count: 1,287

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“What may I find for you today, High Lord?” You ask, peering over the bright red rim of your pointed glasses. 

“So cold to me,” Helion drawls, bracing his forearms on the lip of your desk, the golden snake that bands around his bicep digging into the dark skin as the powerful muscles shift. “Didn’t you miss me while I was gone, peaches?” 

“It was certainly emptier,” you reply neutrally. “Now, what may I find for you?” 

“Can I not visit simply for the pleasure of your company?” The High Lord inquires, faux hurt showing in his sturdy features. “Pleasure certainly seems to be the main motive for your scholarly trips,” you reply, returning you gaze to the charts spread out on your desk, marking which books are due to be switched out and moved, and which sections are due to have new additions to their already full shelves. 

“Anything new?” The High Lord asks, and you can hear the wicked grin on his mouth without having to glance up. “A few things, since your last visit,” you reply, reaching over to the short list you’d scribbled down, now pulling it over and handing it to him to look through. Helion raises a brow as he scans through the short compilation. “Fully illustrated?” He repeats, clearly reading the note you’d added beside one of the titles. “Fully illustrated,” you repeat back in confirmation, ink pen scratching as you make an annotation for some sections to be swapped around. “And you verified that personally?” Helion asks, his deep voice taking on a low, suggestive drawl. 

“Personally,” you repeat back, again in conformation, still not paying him the attention he’s seeking. 

“Will you show me to it?” He asks, trying to pry you away from your desk. 

“You know the section,” you reply, a hint of amusement in your tone, but still annotating. 

“I don’t see anyone else requiring your attention,” Helion drawls, “and I didn’t come just for the book…” 

“To.” You correct, without looking up. 

“…to?” Helion repeats, blinking. 

“And I didn’t come just to the book, is what you meant to say,” you answer, a faint upward tilt at the corners of your normally straight-pressed lips. “Your humour is as sharp as your tongue, I see,” Helion says, huffing a low laugh that has the hairs on your forearms raising. 

At last you look up, and Helion resists the urge to stand upright, keeping his positioning casual as he looks into your eyes, partially warped by those red-pointed glasses. “Have you returned the last one you borrowed?” You inquire, reaching for a blank piece of parchment. Helion raises a brow, “you’ve let me borrow tens at a time, why does this book require an urgent return?” 

“It’s on the list to be shipped out to the continent. I take it you haven’t yet returned it?” You ask, and Helion shakes his head. You nod, scribbling something down before handing it to him. “A reminder,” you say when he takes it from your fingers, “to please return it at your earliest convenience. I understand you have a lot on your plate.” 

“Like a troublesome librarian who looks at me with a particularly…” —you shoot him a sharp glare over the red rims— “…bloodcurdling, expression,” he finishes. You hum, the doubt clear in the sound. You both know he wasn’t going to say bloodcurdling. 

“Now, will you do me the honour of showing me where this particular book is being kept?” He requests, a faint grin on his lips. 

“I suppose it is part of my job,” you reply, “even if you are taking advantage of that.” A distinctly satisfied expression appears on the High Lord of Day’s features as you stand from your desk, the knee-length robes that sit over your clothes swishing with the motion, and you set off down one of the long aisles, knowing Helion is keeping close behind. Able to feel the direction of his attention, too, despite the coverage of the robes. You shoot him a look over your shoulder, and he offers a questioning smile that has you rolling your eyes. 

It takes some minutes to reach the darkened corner of the library this particular book has been stored, and a while longer for you to climb the ladder that will carry you to the shelf it sits on, but at last you find it, handing it over to the High Lord who opens the first page with slight interest. 

“And to think you’ve looked through all of this already,” he remarks, eyes scanning across the few lines of writing beside the illustration. “I’m surprised you could tolerate such lewd imagery,” he muses, glancing at you with a faint grin, “did it bother you, much?” 

“Nothing I haven’t seen before,” you reply blandly, waving your hand dismissively. Helion hums, flipping the page over, eyes passing over the parchment with surprising restraint, then raises his brows. “You’ve seen things like this before?” He asks, half teasing, half serious. 

“Are you surprised?” You reply, brow slightly furrowed, “I’ve been working in these libraries for centuries now, I’ve seen all sorts of things. I doubt anything could shock me anymore.” 

“So if I got to put you in some of these positions…” 

“How very inappropriate of you, High Lord,” you reply, shooting him a look from over top your glasses, before making to move past him. 

You’re vaguely surprised when his large palm wraps carefully around your upper arm, prompting you to pause but not tight enough you couldn’t continue walking if you’d like to. 

You glance back up at him, listening. 

“Do my advances bother you?” He asks, sincerely. “I assume you don’t mind them from your occasional jokes, but I don’t wish to bring discomfort to where you’re required to work.” 

“I had no idea you were attempting advances, High Lord,” you reply, lightly shifting your arm, and he releases you without complaint. “I find that hard to believe,” the High Lord replies questioningly. “You’re flirtatious with most people you encounter, I wasn’t under the impression I was receiving any special treatment.” 

“Would you like special treatment?” He asks, his voice lowered a little, and you narrow your eyes on him. 

“I like genuine interest,” you reply, “I like commitment, and certainty—things I don’t believe you’re yet interested in.” Something shifts behind his eyes, but you wave your hand again, “which is fine. We seek different things.”

“You aren’t interested in finding out what might happen?” He asks, lips curved with a gleam in his eyes. “I would have thought that by nature you’d want to satisfy your curiosity.” 

“I have lived a long life, and I have seen a lot of things, as I’ve said. There are very few topics I’m still curious about, High Lord,” you reply. 

“Not even how it might feel to lay with me for one night?” He asks, that mischievous look on his features. 

But, “no. I’m afraid not.” 

Your lips twitch faintly at the slight surprise in his features before its swiftly concealed. “You’re free to continue as you like, though, so long as you don’t cause any trouble for my coworkers,” you say. “We had a new one in a few days ago and I don’t want you traumatising him with your literature tastes.” 

Helion grins, mischievous look returning, more promising than it was before. “Very well,” he replies, eyes glinting, “I’ll return the book as soon as I can. And I’ll remember to make my advances more clear, next time.”

You turn to head back to your desk, but not swiftly enough that Helion doesn’t catch the upward tug of your mouth. “I look forward to it, High Lord.”

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general taglist: @myheartfollower @tcris2020 @mali22 @slut4acotar @sfhsgrad-blog @needylilgal022 @hannzoaks @hnyclover @skyesayshi @nyotamalfoy @decomposing-writer @soph1644 @lilah-asteria @nighttimemoonlover

[doodleswithangie]

VOL 1: Loving You Brings Only Heartaches by @seven-stars-in-his-palm

It's been 62 years since Aziraphale and Crowley's disagreement in St James' Park, and the world has entered a new era of flapper girls and arbitrary Prohibitions. After attempting to finally get in contact with the angel again, Crowley finds out Aziraphale has been accused of murdering Mr Howard, Soho staple and owner of the Harmony Emporium a few doors down...in his very own bookshop. It's up to Aziraphale and Crowley to solve this mystery, or else they might be next.

For this year’s GOMM Reverse Bang run by @go-minisode-minibang! I had the pleasure of working with two amazing writers, so presenting the first of two! August wrote an incredible high stakes mystery that’ll keep you guessing until the end. Read it here!

[Image Description: Mock book cover and page for a “Good Omens” fanfiction set in the 1920s. Alt text is provided and copied below the cut. End ID]

Copied Alt Text

Image One:

Book cover featuring female-presenting Aziraphale and Crowley in 1920s fashion. Aziraphale peers through a magnifying glass, wearing a yellow and white blazer and skirt set trimmed in plaid and matching brown hat, gloves, and bow tie. Behind her, Crowley wears a white embroidered frock and sunhat with a black velvet overskirt and faux fur-lined cape.

The cover text reads: “A.Z. FELL AND Co. Loving You Brings Only Heartaches. Written by Gravitron. Illustrated by Doodles With Angie.”

Image two:

Book page with illustration and text. Both male-presenting, a wild-eyed Aziraphale is drenched in blood and wields a knife, while Crowley frantically interrogates him.

The excerpt reads:

“Why?” is what spills out of Crowley’s mouth before all else, having to shout it to be heard over the roar of the chaos. “I don’t—it’s only been sixty years, sixty years, and you’ve already—how—?”

“My own shop!”

Crowley blanches. “Eh?!”

Aziraphale’s eyes are blown open in terror, the shoulder under Crowley’s hand shaking like mad. He attempts to shove past the demon, but he remains firm in putting himself between the two. “They had–had to kill him in my own shop! Now everyone is—goodness, they must already think—” He drops the blade in his fist in horror, the imprint of blood deep under his well-manicured nails. “Never would I—oh, it doesn’t even matter, this is going to be terribly inconvenient…”

End Copied Alt Text

[spockandawe]

So there i was, jetlagged as shit, choking on surprise work deadlines, with a broken sleep schedule (9-1, and then 9-1 again) and an entire lost day of work catchup productivity. And rather than going to the office like a good engineer, i was like 'hmm. I wonder what would be a good book for that one casual discord competition.' Anyways! Not playing coy with this one, I've already done it as a single volume (with a rigid yapp edge), but i messed up my trimming and the size of my yapp edges was a little more intrusive than i thought.

So I changed up my typeset a little and I'm going back in. I dont know what exactly I'm doing with this one, but I'm going all out. Leather binding, hot tooled leather if it's enough leather surface area. Power sanded (looking for workarounds is where i fucked up the last one), rounded and backed, faux bands. Either sewn endbands or leather ones depending how it comes together. Maybe leather jointed endpapers if i feel ambitious. Illustrations on the head and tail, now that I know a bit more about playing to my strengths. I'd like to do *something* special with the endpapers, but i think ill have to match leather/paper/fabric before I can properly weigh all my options. Box, probably.

Enforced idleness on family trips plays real bad with my brain! I knew this, and did not do enough to mitigate it. Also probably doesn't help that two work projects are applying heavy pressure when i thought i had breathing room, and my new mortgage and moving logistics are Looming. And I was already antsy before the trip blew things up, haha. But I think this is a good step towards self-care. I'm two weeks behind on my start, but I'm going to let this percolate and see what I can do to swing for the fences.

[kulapti]

Sept 2023, bookbinding of The Wine-Dark Sea by @moorishflower.

Marbled paper by @aetherseer. Design notes under the cut. Fic link in reblogs.

Design notes: The codex design was largely driven by the red and black marbled paper handmade by Æthereal Press and the work's theme of embracing darkness, both the literal darkness of the ocean and space and figurative darkness of what is feared and unknown. Aether generously gave me scraps of the paper I used here for both the cover and endpapers, which reminded me immediately and compellingly of blood in black water, so of course I made an edgy tiny book with it. Some of my friends also gave the opinion the cover looks like stylized wounds, which is again quite appropriate for the fic.

Fun new stuff I tried on this one:

stitched a strip of scrap cloth for faux endbands (looks good)

stenciled title (good try, bad choice of paint)

layered bookcloth design (excellent, much easier than expected)

Octopus illustrations are Octopus macropus (title page) and Octopus vulgaris (epilogue) by Comingio Merculiano in the 1896 monograph Cefalopodi viventi nel Golfo di Napoli (sistematica) by Jatta Guiseppe, accessed via Wikimedia Commons.

Materials: Covers use rayon Italian bookcloth, archival bookboard, marbled paper, cardboard scrap, handmade paper, pH-neutral PVA, machine cut-stencil and acrylic paint. Laser printed text on archival paper; bound with 25/3 linen thread, 100% beeswax, cotton scrap, and cotton cheesecloth mull.

[anteroom-of-death]

After the Party

Synopsis: Malcolm and his wife are attending some book event. For now.

A/n: I am a writer. Occasionally. I'm sorry for being shite with the uploads. Love you all. Warnings for mild cum eating and Ollie's general existence. Hahaha.

You fanned yourself discreetly. The heaters were at full-blast inside the cramped room. You could feel the lining of the skirt you wore starting to cling to you. It was starting to squall outside. You had half a mind to go outside and stand in it.

It would be a relief.

Your husband was off, still clutching a handful of files necessary for his job. Dazzling and scaring the masses of government people from multiple parties. And the press. Followed by his dark shadow, Jamie. Whom you quite liked, but at the moment was the bane of your existence since he tried to coup the faith of your husband out of fear of change.

You didn’t understand why you had to come to this party. It was some nutter’s book launch.

A few spouses had also come but they were put off by you for the crime of loving the scariest man in the room. His reputation preceded him too much. Also, your “noticeable” age difference made people fear the worst sometimes.

You would have thought other scandals would have turned their heads by now!

The Reeder boy approached you. He was possibly hell-bent on ruining every time you saw him.

You clutched your glass of Coke tighter.

“Did your father let you out of the house finally?” Reeder mocked, pointing to Malcolm. The irony was he was younger than you.

You blamed jealousy. He obviously got off on whatever Judas or Brutus fantasies he clearly had coming to fruition slowly. He probably loved masturbating to the image of him getting fucked by your husband on top of a print-out of party manifesto or whatever.

You inhaled and breathed out slowly, “Papa let’s me out twice a year for good behavior!” You mocked his slick, posh accent, as you discreetly tried fixing the strap of your bra under the turtleneck you wore.

Malcolm eventually saw you blanching and scowling as Reeder tried to target you more.

“Ah, noticed your glass was getting’ low, pet. Take mine…” He addressed you and swapped glasses with you. Quickly his tone changed, “You! Fuck nut, get your girl a fresh drink. Be useful! For fuck’s sake!” He said as he shoved the boy away from you. Hopefully towards the Tory girl he was apparently trying to honeypot and failing to do so…

You sipped the orange juice quietly and squeaked out a thank you.

“He likes you.” Malcolm hypothesized as he whipped out his phone and checked it. He sent a quick text and shoved it. You noticed Jamie pat his pocket and check it. He looked over at the pair of you.

He slung an arm around you and kissed your forehead.

“I need to use the restroom.” You confessed. “Can you walk me? I don’t want to deal with anyone looking at me like they did last time I got lost.” You stone-faced ground your jaw.

It was fairly easy to get lost in this place.

“Sure.” He shook his head, walking over to Jamie and whispering something in his ear before rejoining you and opening the door for you.

The hallway was empty. Thank goodness.

You exhaled as if you had been holding your breath for the entire time you’d been at the party.

He looked good. Too good. It was always such a sin for him to look like this on this lighting and in the stupid suits his job demanded him to wear.

You left him in the hall and went to the restroom. When you left the stall, he was in there with you.

“This is the ladies…” You rolled your eyes.

“Did you have to wear that?” He gestured to your simple turtleneck and faux leather skirt get-up. Not particularly sexy, the skirt was even floor length!

“I’ve been hard since you fucking got here.” He approached you, as if to illustrate the point. He fingers the fabric of your belt holding the outfit together. “I want to fuck you here.” He pressed you against the sink’s countertop.

He was right, he was hard. It was pressing against both of your abdomens.

His hand found it’s way to the hollow of your throat as he pressed you into a position where you had no choice but to sit on the edge of the counter now. He kissed your cheek and traced his tongue down the line of your jaw.

“What if someone catches us?” You reasoned, despite every fiber of your body wailing to let him take you then and there.

“Oh, let them. They’ll never speak again!” He laughed. His work persona leaking out. The soft sweet house-husband you knew was dead in these lands. Malcolm was dead, long live Tucker.

This is who he was outside the bubble of your home and what little personal lives you both had. Just a small facet of who he was.

You were quickly falling under his spell and were seeing how quickly you could at least slide your tights down and at least slide your panties to the side for this when you had the realization that you might, personally, be embarrassed if someone, especially one of those judgmental bitches that also married into this life walked in.

You pushed him off as he was just getting his cock out.

“Save it ‘til we get home? Please.” You batted your lashes. “I don’t want caught.” You reasoned.

He pulled back and sighed, “Fine. You’re in for it when we get home!” He smeared his face with his hands as if to manually compose himself into something recognizable. He somehow had gotten his belt undone in the brief time that this attack on your face had taken place.

You twisted your tongue and rolled your eyes as you fixed it.

Somehow you felt like this was just the beginning of a very long night. Longer than it already was.

Your social battery was already dead and gone, so this provided you an opportunity to go home anyways.

You washed your hands and exited, him following you like a bat out of hell. Back into that room…

He went back to talking. Seemed like he was making a graceful and acceptable exit from it.

He joined you as he gave you your coat.

The Reeder boy approached, “Awe, is it past curfew?” He shot you a look that seemed both in mocking and envy.

You balled up your fist and went to strike the annoying boy. A strong, familiar hand caught your wrist as you could see Reeder begin to flinch. You could feel your face twist from scowling and rage-filled to annoyed and put out.

“No, not now.” Malcolm ordered you.

“I’ll fucking deal with you on fucking Monday, walking syphilis.” He shoved Ollie into the corner a tad. “Don’t ever hit my wife again.” He spun the event around.

Oliver Reeder, hitting Malcolm Tucker’s wife would keep this gossip mills busy for a while.

You knew that much about your husband’s job. It was simple enough.

As you made your way through the halls and towards the exit, Jamie appeared, as if his leash was yanked by Malcolm’s invisible hand.

“Tell people that Ollie tried to strike (y/n).” Malcolm barked order at him. “He may have also hit on her and groped her. Your choice.”

"Aye, that's me, boss. Nae fuckin' worries. I'll make sure they all know what a sick wee fucker he is... Ta!” He slugged his beer, grasped so oddly in one hand and started whipping put his phone and texting.

You ripped off and chewed your right index fingernail.

The cold air felt wonderful on your sweating form. Too bad that it was shortly interrupted by the called car and driver pulling up. You could have stood there with the flakes hitting your face from that moment until the end of eternity…

Soon enough, you were home.

The minute the key unlocked the deadbolt, he pounced on the back of your neck, rough kisses with the faintest hint of stubble grazing down the back of exposed neck as teeth made purchase with the hollow of nape of your neck.

“You’re such a fucking tease.” He purred as he shoved you through your front door and shoved you into the entrance and parting your legs with his. “Making me wait while my balls are aching. Took me all not to pin you the fuck down and fuck you in the middle of that room.”

He groped your breast roughly through both turtleneck and bra.

So this is what everyone else got? This sharp, crude and dangerous man? You’d never been given of an inch of roughness by the man. He’d be soft and gentle from the first moment your eyes had met.

You flushed deeply and felt your clit throb and a familiar ache wracked through your core. You moaned and felt your body relax against the wall as he unbuckled his pants and bunched up your skirt, tearing aside your tights and underwear as he slid you down the wall. He steadied the two of you with one of his hands on both of yours. He shoved your butt up with his free hand and slid his cock in your increasingly-wet cunt.

“Christ, you feel so fuckin’ great. You’re so tight. Aren’t you? My tight little missus.” He went on as he gripped your hip with one hand and started pounding you frantically.

The words did something to you.

You felt your spine sink as you went rigid elsewhere.

“No, this won’t do.” You heard him mutter after what felt like several minutes. He went over to the sofa, dragging you along by your wrist, held only in his fingers. He clumsily sat as he slung you over his lap.

“Sit on my lap. Be a good girl.” He pulled your hips over and you onto his cock.

He began to bounce you as he pet your hair, his jaw locked as he pushed himself further into you with every bounce. You felt yourself start to grind down with every thrust.

“Such a fucking slut for me. Show me how you want my cock, angel.” His praise had you swooning over backwards as you felt your head roll back and moan.

He kept bucking his hips forward and up as you moaned more. You felt a guiding hand keep you on his cock and your walls get tighter.

“Oh, fuck.” He groaned as he shot his load into your aching, well-towards-an-orgasm pussy.

You complained, “No! Don’t pull out!” As he slipped himself out of you and let out a huffy little puff of air.

“Of course. You’re such a good girl for me.” His eyes had a strange glint in them. Debauched. That was the only way you could describe it. He was definitely debauched.

He pulled you down to the ground and tilted a pillow from the couch down and propped your hips up on it.

One of those deft, long fingers reached and stroked your lips and went down, wiping up the leaking cum from your hole, digging in slightly.

He brought the finger to your lips and parted them, cleaning it off with the wetness of your mouth.

He went down and dug out a tad more and repeated the process…

“Now, look at what you’ve done, pet.” He cooed. “Look what a mess you’ve made!” Tucker fading and Malcolm taking his place.

He kissed your lips with a feathery smile.

You would have passed out right then and there…

He slid his way to between your legs, where your cunt was fully on display. You couldn’t see but you could feel him breathing down your thighs as he licked and sucked on your raw, throbbing clit.

He steadied himself by pressing and pulling your thighs apart more.

You felt his teeth bite you roughly. Right at the top of your inner thigh, right where you were most sensitive and your flesh had rolled down into and you bucked your hips further. His face shoved directly into you. The slight stubble striking across the new marks as you felt his nose swipe into your hollows.

You groaned as you felt him commit to going down on you. Seemed like he was intent on cleaning up your mess. You failed upwards as you tried to find his hair to play with as he continued to suck and bite and nibble you to a pathetic moan.

“Please, please.” You felt yourself babble out.

You felt girlish and stupefied.

He stroked your folds and tutted. You groaned a tad more, slipping further from reality.

“If you insist, little one.” You could feel his smile from your vantage-less point.

He continued on until you came.

“Don’t wear that outfit again. I cannae focus. I may have leaked more than pre-cum.” He joked.

You nodded from your dumbfounded spot on the floor he had you in.

You still felt a little full of what remained of his load and like you has fully lost the plot here…

He joined you on the floor, yanking more pillows down and propping up both of your heads. He curled you into his chest and kissed your forehead. Both of you still partially still dressed in your clothes of your roles outside of this safe bubble you had; in that moment you couldn’t feel further from Mrs. Tucker. Just his (y/n).

His phone started buzzing off the hook. You swore you saw him switch it off, for the first time ever.

He pulled the blanket off the back of the sofa.

The snow squall outside raged on.

And you felt very safe and warm.

[winterlleaves]

my piece for ssoblr big bang 2024! i'm very happy to share with everyone ! I worked with @northberg with their accompanying fic, strange trails, which is on ao3! please read it it's wondrous and amazing i really cannot sing enough praises for it ! i tried my best to reflect its energy as much as possible in this cover <3

alt text under cut

[ID: digital art: a faux book jacket cover of star stable online characters

on the left/the cover: tincan is standing 3/4 away from the viewer. fireflies surround him, illuminating the hollow woods behind him. some of the grass is visible and large roots are illuminated on the ground. this scene is in the shape of a moth.

above the moth shape is a spiky tree, framing the top part of the cover in red/orange. underneath the tree, the background fades from a indigo blue scene of a lake to alex, who is a teal blue and seems to be recoiling. white lightning flashes over her.

the center/spine: the title text "STRANGE TRAILS" with the font noto sans myanmar. the text is a lime green, with a streak of teal running through it, before shifting to a light purple. the background is a dark purple before transitioning to a red. black branches emerge out of the sides, obscuring some of the text/background color. at the bottom are small thin branches, growing vertically, with the author's name northberg being overlayed on top.

the right/back-cover: on the top-left is fripp and elizabeth, who is more of glowing silhouette. the background is pink and they are diagonally separated from the other characters on the right. on the top right is linda, lisa, and maya; linda and lisa are pink and look distressed, with linda casting a spell with a book in her hand, while maya is in natural colors and looks relaxed. ydris in pink is beside them; he is framed in a circle, looks mischievous, and has his hand tucked under his chin. beneath them is anne in a grey beach scene. anne has a solemn expression with her left hand over her chest. thin branches grow out to her left before transitioning to the text to the summary at the bottom of the image. the text is in lime green and the background is indigo and purple. the summary text: "There's something wrong with the island. Alex could help, if only it stopped trying to kill her." below is the credits: "written by northberg on tumblr and archiveofourown illustrated by winterlleaves on tumblr part of ssoblr big bang" /end ID]

[thefreakandthehair]

@eddiemonth prompt, oct 16th: Library | Eyes on Fire - Blue Foundation | Curious a/n: little Eddie & Wayne, ADHD!Eddie, pre-canon Eddie & Jonathan friendship. un-betaed because I'm challenging myself to write these in under an hour. read on ao3 | ao3 masterpost here

All his life, all seven years of it so far, Eddie has been told to be quiet, to sit still, and to not touch things. He can’t help it most of the time– there are so many things to explore, and learn, and find, so many different textures to feel. Eddie learns best when he’s able to physically hold something in hands to help him focus and it’s gotten him into trouble on more than one occasion. 

But living with Wayne, at least for the summer, he’s been given more opportunities than ever before to lean into his curious nature without being scolded. They’ve gone to museums, petting zoos, science centers, even the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Each new experience is a novelty and Eddie’s loved every single one of them. Today though, Eddie’s nervous. 

“You almost ready, kid?” Wayne pokes his head into Eddie’s bedroom, warm smile and a cocked eyebrow. Eddie’s been taking his time, untying and retying his shoelaces over and over to stall. 

“Uh, yeah! Yeah, I’m ready.” Eddie offers a tight smile, one that feels faux even to him. 

“Do you not wanna go? We can try something else if the library isn’t your thing.” 

Eddie shakes his head. “No, I wanna go! It’s just…”

Wayne enters the room fully, sitting down on the bed next to Eddie who fidgets with his fingers and looks down at the floor, his feet swaying back and forth over the edge of the bed.

“Just what?” He doesn’t touch him, but Wayne’s presence alone is comforting enough. 

“What if I get in trouble? Aren’t you supposed to be super quiet and stuff in libraries?” 

Eddie knows Wayne well enough by now to know that he’d never get in trouble that way that he has with his dad, but he doesn’t want to disappoint or embarrass Wayne, either. 

“Well, yeah, on the grown up floor for the cranky old guys like me,” Wayne bumps his shoulder against Eddie’s, and Eddie can’t help but smile– real this time. “But there’s a whole children’s room that has games, lots of books, fun stuff. And if it feels like too much, you just give me our little signal and we’re outta there.” 

When Eddie first started going places with Wayne, they’d developed their secret signal that probably wasn't too secret but worked just the same– Eddie would stand next to Wayne and step on his foot. Not hard, not enough to hurt, but enough that Wayne would notice, look down, and see Eddie’s overwhelm. And like promised, they’re outta there. No questions asked. 

“Okay, I think I’m ready then.” Eddie stands up and heads toward the front of the trailer. “Let’s go.” 

They’re at the library for all of a few minutes, Eddie hesitant to leave Wayne’s side as they scour the fantasy books, when he meets another kid around his age, maybe a little younger. Both boys go to reach for the same illustrated copy of a book about dragons. 

“Oh, sorry, you can take it,” Eddie offers, moving his hand instinctually. 

“No, no it’s okay, you were looking at it first. Go ahead.” The other boy responds, shrugging and looking back at the shelf. 

There’s a woman behind him, smiling down fondly as she speaks. “Sweetie, why don’t you share with your new friend?” 

“Yeah, if you wanna share, we could. Only if you want to though.” Eddie bounces on his heels, hopeful. He doesn’t get to make a lot of friends when he’s home with his parents. 

“Okay, yeah,” the little boy smiles carefully and pulls the book from the shelf. 

Eddie follows him to a small table at the end of the aisle and they pour over the pages, full of colorful illustrations and short stories. Eddie loses track of time, but he and his new friend, who he learns is named Jonathan, are just kids who don’t need to watch the clock. 

They finish the book and return for another, and then another. Eddie's disappointed when the day ends and they have to leave, but he sees Wayne trade contact information with Jonathan's mom, Joyce.

"We'll see you again next week, Eddie. It was so nice to meet you." Joyce smiles, sweet and comforting, and Eddie isn't so afraid of the library anymore.

[antidotefortheawkward-art]

And now that the Trans Sun Wukong agenda has made the rounds, here's the lineart from my mock JTTW storybook page with and without all the faux scanned old book effects on it! Very happy with how the lineart turned out and I'm very happy with the editing since I think the lineart looks much more recognizably my art without all of it.

[ID: An illustration done in the general style of twentieth century Chinese storybooks. The panel depicts Sun Wukong holding his staff and pointing angrily at Zhu Bajie, who is shielding a disguised White Bone Spirit with his arm. Behind Sun Wukong is a stone with the character 坤 inscribed on it. The caption below the panel reads "八戒像自己被委屈了道: “师兄，你可不懂呀。这个脆弱的小姑娘有怎么可能伤害我们的师父?" 悟空就气得回答："俺老孙不也是坤生的吗！有什么可不懂？你这样说这女妖就是看不起她罢了!" End ID]

[adarkrainbow]

Queering kinship in "The Maiden who Seeks her Brothers" (A)

As I promised before, I will share with you some of the articles contained in the queer-reading study-book "Queering the Grimms". Due to the length of the articles and Tumblr's limitations, I will have to fragment them. Let's begin with an article from the Faux Feminities segment, called Queering Kinship in "The Maiden who Seeks her Brothers", written by Jeana Jorgensen. (Illustrations provided by me)

The fairy tales in the Kinder- und Hausmärchen, or Children’s and Household Tales, compiled by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm are among the world’s most popular, yet they have also provoked discussion and debate regarding their authenticity, violent imagery, and restrictive gender roles. In this chapter I interpret the three versions published by the Grimm brothers of ATU 451, “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers,” focusing on constructions of family, femininity, and identity. I utilize the folkloristic methodology of allomotific analysis, integrating feminist and queer theories of kinship and gender roles. I follow Pauline Greenhill by taking a queer view of fairy tale texts from the Grimms’ collection, for her use of queer implies both “its older meaning as a type of destabilizing redirection, and its more recent sense as a reference to sexualities beyond the heterosexual.” This is appropriate for her reading of “Fitcher’s Bird” (ATU 311, “Rescue by the Sister”) as a story that “subverts patriarchy, heterosexuality, femininity, and masculinity alike” (2008, 147). I will similarly demonstrate that “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers” only superficially conforms to the Grimms’ patriarchal, nationalizing agenda, for the tale rather subversively critiques the nuclear family and heterosexual marriage by revealing ambiguity and ambivalence. The tale also queers biology, illuminating transbiological connections between species and a critique of reproductive futurism. Thus, through the use of fantasy, this tale and fairy tales in general can question the status quo, addressing concepts such as self, other, and home.

The first volume of the first edition of the Grimm brothers’ collection ap[1]peared in 1812, to be followed by six revisions during the brothers’ lifetimes (leading to a total of seven editions of the so-called large edition of their collection, while the so-called small edition was published in ten editions). The Grimm brothers published three versions of “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers” in the 1812 edition of their collection, but the tales in that volume underwent some changes over time, as did most of the tales. This was partially in an effort to increase sales, and Wilhelm’s editorial changes in particular “tended to make the tales more proper and prudent for bourgeois audiences” (Zipes 2002b, xxxi). “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers” is one of the few tale types that the Grimms published multiply, each time giving titular focus to the brothers, as the versions are titled “The Twelve Brothers” (KHM 9), “The Seven Ravens” (KHM 25), and “The Six Swans” (KHM 49). However, both Stith Thompson and Hans-Jörg Uther, in their respective 1961 and 2004 revisions of the international tale type index, call the tale type “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers.” Indeed, Thompson discusses this tale in The Folktale under the category of faithfulness, par[1]ticularly faithful sisters, noting, “In spite of the minor variations . . . the tale-type is well-defined in all its major incidents” (1946, 110). Thompson also describes how the tale is found “in folktale collections from all parts of Europe” and forms the basis of three of the tales in the Grimm brothers’ collection (111).

In his Interpretation of Fairy Tales, Bengt Holbek classifies ATU 451 as a “feminine” tale, since its two main characters who wed at the end of the tale are a low-born young female and a high-born young male (the sister, though originally of noble birth in many versions, is cast out and essentially impoverished by the tale’s circumstances). Holbek notes that the role of a low-born young male in feminine tales is often filled by brothers: “The relationship between sister and brothers is characterized by love and help[1]fulness, even if fear and rivalry may also be an aspect in some tales (in AT 451, the girl is afraid of the twelve ravens; she sews shirts to disenchant them, however, and they save her from being burnt at the stake at the last moment)” (1987, 417). While Holbek conflates tale versions in this description, he is essentially correct about ATU 451; the siblings are devoted to one another, despite fearsome consequences.

The discrepancy between those titles that focus on the brothers and those that focus on the sister deserves further attention. Perhaps the Grimm brothers (and their informants?) were drawn to the more spectacular imagery of enchanted brothers. In Hans Christian Andersen’s well-known version of ATU 451, “The Wild Swans,” he too focuses on the brothers in the title. However, some scholars, including Thompson and myself, are more intrigued by the sister’s actions in the tale. Bethany Joy Bear, for instance, in her analysis of traditional and modern versions of ATU 451, concentrates on the agency of the silent sister-saviors, noting that the three versions in the Grimms’ collection “illustrate various ways of empowering the hero[1]ine. In ‘The Seven Ravens’ she saves her brothers through an active and courageous quest, while in ‘The Twelve Brothers’ and ‘The Six Swans’ her success requires redemptive silence” (2009, 45).

The three tales differ by more than just how the sister saves her brothers, though. In “The Twelve Brothers,” a king and queen with twelve boys are about to have another child; the king swears to kill the boys if the newborn is a girl so that she can inherit the kingdom. The queen warns the boys and they run away, and the girl later seeks them. She inadvertently picks flowers that turn her brothers into ravens, and in order to disenchant them she must remain silent; she may not speak or laugh for seven years. During this time, she marries a king, but his mother slanders her, and when the seven years have elapsed, she is about to be burned at the stake. At that moment, her brothers are disenchanted and returned to human form. They redeem their sister, who lives happily with her husband and her brothers.

In “The Seven Ravens,” a father exclaims that his seven negligent sons should turn into ravens for failing to bring water to baptize their newborn sister. It is unclear whether the sister remains unbaptized, thus contributing to her more liminal status. When the sister grows up, she seeks her brothers, shunning the sun and moon but gaining help from the stars, who give her a bone to unlock the glass mountain where her brothers reside. Because she loses the bone, the girl cuts off her small finger, using it to gain access to the mountain. She disenchants her brothers by simply appearing, and they all return home to live together.

In “The Six Swans,” a king is coerced into marrying a witch’s daughter, who finds where the king has stashed his children to keep them safe. The sorceress enchants the boys, turning them into swans, and the girl seeks them. She must not speak or laugh for six years and she must sew shirts from asters for them. She marries a king, but the king’s mother steals each of the three children born to the couple, smearing the wife’s mouth with blood to implicate her as a cannibal. She finishes sewing the shirts just as she’s about to be burned at the stake; then her brothers are disenchanted and come to live with the royal couple and their returned children. However, the sleeve of one shirt remained unfinished, so the littlest brother is stuck with a wing instead of an arm.

The main episodes of the tale type follow Russian folklorist Vladimir Propp’s structural sequence for fairy-tale plots: the tale begins with a villainy, the banishing and enchantment of the brothers, sometimes resulting from an interdiction that has been violated. The sister must perform a task in addition to going on a quest, and the tale ends with the formation of a new family through marriage. As Alan Dundes observes, “If Propp’s formula is valid, then the major task in fairy tales is to replace one’s original family through marriage” (1993, 124; see also Lüthi 1982). This observation holds true for heteronormative structures (such as the nuclear family), which exist in order to replicate themselves. In many fairy tales, the original nuclear family is discarded due to circumstance or choice. However, the sister in “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers” has not abandoned or been removed from her old family, unlike Cinderella, who ditches her nasty stepmother and stepsisters, or Rapunzel, who is taken from her birth parents, and so on. Although, admittedly, “The Seven Ravens” does not end in marriage, I do not plan to disqualify it from analysis simply because it doesn’t fit the dominant model, as Bengt Holbek does when comparing Danish versions of “King Wivern” (ATU 433B, “King Lindorm”).1 The fact that one of the tales does not end in marriage actually supports my interpretation of the tales as transgressive, a point to which I will return later.

Dundes’s (2007) notion of allomotif helps make sense of the kinship dynamics in “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers.” In order to decipher the symbolic code of folktales, Dundes proposes that any motif that could fill the same slot in a particular tale’s plot should be designated an allomotif. Further, if motif A and motif B fulfill the same purpose in moving along the tale’s plot, then they are considered mutually substitutable, thus equivalent symbolically. What this assertion means for my analysis is that all the methods by which the brothers are enchanted and subsequently disenchanted can be treated as meaningful in relation to one another. One of the advantages of comparing allomotifs rather than motifs is that we can be assured that we are analyzing not random details but significant plot components. So in “The Six Swans” and “The Seven Ravens,” we see the parental curse causing both the banishment and the enchantment of the brothers, whereas in “The Twelve Brothers,” the brothers are banished and enchanted in separate moves. Even though the brothers’ exile and enchantment happen in a different sequence in the different texts, we must view their causes as functionally parallel. Thus the ire of a father concerned for his newborn daughter, the jealous rage of a stepmother, the homicidal desire of a father to give his daughter everything, and the innocent flower gathering of a sister can all be seen as threatening to the brothers. All of these actions lead to the dispersal and enchantment of the brothers, though not all are malicious, for the sister in “The Twelve Brothers” accidentally turns her brothers into ravens by picking flowers that consequently enchant them.

I interpret this equivalence as a metaphorical statement—threats to a family’s cohesion come in all forms, from well-intentioned actions to openly malevolent curses. The father’s misdirected love for his sole daughter in two versions (“The Twelve Brothers” and “The Seven Ravens”) translates to danger to his sons. This danger is allomotifically paralleled by how the sister, without even knowing it, causes her brothers to become enchanted, either by picking flowers in “The Twelve Brothers” or through the mere incident of her birth in “The Twelve Brothers” and “The Seven Ravens.” The fact that a father would prioritize his sole daughter over numerous sons is strange and reminiscent of tales in which a father explicitly expresses romantic de[1]sire for his daughter, as in “Allerleirauh” (ATU 510B), discussed in chapter 4 by Margaret Yocom. Even in “The Six Swans,” where a stepmother with magical powers enchants the sons, the father is implicated; he did not love his children well enough to protect them from his new spouse, and once the boys had been changed into swans and fled, the father tries to take his daughter with him back to his castle (where the stepmother would likely be waiting to dispose of the daughter as well), not knowing that by asserting control over her, he would be endangering her. The father’s implied ownership of the daughter in “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers” and the linking of inheritance with danger emphasize the conflicts that threaten the nuclear family. Both material and emotional resources are in limited supply in these tales, with disastrous consequences for the nuclear family, which fragments, as it does in all fairy tales (see Propp 1968).

Holbek reaches a similar conclusion in his allomotific analysis of ATU 451, though he focuses on Danish versions collected by Evald Tang Kristensen in the late nineteenth century. Holbek notes that the heroine is the actual “cause of her brothers’ expulsion in all cases, either—innocently—through being born or—inadvertently—through some act of hers” (1987, 550). The true indication of the heroine’s role in condemning her brothers is her role in saving them, despite the fact that other characters may superficially be blamed: “The heroine’s guilt is nevertheless to be deduced from the fact that only an act of hers can save her brothers.” However, Holbek reads the tale as revolving around the theme of sibling rivalry, which is more relevant to the cultural context in which Danish versions of ATU 451 were set, since the initial family situation in the tale was not always said to be royal or noble, and Holbek views the tales as reflecting the actual concerns and conditions of their peasant tellers (550; see also 406–9).2 Holbek also discusses the lack of resources that might lead to sibling rivalry, identifying physical scarcity and emotional love as two factors that could inspire tension between siblings.

The initial situation in the Grimms’ versions of “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers” is also a comment on the arbitrary power that parents have over their children, the ability to withhold love or resources or both. The helplessness of children before the strong feelings of their parents is cor[1]roborated in another Grimms’ tale, “The Lazy One and the Industrious One” (Zipes 2002b, 638).3 In this tale, which Jack Zipes translated among the “omitted tales” that did not make it into any of the published editions of the KHM, a father curses his sons for insulting him, causing them to turn into ravens until a beautiful maiden kisses them. Essentially, the fam[1]ily is a site of danger, yet it is a structure that will be replicated in the tale’s conclusion . . . almost.

But first, the sister seeks her brothers and disenchants them. The symbolic equation links, in each of the three tales, the sister’s silence (neither speaking nor laughing) for six years while sewing six shirts from asters, her seven years of silence (neither speaking nor laughing), and her cutting off her finger and using it to gain entry to the glass palace where she disenchants her brothers merely by being present. The theme unifying these allomotifs is sacrifice. The sister’s loss of her finger, equivalent to the loss of her voice, is a symbolic disempowerment. One loss is a physical mutilation, which might not impair the heroine terribly much; the choice not to use her voice is arguably more drastic, since her inability to speak for herself nearly causes her death in the tales.4 Both losses could be seen as equivalent to castration.5 However, losing her ability to speak and her ability to manipulate the world around her while at the same time displaying domestic competence in sewing equates powerlessness with feminine pursuits. Bear notes that versions by both the Grimms and Hans Christian Andersen envision “a distinctly feminine savior whose work is symbolized by her spindle, an ancient emblem of women’s work” (2009, 46). Ruth Bottigheimer (1986) points out in her essay “Silenced Women in Grimms’ Tales” that the heroines in “The Twelve Brothers” and “The Six Swans” are forced to accept conditions of muteness that disempower them, which is part of a larger silencing that occurs in the tales; women both are explicitly forbidden to speak, and they have fewer declarative and interrogative speech acts attributed to them within the whole body of the Grimms’ texts.

Ironically, in performing subservient femininity, the sister fails to perform adequately as wife or mother, since the children she bears in one version (“The Six Swans”) are stolen from her. When the sister is married to the king, she gives birth to three children in succession, but each time, the king’s mother takes away the infant and smears the queen’s mouth with blood while she sleeps (Zipes 2002b, 170). Finally, the heroine is sentenced to death by a court but is unable to protest her innocence since she must not speak in order to disenchant her brothers. In being a faithful sister, the heroine cannot be a good mother and is condemned to die for it. This aspect of the tale could represent a deeply coded feminist voice.6 A tale collected and published by men might contain an implicitly coded feminist message, since the critique of patriarchal institutions such as the family would have to be buried so deeply as to not even be recognizable as a message in order to avoid detection and censorship (Radner and Lanser 1993, 6–9). The sis[1]ter in “The Six Swans” cannot perform all of the feminine duties required of her, and because she ostensibly allows her children to die, she could be accused of infanticide. Similarly, in the contemporary legend “The Inept Mother,” collected and analyzed by Janet Langlois, an overwhelmed mother’s incompetence indirectly kills one or all of her children.7 Langlois reads this legend as a coded expression of women’s frustrations at being isolated at home with too many responsibilities, a coded demand for more support than is usually given to mothers in patriarchal institutions. Essentially, the story is “complex thinking about the thinkable—protecting the child who must leave you—and about the unthinkable—being a woman not defined in relation to motherhood” (Langlois 1993, 93). The heroine in “The Six Swans” also occupies an ambiguous position, navigating different expectations of femininity, forced to choose between giving care and nurturance to some and withholding it from others.

Here, I find it productive to draw a parallel to Antigone, the daughter of Oedipus. Antigone defies the orders of her uncle Creon in order to bury her brother Polyneices and faces a death sentence as a result. Antigone’s fidelity to her blood family costs her not only her life but also her future as a productive and reproductive member of society. As Judith Butler (2000) clarifies in Antigone’s Claim: Kinship between Life and Death, Antigone transgresses both gender and kinship norms in her actions and her speech acts. Her love for her brother borders on the incestuous and exposes the incest taboo at the heart of kinship structure. Antigone’s perverse death drive for the sake of her brother, Butler asserts, is all the more monstrous because it establishes aberration at the heart of the norm (in this case the incest taboo). I see a similar logic operating in “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers,” because according to allomotific equivalences, the heroine is condemned to die only in one version (“The Six Swans”) because she allegedly ate her children. In the other version that contains the marriage episode (“The Twelve Brothers”), the king’s mother slanders her, calling the maiden “godless,” and accuses her of wicked things until the king agrees to sentence her to death (Zipes 2002b, 35). As allomotific analysis reveals, in the three versions, the heroine is punished for being excessively devoted to her brothers, which is functionally the same as cannibalism and as being generally wicked (the accusation of the king’s mother in two of the versions).

In a sense, the heroine’s disproportionate devotion to her brothers kills her chance at marriage and kills her children, which from a queer stance is a comment on the performativity of sexuality and gender. According to Butler, gender performativity demonstrates “that what we take to be an internal essence of gender is manufactured through a sustained set of acts, posited through the gendered stylization of the body” ([1990] 1999, xv). This illusion, that gender and sexuality are a “being” rather than a “doing,” is constantly at risk of exposure. When sexuality is exposed as constructed rather than natural, thus threatening the whole social-sexual system of identity formation, the threat must be eliminated.

One aspect of this system particularly threatened in “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers” is reproductive futurism, one form of compulsory teleological heterosexuality, “the epitome of heteronormativity’s desire to reach self-fulfillment by endlessly recycling itself through the figure of the Child” (Giffney 2008, 56; see also Edelman 2004). Reproductive futurism mandates that politics and identities be placed in service of the future and future children, utilizing the rhetoric of an idealized childhood. In his book on reproductive futurism, Lee Edelman links queerness and the death drive, stating, “The death drive names what the queer, in the order of the social, is called forth to figure: the negativity opposed to every form of social viability” (2004, 9). According to this logic, to prioritize anything other than one’s reproductive future is to refuse social viability and heteronormativity—this is what the heroine in “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers” does. Her excessive emotional ties to her brothers disfigure her future, aligning her with the queer, the unlivable, and hence the ungrievable. Refusing the linear narrative of reproductive futurism registers as “unthinkable, irresponsible, inhumane” (4), words that could very well be used to describe a mother who is thought to be eating her babies and who cannot or will not speak to defend herself.

The heroine’s marriage to the king in two versions of the tale can also be examined from a queer perspective. Like the tale “Fitcher’s Bird,” which queers marriage by “showing male-female [marital] relationships as clearly fraught with danger and evil from their onset,” the Grimms’ two versions of ATU 451 that feature marriage call into question its sanctity and safety (Greenhill 2008, 150, emphasis in original). Marriage, though the ultimate goal of many fairy tales, does not provide the heroine with a supportive or nurturing environment. Bear comments that in versions of “The Maiden Who Seeks Her Brothers” wherein a king discovers and marries the heroine, “the king’s discovery brings the sister into a community that both facilitates and threatens her work. The sister’s discovery brings her into a home, foreshadowing the hoped-for happy ending, but it is a false home, determined by the king’s desire rather than by the sister’s creation of a stable and complete community” (2009, 50)

[aggiepython]

i made this illustration and then realised it was the the right aspect ratio to be a faux book cover. thanks to @st-just for the book rec, i really enjoyed it!!!

[literaticat]

I was just wondering if there are some BIZARRE facts about books or publishing that you've learned over career. Like.. things that made your mouth drop when you heard them?

I don't know if this qualifies as "bizarre" or not, but I definitely heard it and it was seared into my brain forever. (Two things, actually, but they are related!)

Margaret Wise Brown was obsessed with fur, to the point that she insisted that The Little Fur Family be bound in a real fur jacket. (There's a deluxe edition that is still bound in faux fur, and even the board book edition has a little faux fur tummy on the character!)

Anyway, the first edition WAS bound in real rabbit fur, and some still exist but they are quite expensive, because the majority of the books were stored in a warehouse, and moths got in and ate them.

Part two of the story: At around the same time as LFF, illustrator Clement Hurd and his wife brought their then two-year-old son Thacher Hurd (now a celebrated children's book author-illustrator in his own right) to Maine to visit Margaret. She created what she thought was an amazing little fur room for the child, and in fact it absolutely traumatized him. I heard him tell this story at an event one time and it was SO FUNNY but also my mouth definitely dropped!

She was a real character, and I highly recommend the superb picture book biography of her, THE IMPORTANT THING ABOUT MARGARET WISE BROWN by Mac Barnett, and the grownup biography AWAKENED BY THE MOON by Leonard S. Marcus.

(Bonus fun fact, not to do with MWB! The original WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE was called WHERE THE WILD HORSES ARE, but Maurice Sendak realized he was bad at drawing horses.)

[doodleswithangie]

VOL 2: The Sun Shines Even on the Cloudiest of Days by @faenix16

Aziraphale gets lost in memories of before the fall happened, Crowley does their best to cheer him up.

For this year’s GOMM Reverse Bang run by @go-minisode-minibang! I had the pleasure of working with two amazing writers, so presenting the second of two! FaeNix wrote a very sweet and cozy story (with a dash of angst) that's perfect with an afternoon tea. Read it here!

[Image Description: Mock book cover and page for a “Good Omens” fanfiction set in the 1920s. Alt text is provided and copied below the cut. End ID]

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Image One:

Book cover featuring female-presenting Aziraphale and Crowley in 1920s fashion. Aziraphale peers through a magnifying glass, wearing a yellow and white blazer and skirt set trimmed in plaid and matching brown hat, gloves, and bow tie. Behind him, Crowley wears a white embroidered frock and sunhat with a black velvet overskirt and faux fur-lined cape.

The cover text reads: “A.Z. FELL AND Co. The Sun Shines Even on the Cloudiest of Days. Written by Faenix16. Illustrated by Doodles With Angie.”

Image two:

Book page with illustration and text. Both male-presenting, Aziraphale reads a mysterious note while Crowley fondly looks on in the background.

The excerpt reads:

Going back to looking out the window, though now with a soft smile on his face, he finished his tea. As he picked up the pot to pour himself a new cup, he noticed a folded slip of paper hidden underneath. Giving Crowley an inquisitive look, he asked, “Do you know what this is? There isn’t usually paper under the teapots.”

They looked smug, and waved him to open it. “You’ll see what it is soon enough Angel.”

Huffing at them, he opened it, reading the line written on it under his breath. “Scarlet is the colour you’ll come to learn, in a Study of threads. What? This is a riddle of sorts. Did you do this?”

“It looked fun when I saw a group of young ladies doing a larger version earlier today. Thought you might like it.”

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