#firstly I’m not entirely happy with this but it is a first draft

[basket-of-loquats]

My take on post canon cross design!! Nobody ask me if I’m okay about the finale because I’m Not 👍 this is my coping mechanism

[ink-flavored]

Reworking the Plot

BTS Series: ⬅ Table of Contents - Heaven and Angels ➡ Also available on Neocities! P&J Taglist (Check out my Google form to get added): @elegant-paper-collection @auroblaze@zeenimf @vacantgodling @foxys-fantasy-tales Banner art by @auroblaze

In the process of turning this project from a fanfiction to an original novel, I knew the plot was going to need some work. Firstly, a short story I wrote in a day has nowhere near the amount of beef necessary to fill out an entire book, and second, it didn’t even have other characters in it besides the two leads. Clearly, things need to change.

Though I’ve been working on retooling the plot of Pride & Justice for a while, it’s definitely not anywhere close to done. I have the beginning, ending, and general plot beats I want to hit, I have character arcs, I have antagonists, but stringing them all together is the hard part. The middle is quite flabby—basically it’s just a random assortment of cool things I had ideas for, with very little connectivity. I’m nowhere near the completion of a first draft, much less an actual finished manuscript. All this to say: it’s very possible that the things I make note of in this post will change by the time the book is done. I think that’s even cooler for you all, though! You get to see a book happen from its embryo-like beginning stages all the way to a finished product. Usually only the authors get to suffer through that!

Without further ado: here is how I reworked the plot for Pride & Justice. This first chunk will be a play-by-play of how I’m changing the fanfiction parts.

The beginning starts out relatively the same as it did in the fanfiction—Pride is imprisoned in Heaven for attempting to break in through the front door. This time, instead of being dragged off to his execution in the very next scene, he’s dragged into a heavenly courtroom. Presiding over that courtroom is Honesty, and Justice is not only the guard outside his cell, but also a witness to his crime.

Pride is predictably smarmy while Justice recounts his testimony, and even when Honesty sentences him to death, can’t be bothered to do more than sarcastically ask why they didn’t bother to ask for his side of the story. She moves to dismiss that half-question, but Justice stands up and tells everyone he’s right. Without hearing the other half of the story, all they’re doing is killing Pride based on who he is—how is that virtuous? Honesty is not happy about this, but gives Pride the chance to speak anyway.

Pride reveals that he broke into Heaven because he made a deal with a soul in Purgatory who had been waiting over a hundred years to be rejudged by God, and would soon lose that chance altogether. As every multidimensional being in that room knows, souls that fade from Purgatory go straight to Hell (everyone who read Pride’s backstory on Tumblr? Yeah, he was lying). And, as the fine-print of the contract states, their souls are forever entwined until he can get them up to Heaven. So if they smite him here, they’d be killing an innocent soul too. Everyone looks to Honesty to dismiss that claim as false—but she can’t.

All of the angels in the courtroom are distraught, but Honesty concludes that Pride needs to die anyway. Justice, once again, stands up and offers a solution. If they let Pride escort the contracted soul to wherever in Heaven it’s supposed to be, end the contract, and let him leave, literally everyone benefits. Heaven saves another soul from damnation or obliteration, Pride gets his contract fulfilled, nobody dies.

Honesty shoots him down, and nobody disagrees. That soul can’t be returned to Heaven, God hasn’t judged them to be worthy of leaving Purgatory. Justice argues that letting one person in against the rules is better than killing them—on purpose, knowingly. How is murdering one of His children supposed to be in service of God? At this point, the entire courtroom is in shambles, arguing over each other, and everyone is basically split down the middle of how to handle things. Pride is watching all of this very pleased with himself and also curious about the angel that bothered to give him the benefit of the doubt.

To save them from complete disarray, Honesty adjourns the trial and declares they’ll have a second one to make the final decision. Everyone leaves, but Honesty makes sure to call Justice out. As he’s escorted out, Pride listens to her reprimand him for going against God’s word, telling him that it doesn’t matter what his personal perspective is—justice is blind, do as the Lord commands. Justice is clearly not happy about this, and Pride gets even more curious.

Back in his cell, Pride is guarded by a few other angels before Justice shows back up again. He tries to strike up a conversation about how the trial went and how “excited” he is for the next one, but Justice bluntly tells him the second trial is a lie. They’re going to smite him before he even gets in the door. He also mentions they’re doing it so quickly because Honesty is worried “someone” would help him escape. That someone is, obviously, Justice himself, and he does.

Pride and Justice hatch an escape plan to get Pride to where he needs to be, drop off his contracted soul, and leave before he can get skewered by a holy sword. In practice, things don’t go quite as planned. Caught in the middle of his escape, Pride begins gleefully mutilating his way through God’s army. In the meantime, Justice is pretending to try and catch him, none too pleased that his request that Pride not harm anyone went ignored. They have a fake-battle-to-the-death where Justice “chases” Pride off the very edge of Heaven itself, and they go plummeting to the Earth.

Once there, Justice insists that Pride, for all intents and purposes, is dead. He can’t come back to Heaven, or they’re both in trouble. Justice leaves before his angel friends can wonder where he is, and Pride stays alone on Earth. He knows he can’t go back to Hell, contract unfulfilled, not to mention the shame of needing an angel’s help to escape would make him a target for much worse than a death sentence. He stays on Earth, tempting humans to sin in his spare time—which is all of it—until he can figure out how to complete his contract. Because if he doesn’t complete it, he dies anyway.

Eventually, Justice visits him on Earth again, demanding to know what he thinks he’s doing on Earth instead of back in Hell. Pride gives plenty of sarcastic non-answers, while Justice demands he leave. This whole area radiates sin and demonic energy, and if any other angel figures out Pride is still alive, they’re both screwed. Pride continues to be an asshole. The meeting ends with Justice saying he gets one last chance.

The last chance comes around, because lo and behold, Pride hasn’t left Earth. During another argument, Pride lets slip that he has nowhere else to go. Justice, sympathetic and knowing that there’s no way he can keep his secret forever, offers to join him so they can mask their respective demonic and angelic energies. Pride takes him up on that, and they agree to hide on Earth until they can figure out a way to get Pride’s contract fulfilled without setting off every known alarm in Heaven and Hell alike.

This is where my rework of the fanfiction plot ended, and where I had to start coming up with new ideas to fill the rest of the story. I have plenty of broad-strokes ideas in the works right now, still tripping over some details that I’ll list a few of later. Here are the important plot-points though.

Heaven is looking for their not-so-dead prisoner and runaway angel, a mission lead by Honesty herself. She’s determined to wrestle Justice back to Heaven and kill Pride for real this time, but first she has to find them. With the two of them living in such close proximity, their normally easy-to-differentiate energies are nearly identical to humans. The only hints they get are when Pride and/or Justice use their respective powers, a tiny blip of abnormal activity on the angelic radar.

The same goes for the servants of Hell, though for a less concrete goal. Other demons try to appeal to Pride throughout the story, telling him to ditch Justice and team up with them instead. Lust, as we discussed in the last post, is the one that shows up the most, and it refuses to take no for an answer.

EDITOR’S NOTE: As I mentioned before, this has changed a little bit. I’m toying with the idea of Lust enlisting other demons to find Pride for it, and harass him into coming back to Hell. It would make more sense than a bunch of demons randomly wanting Pride as an ally because—reasons?

When they aren’t being harassed by agents of cosmic divinity, both Pride and Justice acclimate to their new “human” lives. Justice finds a human church to attend to reconcile with his recent struggles understanding Heaven’s shortcomings, attends a book club, volunteers, and generally tries to blend in as much as he can. Pride, on the other hand, can’t help himself from causing trouble, not having much else to do, and not interested in making any puny human friends. That is, until, he meets some human friends who can rock with his sensibilities, a tiny group of queer people who can generally tolerate him. His hobbies expand to include weed, clubbing, shoplifting things that food stamps won’t cover, and eventually even learning to paint. This doesn’t stop Pride from getting into random fights, or taking to the streets when he feels like he’s been wronged, causing sin everywhere he goes and turning half the city into a prideful nightmare. He and Justice have a lot of arguments about that last hobby, especially since it sends up a beacon of sin to anyone who can detect it.

When Pride discovers that one of his friends goes to Justice’s church, their activities bleed over to one another. They start inviting each other along to various outings with their respective groups. Over the course of the story, they stop becoming “enemies on the same side out of necessity” and start becoming real friends. They complain together about the things they disliked about Hell and Heaven respectively, and teach each other about what it’s really like to live there. They discover they’ve both been living in, essentially, opposing authoritarian regimes, with different, equally iron-fisted laws that need compliance from everyone to stay up and running.

Interpersonally, Pride and Justice are the oddest of odd couples there is, but they do help each other. Justice has been taught for this entire multi-century existence that he has to be good and pure at all times, to help people, make no mistakes, follow God’s word with no exceptions. Pride helps him be a little less of a perfectionist, and he learns it’s okay to be selfish sometimes. For his part, Pride needs… a lot of help. Justice and his friends are people who genuinely care about him, a completely alien concept to him. In particular, Justice gives him space to feel safe and accepted for once, and offers him the one thing he’d never dream of getting: forgiveness. Eventually, they fall in love. Cue the section of the story where I mash my characters together to make them kiss like I’m playing with dolls.

Sadly, things start going south. The first warning is when Lust becomes obscenely angry that Pride isn’t cooperating with its demands, and they have no choice but to fight and kill it in response. This battle sends up a huge flare for Honesty and her team out looking for them, but the angels are a bit smarter about their choice of attack. Instead of charging in swords-blazing, Honesty kidnaps Pride to use as a bargaining chip. She takes him to a church and tortures him to prove to Justice—once he shows up, radiating holy vengeance—that Pride will never change. He’ll be a demon forever and he’s wasting his time trying to save the unworthy.

Justice, defending Pride both physically and verbally, asks isn’t that the entire point? How is it a waste of time to have sympathy and love for the most unloved thing in the world? How is it against God to give grace to people who’ve made mistakes? He accuses Honesty and every angel at her side of Wrath, calling them all sinners for sitting there watching Pride be tormented for absolutely no reason other than he’s a demon, and they think he deserves pain. If this is God’s will, if this is the justice he’s meant to serve, he wants no part of it.

Unfortunately, this was what Honesty was waiting for. She abandons Pride and says, okay fine. If you don’t want to be an angel, you can be a demon like him. Justice is restrained, fighting against Honesty, who takes his sword to cut his wings off and break his halo, punishment for disobeying God.

Pride uses the last of his strength and rage to tackle Honesty before she can do a thing. Justice warns him not to kill her—it’s what she wants, it will only make things worse—and it’s the only reason Pride stays his hand. He tells her that outright, that he loves Justice more than he hates her, and that’s the only reason she isn’t in pieces. The other angels let Justice go and the two of them escape.

After returning home and recovering, Pride and Justice discover something even more pressing. They’re losing their powers, becoming more and more like humans every day. This wouldn’t be a problem, if it weren’t for the fact that Pride can’t complete his contract without his power—and if he can’t complete the contract, he dies. Even farther from a plan now, all they can do is promise to be with each other until the end.

That is, until one of the angels from Honesty’s brigade shows up to help—Kindness, Justice’s sister. She was horrified by everything that happened in that church, and confessed that there’s a small sect of Heaven that’s been on their side the whole time, too small to make real change, but willing to help however they can. Justice makes it clear that he and Pride are a package deal, no matter what, and she agrees. From there, they hatch the true plan to smuggle the soul up to Heaven.

The plan itself is still hazy for me. I know that Justice gets super-charged with angel powers once he goes back to Heaven. He’s been away for so long that his normal power is extremely potent for a while, and it’s a great help in defending against the inevitable opposition. Honesty will be there, she will most likely be killed, and Pride is able to deliver his soul and complete the contract. Hooray!

Bad news again! Pride is going to crumble into a pile of dust if he doesn’t get back down to Hell ASAP to restore his power. He can’t be in Heaven any longer than he already has—but he makes Justice promise to come find him. Justice agrees, and Pride returns to Hell.

Here, there’s going to be a POV switch to Justice’s perspective, as he prepares to traverse to Hell to find Pride. Kindness and his other angel friends are skeptical, but he insists that he made a promise, he has to leave. He’s not sure if he’ll be able to come back, and it hurts him to have to say goodbye to Kindness after only recently reuniting, but Pride is more important to him than staying in service to Heaven, a place that easily rejected him not too long ago.

Down in Hell, he finds Pride, but something is wrong. In his beast form (which I unfortunately don’t have a solid design for yet, but I promise it’s cool), Pride has also be super-charged with Hell’s power, but this means he’s also overloaded with sinful, prideful, energy, and he’s decided he doesn’t care about Justice anymore. Justice doesn’t take no for an answer, and Pride attacks.

Justice can’t bring himself to actually hurt Pride, so he’s subdued pretty quickly. Before Pride can deliver a killing blow, Justice is able to remind him why they loved each other, and the influence of the sin wears off. They run away together for a second time.

EDITOR’S NOTE: You can see Pride’s beast form here, drawn by AuroBlaze. I’m also changing Pride’s motivation for not caring about Justice, and it’s from the pain of being re-traumatized. He literally fell from Heaven into Hell for a second time which is… not an amazing experience. It takes Justice a while to find him, and in that time Pride convinced himself Justice isn’t coming for him at all. When he does show up, Pride blames him for all the pain he had to endure a second time, and lashes out. I want it to showcase how recovery isn’t linear, relapses happen, but it doesn’t mean you’re broken forever or incapable of healing. I’m messing with it. The rest is basically the same, there’s a fight, Justice is able to knock some sense into him, probably some crying, and then they escape.

The ending can go one of two ways, in my mind. I have a really cool image of Beast-Pride wearing Flaming-Wheel-Justice like a collar, stalking around Purgatory, but I have no idea what they would actually be doing there—other than hiding from Heaven and Hell. The second option is they go back to Earth and live out the rest of their lives as humans, which is the ending I’m sure everyone would want for them by the end of their ordeal. Optional semi-sad bonus: it’s been a few decades since they left, but they haven’t aged a day since the original story took place. When they go to meet their friends again, everyone has aged by 20-30 years and are… slightly concerned that the friends from their youth that disappeared one day have miraculously returned and look exactly the same. That might be a bit too much, though the sadistic part of my heart has entertained it.

EDITOR’S NOTE: I chose the happy ending. They go back to Earth and live out the rest of their lives as humans with their friends. I still love the first idea though, and I might incorporate it into their escape from Hell in some way.

Details I still have to come up with include: how did Pride/Justice find a place to live? Did they steal a place, break in, use magic? Do they have jobs? Well, does Justice have a job, Pride would remain staunchly and diligently unemployed. What do the demons that try and get Pride on their side actually want from him? What are their ideas for getting back to Heaven before Kindness shows up? Do they try any? How do they fail? What’s Kindness’ plan, and how many angels are on their side? How do the other angels take Honesty during all this? Do they actually agree, or are they just following orders?

So! Plenty is subject to change, plenty still needs to be organized into a cohesive story, and plenty will of course be cut for the good of the final draft, but congrats on your first look into the earliest parts of a novel. Thoughts? Questions? I’d love to hear what you guys think!

Thanks as always for your support!

— Annika

[ego-osbourne]

im really new here, is tdi like a comic or a fic or something? if it is where can i read it 😭

Gonna go ahead and answer this one early as opposed to leaving it in the queue

Firstly, hello! Happy to have you on my blog!

Secondly, TDI—The Dez Illusion—is a fanfic that is currently in production. I figured I could also use this ask to update my followers on the status of TDI right now :]

Technically speaking, the entire outline is written. It sits at ~100 chapters at the moment, but I am planning on bringing that number down. There are a few multi-chapter long sections that I plan on cutting out completely for narrative flow, pacing, and utility in other planned fics.

More below

When I was first drafting TDI, I had never played Oblivion and had no intention to make more fics afterward. Then, I started a sequel story, Salt in the Wound, with a group of friends. Some characters there would have ties back to the events of Oblivion, so I decided to give the game a go.

And I fell in love with it. So much so that I wanted to write another fic. Mortal Intentions will be that fic—a prequel-sequel to TDI.

However, this meant I had to change my initial plan for TDI. A lot of stuff that I put in that fic I realized I could do much better in future fics. So, with everything written out, my job now is to go back and trim everything down so the story isn’t so bloated. It’ll be hefty, believe me, but perhaps more digestible once I’m down.

I will make no promises as to when the first chapter will come out. If I dedicated all my time to writing, we’d very likely have chapter one by December. But, I have just moved back to college, and my motivation for writing gets traded back and forth with my motivation for drawing.

So, let’s just say sometime next year sounds pretty safe for chapter one. After that, hopefully it’s smooth sailing and I’m writing chapters with ease :] Just gotta cut off the excess for now.

//TLDR: I am in the last stage of drafting before officially writing chapters, but this last stage will take a while.

Thanks for the ask!

[maruyaaya]

Hey Imeda! I am Low! I read your Pandalily fic recently and I adored it! I saw that you haven't had this account long and since I can't peruse/stalk your account to satiate my curiosity I've decided to inquire here :) I hope you don't mind.

Do you have any specific Pandora or Lily headcanons you can share? Do you have any WIPs in the works? Do you have any songs you are listening to on repeat right now? What are the top 5 ships that are giving you the most insistent brain rot currently?

And finally, I am done pestering you and I'm wishing you a day full of wonder <3

OMG HI LOW!! yes absolutely i am always happy to talk about pandalily they are my beloveds <3 yeah i set up this acc relatively recently bc i wanted a fresh start for my ao3 and i haven’t really had the chance to do much on it yet (i am unfortunately a full time university student) but i am so happy you sent an ask bc i am always excited to talk to ppl!! feel free to send more asks or even dm me for whatever reason!!

i’m gonna do the pandalily headcanons last bc i have so many of them, but firstly do i have any wips:

oh i ABSOLUTELY have wips. i actually am the worst at starting wips and never finishing them, but as for main ones i’m working on rn, i have a prongsfoot wip that’s currently around 50k words 75% done, a marauders x daisy jones & the six au, a (you have to hear me out on this one okay bc i know nobody ships this but me BUT HEAR ME OUT) friends with benefits sirius x barty fic that’s about half done, and another pandalily fic that is basically just taking shape but i don’t have much to say about it yet (im actually just the worst multishipper ever and i ship my favourite character, sirius, with every single person who dares to so much as breathe in his direction)

songs on repeat

ok so i am totally willing to just link my spotify, in fact: here and i have a pandalily playlist in the works here, but specifically, i’ve had never love an anchor by the crane wives, three by sleeping at last, and funeral by phoebe bridgers on loop over and over as well as the entire daisy jones & the six album.

top 5 ships giving me brainrot

1. PRONGSFOOT!! prongsfoot is forever in my head as one of my fav ships ever

2. pandalily! i absolutely adore their dynamic and the little version of them that i have created in my head

3. rosekiller. i think this is a relatively unpopular opinion but i am so intrigued by their dynamic and i’m currently in the process of drafting a LONG fic about them but i haven’t done much work on it yet

4. dorlene. UGH MY OG ENEMIES TO LOVERS i am forever obsessed with them and i can’t believe i haven’t written them yet

5. normally i’d have jegulus around here i think but currently i’ve been having intensive brainrot about the idea of a dynamic between barty and sirius. i think they’re two characters who are very similar and yet hate each other and i think it’s really interesting to explore a two sides of the same coin dynamic between them and idk i have a lot of thoughts about them i could absolutely rant for a very long time abt the sirius/barty dynamic i have in my head

bonus bc it isn’t a marauders ship but my favourite ship of ALL TIME is soukoku, aka dazai/chuuya from bungou stray dogs. i like them a Normal amount (i’m crazy abt them)

and now, the moment you’ve all been waiting for, here are a few of my pandalily headcanons that i can think of off the top of my head

first of all, my fav pandalily song is trouble by halsey. it’s literally them. that’s their dynamic to me

pandora’s much more open about her oddness and want for Blood while lily is more closed off about it. it’s still there—absolutely still there—but pandora kind of awakens it in her and helps her to realize that it’s okay to show that part of her

they met through james and regulus and often go on double dates with them

they absolutely get matching tattoos. probably ethel cain lyrics or something abt the inherent eroticism of cannibalism idk

my favourite headcanon is that pandora and evan are twins and evan tries to get lily the shovel talk when he meets her for the first time, but actually just ends up half in love with her bc he thinks she’s so cool

speaking of, evan and lily joke that they’re going to run away and elope so that evans name could be evan evans and pandora thinks it’s the funniest thing ever

bonus headcanon that evan is the older twin by a few minutes but pandora tells everyone that she is and he doesn’t correct her

they watched bones and all together and every 5 minutes they would whisper “this is so us” to each other

they absolutely LOVE baking together. they do it at least once a week and they make cookies or cupcakes or something and decorate them like pinterest photos and give them to their friends

they have two shared pinterest boards. one is really cutesy baking ideas and cute room decor inspo and the other is full of quotes abt cannibalism and blood and eating each other whole. they treasure both of these boards equally

lily is the biggest taylor swift fan ever and she makes pandora listen to her songs together. pandora moderately enjoys taylor swift, but will listen to her constantly to please lily. lily’s favourite song is this is me trying and pandora likes cowboy like me

they give each other flowers all the time (notably lilies ofc). pandora can’t stand to watch them die and always presses them and keeps them all in a little notebook with the date they got them

they’re obsessed with biting each other. like not even just during sex, they do it all the time. they’ll be watching a movie and pandora will just reach over and bite lily’s shoulder for fun

their favourite show to watch together is hannibal. they’re crazy about it. they rewatch it all the time to an unhealthy extent

they often say really strange declarations of love to each other in front of other people like “i want to eat you down to the bones” or “i want to rip open your skin and crawl inside your kidneys and sleep in there” and everyone around them just laughs nervously and can’t tell if they’re serious or not

i probably rambled much more than i needed to but i am always very excited to talk!!

[spindleprick]

i’m not sure if you do writing advice and if you don’t, feel free to ignore this! i was wondering how do you come up with such beautiful metaphors/descriptions in your writing? and are there any authors that are good examples of how to create new + striking ones? i struggle with finding new ways to describe things and i fear it’s making my writing boring :(

hi!! firstly, thank you so much for the compliment, it's incredibly kind. secondly, if i'm not mistaken you might have sent me a very similar question some months ago, and i totally forgot until now because i started to answer, draft it, then never remembered to finish it. if that was you i'm so sorry (and if it wasn’t you, i’m still very sorry to the person whose question i never answered)!! i'm not sure i ever feel entirely qualified to give writing advice, and please don’t think your writing is “boring” because it doesn’t fall into a certain style. i fully admit that i lean heavily on metaphor (which is probably obvious give you came to me with the question), but i tend to get really tired of this and wish i could write more pointed, startling prose than manages to impart emphasis without excessive description or “floweriness” (the most widely known author i can think of to point to might be chuck palahniuk, but on tumblr i also think abby aka @exalibur manages this beautifully). we are always hardest on ourselves, and the grass always looks greener on the other side of the stylistic hill. 

ocean vuong discusses metaphor in particular better than i ever could, and there’s some reposts of stories he made on the subject here. i also think heather o'neill would be a fantastic person to look at for metaphor, particular her latest book when we lost our heads (albeit possibly my fave modern book is the lonely hearts hotel, if you read this please come scream to me about it). i pulled a couple quotes of o’neills from the former to use as example, which also fall in line with what vuong outlines:

The mansion was surrounded by a thick bed of beautifully kept pink roses. They were like ballerinas taking a break and sitting down in their tutus. darling. delightful. feminine. and with context, the home of a girl who would put sofia coppola’s marie antoinette moodboard to shame: precious, precocious, and doll-like. She found the violin, took it out of the case, and tried playing a note on it. It sounded like a black cat who was on the gallows confessing to all the bad luck it had caused.   this character refused to play piano because she found every sound it made too happy, and didn’t feel it ‘matched her soul,’ which is why she would eventually try the violin. for a girl who would inadvertently murder someone, and spend much of her life wearing black and writing startling erotica, it’s also entirely on-theme. there’s obviously a lot of ways one could describe roses or the sound of a violin, but each fits perfectly into the respective character. if in the first quote the roses has been described as heavy red roses bowing reluctantly under the weight of a snowdrift like angry russian courtiers, you’re going to get a very different impression of the moment. as with the sound of the violin, if it has been described as a lonesome widow calling to her drowned lover from the pier, it’s going to completely alter the reader’s perception. so while these devices can create beautiful things to read in isolation, the most impactful ones are about more than saying something in a creative way: they add to the desired ambiance!

i know none of that is particularly instructive as to how i or others come up with descriptions, but i think that’s going to be very individual to the person! i personally like to think of it as the association game. i’d like to say it’s something more sophisticated than that, but a lot of the time it really does some down to just pausing for a moment and running along an evolution of images: the roses are red. what other physical objects are red? what emotions do we associate with red? what acts are those emotions elicited by? what sensations do we experience in those actions? there’s no right or wrong way to come up with your descriptive text, but don’t be afraid to take continual leaps not only forward, but backwards and sideways until you find something you like. even if you struggle to feel like you’re not being ‘original’ in the comparisons you’re drawing, there’s always ways to make something more ‘obvious’ less cliche. want to describe the colour red but can only think of roses? that’s okay! just rip it up a bit. turn it to sit on its side. think of a way to make it new. apply the notion of trying to impart something in your metaphor: where can a rose be seen, in what context can they be given or seen? instead of saying her lips were red as roses, there’s something like her lips were the red of a rose you’d find abandoned at the stage door, leaning its forgotten head across the last stoop. finally, it’s overstated (and you probably already know this given how you framed the question), but it also can’t be said enough: reading is your friend! while i definitely recommend the authors i mentioned above (or catherynne m valente, or janet fitch, or i remember reading how much of these hills is gold by c. pam zhang in the summer and thinking there was a gorgeous command of language), i think reading of any kind is going to give you a benefit. it’s just stretching the creative muscle, taking in new phrases, words, and ways to apply them. if you’re feeling mentally a bit bogged up, you could even listen to some spoken word poetry on youtube! i never know if any of my ““advice”” makes sense, but i hope this does, or that it helps in some small way!!  ♡

[sunflowersoldat]

Kingdom of Fire and Ice Pt. 15

Summary: Something is afoot in the castle, and your heart is torn between your best friend and the man you have to marry. Could it get any worse? Secrets are spilled, but more are hidden right under our noses, will they make or break us?

Warnings: Blood warning, violence, angst.

A/N: This has been in my drafts for months. But to be honest with you I really like this series and I have missed it. And to the dear reader that encouraged me to continue it, I appreciate you, more than you know!

Any time it is 'italicized' with single quotes, someone is speaking telekinetically.

Word count: approx. 1.7k

Main Master list

Series Master list

Bucky Master list

Loki Master list

You sat atop the throne in the great hall, between your father and Pepper, as the celebration raged on around you, everyone ate and drank. 

Other royals and aristocrats introduced themselves to you and congratulated you on your coronation.

You hadn’t got the chance to speak with Loki about his impromptu proposal. You were going to wring his neck when you got him alone. 

‘I can’t wait for you to sit atop Jotumheim’s throne like that.’

You rolled your eyes as they landed on Loki across the room, he was standing with Thor and Natasha, she smiled widely as Thor bent to kiss her cheek. A pang of jealousy rang through you, how easy it would be if you were her, without royal duties. 

To love who you pleased. 

‘I never got to tell you how beautiful you looked today Пламя (plamya).’

You tore your eyes from Loki’s as you searched the room, failing to find him. 

‘Up here you grace.’ A crisp breeze caressed your face, beckoning your gaze to the second floor. Your eyes finally landed on Bucky, as he leaned against the balustrade a glass of amber liquid cradled in his hands. Steve standing next to him, in deep conversation with Peggy. 

‘I don’t know if I have ever told you Мое Сердца (my heart). In all the years I have known you… I am proud of you.’

Your brow involuntarily furrowed, ‘I’ve heard that a lot lately… I’m not sure what I have done to deserve such praise…’

He lifted his glass to his lips, nodding his head slightly, ‘Well… firstly you put up with…’ his gaze moved from you down to Loki, as he stalked towards you. 

Loki bowed deeply, “It would be an honor to be your first dance as the queen your majesty.”

You hesitated, slowly rising from your seat placing your hand into his, your engagement ring sparkling in the light. He lifted your hand to his lips, kissing it lightly. Your eyes moved past him, looking back up to where Bucky had been, your face falling slightly as your eyes met empty space. Steve turned around, when he felt your gaze, his ocean eyes full of questions, you shook your head lightly, eyes traveling back to Loki, waiting patiently in front of you.

‘Looking for someone, pet?’

You blinked at Loki, stepping forward onto the dancefloor, allowing his arm to lace around your waist, his cool touch seeping through the fabric. Much colder against you than usual,

‘Just a friend…’

He clasped your hand bringing it up between the two of you as he began to lead you around the dancefloor. Other couples began joining you, Pepper and your father were the first, followed by Steve and Peggy, as well as Thor and Nat. seeing them all together made your heart swell in your chest, Steve deserved to be happy with Peggy, since you have known each other, all he ever did was work, it was like a breath of fresh air to see him enjoying himself. 

Natasha’s eyes met with yours across the room as Thor released her into a spin, a joyous smile lighting up her entire face. As Thor pulled her back, he placed a kiss to her lips, you didn't have to see her face to know she was blushing, you watched it bloom across her back and shoulders.

‘They make an adorable couple don't they, darling?’

Your eyes flicked to Loki’s, his features were softer than usual, there was a calmness to him you weren't familiar with.

‘You can see the love they have for each other… something I had hoped I would experience one day…’

He nodded sadly, ‘I had hoped we would be more than just an arrangement, my love… I know you hate me now, but could you grow to love me?’

You were shocked at his question, the amount of care in his words, he was finally asking how you felt about this… it was a little late for that… ‘I don’t hate you Loki… And honestly, I don’t really have much of a choice in the matter.’

You watched the hurt swim in his eyes, you didn’t mean it ruefully, it was just the honest truth, you had little choice in the matter, in fact you had no choice at all. 

You averted your gaze, as the music died and the dance ended, watching as Peggy grasped Bucky’s hand, pulling him from the hall, you stumbled, Loki catching you as the song finished. “Easy darling, I've got you…”

Your heart twisted in your chest, what was Peggy doing, and why did Bucky leave with her… The clock chimed the hour of sundown, your gaze flickered to the window, the sun filtering through the stained glass. You hastily turned back to Loki, curtsying,

“Excuse me.” you whispered, before turning on your heel, rushing out of the hall, you picked up the skirt of your dress, your hair falling from your updo, your crown tilting. 

By the time you made it to the stables, it was pitch black out, the only light that shone through the night was a single lantern in the stable window. 

You opened the door quietly, letting it fall closed behind you, “Bucky?”

You strained your eyes in the dark, as the door at the other end of the stables opened to outline Bucky’s form. You rushed forward, your blood roaring in your veins, as what looked like Peggy stepped out of one of the pens, grabbing you by the throat. You croaked reaching for Bucky, as she morphed into Hela, her skeletal hand tracing over your healing wound. Her magic seeping into your skin in searing heat, it felt like your wound had reopened. 

The distinct smell of oleanders filled the stables, it piqued your memory, why? You racked your brain trying to trace the smell, but it wouldn't place. 

‘Bucky! Help me!’

Across the room Bucky’s figure began moving, “Cry all you want your highness, he can't help you. Tsk, tsk. You should be more aware of who may be listening.” The figure’s voice cut through the silence, but it wasn't Bucky’s. Dread overtook your body, where was Bucky?! As the figure entered the dim light of the lantern, his appearance morphed, revealing Malekith. An evil smile lifting his lips.

He snapped his pale fingers, as the real Bucky appeared next to him, bound and gagged. You surged forward, calling your powers, only for crippling pain to radiate through you. Your knees gave out, Hela’s grip on you was the only reason you didn't collapse onto the ground.

Your breathing became labored, the usual fire that burned in your veins never surfacing, just cold empty pain remained.

Bucky thrashed in his restraints trying and failing to get free, “Not so high and mighty without those powers are you Flame’s Heart?”

You growled, feebly attempting to remove yourself from Hela’s grasp. Her hand again landing on your wound, her power surging through you, the pungent scent of Oleanders permeating the air again, filling your lungs. A strangled cry leaving your lips as she slapped a gag in your mouth.

Malekith raised a pale hand, a dagger materializing before your eyes, lowering it to Bucky’s throat. You tried to scream, to yell, but nothing escaped your lips except a muffled sob.

Your mind raged, ‘Bucky, I’m so so sorry!’

A dark chuckle left Malekith’s lips, “Oh my dear, don’t be sorry, he chose you, chose this.”

Your eyes widened, Maliketh had heard you, that was impossible, Loki said… Bucky struggled against the restraints again, earning a bone crunching blow from Malekith.

You growled as another wave of pain pierced through you, ‘Get away from him!’

Hela yanked your head back, mouth stopping centimeters from your ear, “Or you’ll do what exactly?”

‘I swear I’ll kill you’

Malekith sneered at you, pressing the blade closer to Bucky’s throat, a small stream of blood shining in the dim light, “Watch it your highness, one more wrong word from you and I’ll gut him…” Bucky grunted attempting to pull away. Tears streamed down your face.

“It’s a shame really, we were hoping to capture King Laufeyson, but the Elven prince would do just fine too, we weren't expecting you to love another… Not just a dumb knight it seems…” Malekith reached into his pocket, revealing a silver tin, as he morphed into Natasha. His wicked smile on her face made your stomach churn, “Goodness your highness, you really should do more research on what flowers you keep around the palace…” he opened the tin, tossing it onto the floor, the flowery smell from the salve reached your nose.

Panic surged through you, your mind connecting the dots, you remembered where you had smelled Oleanders before.

Bucky tried wiggling free of Malekith’s grip, his eyes wide, “Oh don’t worry it wasn't enough to kill you, your magic is much too strong for that, but it does weaken you, and that damned fire in your veins.” he removed his dagger from Bucky’s throat, pointing to you, “Oh no my dear, I have big plans for that magic of yours, you will bring a kingdom to its knees daughter of Surtur…” he gave Bucky a sidelong glance, “it’s a shame, I didn’t want to kill you…”

‘No! Please, just take me! I’ll do whatever it is you want! Just please don’t kill him, please…’ your heart was thundering in your chest, the wound stinging at your body’s strain to stay in control, your powers still not surfacing.

A malicious smile cracked across Malekith’s mutilated face, “Oh yes you will…” 

‘Пламя (plamya), no!’

With a swift move, Malekith brought the blade down into Bucky’s side, tossing him to the ground, a muffled scream left your lips, “He’s not dead your highness, just insurance that he won't follow…” Hela and Malekith gripped your arms, hauling you to your feet, you craned your neck to meet Bucky’s gaze over your shoulder, fresh tears spilling from your eyes.

‘I would give my life so you could live yours, Bucky.’

@texan-tazzy @tianamontag @daiseychaindisasterr @silently-killing-you @buckyfan12 @leyannrae @shwetaaaaaaaa @happyt0exist @hailhydra920 @justlovelifeblog @sheadre @austynparksandpizza @njavezan @lokismidgardian @rosefanatic @betareader7

[wrienne]

Official Post: Writing Comeback!

I was going to post this on Twitter but realized that it became way too much text to fit in a comfortable format there. Also, since this is the revitalization of my writing and Tumblr page, I thought I might as well fuse both of them together!

This will be a semi-long but official post regarding all my writing plans. For those of you who just want the TL;DR: I haven’t abandoned any of my Ao3 stories, in fact I’ve already planned for sequels for both AHPHand DL. I’m also working on minor revisions with TET and finally writing the sequel, The Essence Prince, which I plan on posting exclusively here on Tumblr! Tumblr will also be my all-in-one hub for all my writing and art and blogging!

Firstly, about Ao3!

None of my stories on Ao3 are abandoned! I have full intention of continuing and finishing all my stories. In fact, for I have a second season planned for AHPH and a sequel to DLas well! I know it's very ambitious considering how my tempo of writing has been the last two years, but my circumstances have changed drastically since then. Not to get too personal, but I’ve wasted so much precious time and effort on people who didn’t deserve it. Although it’s regrettable, I have learned incredibly much from this experience and I feel more focused and happy than ever before!

Regarding AHPH, I feel no need to stress the actual plot and story that I have developed for it, as I want it to be a pleasant, fun and comfortable read. I don’t wanna say anything about it, not even a tease as it might disturb the reader experience and the overall narrative I’m pursuing. But there is a bigger picture to the entire story and world, which will unravel slowly but surely toward Season Two. As such, you can expect AHPH to be a very long ride!

As for DL, I have hit somewhat of a creative block in terms of the story’s pacing. However, it is not meant for a long run, and I really want to focus on finishing it as soon as possible. You can expect more familiar faces to appear in the sequel, such as Namjoon as a Sherlock-esque mastermind/private detective and Hoseok as either a chief prosecutor/lawyer or criminal psychologist. The story will be about the case that Reader cracked during her time at the police academy and made her famous among her peers!

Secondly, we’ve got my refreshed and now active Tumblr!

All my writing, whether they’re meant for Wattpad, Ao3 or original fiction, will be posted on Tumblr first! So, if you wanna get a faster look at any of them or you want the convenience of one single place where you can read everything that I write or make, you can find everything here. I wanna use Tumblr as my one-in-all hub for all my creative endeavors, making easier for both me and readers to find all keep track of all my updates and stories! And, speaking of all my creative endeavors...

Thirdly, I have not yet abandoned my dream of making webtoons! I can’t say for sure when this dream can be realized, but I’ve got two stories in the making: The Emperor’s Bride and The Dragon’s Wish. Both are based in Korean culture, mythology and history. The Emperor’s Bride is set in a pseudo-alternative Korea where the almighty tyrant and mysteriously masked Emperor seeks his first bride in a trial of one hundred women, of which one is the main character – however, she’s only joined the competition to exact her vengeance on the Emperor. The Dragon’s Wish is based in contemporary Seoul where a failing acting student is struck by a falling star and finds her destiny intertwined with a dragon – or two. Some ideas for characters for The Dragon’s Wish are already posted on Twitter!

In general, I wanna do art and draw, so outside my webtoon endeavors, you can look forward to more than just writing from me in the future!

Fourthly, I have decided to finally get back to working on The Essence Series. It’s been a complicated project to return to out of personal reasons, and I’ve also developed vastly in terms of writing since I wrote The Essence Thief. As such, I’ve been going back and forth on revisioning The Essence Thief once more, or even rewrite it completely. This has caused me mentally to keep putting the sequel on hold, which I now realize has been a horrible idea. So now instead, I have decided to simply correct any minor errors that still remain in The Essence Thief and move on to The Essence Prince! And yes, name drop for the official title of the sequel! A new face will be introduced, as the last missing piece of the OT7, and the threat of King Kwang-Jin will be dealt with as secrets crawl back to surface! I will be posting the raw firsts draft/manuscript here on Tumblr as I write them! Feedback of all kind is what I will be needing, but also the pressure and expectations from readers in order to get me to write! The final result of The Essence Prince will be a published book and sequel to The Essence Thief, so I hope you’ll be looking forward to that!

Lastly, I will be using Tumblr as a blog as well. I want to post travel and college stuff and other things unrelated to my writing and art. In regard to my previous series on my WordPress, “Writing Wednesdays”, is something that I am also considering, but let me know what you think!

Always and forever, thank you for reading! If you reached this far, I want to tell you once more how happy and fortunate I feel having so much support for my writing. It means, literally, the world to me. Thank you.

[whumpinator]

So, I recently got some very lovely shout-outs from @whumpzone and @sideblogformindtrash that made me feel very warm and fuzzy inside. Thank-you so much to you both, you don’t realise how much compliments on my writing help to boost my motivation and makes me happy.

And it helped me realise I owe y’all an update with regards to posting. 

I’m not sure when I’ll write new chapters of Mongrels or SLO. Slowly beginning to realise writing for oc whump in particular may have just been a hyperfixation that has now passed. Where does that leave my unfinished stories? I don’t know. And I hope you believe it’s just as frustrating for me as it is for you. However, I’m gonna start trying to post on tumblr more regularly and see where that gets me. 

In the meantime, since I’ve been gone (a lot longer than I originally planned holy shit) a lot of things have happened that I’m very excited about and might help excuse my absence a little. Firstly and foremostly I have entered my first serious relationship with one of the most beautiful creative people I have ever met in my entire life. It knows about this page and I’m looking forward to sharing more time with them. Secondly, I have finished the first draft of a full-length play that I’m really excited about and I’ve been putting aside most of my writing spoons for. 

Some other things, I got a new job, finished university for the year and got the all-clear from work and the gov to spend christmas with my family!!!!

I love you all and i look forward to chatting and interacting with you again. 

[wheresmynaya]

Do you have any tips for someone who is trying to write their first fanfic? I admire your work sm and anything you can share is much appreciated

OMG IM SORRY THIS TOOK ME SO LONG TO RESPOND TO!!! I’ve been very busy work wise and I wanted to make sure this had my whole attention before I reply lol.

Firstly, I wanted to say I feel very soft bc you admire my work and now you want to try writing for yourself and you came to me for tips and that’s really awesome 🥲💕

Secondly, writing tips! I think the most important thing to keep in mind when asking for tips/advice is that they aren’t the same as writing rules. What works for me might not work for you and that’s okay. It won’t make or break your story if you chose not to follow certain tips/advice bc at the end of the day it’s your story - you write it how you want to.

Now for things that I do that help me when writing a story. I’ve talked about this before but DRAFTS! I do an overview of the story and do a story arc that’s similar to a timeline and from there I’m able to form chapter and decide what each chapter is going to be about. I like doing it this way because it helps me stay on track with how I want to tell the story and also helps me ensure that I’m pacing everything out properly.

Also I like look at the story from a big picture point of view as well as the broken down version it that makes sense. I always encourage people to at least draft their entire story arc so they have a distinct beginning, middle and end otherwise it might get a little difficult to come up with things on the fly if you happen to be writing as you go. I’ve written myself into a corner too many times when I was either writing without a draft or writing off draft so I say try to stick to one as best as you can.

Something thing else that I find helpful is looking over dialogue prompts (or just prompts in general). Even if you’re not using them for anything, I find them really helpful when you’re trying to get into the writing flow. Follow some writing blogs too! They usually have tips and tricks as well and I like to pick and choose which I want to try out. If you look up #writing things on my blog you’ll probably find a post where I Rec some to follow as well as other advice I’ve given.

Hope this was a lil helpful! Happy writing ✍🏽

[astrologgeek]

*coughs* fair warning this is kinda big and I always have this feeling like I'm doing something wrong, so if I did do anything wrong, please tell me ;-; My brain isn't really all that good sometimes

Firstly, CONGRATULATIONS :o This is huge im so happi ;;-;; dont mind that i said happi and then the sad face, its just how i work Sooo, five things I want you to do with your blog:-

1) Definitely more of astro stupid. I've only gotten one taste of it BUT I NEED MORE. 2) Maybe make a masterlist with everything ordered? :o ( Totally not bullshitting through with these five things) 3) this may be entirely personal (because im just that selfish LOLOL) but plis talk to meh more ;;-;; U seem funny and genuinely nice ;;-;; I'm lonely gorl ;;-;; 4) Maybe more astrology observations? :0 I haven't seen much of em from you and I'd really like to know all that you've observed. But then again maybe you have and it got drowned in all the other posts this is where the masterlist idea comes in woooooooo 5) This isnt really for the blog, but specifically you. I want you to uh take a lil promise, just between us two peeps. If you ever feel overwhelmed and need to take a break, i want you to do it. With gaining followers and stuff I've seen the load of work tightens up too. And damn these blogs overwork themselves so much :o So just keep good okay? hugs

Oop, now that the serious business is done, I'll stop my brain from thinking too much to the point it fails i still need to do math so i cant let it get used up much ;;-;; Five placements or aspects in my natal chart...hmm.

1) Cancer mars, Pisces venus, Aries mercury have been nominated for astro stupid, i fucking love that series and I need to have something in it. Its like love at first read ;-; 2) Sun sextile mars, I would like to know more about this and by more I mean anything because i dont know jackshit about it 3) astro meme for mars in first house because it needs to be made fun of :P

⚠️I do not give any permission to anyone reading this post to re-post my content nor plagiarize it. This content belongs to me and myself only @astrologgeek ⚠️

1. That's 100% ok like why wouldn't it be?? Ur really sweet, thank u so much ❤🥺🥺🥺💕💕💕

2. THANK U I APPRECIATE IT SO MUCH :)) I'm reqlly happi too 💕

3. Answering ur suggestions:

1) Yes ofc I will!!

2) Already did - but u already know that so thank u for motivating me love :))

3) GORL I'M ALWAYS HERE IF U WANNA TALK JUST DM ME!! + Ur not selfish thar doesn't even makes sense!!

4) I know that I can make observations but I actually don't want to ^^ I think that if I have my personal unique thoughts Instead of posting them I'll let them out in my readings and make them even more unique ❤

5) Ur so sweet 🥺💕💕💕 I WILL, AND THAT'S A PROMISE ❤❤❤ hugs

♤ NOW MOVING ON TO THE PLACEMENTS: ♤

1. In the draft ^^

2. SUN SEXTILE MARS: this aspect gives an easy ego/core personality-anger relationship as sextile is an easy aspect that gives the chart owner much energy, they might be very energetic or know how to channel their energy / anger / motivation into their self-expression. Their self expression works very well here, this person might be charismatic and have great masculine energy that fits well to their ego (depends on the actual placements tho) - might even feed it sometimes so be conscious about these. Sports might be very helpful or easy to you or at least able to help you with expressing yourself ^^ your relationship with men and father might be excellent! You may find it even easier to hand out with men and be around masculine energy. Sex to you might be very authentic and fun, your core-self doesn't seem to have a problem with sex, a thing that personally might bring you enjoyment ^^ but again, it mainly depends on the placements and houses and degrees - and specifically to the enjoyment part? Check if ur mars creates an easy aspect to jupiter. This is my personal analyzation of the aspect - so take my words with a grain of salt ^^

3. in the draft :))

Have an amazing day baby ❤❤❤ your memes will be posted in 2 days 😋💕💕

[hurting-fictional-people]

I adore your stories firstly! Their simply wonderful and so captivating to read :)

Secondly, I have a bit of a question do you have an tips on how to stop one's self from Info dumping.. I find I always get so caught up in descriptions it becomes pointless drabble basically... I've read some tips on Google but I'm just not really getting it you know?

Aww thank you so much! 🥺🥺💙

Hmm yeah I have that problem too, I really get you Anon

What I usually do is dump all that information in the first draft. Every single thing, even when I immediately go “uh maybe that’s not relevant”, I just put it there, just in case. When I’m done, I go back to reread it once, to catch a few mistakes and maybe some unnecessary info, but that doesn’t usually happen this fast. Now here’s my secret weapon: I leave it alone for a while. Usually for a day before I come back to it, so when I reread what I wrote, it’s with a fresh pair of eyes. That’s usually when I catch the info that doesn’t need to be there. The longer you give yourself, the more info dump you are likely to catch in my experience, because it’s more time you’ve spent not immersed in what you wrote. Even if it is a continuous story, just go on to the next chapter and leave the last one to reread later, and you’ll catch a lot of stuff then. Just take yourself off the writer's shoes when you come back to it, imagine you’ve never read that piece before and if you’d be interested in the details if that world weren’t yours, and you’ll probably see what feels like too much and what needs to stay.

Oh, also, sometimes I have to rewrite stuff. Betrayal Story for example, I usually write each part twice (some even more) before I’m happy with it, because sometimes there’s just so much info that I simply cannot clean it up and need to start over. If you are doing that (which is a great tip that I actually found on pinterest), try to reread the original chapter once to remember what it is about and your favorite scenes, and then write it from memory. You are likely to leave the unimportant stuff aside and the writing might flow better. Or, if you like what you have but know something feels a little dull, copy the piece into another document and change the new one until you’re happy with it, knowing that the original is still there if all the moving things around doesn’t work. I find that sometimes, I’m hesitant to delete entire paragraphs or entire scenes even because I’m like “but what if I need this later? What if it doesn’t make sense without it??” so for me at least, having the original document one click away makes it easier to cut stuff off and change all that doesn’t belong there.

TL;DR: write your piece and then leave it alone. When you come back to it, look at your work as a reader and cold-bloodedly ask yourself if you'd want to read it if you weren’t the writer. If the answer is no, it is editing time and you probably should cut some stuff off or try to rewrite it. And if that doesn’t work either, take some more time away and when you read it again you'll spot info dumps you hadn't before

Okay this is all I can think of right now, but please keep in mind that I’m talking about things that I found work for me specifically and I’m just writing for fun :) I think that spotting unnecessary info dumps comes with time, so just don’t stop writing, and it’ll get easier! And read! It’s when I read other people’s works that I find what makes me get bored and stop reading or be desperate for more, and know what to include and what to avoid when I’m writing. Anyway, I hope something here helps you, Anon <3

[thegeminisage]

wAit i actually do want ur thoughts on how much u think michael was talking total shit i nthat bar

(here’s the post for context)

well firstly i think it’s an interesting juxtaposition between lucifer, the “bad son” who ostensibly doesn’t lie but merely tells uncomfortable truths*, and michael, the “good son” who not only lies all the fucking time, but knows the exact worst possible thing to say to anyone at any given time. I JUST THINK THAT’S NEAT. 

(*lucifer lies a lot in late seasons too because of antag decay, but like, the original concept of him was one of uncomfortable honesty.)

michael is willing to lie to get his way and does so frequently - starting with going back on the deal he made with dean, to leave him after they killed lucifer. he also does it when he shit-talks every last one of our protagonists in turn in 14.10, the episode the gifs are from. he starts with jack - telling him he’s nothing but a job, and dean wasn’t sad when he died, when we know that isn’t true (jack is visibly upset by this, which is part of why he chooses to use his powers later; michael successfully manipulated his enemy into doing harm to himself). after that michael goes in on cas, telling him that god doesn’t care about his world because it’s nothing but a failed draft (interestingly, cas is also visibly shaken by this).

then, before sam and cas enter dean’s mind, michael says that he WANTS them to do that - because his body might be all chained up, but in there, they don’t stand a chance. this is also untrue, because the whole purpose of him talking shit in that gifset to begin with is to stall so his monsters can rescue him. dean DOUBLES DOG DARES HIM to snap his fingers and nuke them all, and he doesn’t because he can’t. he didn’t want them in dean’s mind at all. he’s in trouble the whole time they’re in there and he KNOWS it.

as for what he said to sam, dean, and cas - yeah, this was also deeply untrue. the first thing he does is take a shot at cas; he claims that dean doesn’t care about cas, only feels obligated to help him out because of cas pulling him out of hell, and that cas, known fuck-up, is almost not worth the trouble. of course, WE know that isn’t true, and DEAN knows that isn’t true, and, being that cas was just looking through dean’s worst memories a few moments ago, and likely saw his own death there, HE probably knows it isn’t true too. (look at his face there compared to sam’s; he’s quite unbothered by the accusations, but shortly after looks away as though remembering something. the sheer magnitude of the lies michael is telling is what leads cas to figuring out in a moment that what michael is actually doing is stalling.) 

michael takes a swing at sam next, and this punch seems to hit the mark a little better - michael claims that dean was happiest when sam wasn’t around so it could be just him and john, alone together, just the two of them. it’s not in this gifset, but he also says “deep down, [dean] knows that you will always abandon him, again and again,” and sam shakes his head furiously. 

of course with what he went through at lucifer’s hands, sam has every reason in the world to be afraid of archangels, but i like to think he’s thinking about running away in flagstaff - i imagine the older sam got, the more he began to understand about the differing ways he & dean were abused by john. michael is striking at sam’s guilt for leaving dean alone to go to school, because he knows EXACTLY what dean’s life with john alone was like (more on that in a sec), but he’s also unknowingly striking at that flagstaff guilt. knowing something in your head and believing it in your heart are two entirely different matters - but i think logically sam is emotionally intelligent enough to know, most of the time, that the person at fault for dean’s abuse is his abuser. at the very least, he can be certain that dean was NOT happy when left alone with his father - dean’s neediness has been brought up in this series almost more times than i can count.

but both michael’s attack on cas and his attack on sam are ALSO attacks on dean, because dean will worry that sam and cas WILL think it’s all true - which is why michael says it. sam and cas are there as dean’s support system because dean isn’t strong enough to fight michael on his own. michael is SMART and the smartest thing to do is to drive a wedge between dean and his rescuers as quickly as possible. 

dean’s face here is absolutely INCREDULOUS. not only is this evidence that everything michael is saying is wildly untrue, but that he knows exactly how untrue it is - after all, he’s in dean’s head. michael’s goal isn’t to expose an ugly truth, it’s to strike at insecurities and weak points with untruths. the very next thing he says to dean is “you don't need them. you don't even like them. they're not your family, they're your responsibilities. they're a weight around your neck, & deep down, you were desperate to get away from them - that's why you said yes.”

dean goes from incredulous to disgusted in a big hurry once michael starts implying that dean believes sam’s going to abandon him again, and he gets out-and-out angry once michael actually does hit on the smallest kernal of truth - that dean sometimes felt burdened by the responsibilities of caring for his family. i think dean only getting truly angry THERE is indicative of how much bullshit the rest of it was. 

...including (told you we’d get back to this) the fact that dean was happy to be left alone with john. as we can see from his face - his “michael-is-lying” face - dean was NOT AT ALL HAPPY that it was just the two of them. consider:

john is a control freak - he expects instant and unquestioning obedience from his sons at all times. dean explains to sam later (and john himself confirms this near the season finale) that john equates control to protection. "dad was never disappointed in you...he was afraid of what could've happened to you if he wasn't around." "when you said that you wanted to go away to school, all i could think about, my only thought was, that you were gonna be alone, vulnerable." john, in his insane quest for vengeance and in his constant paranoia, wanted to control every possible aspect of sam and dean’s lives.

when sam leaves he’s not under john’s control. when sam and dean withhold information from him (that sam has been having visions) they aren’t under his control. when they talk back or disobey orders (when a young dean leaves the motel room to go to the arcade instead of watching sammy, when sam won’t accept his hunt midseason, when sam refuses to shoot him in order to kill yellow eyes) they are not under his control. even when dean doesn’t take care of the car as he was asked to, he’s not under john’s control. he’s slacking. 

and EVERY time this happens john gets angry. he demands to know why didn’t didn’t call about the dreams. he snaps at him about the car. when john came home from flagstaff and found sam missing, he was furious. we don’t know exactly what happened but we can tell it was not good. how much worse would it have been when sam went away for good instead of just two weeks?

i don’t think john’s reaction was as rash as the one in flagstaff - because he knew sam wasn’t dead, and sam’s college dreams weren’t dean’s fault, he didn’t wind up beating dean for it - but i do think it was longer-lasting and in many ways worse to deal with. he basically threw a 4-year temper tantrum that he couldn’t MAKE sam stay. and with one son missing there was just one left to take it out on. again, dean’s abuse is the fault of his abuser, NOT SAM, but no: dean probably did not have a good time while sam was gone.

what’s absolutely twisted about this is that the feeling seems to have been mutual - sometime in those four years, john started letting dean go on hunts by himself. this is explained away in the now-iconic “i’m 26 dude” line but john is such a control freak that it seems unlikely it was a matter of finding dean old enough to have earned his independence. dean could have turned 40 and if john was still alive and hunting yellow eyes he’d still expect dean to go right where he put him. i have a different theory:

dean says in season 14 that john used to send him away from sam when he was angry, so dean associates being split up from them with failure and punishment. it’s very likely that not only was dean NOT happiest when it was just him and john, he was actually SO unhappy that john simply didn’t want to be around him anymore.

hence the incredulous face.

[spn masterpost]

[cordonian-literature]

The Aftermath - Ch. 34

Happy Birthday, Ella

Summary: It’s Eleanor’s 18th birthday

Word Count: ~2.6k

A/N: big time jump! 

A/N 2: ahhh this is the last chapter!! the one before this was sort of a conclusion but in this one is more like... the aftermath of the aftermath, haha. anyway, this was more than difficult to get out, firstly because i absolutely suck at conclusions so if this is terrible, sorry :( and secondly because this is my first fic and i really can’t believe it’s finished! am i crying? maybe... anywayyy, thank you all so much for reading!! i hope you’ve enjoyed this series as much as i’ve enjoyed writing it!! <3

Warnings: mention of character death

*All characters belong to Pixelberry, except those that are unique to my story (I’ve also used some characters and fictional instances from Donna Tartt’s book, “The Goldfinch”)*

Tags:  @captain-kingliamsqueen @gkittylove99​ @lovablegranny @iam-the-kind-and-thoughtful @mom2000aggie @kingliam2019 @queenrileyrose @shanzay44 @cordonianroyalty @hopefulmoonobject @hopelessromanticmonie @twinkle-320 @amandablink @texaskitten30 @pens-girl-87 @ladyangel70 @sanchita012 @cordonianprincess @cordonia-gothqueen @queenwalton @yourmajesty09 @alj4890 @choicesbutterfly 

- Eleanor - 

I sit at the empty desk across from my bed. There is nothing in front of me, but I stare at my neat piles of notebooks and novels: some that Daddyo had recommended to me, others that I had borrowed from his library.

My bedroom door is open. From the hall, I hear the tapping of Roger’s paws and the light thuds of Fabian’s footsteps. The noise of their arrival lightly raises me from my seat and my tired thoughts. I walk out of my room and go after them.

Roger runs away from Fabian with something in his mouth. My little brother giggles as he runs after our dog, struggling to keep up with him. The dog weaves through crowds of servants, making its way towards the front of the palace.

Fabian sighs, frustrated. I put my hand on his shoulder and urge him to continue on with me.

Once we reach the front doors, we see that Roger has stopped running and is having his belly rubbed by Aunt Rowan, while her oldest son, Rowell, races towards my brother.

Rowell and Fabian run off quickly, already in the midst of a game. Lord Maxwell gives me a side hug, holding his and Aunt Rowan’s youngest son to his side.

I hug Aunt Rowan, then give the little babe a kiss on his chubby cheek. I lead them towards the sitting room, where Mama drinks tea with Duchess Hana and Duchess Olivia.

After the adults are all seated, they usher me out of the room. I giggle, saying that there’s nothing they have to hide from me, but I know what they’re planning and agree to leave.

Outside the sitting room, I decide to go look for Gabe and Daddyo, hoping that their meeting with the dignitary was over. I check my watch and see that they should have been done about a half-hour ago, but I know my brother had probably gone on overtime.

He had started taking his duties more seriously as of late, and I know it’s because of the talk Daddyo had with us at Applewood. He had insisted that I come along into town with them and receive the same speech, even though I said I was fine with staying behind.

Gabriel and I had laughed when Daddyo told us that he was the heir and I was the spare. The silly phrase wasn’t the only thing that sent us into a fit of laughter, but it was also a bit of disbelief. My brother and I weren’t naive; we knew what the people of the court had to say about me being a member of the royal family. Daddyo never failed to remind us that their opinions didn’t matter and that I was his daughter no matter what anyone said, but of course, people kept talking.

Sometimes I wanted to argue with him and say that keeping my last name as Blaise — while Gabe’s had been changed to Rys years ago — would keep me from being fully considered his daughter, even though he had officially adopted me when he married my mother.

But I knew such arguments were ones that broke his heart. The smallest change in my behavior made him fear that I no longer considered him my father, which was heartwarming, in a sense, but also depressing. (When I was about twelve, I had thought calling him “Daddyo” was too childish, so like Gabe I called him “Dad.” One morning he pulled me to the side and with the saddest eyes asked me if I was upset with him, or if he had done something to anger me. I laughed it off but went back to calling him “Daddyo” immediately. Though I cringed every time I said it, it was better than upsetting the only man who had ever felt like a true father to me).

And so most of my daily thoughts were now consumed by the anger I had for my biological father — everything he did to my family, and to the nation and people I had come to love — but I was slowly coming to terms with it. Even though I was ashamed of him, I was accepting the fact that he could no longer dictate my life or the lives of those I love.

These past few months marked ten years after the bombing. When my father had died, and Gabe and I had been in the hospital waiting for Mama to get better, I had been childishly angry at him. My last clear memory with my biological father had been reminding him to take pictures of the new exhibit at The Met so I could get a glimpse of what he and my mother would see. He was never able to show me those photos. That is, if he even took any.

But that was a different kind of frustration. One that, if my little brother Fabian expressed, I would sadly laugh at and explain to him the seriousness of the situation.

Theodore’s actions had controlled all of us, even Daddyo, Uncle Drake, Lord Maxwell, and Duchess Hana.

But now we are all in control of our lives again. Uncle Drake and Duchess Olivia had done honorable work with the King’s Guard. Lord Maxwell and Aunt Rowan had married a few months after my parents did, and a year later Duke Rashad married Hana — around the time Fabian was born. Daddyo eventually mended his relationship with Uncle Leo, and every few months his family would come to visit us.

Any person who was a threat, such as Boris — his betrayal was one that broke my childish heart, but not a day passed where I missed him— and Uncle Drake’s ex-fiancée, Jessica, were spending the rest of their lives behind bars.

It had taken our parents a while to tell us everything, and when they finally did, it took even longer for us to come to terms with it all. But Daddyo and Mama never pushed us away when we needed to talk to them.

As I walk up the stairs to Daddyo’s office, I take deep breaths, allowing the concerns to flow out of me. Before I knock on the door, my mind is clear.

I smile to myself as I reach for the handle, memories of our obstacles so far behind us that I feel foolish worrying about them at all.

Inside, Daddyo, Gabe, Fabian, and Rowell are crowded around something on the desk. Everyone turns to face me.

“Is it time for the party?” Rowell asks.

“Shush!” Fabian elbows his friend while Gabe and Daddyo laugh.

Once the boys are done scolding each other, Daddyo asks, “What do you think about eating out for lunch?”

“Same restaurant?” Fabian questions.

“Unless you wish to go someplace else?” 

I shake my head, then link my arm through his. “No, I like that place.”

As we walk out the doors of the palace, we spot Uncle Leo, Aunt Katie, Hunter, and Heather with bags in their hands. Once they see us, they lightly toss those bags back into their limo, and they join us in our car to go eat lunch.

We had eaten in this restaurant on my eighth birthday, which had been only a week after Mama and Daddyo had come back from their honeymoon. My family came here often, and Uncle Leo liked joining us.

We enter the restaurant and see that the place is empty. The menus are put in front of us, and we order without looking at it. Fabian and Rowell talk between themselves, and Heather tells me about their flight, while Uncle Leo asks Gabe how he’s feeling. 

Gabe shakes his head, an amused look on his face. “You know, I thought this would all be overwhelming. I was scared that the pressure would bring the anxiety back, but it didn’t.” 

Uncle Leo pats my brother’s back. “Now tell me about that girl you mentioned in that course you took.” 

Gabe’s face goes red, and he gives a little laugh. Aunt Katie raises her eyebrows, while Daddyo urges him to talk. 

My brother leans back in his seat, the amusement increasing. “I’m think I’m gonna draft a letter to her.”

“Oh?” Aunt Katie takes a sip of her drink.

“I’m planning on asking her to join the next Social Season. That reminds me.” He cuts off and looks towards our father.

But before he can say anything, Uncle Leo goes, “Gabe, go to your dad when you want to know what not to do. Take my advice instead—”

Hunter interrupts him: “You say that like your advice doesn’t backfire on the regular.” 

“Poor soul is speaking from experience,” Heather whispers to me. Daddyo overhears her, and laughs with us. 

We leave as soon as we finish our meal, not considering dessert. The ride back to the palace is filled with smooth conversations and laughs. As the limo stops in front of the entrance, everyone tells me to exit the vehicle first. 

Tentatively, I crawl out the car and make my way up the stairs. Servants open the doors for me, and the entire room is flooded with balloons, decorations, and sweets. 

My mother kisses my cheek, then Daddyo and Gabe wrap me in a hug. Fabian runs off quickly with Rowell.

The rest of my parents’ friends continue giving me birthday wishes, until Fabian finally reemerges with an envelope in his hand. Everyone crowds around me as I open it and take out a thin, rectangular piece of paper. 

“It’s a bookmark!” Fabian cries as I examine it. I turn it over in my hands, feeling the soft edges against my skin. On the other side, there’s a drawing of six stick figures. Fabian puts his finger on the bookmark, and I bring it to his eye level. 

“That’s you with the books since you like reading,” he tells me. “That’s Daddy and Mom since they have the crowns, and Gabe is the one with the smaller crown, and that’s me and Roger, and that’s our home in the background.” I follow his finger as he points to his little drawings. “I know it’s not very good, but I didn’t know what else to get you!” He giggles as I further examine it. 

“No one knew what to get her,” Gabe comments. “Little Miss—” he takes on a high pitched voice— “Oh, you don’t have to get me anything! No, really, I don’t want anything!” 

The room of friends laugh and chuckle at the mocking voice. 

I go through everyone else’s gifts, which are mostly things that I can use, but don’t need and didn’t ask for; like Fabian said, everyone had wanted to get me something, but I was in need of nothing. I know that Uncle Maxwell was more than frustrated when I told him so, and he must have been even more upset when he couldn’t get any hints out of my parents either. His and Aunt Rowan’s present to me are new pointe shoes. 

Duchess Olivia had started giving me more self-defense lessons, so her gift to me is a stiletto knife, along with stiletto shoes.  

Duke Rashad and Duchess Hana give me a pearl necklace: when the Duchess had taught me how to paint, we had made portraits of each other and had illustrated pearls on our pictures. The portrait I had made of his wife was the Duke’s favorite.

Uncle Leo and Hunter give me new paint brushes and a steel paint easel. Heather hands me a cup with a picture of her and I on it — I had given her something similar for her birthday — and Aunt Katie gives me a cute bag.

Uncle Drake gifts me a new pair of skis: last winter and during the Social Season, we had raced down a slope and I had lost both times. “So you can practice a bit more next time we head to Lythikos,” he tells me with a pat on my back.  

Gabriel hands me a heavy box. My arms burn as I make my way towards a table and put it down. Inside are books that are on my to-read list, candies that we had tried and liked on our last family trip to Italy, a bracelet with charms, and gold earrings shaped like a crescent moon. “You didn’t give me any clues for what you wanted, so I just put all of them in there,” my brother says with a shrug. 

Mama and Daddyo’s gift is next. My father wraps me in a large hug, then holds me to his side as servants roll in a new Baroque piano — it was similar to the one I had seen in a museum the last time we visited Applewood. The old one was being wheeled out; I had played it daily in the last few years, both for the entertainment of my family and for important members of the nobility, and even though it was constantly cared for, the strings had started to become dusty. I knew we wouldn’t get rid of it; I was sure that Daddyo had plans to donate it, but again I felt that there was no need for a newer one. We could have just taken more care of the one we had. 

But I don’t complain. I could never complain for this group of people who love me so dearly. I accept hugs from everyone in the room, and then the cake is brought out. The frosting looks like a painting, and is sweetly smooth as we eat it, the icing staining the corners of our mouths. 

We sit and chat about nothing at all, simply enjoying the blissful companionship that came with family and beloved friends. I had told my parents that I didn’t want a big party, and this was exactly what I had in mind. The room is light and joyful: Uncle Maxwell tells jokes while Uncle Drake rolls his eyes, Mama throws her head back, Daddyo’s arm around her while he tries his best not to laugh, and Uncle Leo, Hunter, and Gabe wipe tears from their eyes. 

The rest of the party is spent like that. The irreplaceable friendships that had went from nothing, to everything, to nothing again, then beyond the meaning of intimacy that came with being understood. It fills the rooms of the palace as it has these last ten years. 

I think about the gifts I’ve been given today, wondering where I would put them in my room — except for the piano, which I will leave in the ballroom — and how I will use them. I smile when I remember Gabe’s joke about my refusing presents. 

I don’t think he understands that I didn’t wish for specific objects because I can’t remember the last time I longed for anything, and if I ever did, there was no request that Daddyo wouldn’t strive to fulfill. My life had never felt lonely or without purpose, and I think that means I’ve found happiness. Like everyone in this room.

Daddyo notices that I’ve zoned out a bit. From the corner of my eye I can see the gentle wrinkles on his face and the graying roots of his hair. He leans towards me and plants a kiss on my forehead. “Happy birthday, Ella dear. I love you.” 

I smile at him, then use my fork to steal a bit of icing off his cake. Fabian follows suit, and soon our dad’s cake has no frosting on it. 

The three of us laugh, and with a mouth full of sugar I say, “I love you, too, Daddyo.”

[storybookprincess]

Hello there I hope you're having a nice day!

What is your writing process? I love how you write!

awwww thank you thank you for your kind words!!!!  it means so much that you enjoy my writing!!!!  i’d be happy to share my writing process with you, with a big disclaimer that i’m self taught & that this isn’t the one singular correct way to write by any means.

so my writing process can basically be broken down into 3 major steps: outlining, writing, and revision.  i’ll go into some detail about what each of those steps entails & my personal approach to them.

first, outlining!!!  outlining is incredibly incredibly helpful to me for any fic longer than a few thousand words.  i don’t think i’d be able to write multichaps successfully if i just flew by the seat of my pants without an outline.  when i outline, i break my fics down by chapter and then by scene & write very informal but very detailed notes on what i want to take place in each scene, sometimes down to the individual lines of dialogue spoken in a conversation.  not everyone likes writing outlines this detailed & structured, but it’s enormously helpful to me to get all of my ideas on paper at once so i don’t forget anything.  my outlines often end up being several thousand words for longer projects, but it saves me a ton of time & work & stress in the long run to know what’s happening at every stage of the story.

second, writing!!!  my preferred method of writing is in sprints.  more or less, i set a timer for 20 minutes or so & try to write as much as i possibly can for that time period.  sprints help me for a variety of reasons.  firstly, they help me focus & reach a state of flow.  without sprints, i find it very easy to only half-focus on writing & open up social media every few sentences, goof around for a bit, come back & write a little more, rinse & repeat.  with sprints, on the other hand, i’m entirely focused & immersed in my writing with absolutely no distractions for short bursts of time & it’s a much more efficient and productive way for me to work.  secondly, i think sprints help me be more creative and less inhibited.  knowing that my focus is solely to get as many words on the page as possible in a given time period makes me less focused on perfection and frees me up to just go apeshit in my google doc.  discovering writing sprints was really a game changer for me & made writing much more fun and efficient.

finally, revision!!!  i spend a TON of time revising my fics.  i’d estimate for an average 3-4k chapter, i’m spending anywhere from 2-3 hours total on revision.  while the writing stage is where i just go bonkers vomiting out words, the revision stage is when i’m going in with a very critical eye for what is and isn’t working in a chapter.  i pay a ton of attention to the fluency and syntax of my fics especially.  more or less, i want the writing to flow smoothly and read well & i spend tons of time tinkering with paragraphs to achieve the flow i’m looking for.  at least for me, separating my writing into writing time, where i just get as many words on the page as quickly as possible with no regard for even basic coherency, and editing time, where i focus on cleaning up and revising the story, really helps me to overcome writer’s block.  i don’t need to worry about my first draft being perfect, because i know i’m going to spend a ton of time fixing all my mistakes later.

i realize nothing about this method is particularly revolutionary, but over time, it’s what i’ve learned works for me.  i think writing processes are very personal based on your own personality and methods, so i definitely encourage you to spend some time experimenting with different suggestions to find what ends up working best for you!!!  a lot of this is trial & error, but that’s all part of the learning process!!!!  best of luck & happy writing, my friend!!!! xo

[inventors-fair]

“Surprise Me” commentary: Return to Innocence

Look, I’m not going to lie to you (unless it’s convenient for me or unless you’re about to find the body). Every time we open up a contest, we have preconceived notions about what people will send in and the kind of entries that we want to have. Every judge, all the time, even the ones I’m speaking for who disagree with me and my megalomania. 

For this particular contest? I wanted to get rid of that entirely. I didn’t want to experience what I thought would be surprising, because that destroys that notion entirely, doesn’t it? I wanted something new.

I’d say that for most of you, that came across pretty well. I particularly enjoyed the return to custom mechanics, even if some of them... Well, let’s just talk about them, shall we?

@abzanhero — Simikiel, Due Vengeance

What I like: Well, it certainly feels like a WBR angel in the vein of its predecessors. The RW activation combined with the black drain does feel coherent in a way that I enjoy. Stats are good, wording’s fine. I think that this card is interesting because people will be looking for a way to combo out with this even though land sacrifice like Goblin Trenches will do just fine when the activated ability doesn’t pan out. Desolation (italicize!) is an interesting reverse-Morbid in a way.

What we can improve: I’m not personally invested in this card. I see that you made this for a custom set, but this feels entirely like a Commander card, and reactive abilities might not be what Commanders want. Yes, sometimes it’s about control, and I can see where you’re coming from. It might be the fact that because it’s a control-y card it makes it hard to want to build around as a commander. If you’re intending this for drafting and limited? Well, that’s another story, and I feel I’d have to see the context of the set. Desolation is...weird. There would have to be a lot of noncreature destruction for that, and I don’t exactly know how you’d make that happen without, well, a constructed environment. The card feels at odds with itself.

Baked Beans — Mutagenic Slime

What I like: Firstly, uh, sorry about that namesake? If you have a name you’d rather go by, then you’re free to specify in your submissions. Secondly, there’s a lot to love about this card. It does pretty much everything you would want out of a UG ooze for sure. I think it’s interesting how you retained the mana costs of the card and abilities with color weight.

What we can improve: In short, I got very confused by this card. After some discussion in the modhouse, I was surprised to learn that this actually works fairly well, considering the fact that copy effects are notorious for being frustrating to template correctly, and Mutavault-animation-copying is a whole other weird kettle of fish. I suppose that confusion is my fault, and I initially judged this card too harshly. I honestly don’t know if it needs the first ability, considering holy cow that’s powerful, but the rest of it, honestly? Not as egregious as I thought. I guess this is one of those things where my personal confusion initially got in the way — a lesson for me.

@chungus-supreme — Myriad Sliver

What I like: Well, it’s easy to see where you started and what you like. I think that Slivers were a great first tribe for a lot of people. A callback to the MH Slivers is pretty cool.

What we can improve: There’re a lot of strategies that could possibly use this card, but it feels immensely “win-more” when it comes to Slivers already. Why would this card need to exist? What interactions would it have that Slivers don’t already have with each other and with weird tribal cards? Someone would be happy with this card, but it wouldn’t be Sliver players. Minor note on presentation, too? Reminder text should be italicized following the rules, but I understand limitations on card creators. The lack of flavor text and context is just a little too weird. What possible circumstances could lead the Slivers to learning that they were every creature type? Frankly, what’s the story point? There’s a massive clash between flavor identity and reasonable storytelling.

@corporalotherbear — Pleasure in Pain

What I like: Alternate win-cons are always a nice addition to the game. I can see the sadistic side of black and the “at any cost” combo style that this card seeks to emulate. Personally, too, I’m a fan of conflicting rules text like the trigger and the static on this card. A new player might think they don’t work, and well, that’s just how new players work. And this card isn’t for them, it’s definitely for advanced Johnny players.

What we can improve: I still don’t exactly know how to make this card work. There don’t seem to be that many combos that could work well with it considering the mana cost. Ad Nauseam already does what it does, so that’s something, but I mean, I’d like to see what deck you would make with this card first because frankly, I don’t see it. Paying life doesn’t work if you don’t have life to pay, losing life is hard as heck, the whole shebang. Damage could work? Yeah, either I’m really dumb, or I don’t see the obvious exploitative combo you were envisioning outside of Ad Nauseam. 

@dabudder — Perplexing Pact

What I like: Nice flavor, I think. I don’t know much about Davriel but I can totally see how it works out. It’s appropriately mythic considering how people would treat combat damage and the like, so that’s all well and good. Props for the reminder text, and for what I think is a fairly appropriate use of hybrid.

What we can improve: Where would this card exist? What kind of set would it belong to? I can’t contextualize it outside of just ‘a custom card for custom card’s sake’ and that feels frustrating to me. Ravnica mythic, perhaps? Sure, but what would the rest of the set look like? Could there be two alternate win-con effects i the same set? It’s actually kinda weird that the Guilds block had five across three sets, but still, they were different enough. I also feel that this is pretty easy to exploit with cards like the Pacts, turning this into a four-mana “at the beginning of your upkeep you win the game” effect. Not sure how I feel about that.

@deafeningsandwichpeach — Roaring Stompodon

What I like: This card was almost a runner-up! It’s a fantastic and powerful use of hybrid, it feels like a dinosaur, it’s fast and furious and chompy, and the only real questionable part is the redness of it. Could red get ETB fight like this, is the question? I feel that for this card in the right set that it honestly wouldn’t be too bad. I also feel that that’s more my heart than my head thinking here. I’m a weird control player who also happens to love fast and furious dinosaurs, what can I say.

What we can improve: Hm. Actually, the more I think about it, the more I’m worried. If you take off the “may” on the fight then it’s a little better, but whoo boy, imagining this in RDW with a slightly higher curve than usual? There’s something scary about that. I feel that erring on the side of caution would be best here. As a custom card I love it. I don’t know how printable it would be. Also, flavor text is good but retreading old ground. Consider something sillier, perhaps? Sillier or scarier, either or.

@deg99 — Azor I, Parun

What I like: Yup, it’s a callback to the quintessential Azorius namesake. With the mana cost like that, I can tell that you were shooting for a significant and austere commander for the guild, someone who requires many proper resources.

What we can improve: The problem with a card being quintessential is that everything that it’s doing has been done before. This card does not surprise me in the least. The fact that Azor creates The Immortal Sun on this card is about as expected as can be. Detaining is fine, and the draw is fine, but that’s it; they’re retreading expected ground. The mana cost doesn’t mechanically need the color weight, and as a custom Commander, this card just doesn’t seem fun. I would rather have seen you attempt to make something from the ground-up that was new rather than submit an old design that hasn’t been changed since inception.

@evscfa1 — Scales of Pitiless Justice

What I like: Pretty metal name, pretty rad. 

What we can improve: Let’s...slow down a second.

There doesn’t seem to be a reason for the mana cost to be weighted like that. Without any context for the world, set or flavor, it feels arbitrary.

Speaking of arbitrary, why does this need to have both enchantment and artifact subtypes? I don’t understand how that helps mechanically. 

This card does not need indestructible OR shroud. Full stop. “Bypassing any interaction” is not the same as “difficult to remove.”

Mana burn was removed from the game for a reason. It simply is not fun.

The “if” ability should be a trigger: “Whenever a player draw a card [etc], that player discards that card unless they pay 2 life.”

The last ability should say “casts” instead of “would cast.”

And in the end, I understand your frustrations with green and blue that you might see in your personal playgroup or whatever, and I understand what might be happening in standard and all the junk with that. Godmodding isn’t the answer. This contest was about seeing more of what you love, not destroying what you hate. In that context this card is antithetical to the approach we were hoping for. I would strongly consider putting love into cards that you submit rather than trying to force the pendulum in another direction. 

@fractured-infinity — Sygg, Heir to Mornigtide // Sygg of the Razorfin

What I like: Sygg! Okay, so this is a... I’m envisioning this as a potential Esper DFC mer-legend in a limited return to Lorwyn, which is — aight? Shoot, the thing is, I love each side as they are. With a couple exceptions. I will say that I was both surprised and delighted to see a mythic Syggy-boy.

What we can improve: You have three set-unique abilities on a single DFC, and my friend, that’s confusing as heck. Daybreak and Moonrise just don’t seem like great mechanics, because if you need one and not the other, and you’re stuck on certain places, how are you gonna turn it? If they changed the seasons upon casting, that would be cool, right? What about that? I would maybe keep Aurora or something, and change your set’s mechanics (are you making one?) so that sorcery effects can change whether or not it’s Sunny or Moony on Lorwyn. Keep this idea, just narrow it down. A LOT. 

Small note: “MorNINGtide.” Double-check your spelling. I’ve made that mistake once or a hundred times.

@ghost31415926535 — Piece of Mind

What I like: Well, it’s one way for white to interact with graveyards and the like. My favorite part of this is the flavor text. I don’t know much about Chulane but I do like the prospect of this teller having to forget a painful story from the past.

What we can improve: The first ability doesn’t get rid of replacement effects like Leyline of the Void and Rest in Peace. Honestly, I think for the sake of all custom designers, graveyard hate effect shouldn’t be hated out themselves. It becomes a mechanical arms race. That last ability, though... Nope. Nooooope. That’s insane. Mono-white draw so many cards? Four mana? Even as a one-time effect it’s absolutely bonkers and out of pie. UW mill means that you can draw three new hands by the time this is activated. And, for this contest, I can’t say that I was entirely surprised by this card. It’s doing what so many custom card designers have done before.

@gollumni — Ihren, Master of the Deep

What I like: This feels like one of those cards where it makes sense in-world and then when you put it on a card it’s like “oh, my goodness, is that the story we’re telling?” And I like that aspect! I’m imagining a happy Giant wrangling a squid the size of a bus and loving every second of it. I can say with certainty that I didn’t expect “tentacle farmer archetype” in these submissions.

What we can improve: But it’s so, so much of a “win-more” again. You get sea monsters with your giants, and then giants with your sea monsters? To what end? What’s the point of casting all these massive creatures that require you to have more massive creatures, when just the massive creatures alone could win you the game? Quest for Ula’s Temple was awesome because for one mana you were eventually able to summon the giant monsters. This card, well, it’s big for big’s sake.

@haru-n-harkel — Ozalii, Apex of Evolution

What I like: I can fully say that I didn’t expect a mutate card for this contest. Did people like mutate? I can tell one of you did! Five-color true mutate legend, yeah, that’s a niche that could have used a spot. Y’know what, props, credit where credit’s due. I like the concept.

What we can improve: I feel that the abilities should say “this creature” instead of the name, right? Isn’t that how all mutate cards work? This may just be me being lukewarm on mutate for this whole thing, honestly. Past that, I understand that this card is good, but Mutate was just so parasitic. I don’t know, this may be one of those unfortunate biases. So don’t take this the wrong way, and please do put this in a custom Mutate-filled cube if you have it. 

@ignorantturtlegaming — O’Jaru, Kavu Arisen

What I like: You and Kavu. Meme all I want, but yep, that’s a kind of gaming love I can get behind. It’s a big creature, it’s a beast, it’s powerful, it’s got a strong cost, and Panharmonicon on a creature? Oh lord. OH LORD. This would be an intensely powerful commander for that alone.

What we can improve: ...except for the fact that it triggers itself. It’ll be on the battlefield, so, well, you’ll have to return four other creatures if you want this thing to stick. Hate to say it, but that’s a massive drawback, so massive that I don’t know if it would really stick. However, this is an easy fix. All you need to do is change “If a permanent” to “If another permanent” in that first part. Solved!

@macaroni-and-squeez — The Breathing Past

What I like: I can absolutely commend you for trying something new. This feels like a card where a lot of background understanding is needed, and that’s not always a bad thing.

What we can improve: That doesn’t change the fact that I don’t understand the process behind this card’s creation. In short, I don’t know why sagas and creatures should be combined aside from the fact that it’s new, and that doesn’t feel like a great precedent. The card would have worked fine as a saga (ish) and actually great as a horror. But both makes it feel messy and unintuitive. What story is being told? I don’t know. What kind of character/incarnation is this legend? I still don’t know. Clarify, simplify, and revise.

@milkandraspberry —  Importation étrangère

Silver-border is not the problem here. I don’t speak French. Was that the joke? What possible set would this card appear in, and why? I think based on this card alone, cards with non-English rules text are hereby not eligible for submission from this point forward. There may be a joke, but it wasn’t even explained in the submission, so I don’t really know what I’m supposed to do here. Google Translate? To what end? If the gist of the card is that it’s supposed to not be understood, then that’s a sign already that you should consider revising your idea. Most importantly, the judges can’t give you fair critique, and that’s not fair to you either.

@misterstingyjack — Slobad, Selfless Scrapper

What I like: Planeswalker iterations are always cool. Thank you for explaining the story to me, because I think that I vaguely remembered the name but couldn’t remember the context. And man, this is an interesting card. Red artifact/planeswalker matters planeswalker? It’s narrow, but shoot, it also feels appropriate for rare. I think I’m warming up to this kind of specific concept more than I was originally. 

What we can improve: Still, he doesn’t exactly feel like a planeswalker and more like a new card type entirely. ... Maybe that isn’t a bad thing. Maybe this new design space could be way more interesting than I’m giving credit for. I would have to see what the environment looked like, because wow, this would have to be balanced properly, else we end up with War of the Spark Horizon Masters of Mirrodin broken. For wording: Second ability could just be ‘Create a _ for each walker you control’ and the last one honestly could just be “Move all loyalty counters from Slobad onto another target planeswalker you control.” A little more busted, but let’s be real, more flexible as well. Who says he has to give up his spark for a specific dude? Besides the story. 

@naban-dean-of-irritation — Darksteel Experiment

What I like: Yeah, I can see the problem you’re trying to solve and how you’re trying to solve it. Gotta make something as unkillable as possible, right? It’s the “anything-proof-shield” on the playground of custom MTG design. Making it Darksteel is a great callback, and the flavor text is pretty fun so I’ll give you that.

What we can improve: I’ve played a lot of Magic, and I know that getting things killed can suck. But the game is one of interaction. There are answers to everything but you have to draw them. The card specifically and maybe this specific wording (if it works in the rules, I’ll have to lawyer it) might not have been made before, but the concept? It’s been around since Magic’s existence, to the first frustration of getting a Savannah Lions Lightning Bolt-ed. When the gameplay stops being a conversation, there is no longer gameplay. Trying to find answers to that shouldn’t be what we’re looking for.

@nicolbolas96 — Abyssal Pact

What I like: You know, Mr. Shiny actually made a vaguely-in-the-same-vein card that was almost going to be an example. Well, it involved sacrifice, anyway. But the point is, yeah, same kind of interesting design space. I love winning with no cards in a library, I’ll say that much. For a legendary enchantment, a “pact” is probably as appropriate as you can get without being an object or curse or specific story moment. Interesting flavor, too! Well-conceptualized.

What we can improve: My good fellow this card breaks the game in about a trillion different ways. Treasures become 40-80+ mana. Grimgrin becomes massive. Any card that says “Sacrifice X: Draw a card” becomes an instant and I think uninterruptable win, of which there are four in this card’s colors alone. If it was, like, “the first time” instead? Or something? I don’t know, there’s a LOT to take into consideration, but the gist is: this card is a broken infinite combo waiting to happen. Maybe you intended that. If that’s the case, then shame on you but I respect it. Sort of.

@nine-effing-hells — Evolutionary Explosion

What I like: This was so close to being a winner if it wasn’t really, REALLY darn too powerful. If you have an army of 1/1 tokens, this card becomes incrementally more amazing. Is that a bad thing? I mean, I love the concept, I love the math, I love that you’re doing new things with how to make a cool mythic Overrun sorcery.

What we can improve: But we gotta compare to cards like Wild Onslaught, which is eight mana for what this card can do for sometimes half that cost. It really can just make the late game a little too ridiculous. I wish I could love it more, and I think that as an uncommon that targets a single creature it can be an amazing powerful blowout. This? Too much for a variable X cost. 

Also, I sent a PM tp the Denver museum and they’re checking with their team for the proper artist credit and once they respond in a few days I’m gonna smack ya for improper artist credit. (Not really that last part, but I did message out of curiosity. That mural is dope.)

@ouroboros-breaker — Tibalt, Rakdos Insurgent

What I like: Rakdos Tibalt has been something people have been asking for for a while now, and as a fan, I hope that we can see more of him in the future. I can see that you liked the character’s chaotic nature and the way that he engages with you, plus the double-edged sword aspects of it all. There’s a lot of cleverness behind your process.

What we can improve: That doesn’t change the fact that the second and third abilities are reeeeally pushing what’s reasonable for an acceptable risk. Yeah, it’s neat for there to be some risk involved, but the possibility of -3 and losing three permanents is way too rough. Rakdos at least absolutely saved himself during coin flips and whatnot. The last ability, the emblem? I wish I liked it more. I feel that it could have been a -5 for something like a Hellrider effect: “whenever a creature you control attacks, it deals 1 damage to any target” or something. Then, maybe there could have been tokens made, like Tibalt’s WAR card, and, well, the boy might be more playable. I feel that symmetrical emblems aren’t great to have. In short, don’t be afraid to make cards, especially planeswalkers, a couple degrees more helpful.

@partlycloudy-partlyfuckoff — Progeny of Immolation

What I like: I think that Emerge was a fantastic mechanic, and I’m happy to see it again. Eldrazi Hellion is a great creature type combo, and as a fan of Eldritch Moon this card is hitting some nice parts for me.

What we can improve: The big challenge is whether or not it’s okay for this card to effectively deal up to 11 colorless damage in something like limited. If you’re running a red deck, you can get this out early and have a fine enough red source in-pie, but even if you’re running something like a blue-white control deck you can ramp up to eleven mana and halve someone’s life total. I’ll say that yes, the Eldrazi all from EM all could be cast like this, but the off-color effects were never quite pushed to eleven damage. I fear development issues. Keep in mind what may or may not be appropriate for your costs. 

@real-aspen-hours — Instant Pot Chicken and Rice

What I like: This is at its core an affordable, easy, nutritious meal that provides a fair amount of food for relatively cheap cost. Instant rice and chicken breasts aren’t hard to come by, and another great part of this meal is the fact that it’s fairly universal. If someone’s vegetarian, you don’t have great options, but that’s not gonna come up as much as long as you have people who understand what it means to eat affordable. The Instant Pot is a great addition to any kitchen as well.

What we can improve: Tomatoes are fantastic for flavor, but what else is there? I’m missing out on a lot of the herbs and spices that could turn this into a real meal. Adding additional liquid plus things like white onions, garlic, carrots, etc. would turn this from “edible” to “exquisite.” Consider thyme and basil, but also think about different flavors like Teriyaki or sriracha for more stand-out returns. I wonder how chicken chili would go? But that would be a fundamental shift, so that’s more conjecture than anything else.

As an aside, this did bring a smile to my face. However, I hate to say, this is a Magic: the Gathering blog, and I am not a cook. I have to ask that we stick to cards for the future. Still — this is our one and only consolation prize for doin’ your own thang.

@reaperfromtheabyss — Maelstrom Vale

What I like: Hnnnng cascade. This is one of those cards that I friggin’ love because I grew up on cascade, before I knew just how broken it was as a mechanic. I think that in limited and constructed, this card can be played in any deck, and I dunno how to feel about that at second glance. Five-color commander and casual play? Heck yes, this is so much fun. I love these kinds of cards.

What we can improve: Five mana giving practically any spell cascade is...busted, especially in limited. If I had had this last night at FNM, I would have swept so hard. 3-5 drops into multiple creatures and answers? Good lord. If it was 7 to activate, it would be balanced. As it is, might be too far. Small note: this flavor text would be 100% better if you didn’t have that silly attribution. Seriously, it was epic and cool and meaningful until the last part. Sometimes established things work well.

@rustyguacamole — Uth, the Impermeable

What I like: Self-mill with a cool white upside makes this card a welcome addition to some of the other Abzan reanimator builds. I like how you worked off of those to make an interesting fungal commander. I feel that it could even be part of a core set legend if it were mythic.

What we can improve: The “you may play cards from your graveyard” definitely needed a “this turn” at the end of it. And I mean, Yawgmoth’s Will remains an impossibly powerful card to this day. A repeatable version of that seems way too strong at first glance. You could do it at the end of someone’s turn too and then next turn fill that stuff back up. Also, for that reminder text... If you activate it twice in a turn, wouldn’t the second resolution then exile those cards if it already resolved once? That doesn’t feel great. I don’t know, I still don’t think that repeatable Will is a good idea. And small note, the biggest exilers, Leyleine of the Void and Rest in Peace, are replacement effects and would get around that first ability. It really, really, really isn’t a battle worth fighting.

@scavenger98 — Watched of Fanged Winds

What I like: “Wolf creatures you control have flying.” WHAT. I was kinda blown away by that when I first read it, I’ll be honest. Working with, uh, I suppose Bant wolves? Could make for some crazy stuff. The token-making isn’t impossible but it’s a work-around, and I think that I can think of a couple ways to get infinite wolves but they’re all crazy combos and aren’t really broken in any format. That’s not a bad thing! I do like combos when they’re hard to get off. Aura Shards/Lumengrid Sentinel + Ornithopter/Memnite + Watcher comes to mind. See, that sounds fun!

What we can improve: There’s...not much to improve, honestly. I think the gist of my complaints is that I don’t get flavorfully why wolves can fly. Is the spirit giving it to them through some weird magic? What are the Fanged Winds? Sometimes in Magic, there are mechanical interactions that don’t make flavorful sense, but a card has to have internal flavor consistency, and I’m still not sure about that. Mechanically I’m in love.

ShakesZX — Woodland Gratifier

What I like: This is indeed a new version of something that exists but hasn’t seen print in quite this way. That’s pretty much what we were after! It’s a powerful elf effect, and as we speak, someone’s eyeing Gaea’s Cradle and salivating. 

What we can improve: This definitely needs to be a replacement effect, see Mana Reflection. That’s an easy fix, though. This submission feels...strange without any flavor behind it. As a draft, sure, this is great. Presentation is iffy. I would have liked there to be flavor text for certain. There’s not really much to say about this card without that. I love the effect, but that’s where things stop. Also, uh, I’m either a terrible person or the word “gratifier” is giving some unintentional innuendo. I may have just spent too long on the internet.

@shootingstarhunter — Jack-In-The-Box

What I like: Knowledge Pool was a fantastic card, and this feels like a callback to that and then some. The change from libraries to the battlefield makes this card really fun to play around with as a kind of boardwipe, and for seven colorless mana there’s a lot of decks that could love this. Playing it then sacrificing with the trigger on the stack? Yike-a-rooni. I’d love to play that. I might also be evil.

What we can improve: But that’s another problem. Do you want permanent exile like that? If that’s your intention, I applaud it. I don’t necessarily like how you’re not the first person to get a present from the box, but that’s a necessary evil, I think. Like Omen Machine. My mechanical suggestion would be to CAST the cards from exile for additional synergy, and to word it so that the boxes are completely optional or completely mandatory. Secondly, the name. Why is a children’s toy exiling all permanents? That’s a major effect, something like an obelisk or a maze, not, well, a box. I would edit the flavor a little bit to reflect a world-breaking effect. Magical portal, woo!

@snugz — Disab, Lord of the Seven Seas

What I like: I imagine if this were come sort of commander it could come with little teardrop cutouts that you could scatter on different permanents or whatever, special flood counters. As a limited card, I think that it’s excellent, and as a constructed card it’s, well, still excellent. It’s a lot to put into a card but you get some awesome control out of it and beef up your pirate to the nth degree. I like how it doesn’t perma-change Islands, although man, there’s some fun combo shenanigans to be had there, I’m sure. Pretty great pirate-y flavor, too.

What we can improve: You know, I don’t have any comments on ways to improve this card. I’ll say that it’s the closest thing that could see print out of most of these submissions, and maybe, well, that’s the problem. It feels almost safe. It’s such a great normal card that it’s not grabbing me by the briney beard and showing me the lost skeleton treasure of Boney Jim. That’s more of an indictment on the contest than it is you or the card, so consider this an apology for having uproariously high expectations for weirdness while at the same time throwing the weirdest submissions under the bus.

@socialpoison — Forget-Me-Not

What I like: You submitted some really cool backstory for this card, and I appreciate the amount of work that you’ve put into this idea. I think that Aetherborn on another plane could work really well with what you have in mind. This card allowing for the self-mill-return is powerful without being, like, Kethis broken. I think you found an interesting balance. Green is a nice choice for the people who would want to make this a commander.

What we can improve: Phasing is one of those mechanics I think I’ll personally never like, but that’s just me. This card itself works with that well, although it hasn’t sold me. I don’t really get the timing of phasing having not grown up with it, but you know, I might have misinterpreted this card and right now I’m thinking about card advantage and realizing that oh my goodness, uh, this card really is a mythic. It’s got card advantage out the butt. Is that too powerful? Well, no, but this may give rise to a control archetype. I think this requires a lot of playtesting. In short, this card is good, but it’s not for me, and that’s no fault of yours. My one critique in an area that I’m actually versed in: I don’t really like the name, cutesy as it is. In-story it could work, but it’s also an idiom of sorts, and that doesn’t feel very legendary to me personally.

@teaxch — Trium, the Strongest Shape

What I like: Alright, this is one of those cards, I’ll admit, I started brewing with it when I saw it. Forgetting the vigilance and haste, there was the draw and the build-around of three-mana 3/3s in these commander colors, of which there are over a hundred. You got Resplendent Angel, Dauntless Escort, Bastion Protector, Verge Rangers... And that’s not counting tokens like Garruk’s beasts. Man. There’s a lot of crazy fun stuff to do with this card, and a fun design space for a meme commander.

What we can improve: Did I say “meme commander?” Good, just checking. It’s a damn triangle. I know they did a legendary Wall, but people were asking for memes before they knew what they were getting into. I love the way this card works mechanically. I’m not going to give any more kudos than necessary to a triangle. (I hope this isn’t too mean, I really do like the design.)

@thedirtside — Master Craftsman

What I like: The more I read/think over this card, the more I kind of appreciate it. It’s a nice casual build-around-me artifact mythic that’s just asking for fun budget stuff. Maybe it’s broken in some builds, but frankly, I don’t see it. I really like how you brought together all the different artifact types and archetypes in one kind of build. This is definitely a Horizons type of card, and you know, for this, that’s not a bad thing.

What we can improve: This card feels pretty cramped for space, and even then, there needs to be a little more. Most of my qualms are about presentation. There need to be commas after all the mana symbols but before the tap symbols. The black ability needs to say “two” instead of 2. The red ability needs to say “Master Craftsman deals 3 damage to any target.” All damage needs a source. And get rid of the flavor text for this one, five abilities fills it up too much already. In terms of surprise, I think after rereading and going through this contest I found myself enjoying this card after all. Just gotta clean up a bit.

@walker-of-the-yellow-path — Time Rift Tactics

What I like: I like this card a lot. The multicolored suspend is pretty interesting considering time shenanigans and blue’s flavor, and even for six mana getting those four tokens is pretty powerful. I wouldn’t say that it’s first-pickable, but it’s definitely great. I’m a fan of the flavor wherein a bunch of soldiers or some general came up with an attack strategy that involved sending soldiers through time and space.

What we can improve: Again, mostly presentation and numeric issues. Suspend definitely needs reminder text, especially for a common, and with the proper em-dashes. Each instance of “4″ should be “four” as well. And the thing is, if you have the blue mana, you can play this in a nonwhite deck for no downside, and I honestly think that that breaks the pie. A cheaper alternate casting cost might prevent it from commander play, but this card was never going to be in commander to begin with, and mono-blue access to this isn’t what blue gets to have.

@wolkemesser — Untapped Potential

What I like: Unique tokens are pretty cool. I like the strangeness of it all, and I think that there’s definitely some ways to make this card really powerful. In colors that can populate, I imagine that there’s a lot of ways to get some crazy draw engines working. I think in the workshop there were a couple people who really liked your work on the flavor text as well.

What we can improve: I wasn’t altogether grabbed by the end result of the token. So, you get a big creature and can see everyone’s hands, but then what? Each player’s token basically becomes a big creature that you’re fighting to get bigger and work with that, discouraging you from casting spells from your hand, and I don’t think I’m a big fan of that. In the end this card makes a cool token but there’s no synergy or movement beyond that, and that’s what’s not lighting my fire. Small notes: “Avatar” should be capitalized, and the two abilities of P/T and “Everyone plays with hands revealed” need to be two separate quotation marks, see Pursued Whale.

Good lord, finally done. Thank you all for your submissions. Tune in tomorrow, when we make history! Or something! We make history every day, don’t we.

-@abelzumi

[seatownpublishing]

oops I wrote a lot

I read a prompt today asking which character is most like oneself. Obviously, there is some of every author in their characters. In a way all of the characters in Foxgloves are different aspects of me. Marcus is myself healing from trauma, Ashby is the same but in a way he’s a tribute to my dad’s best qualities, Nanette is my sort of ideal wife/mother self or at least the “how I nurture others” self, and Jane is me as a child, the least developed character. Ironically, the child character was how I was telling the story, from her perspective, and then one day I was talking to a former friend (we used to hang out at coffee shops a lot) how I decided not to write from a child’s perspective for two main reasons and several sub-reasons. Firstly, because I was identifying more with who is now my central character, Marcus. Originally, I didn’t write him as having PTSD largely because I started the tale from the little girl’s perspective but more importantly it was because I was yet unaware that I had PTSD. Once my own mental health was clarified and it dawned on me why I identified so much with stories about WWI-vet’s shell-shock I started to realize that I should write from the perspective of Marcus but in third person. My second reason for switching was because I realized that I could no longer write from the perspective of a child. Initially I thought this was just because I was now an “adult” and could no longer connect with the magic and innocence of childhood. Over time of course I made the horrifying discovery that I was made to be an adult most of my youth and therefore my childhood was essentially the existence of an adult in the body of a child. Being truly carefree was something that stopped for me after the age of about four. Attempting to do inner child work the list made me burst into tears and that was just on the first prompt. While this was after I had made the decision to switch perspectives, these new and heartbreaking realizations helped me figure out what I needed to change in the story, how I could write the child better, and why is was  important that I had made the change to Marcus. In order to make a more compelling story it couldn’t just be a made up story about a childhood experience that I had never actually gone through, it had to be the visceral reality of my current experience of a damaged adult. However, I am not sacrificing my little girl character. Originally I named her Foxglove, but, like my first draft it was too contrived and kitschy. So I named her after me, her middle name. Other than inner child work and going through old memories of experiences of positive past, working with my 12-year-old student has also given me an idea of a child’s perspective again. What did I think when I was 12? I can’t completely remember, but I do recall my memories of the beach I’m writing about when I was nine. Ironically, my student’s name in Sanskrit “literally means flowered, blossomed, fully developed and completely manifested.” For a character and their story to work, neither can be undeveloped. I have to completely manifest what my story means - no more hiding behind the third draft of the same half a chapter I wrote five years ago. When I first wrote about one particular experience there for a creative writing class assignment about a decade ago, November 2010, I was mostly happy with the story but I knew it wasn’t quite write. My teacher at the time, one of the greatest professors I have ever worked with, said two things to me in his notes. One, “You have an eye for landscapes that most people your age don’t have” and two, “I don’t feel like the story is finished yet.” He was a gifted teacher. Both statements were some of the most important feedback I have ever gotten in my entire life. Obviously, it was awesome to get such a wonderful compliment and it gave me the impetus to keep working at landscape writing, but more importantly it told me an uncomfortable truth that I knew even then was an absolute gift. The story wasn’t finished then. It was a memoir format but it still fed into my novel and I used the incident I had on the beach in the plot. It was perfect. That assignment, that memory, that story, the idea of this novel, was not finished. Now I am slowly pulling it closed like an open wound because now I know what I was trying to write. So the story is me, every character has some of me in it, and the process of writing this particular story is coming together after all these years.