#i haven't published anything in like 2 years but i have a deep love for fucked up women so i think it balances out

[gootarts]

imposter roundabout | 4.6k words | G rating | Mizuki & Bibi 

If there was a single set of words that properly described how Mizuki Date felt about those weird company parties that Lemniscate hosts, she'd probably settle on something along the lines of ‘strong dislike’ on a normal day. On a bad day, however, her mind would immediately make a beeline to the words all-consuming hatred. Yeah, sure, Renju used to host those things in order to get all buddy-buddy with the likes of So, but just because some rich weirdoes wanted to rent Sunfish for an hour for a fancy dinner party didn’t mean she was going to show up.

The only reason that her bike was being parked outside Sunfish in the first place was a verifiable siege of pleading from Iris, saying that there’s going to be some bigwig or other who worked as management for one of her favorite streamers, and if she please please please came over, there’d be a really good chance of snagging a collab with her. Mizuki was many things—genetically modified, cranky, tired—but she wasn’t a monster. So here she was, putting around in the dark outside Sunfish Pocket trying to find a parking spot for her bike.

finished aini this week and made a joke to a friend about how bibi would 100% dress up as mizuki to take advantage of free catering at lemniscate parties given how there’s flavor text about her eating garbage. this instantly raptured me to a fourth dimension and less than a week later this was on my hard drive. if you read it here and reblog and/or comment i will do my best to come up with more completely deranged rat fic for you. this is a promise

[ddejavvu]

I would run to you - opposite attract eddie munson (kinda like hopeless romantic book lover )

Also congratulations mei i love ur new theme and it looks really great

come celebrate 5.7k with me! - thank you so much!! i'm glad you like it, i do too :D

Book Club - Eddie Munson x Reader

Summary: Eddie doesn't expect to see you in the fantasy section at the Hawkins library. He has to take his chance while he has it, even if it means telling a little white lie that you're far too interested in.

feedback is greatly appreciated! comment, reblog, talk in the tags, send me a message, tell me what you think!

Contrary to popular belief, Eddie Munson visits the library on a regular basis. He frequents the deep fantasy section, and even if he'll never admit it, he has a carefully planned out thought process as to which novel he'll bring home next.

It's a little checklist, the components measured being:

1.) Time since last return: has it been sitting there forever? Could he risk not taking it home right away? Or could he put it out of its misery?

2.) Time since arrival: is it a new book? Is he going to die without the knowledge it contains? Or can he let the hype around it die down?

3.) Previous affiliations: Is it a sequel to a book he really liked? Is it a prequel to a book he's never read? Will he be confused without reading another book first?

Sometimes, though, he just has to go with his gut. And his gut is currently telling him that he needs the book he'd passed up last week, a recently published deep fantasy novel heavily circling around dragons. He's loved dragons for years, since the moment he caught a saturday morning cartoon about their adventures around a fantasy realm. He turns the corner into the shelves where he knows the book is sitting, a confident spring in his step as the leather of his jacket bounces against his chest. He stops dead in his tracks, though, when he sees a very familiar cover, the book splayed open in your hands as you flipped through the pages.

You hear the commotion he makes by strutting in, the near-silent library watching as he makes his entrance. You step back against the shelves behind you, nodding apologetically to the shelf you were just standing in front of, "Sorry. Go ahead."

He's bewildered. He's never seen anyone else in the fantasy section before, he knows that there must be fans in Hawkins because sometimes the books get checked out, but he'd have assumed they were younger kids just getting into their first fantasy novel because there was a wizard on the cover. Not incredibly pretty people like you. And not to mention your age, you seem to be about his own, if only a year or two younger.

He finally lets a sheepish smile cross his face, "You're fine. I, uh, I was going for that one." He gestures to the book in your hands and your eyes widen, your fingers slipping out from between the pages as you snap it shut.

"Sorry! Sorry, I.. I haven't really read anything like this before," You hold the book out for him, "I was just curious. You can take it!"

"No, no, it's okay." Suddenly the burning desire for the book in your hands is gone, the cover looking much more suited in your hands than it would in his own, "You can read it. It's your first fantasy novel, I'd be a dick to take it from you."

You seem suspicious of his generosity, still extending the book towards him. He ducks for another book on the shelf, a title further down on his list, but still present, "I'll take this one. Been meaning to read it for ages."

"Are you sure?" You finally question him, and he nods vigorously, his hair bouncing wildly around his head.

"Under one condition, though." He takes the leap of faith, something funny twisting in his tummy at the sparkling curiosity in your eyes as you nod.

"You read a few of my recommendations."

You cock your head to the side at his offer and he steps forward, plucking a book off of the shelf.

"This one," He starts, "Is super good. Lots of worldbuilding, great character development." He tucks the thin book between his middle and pointer finger, using his thumb to pinch another in his grip, "And this one is more focused on mythical creatures," He hands them both to you, "It's a really good book for getting into fantasy."

You take them both with wide eyes, hooked on every word of Eddie's fantasy elevator pitch. He snatches one last book from the shelves, a personal favorite of his, "And this one's the best by far. It's the whole package, and it's got great battle scenes."

You have the books clutched to your chest and he realizes that if you rearrange them one will fall, so he keeps it in his hands, "If you wanna check 'em out, I can help you to the counter."

You deliberate for only a moment, then you nod once, "Thank you. You're.. you're Eddie, right?"

He should be stunned that you know his name, but something sinks in his chest as he realizes it's probably due to his not-so-great reputation around town. But he plays it off, nodding as his grin curves up to expose a glimmer of his teeth, "That's me."

"Thank you, Eddie." You offer him the first smile of what will be many, the sight warming his heart and bringing a flush to his cheeks, "I didn't know you were a big reader."

He struggles to make himself sound cooler, hellbent on impressing you instead of admitting that he hangs upside-down off of his bed with a book bent in half in his hands, "Um, yeah. I've got a.. book club."

He does not have a book club.

"A book club?" Your eyes shine, "Can I join?"

You cannot join his book club. He does not have a book club.

"Of course you can!" He smiles forcibly at you, though the expression melts into a genuine gooey one as your face lights up, "If you give me your number, I can call you before the next meeting."

"I don't have a pen or paper," You lament, "I'll see if the front desk-"

"No, no." Eddie waves you off, taking the books carefully from your grasp and tucking them under one arm, "Here. I've got a sharpie."

He plucks the permanent marker out of his pocket, handing it proudly over to you. He silently thanks his doodling habit for keeping him prepared.

"I still don't have paper." You laugh awkwardly, but he holds out the hem of his denim vest.

"Here, sweetheart." The pet name rolls easily off of his tongue, but doesn't seem as mindless as it usually does, bringing a momentary flush to your cheeks, "Just sign it there."

"But that's- this is permanent." You remind him, as if that hadn't been the reason for the suggestion, "It won't wash out."

"Then I'll remember you forever." He grins cheekily at you, still brandishing the denim towards you, "C'mon. Digits, babe."

You seem flustered speechless at his bold words, but it shocks you into compliance, and you scribble your number onto the grungy jacket. He watches your tongue poke out of your mouth in concentration with an adoring twinge in his eyes, not bothering to break the gaze when you step back and notice it.

'Perfect." He takes back the sharpie that you hand him, then carefully deposits the books back into your grasp, "Now come on, I'll walk you to the front. 'Gotta make sure you don't chicken out on me." He's teasing, but something deep down inside of him is truly concerned that maybe he'd been too forward, that maybe you were just being nice about his fantasy fixation and that you'd put the books back altogether once you were out of his sight.

He watches you check out the books with growing amusement, incredulity at your follow-through warming his chest and making his heart thump. Then he remembers his blatant lie, panic clawing at his lungs as his smile drops.

He needs to start a book club.

[thirteenemeraldcats]

Answer the questions and tag five fanfiction authors you know!

tagged by the terrifyingly talented @kvetchinglyneurotic and the impossibly incredible @sighonaraa

1. How many fandoms have you written in?

One! Uno! Eins! All of the ridiculously emotionally evocative writers in the Ted Lasso fandom completely broke my brain and launched me into the undiscovered country (fic writing).

2. How many years have you been writing fanfiction?

Since January, so about .3 years 🤗

3. Do you read or write more fanfiction?

Definitely read. I am perpetually mentally exhausted in my free time and usually can't concentrate enough to write. That being said I also haven't had much time to READ fic lately. So. Help???

4. What is one way you've improved as a writer?

Hmmmm. I'd say embracing the draft process? When I started writing fic (OH SO LONG AGO I KNOW) I was very 'this needs to be good' and now I'm appreciating the 'this needs to be FUNCTIONAL' mindset more.

5. What's the weirdest topic you researched for a writing project?

Definitely not weird BUT I did accidentally fall down a research spiral for ONE WORD in 'i learned to walk while he was away'. For context: I am not Jewish, but I head-canon Roy as Jewish and there is ONE LINE that references this in that fic. I wanted to double check if there was any significance to the different spellings of Hanukkah, lest I accidentally step on a cultural landmine. Cut to a day later where I'd fallen deep, deep down an equally enjoyable and educational rabbit hole about Jewish holidays, (fostered my ongoing vendetta against the English language,) and found a Jewish bakery that's local to me because I wanted to try Challah very badly. (It was great.) (There is not a large Jewish population where I live [in case that wasn't obvious] I'm blaming my now-semi-remedied culture blindness on that. But Em, you took an elective on world religion in University? SHUT UP I KNOW.)

6. What's your favourite type of comment to receive on your work?

ANY COMMENT. I made an ao3 account last year because I wanted to not lurk quite so much, stop being a 'consumer' of fan-creations, and LEAVE SOME COMMENTS. And I'd seen authors talk about how great getting them was but holy guacamole nothing could have prepared me for the feeling of people liking something I wrote enough to leave a comment or a heart or an 'ah'.

7. What's the most fringe trope/topic you write about?

Errrrrrrr. I guess just gen-fic? Looking at the numbers of ship-fic in the archive, it certainly feels fringe-esque to write gen.

8. What is the hardest type of story for you to write?

I was going to say 'short' because things just keep happening when I try to write succinct outlines (somehow NONE OF THOSE 'THINGS' ARE PLOT), but after applying a bit more scrutiny to anything I've ever written; it's action. Fast-paced action. I don't know her.

9. What is the easiest type?

Assorted emotional whacks! When I was writing original fiction a solid decade ago as a teen-bean I favoured physical-whump, me now has found it a lot easier to write emotional-whump. Not sure why??? But here we are. (Either way someone's suffering.)

10. Where do you do your writing? What platform? When?

Okay this is actually a very involved story that I might tell later, but I just changed what platform I was using. SO! As of about a week ago I've been writing on google docs. Beyond that, it's a laptop/couch combo whenever I have the brain power (which is almost never 😭).

11. What is something you've been too nervous/intimidated to write, but would love to write one day?

OOOF. There are a few wips in the assorted-mountainous-pile of non-active development that are. Heavy. Heavier than the various fics/wips I've published/am actively poking at. I'd like to write them one day but I am also very 'hmm' when I look at them.

12. What made you choose your username?

So 'Em' is a real-life nickname, smash that together with my love of the colour green and tada! You get 'emerald'. 'Cats' is about... cats. I am obsessed with the little creatures, despite never owning one. (Initially I spelt it as 'kat'- no idea why??? I think I just like the letter 'k'???? Potassium?????????? B A N A N A???????????????) And 'thirteen' is my favourite number, just because I find the concept of a number being considered 'unlucky' hysterical and the idea that some airlines genuinely leave out a row thirteen because of superstition always makes me grin like an idiot. The order is purely because I like the image of a bunch of green cats running around together.

I have done a quick investigation and everyone I know has either already done this or already been tagged. (I have once again shown up two days late with iced-coffee to a tag-game. [At least I showed up, I forgot to do like three of these things despite loving them, I'M SORRY 😭])

If anyone sees this and they HAVEN'T been tagged, consider this your green-for-go flag and feel free to tag me as your tagger.

[astralartefact]

Right, I forgot to post something about Reincarnation ending for real yesterday, so. uhh. what pseudo-deep thing do I have to say about all of this...

Reincarnation is allowed to end and its contents are allowed to be ""inaccessible""* and everyone involved in its production knew it was going to end like this from the start even if they likely thought it wouldn't end quite this abruptly.

Yesterday Matsukawa literally said on Twitter that one of the first things Yoko Taro told him was to keep all the design work they did in consistent structures so they could easily publish them afterwards, they knew, they're not as stupid and helpless to corporate greed as some of you seem to think they are.

*heavy air quotes here because it's not inaccessible, there are at least three seperate fan projects documenting its content and even all of the in-game data has been publicly archived by fans - how much more accessible do you want an online game to be after it ends???

I know we love to complain about live services because that's a buzzword to do with capitalism (which is indeed bad) but like. It being inherently impermanent isn't what makes it bad. Theater plays are inherently impermanent and I have yet to see someone complain that Theaters still perform plays seasonally and then change what they're playing. What if I couldn't see Faust 1 last year and this year they're only playing Faust 2??? i dont think faust is a theatre play

Video Game Archiving is weird because yes, there's basically no downside to keeping something accessible forever aside from cost - and yet to me it has kind of started to become a little bit like hoarding in the fear that you might need it eventually. Like sure, why not store a video game in perpetuity if you could, someone in the future might want to look back on it after all - but like. Do you really need to be able to play a video game to do that, to understand what it tried to do and how it executed on its premise?

If nobody actually liked NieR Reincarnation's gameplay - which a lot of you complaining about it ending seem dedicated to point out any chance you get - then why keep it around as a game and not just as recordings or in writing? And whose responsibility is it to record that stuff? For the most part History wasn't recorded by those that made that history happen either. History can be recorded in writing, in photographs, in paintings,... so why can Video Games only be recorded as that Video Game?

I think these discussions are important to have and it sucks that it's always undercut by "Well but Corporations should do it, especially since they only don't do it because of money" - which is perfectly true and I agree with that, just for the record - and yet even in a better societal structure than Capitalism these problems would remain. If money wasn't an issue should every person ever posting anything on the Internet have to make sure it will always remain there for people that haven't seen it yet just because they could? Taken to the next step, are you allowed to remove something from the Internet if anybody finds it some amount of impactful?

The answer is pretty easy. If you care that much about it you will just have to record it yourself somehow - like a lot of Reincarnation's fans already did. And yes, video games have an interactive component that is now lost - but so what. If that was so important then write down what it meant to you! Make art that expresses what Reincarnation made you feel! All perfectly valid ways to record and experience history!!!

I feel like some of you people haven't had the pleasure of not being able to afford a certain video game console anywhere in the foreseeable future but knowing there's a game on there that you would love and so you decide to experience it through everything but playing the game itself. That game for me was Drakengard 3 on the Playstation 3 - and it was my favorite game of all time before I actually was able to play it 7 years later. And I think that's why I'm not particularly bothered by Reincarnation being taken offline, because I know you can appreciate it and everything it had to offer without actually playing it - because in Reincarnation's case a lot of people did the actual work of making it accessible online and that includes both fans and the devs for structuring their game in a way that makes it easy to do so.

But all I see is this weird insistance that Lore will be lost and that people won't be able to understand NieR 4 because they can't play NieR 3 to catch up on the Lore anymore even though

a) that hasn't been a thing for a single Yoko Taro game. The only time that ever happened is YoRHa:Dark Apocalypse and even there it didn't actually happen, people just fully misunderstood what part of the story was the actual A Plot and blamed them not understanding that on the Lore.

b) Reincarnation has maybe a handful Elements of concrete Lore and each of them can be summarized in 2 Sentences at most - case in point Noelle's RoD crystal is now part of the official timeline.

3) Drakengard's lore has never been explained once, not even in Drakengard itself, and yet a lot of people were able to love it and/or everything following in its wake - so clearly the lore is not that important, is it?

I also can't help but point out that 10H's story is literally about how she has to rewrite stories from her own memory of them because they keep being maliciously changed and that when she loses access to them completely the first thing she does is to recreate them and then she ends up giving them to someone else to experience (which ends up being herself but aah, technically somebody else)

Anyways, something completely different as a reward for reading all of this bs: Do we think Accord is a Player Insert? Is the Player Accord recording what they're experiencing for the "greater sake of Humanity"? We're always watching the Player Characters from a Third Person View - Who's to say that's not actually Accord's First Person View?

Has Accord been here the whole time?

[catty-words]

finally back home from my family's and ready to put last year to rest with the

2023 fic writing roundup

Total 2023 Word Count: 95,451 published words, but 116,360 words written for the year   Total 2023 Hits: 25,513 Other 2023 AO3 Stats: Kudos: 1,272; Comment threads: 198; Bookmarks: 252; Subscriptions: 158.

Total 2022 Word Count: 36,969 published words, but 132,549 words logged for the year Total 2022 Hits: 17,797 Other 2022 AO3 Stats: Kudos: 1,910; Comment threads: 111; Bookmarks: 259; Subscriptions: 20.

links and titles to 2023 works

[cw's nancy drew] couldn't help noticing the gold mines glistening in your skin (3,966 words) - a birthday gift for bethany! what if nancy and ace hooked up pre-canon?

[never have i ever] one more last try (4,323 words) - for the girlies* who were/are incensed that the nhie writers had the audacity to make bad benvi sex canon and then UNINTERESTING. *it's me, i'm girlies

[cw's nancy drew] first contact (849 words) - nancy and ace texting can be poetry if you hold my hand and just believe!

[never have i ever] answering machines & how your voice says it’s gonna get back to me someday (3,163 words) - devi and ben's relationship through their first year at university as told by the voicemails they leave each other

[never have i ever] a lie away from getting you into the mood (77,482 words) - i mean. how could i possibly sum this one up? d/b FWB, sure, but also so much more than that. bitty spark 'verse pt 2.

[never have i ever] to nestle deep into the safe-keeping (3,440 words) - in a now time-honored tradition, i wrote rose some smut for her birthday! d/b being soft and in love their first year of university.

[cw's nancy drew] it’ll hurt like a mother when your foot comes out (2,228 words) - drew crew hike to commemorate a real life hike! fun!

Favorite Fic: 'gold mines' is a strong contender, but. you know it's 'lie away'. how could it be anything else? i spent a year and a half writing it and i finished the fuck out of it despite the tornado that stirred up my personal life this year. i don't know that i've ever been prouder of a fic. almost certainly not.

Hardest Fic: also 'a lie away'. the amount of material that i wrote and then scrapped because it wasn't right was A Lot.

Do You Plan to Take Prompts in 2024? haven't done a prompt game in a while! think it might be time to pull out that song lyric one, i've been gifted some exceptional music that way.

that said, though, when i do have all day to sit down and write, i've found myself more interested in chipping away at something longer-form. then again, it's been a while since i exercised the prompt-filling muscle in my writer brain, and i don't want that muscle to lose definition entirely. we'll see, i suppose.

What was the best thing about 2023? I FUCKING FINISHED 'A LIE AWAY' I DID IT I DID IT I DID IT

What was the worst thing about 2022? woof. i sure did split from my partner of a decade. which has actually been incredibly good for me, but living through it was a bit fucky, as you can imagine.

which makes this a great time to nod at 'answering machines' for being perfect creative fun and getting me out of my head during the worst of the breakup. looking at the title alone can make my brain stutter, though, it's a time capsule from such a tumultuous period in my life. probably doesn't help that i used a song from my unofficial breakup album to title the fic. i love you, 'answering machines'. i cannot fathom rereading you at this time.

Any last thoughts for 2023? i am content. the year was good to me, all things considered.

Goals for 2024

fuck around with devi the vampire slayer

original fiction???

fall head over heels for another show

continue writing devi/ben even if the audience for it dissipates entirely

[northerngoshawk]

2023 Year-End Fic Round Up

many thanks to @itsmoonpeaches and @chocomd for the tags

oh boi i have not written a lick of a word since starting college again but here goes nothing

Words written (published or not, WIPs totally count too!): 149,165. probably have more due to wips that i started (but didn't finish) last year but for now i'll go with this number

Smut scenes written (if applicable): 0

New things I tried:

dabbled a lil in the Spiderverse fandom with my drabble a thin thread of trust, broken

tried my hand at a more romantically inclined fic premise with a love worth fighting for, my kataang forbidden lovers au

tried my hand at integrating Chinese culture a lot more into the ATLA world with Pangu, my kataang week fic written for the Injured prompt

other than that, there wasn't that much i experimented with. it felt a bit like the same old, same old

Fic I spent the most time on: definitely a love worth fighting for. twas a multi-chap with 6 chapters, with the word count ranging anywhere from 2k to 6k words? maybe even more. but not only did i want to portray the romance, i also wanted to flesh out the worldbuilding, develop other relationships b/w characters in this au, and so on. thus, this fic was warranted to be the one i spent the most time on

Fic I spent the least time on: a thin thread of trust, broken. it was really just a drabble from Thoughts i was having about Across the Spiderverse, specifically about Gwen and her relationship with her friends and Miles and also as a response to the unwarranted Gwen hate that she got post-movie something something misogyny something something redemption not being necessary for her because she was just a teen caught in a horrible situation but i digress

Favourite thing I wrote: oof idk. i think i really love how Pangu turned out, mostly because that was my first really deep dive into trying to integrate Chinese culture into the ATLA world. i know the premise of the fic was for kataang week, but my intention here was to delve deeper into the loneliness and burden Aang would inevitably feel in being the Avatar, and how it's always Katara (and his other friends) who help carry that burden with him. i think the story of Pangu really helps act as that parallel to Aang, but where the giant in the story was alone and eventually perished under the weight of his burden, Aang's friends help shoulder that weight with him and help him live.

Favourite thing I read: i'll be honest, i haven't really read a lot of fics recently, but one that does stand out for me is @chocomd's Enough, a kataang hanahaki fic, and its sequel The Deal. the writing between these two fics is incredibly gorgeous and haunting, managing to capture a kind of horrific beauty in both the hanahaki that afflicted Katara and the hope-turned-horror of Aang's eventual deal with... well, you'd have to read these fics to find out.

Writing goals for next year:

i'll probably take a sharp right turn from ATLA for now and head off towards writing fic for Genshin. i don't really have any good ideas for ATLA for now, which probably means i need a change of pace and to discover new material to work with. i'll probably come back to ATLA someday, but right now, between school and impending work and my hyperfixation on Genshin, i just can't find anything to work with.

in a similar vein above, i'm probably gonna take a break from romance and introspection and try my hand at action and adventure. unlike most of the Genshin fandom, i don't really ship anyone with anyone, and i also don't care about what the fandom thinks - i'm happy in my own little corner. i also recently read Six of Crows and i think it's high-time i try and conduct my own kind of plot. maybe through a mafia au? dungeon au? apocalypse? spy? who knows

even though i'm looking to eventually turn to Genshin, i do wanna finish up my pending Demon Slayer AU fic The Last Wind-Breather. i kinda want it to be a series of fics in the world, but for now i think i'll finish up the 2nd chapter and then come back to this au from time to time, write whatever comes to mind.

aaaand with that being said, i should probably at least get a chapter or two out for see the sky and sea (and remember me). started this fic in 2022, but even then i want to tie up my loose ends, give these fics the endings they deserve

Tagging (no pressure): @flameohotwife @benwvatt @shameaboutthedilettantism @coyotelemon and anyone else who wants to join in, feel free to!

[larkral]

20 questions for fic writers!

Thank you @orange-peony and @wellbelesbian for tagging me in this game! I feel sure that others have tagged me but I have become incapable of reading my activity feed.

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

14! This feels both reasonable and correct. (one is a self-meta and one is a round robin fic)

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

204,176 this feels correct and unreasonable.

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Carry On, In Other Lands, apparently Check Please though I haven't published the thing yet.

Historically I've written for X-men the movie and Battlestar Galactica (BSG). Most of the fics in my profile are for BSG, and all of my X-men fic was on ff.n 🤷

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos

Number 1 is Good at Something by a ridiculous margin. Number 2 is A Dangerous Affinity by a normal margin Numbers 3-5 are fics in a series I wrote for Battlestar Galactica: Proof Positive (third in the series), Proving Grounds (first in the series), and Prove that you can do it better (second in the series), which I posted 8 years ago. So they've had a while to accrue readers.

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

I do... most of the time. Sometimes I get overwhelmed and don't respond for a while. I intend to respond to comments, I don't always do so.

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

A BSG fic called Grief. Which is actually about how horrible it feels to realize that your grief has lessened over time.

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

I suppose this is a deep spoiler, but I think A Dangerous Affinity has the happiest ending of anything I've written. It's happy for the characters (who don't die) as well as for the crossover setting it's based in.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Not really? The only thing I'd consider borderline "hate" is when someone bookmarked a fic I adore (An Arranged Meeting) with a long comment that included both of these phrases:

"you have to buy some changes in personality depiction" and "the random timeset of the vignettes is hard to follow."

And, listen. If you are reading a deep AU and you can't understand why people who have a meaningful change in their early professionally formative years might end up as different people, I don't know what to say to you. Also, like, I wrote it nonlinearly. That was on purpose! I love nonlinear narratives, I would change nothing.

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

Yeah. Yep. All kinds? My BSG ship was het, I've written some femslash for Carry On, as well as a...um, fair amount of mascslash (is this a thing? I'm going with it), and in my Check Please fic there's an orgy, so. Lots of kinds of smut, though, as others have mentioned, I tend to trade in tender smut above all else.

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

Yeah, those 200k words up there? 125k of them is a Carry On/Scholomance crossover/fandom fusion. But the characters don't cross over, so... Shrug.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

nope

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

nope

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

nope, but I *want to*

14. What’s your all time favourite ship?

God, this is a hard question! I cannot. I will not. Pacey/Sage. There. Now you know.

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

I started writing a story in BSG that was based around the idea that Kara was adopted by Tigh and Ellen, and I wrote some stuff I really really love for it, but I lost the mojo around BSG around the time I was starting on that story.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Figurative language.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

I really have to be yanked into the story I'm writing. It's difficult for me to find motivation to write unless the story is dragging me along kicking and screaming, or I've got some kind of external motivation to write. I feel very lucky to have had a lot of

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

I think it can be necessary. I did it in ADA, and it was necessary, and I added translations in the title so it showed up on hover and end notes. I think that sometimes it's done when it's not necessary and then it bugs me, but as long as I'm being given adequate context to continue reading on, I'm happy. It's hard to write because inevitably when you're doing it, it's because someone is a native speaker/fluent, but likely you as the writer aren't, so you need to get someone who is to advise, which is not easy to do in fandom. I've been lucky to have friends and connections who can help with those things, but it's not a given.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

whispered Animorphs.

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

Good at Something. Closely tied with Holsom Timeloop/Friday Prime, which no one but @petedavidsonscock has put their eyes upon, and it's not yet finished, but I love it so much.

I'm tagging @fireinmywoods, @shrekgogurt, @petedavidsonscock, @facewithoutheart, and @cutestkilla if any of you haven't already done this

[crow-mortis]

༶•┈┈⛧┈ꉓꋪꂦꅏ

⛧°。ᵗʰⁱʳᵗʸ⁻ᵒⁿᵉ ⛧ ⁿᵒⁿᵇⁱⁿᵃʳʸ ⛧ ᵖᵃⁿ ⛧ ʷʳⁱᵗᵉʳ ⛧ ᵖʰᵒᵗᵒᵍʳᵃᵖʰᵉʳ 。 °⛧

ⁿᵉᵒᶜⁱᵗⁱᵉˢ ⛧ ᵏᵒᶠⁱ ⛧ ᵗʷⁱᵗᵗᵉʳ ⛧ ᵍᵒᵒᵈʳᵉᵃᵈˢ ⛧ ˢᵖᵃᶜᵉʰᵉʸ

⛧°。┊about/dni

Not everyone has all of their info in their "About Me" so I figured I'd provide this list for anyone checking out my profile. DO NOT INTERACT IF YOU ARE:

⛧ under 18

⛧ racist

⛧ lgbtqia+phobic *including transmeds, exclusionists, terfs and illegitmate sexualities/pronouns - i.e. MAP nor/mal, etc. (if they're meant to mock someone, i don't fw you)

⛧ pro-birth/pro life

⛧ xenophobic/islamophobic

⛧ sexist/misogynistic

⛧ pedophilic/MAP

⛧ ableist

⛧ anti-vax/anti-medicine

⛧ I also don't fw animal abuse, MAGA, blue lives matter, or general bigots.

I can/will add to this if I think of/run across more.

more under the cut !

This is the hardest thing for me to do on any social media website. I'm horrible at talking about myself unless it's in relation to one of my interests. Which, I'll briefly list below:

⛧ music

⛧ video games

⛧ creepy stuff/cryptids/ARGs

⛧ gardening/homesteading

⛧ crows

⛧ oddities/"vulturecore"

⛧ writing

⛧ photography

⛧ reading

I'm sure I have more I'll end up adding here eventually, but I can't ever think of many things I like right off the top of my head.

Call me Crow. I'm 31 y/o, nonbinary, pansexual, and my pronouns are they/them. I'm married and we have two dogs, one cat, a parrot, and twenty-four chickens (I post about all of them a lot so you'll probably get to know them well if you follow my blog.) We live on a 2 acre homestead in southern Appalachia. I practice conjure and rootwork that was taught to me by family and neighbors growing up. I love to forage and make my own herbal salves and tinctures, as well as canned items like preserves and jellies. My partner and I are also professional portrait and event photographers, and I love posting our work whenever I get the chance.

My favorite band is Coheed and Cambria, with Sleep Token and Ghost following closely behind. I'm an old school emo kid, and I also listen to a lot of pop-punk, numetal, and post-hardcore. I also dive into j-rock and SOME Appalachian gothic, neotraditional country, bluegrass, and folk music. My tastes are a little all over the place and if it sounds good I'll probably like it.

I am a gamer, and my favorite game is a tie between Bloodborne, Baldur’s Gate 3 and RDR2. I have also been playing Destiny 2 since the launch of Destiny 1 in 2014, and I fall in and out of love with it every few weeks. Depends on what the content is giving me at that time. I also really like Minecraft and other comfy games like Stardew Valley and Animal Crossing. I'm a huge fan of horror games and I especially love the ones with deep and interesting lore and worldbuilding.

I'm a writer, and have been actively doing so since I was 11 years old. I haven't published anything, as it's more of a hobby for me than anything (plus imposter syndrome sucks). I have a world building project/RP that I've had going with a friend of mine for almost a decade now. I love thinking of/writing new characters and short stories. I used to write fanfiction but I'm not consistent enough to post multiple-part fics anymore, and my schedule doesn't leave much time for that sort of devotion. So, for now, it's just a hobby I get to enjoy with a few select friends.

I'm really into creepy content. Cryptids, cosmic horror, ARGs, analog horror, and the occult. I've seen a lot of what there is to offer on YouTube, so I'm always open to suggestions on stuff that I may not have heard of. I also like to collect bones, antlers, and other oddities.

I'm a big reader, and I'm currently doing a 52 week book challenge for 2024. I usually read 2-3 books at a time for when my ADD says I need something different.

I am also autistic and was diagnosed as an adult (age 27). I also have relapsing/remitting MS; it affects my short term memory, vision, and balance, primarily. I also sometimes have some other cognitive issues (forgetting/flubbing words, names, etc.) I am on treatment for a few of the symptoms, but it does impact my daily life.

I think that's about it. Sorry for the wall of text, but I really don't know how else to format this.

⛧°。 ┊ my stuff.

links here !

⛧°。┊ other links.

links here !

[rivalsforlife]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

I saw this going around a little while ago and wanted to do it myself mostly because it doesn't involve me having to answer about anything I did this year.

1. How many works do you have on A03?

20

2. What's your total A03 word count?

262,994, apparently

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Ace Attorney! I have to admit I've been writing persona 5 fanfic for most of this year but am still undecided on if I actually want to publish that. if I ever finish it.

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

A Rose By Any Name (by a margin of like 1000 kudos), Deep Dark Secrets, Childswap, The Catch-Up Game, Love Languages.

I am eternally going to feel a bit bitter that the first one is that high.

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

I used to respond to them all the time because I love the interactions, but then I started getting burnt out by school and now have such a massive backlog..... so I pretty much never do these days. I'm very sorry and I still read and really appreciate all the comments I get!

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I don't write a lot of angst... and I definitely don't have a tendency to leave things on an angsty note. Maybe Need Not to Need which was in early disbarment era, or Left Behind, Looking Ahead because it's a missing scene in the middle of aai2, and Franziska ends it on the conclusion that she should prepare to not have Edgeworth in her life anymore.

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

Since I don't write a lot of angsty endings most of them are happy lol. Maybe The Opposing Council's Proposal because it ends on a proposal, which is a pretty happy event.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Nope! Everyone's been really nice.

9. Do you write smut?

Definitely not. It takes me like five minutes to work myself up to writing a kiss. I'm too squeamish about that kind of thing.

10. Do you write crossovers?

No, and I feel like that's not something I'd be very good at doing. There's so much work involved and I haven't had any situations where I feel like characters from different franchises have to meet in order to express some aspect of characterization that they couldn't do otherwise, which would be my main motivation for writing one.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not as far as I'm aware.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes!! Plenty of my fics have been translated into Chinese. I had one person write an entire rec list for my works in Chinese before and was so happy about it.

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

Nope, I feel like I wouldn't be good at this either, I've always been the kind of person who isn't good at playing with others and would want to take control of the whole thing lol.

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

Narumitsu without question. It takes a lot to get me to actively care about romance, much less write it.

15. What's the WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

I have a PLvsAA canon divergence fic where everyone stays brainwashed for a much longer time (and Edgeworth also gets brainwashed) that I wish I could finish, but I feel like it's a lost cause at this point. I have an earlier version of that fic which went in a completely different direction and is less than one chapter away from being complete. There's also One Good Narumitsu Story left in me that I've had in my head since 2018, never been able to bring myself to write it, and am not sure if I ever will. I hope I do someday, though.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I think one of my favorite comments I've ever gotten talked about putting effort into developing relationships and characters outside of the main focuses of the fic - Catch-Up Game being an example, even though narumitsu is the focus, I spent some time paying attention to Phoenix's relationships with Trucy, Maya, Iris, and generally tried to make it seem like the characters had their own lives outside of what Phoenix and Edgeworth had going on. That's something I still feel pretty proud of and try to keep up when I can.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

DESCRIPTIONS. I can't describe people very well at all, probably at least partially because my facial recognition skills are atrocious. I can't describe locations or settings, either. I sometimes feel like it becomes far too obvious that I rarely leave the house.

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

I think it's fine on a one-off but not extensively. Like with Klavier as an example, the occasional Achtung or pet name or whatever is fine, but when it starts to be longer sentences or full conversations I draw the line.

Overall I think the best way to handle it (in a hypothetical conversation between Franziska and Edgeworth, depending on if the POV character is Edgeworth or Phoenix):

a) If the POV character speaks the language (like Edgeworth), doing something like "Franziska switched to German, so Phoenix couldn't overhear. "I am speaking in German, but you are reading it in English.""

b) If the POV character does not speak the language (like Phoenix), saying "Franziska switched to German and started yelling at Edgeworth" makes more sense - when I hear a foreign language, at least, I wouldn't be able to repeat it afterwards, because my brain does not process the words like it would English words, so I don't think it should stay in writing either.

There are practical purposes too: I wouldn't trust google translate to capture any nuance, and don't speak any other languages, so I'd want to find someone who knows the language to translate for me, which can be annoying and inconvenient for them. Also, readability. I don't think a reader should have to open up a new tab to understand your fic, is the point.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Warrior cats!! Way back in 2012 or so.

20. Favourite fic you've ever written?

The Catch-Up Game is still my favorite, at least partially because I got so much engagement while posting it that it was a lot of fun to go through comments on it. The narumitsu server talked about it a lot, and I'll forever be bitter that a rogue mod wiped those channels, because it's a really good feeling when something you write can inspire discussion like that. Also, I'm still satisfied with most aspects of that fic on its own - I reread a couple of chapters just the other day and was enjoying myself, which is always a win.

[jeongjaebae]

fic summary 2k22

ayeee so it's that time of year again!! i know i haven't posted much in 2022 (like... just a handful of fics oops) but i still hit a decent word count and made significant progress on long fic wips!

so yeahhh here's my 2022 fic summary which is... basically a chance to introduce my wips LOL

Total word count written: 89,033

Total word count published: 33,243

Fandoms written: tbz and svt

1. Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or what you predicted?

a bit less!! it's about half as much as i wrote last year (which was a whooping 150k word count LMAO), but this range is already more than the average for me in any given year so it's not too bad. in terms of what i POSTED though... i have no excuse for that 😅 most of my word count is from wips/ideas so i didn't have any finished content to post

2. What pairing/genre/fandom did you write that you would never have predicted in January?

last january i definitely didn't know i would write for svt!! i kind of had a feeling that deobiblr was already dying at the time, and that's around when i started watching going seventeen to get into them... but yeah didn't know i'd slip so deep into the carat life (blaming you, kim mingyu 😒)

3. What’s your own favourite story of the year?

it's a time loop au wip that i've written about 19k so far!! where our mc is stuck in a loop trying to change their fate of unrequited love by meeting [boy group member] first before his current gf does. so mc tries to alter events and change the course of fate all while trying to figure out a way to leave the loop

4. Did you take any writing risks this year? What did you learn from them?

uhHHhhH the time loop au i suppose is a risk in itself... bc like... plotting it has been a complete pain when you're trying to consider multiple reruns of the same timeline. every detail has to be in the right place so that when the mc's actions change, we can directly see how that affects the events in the timeline

also writing domestic fluff like i did in best boy... can't say i enjoyed it but it was a good challenge!!

5. Do you have any fanfic goals for the new year?

post the damn hyunjae e2l already 💀 (takes one to know one)

From my past year of writing, what was…

My best story of this year:

the time loop au ahahaha but if we're talking posted fic then the whole truth!! it has a bit of everything: decent flow and sentence structures, some important themes, tiny bit of humour, and gotta love f2l ju

My most popular story of this year:

the whole truth!! i reread this kind of recently and think it really is my best in terms of flow and sentence structure. also i really haven't posted anything else so.... yeah 😶

Most fun story to write:

hmm besides my two biggest wips i'd say it's this jogging au i wrote back in april!! where mc gets roped into a jogging date with [cute dating app boy] despite hating all kinds of exercise. it's definitely the typical jeongjaebae style of humour, secondhand embarrassment, and fluff. very fun to write and has me laughing every time i reread it LMAO

Story with the single sexiest moment:

probably the whole truth, the scene where they're making out in juyeon's room LMAO. srry i have no other contributions this year. BUT!!! my e2l wip has the full and extended scene from want so that's something to look forward to 👀

Most “holy crap, that’s wrong, even for you” story:

best boy. maybe it's not terrible but idk i haven't touched it since writing it bc i hate it 🤡 domestic fluff is... not my cup of tea. i suppose it was a good writing challenge tho. maaaaybe i'll write it one day but... needs a bit more practice

Story that shifted my own perceptions of the characters:

hmm maybe 1 plus 1? writing it made me obsessed with the (og) guy in it and he shot way up my bias list. and like. i'm still in that phase rn LOL

Hardest story to write:

oh boy it's deffs the time loop au. still stuck on the plot tbh? there's just so much planning and then... the thought of it reaching 50k or something... makes me tired OTL. it's exciting to think about but at the same time, there are way too many details i still have to write. it's a bit of a struggle

Biggest surprise:

surprise surprise who knew i would be writing for svt?!? and the one piece of angst that i wrote: all that we are

Most unintentionally telling story:

let's go with the whole truth. i loved some of the concepts and moral lessons in there, like how we're not made to be someone else's object of desire. why should we exist to be beautiful to others? and the other part about how love is deeper than what an app can tell us.

Favourite opening lines:

ehh nothing i particularly like but here we go

[better than the movies]

the most relatable sentence

If your life was a movie, at this moment, you’d be that introvert at a party.

[jogging date wip]

ahh.... relatable once again. the opening here sets the tone perfectly

"Yeah, of course. A jogging date sounds perfect." That was the moment you knew you fucked up.

Favourite closing lines:

nothing will beat this is how we fall but here are some that i like

[takes one to know one]

this actually isn't at the veryyy end of my wip rn but will probably change it and make it the actual ending later bc it's so fitting!! potential spoiler i guess but not really bc we all knew what was coming right?

When he pulls back and you see the fondness in his eyes, you realize that maybe the two of you aren't so different. He may have been an asshole, but you'd pretty much been one too. You were insanely competitive but only so that you could match up to his level. And even though it took a while for you to understand your feelings for him, now you know that he's felt the same way all along. Indeed, the two of you are more similar than you think. But then again, it takes one to know one.

[the whole truth]

they went through so much and this wrapped it up nicely. the silence especially is a powerful symbol here

When Juyeon takes the final step and crosses into your range this time, the silence is something you’ve never been happier to hear.

Favourite lines from anywhere:

[the whole truth]

important life lessons 101. if someone doesn't like you that's their problem not yours LOL. why should it be your job to be likeable?

"It’s not embarrassing to not be loved back. Painful, yes, but not something to be ashamed of. You weren’t put on this world just to become someone else’s object of desire, okay?"

[time loop au wip]

not quite closing lines but could kind of be similar to that

The two of you don't talk about, but it's all too evident anyway. It's evident when you lean into him as the night gets colder, head against the crook of his shoulder, and then in the way he shifts so that his lips meet yours. It's evident in the way he kisses you, with the sweetest of a first kiss, the bitterness of a last kiss, and the constancy of making the same choice in every loop, every timeline, every lifetime.

Scenes from anywhere you would have choose to have illustrated:

for the sake of referencing posted fics, i would say the ending of redo where they're on the bench under the mistletoe!

(in terms of wips: time loop au where y/n and [redacted] are watching fireworks from homecoming week!!)

New year’s resolutions:

finish and post that damn hyunjae e2l already OTL. and like... probably finish the time loop au if possible

Word Count Totals

Total finished, posted fic: 33,243

Longest posted fic:  the whole truth ~14.2k

Longest wip: hyunjae e2l is sitting at 25k still... and time loop au at 19k... 🥲

Total number of words written: 89,033

[marigoldplastic]

Blog day 1?

I haven't had an internet blog... like, ever. Not a serious one at least. A place where you can put down your thoughts with no filter is foreign to me from anything besides a pencil and notebook paper. I want to be able to write freely. I want to start off on a weird personal level that slowly devolves into fictional rants and stories. A place where I can vent my deepest frustrations and my darkest thoughts.

A scream into the void, if you would.

See, I've always fancied myself as a writer. From trying to write zombie books as a kid, to winning the young author award in middle school, and even as far as becoming a published journalist by high school and ending with proper dabble into the creative writing zone by my senior year. However, since the start of my college career... I find myself writing less and less. Which is incredibly ironic given the fact that my literal career of choice is to become a speech writer for politicians (don't ask why, it's a very convoluted answer lol.). So I guess this is my attempt of making a more personal and, admittedly, easier, way of hopefully embarking on a continuous stream of my small, and possibly insignificant, life for the internet to stumble across someday. It all feels very weird to be quite honest.

I'm not particularly the type to show my emotions to those around me. Call it years of traumatic emotional abuse from a narcissistic mother, but I just don't see the purpose of burdening others with my tragic life woes. Now other people's tragic life woes? BRING EM ON. I eat up other people's problems like it's a nutritionally balanced and well rounded breakfast on the first day of school. I live to listen to people and to help solve other people's problems. That can be great and all until you come to this point of wanting to be heard too. That's the catch though... how can you want to be heard, yet continue to be an emotional wall? These are the type of questions that have been keeping me up until 5 am lately! Don't even get me started on my sleep schedule, jeez.

Would you believe that I've been sleeping in until nearly 3 pm everyday for the past 2 weeks. I have classes starting on Tuesday this week and GOD it's going to be a pain in the ass to wake up at 6:45 am to get to my 9 am class on time. Maybe I'll just stay up all night lol. It's a shame though. My dreams have been so emotionally involved lately. I constantly dream of minor romances and deeply embedded plots. There's always chemistry between me and some person and there's always something large at stake that I'm working towards fixing or solving. My dreams can vary from zombie apocalypses, to dystopian government, and even to exploring deep forests and finding dead bodies. OH man, one of my most intriguing recurring dreams involves a vast cave system deep in familiar mountains. In this cave system lives a forgotten horror of people living within them. They're not people people though, and they're not mole people either. They're mindless, savage beings who hunt you down when you dare enter too deeply into the caves. There are two main parts to the cave system: the top part that is safe and accessible to the general public; and then there's the lower, deeper parts of the cave. Even from the upper level you can hear the screams and wails of these people.

Typically, this cave system may also be attached to a large facility that connects to it in odd and physically vast and deep ways. These dreams are honestly probably just a conglomeration of all the video games and horror movies I've watched growing up. Not to mention I've been to a local gold mine that's locally popular. That cave system is amazing and tucked away two miles into the Los Angeles Mountains. It's insanely dark in there, but it's astonishingly beautiful to see the rock structures and materials left behind in there. I've been to all the main access areas of that mine, but I'd love to go and do an extreme deep dive of the place. There's upper, lower, and middle sections of the mine, as well as an area that's only accessible via a flooded hallway. I'm talking like up to your waist level of flooded.

I want to go back there someday. My last visit was in October of 2022, but that wasn't the best or most memorable trip unfortunately. That trip, looking back at it, just makes me feel icky. What a fantastic way to jump into my personal issues again! There's a part of me that really thinks I shouldn't be with or around people on a deeper level than surface. There's something really wrong with me when it comes to being a deeper and more vulnerable person. I look back at my behavior when I'm around others and I'm just embarrassed at myself. I look back and see how selfish I am, how quick to become upset I can be, and how I seem to take it out on those around me or expect to be coddled like some infant. But when I'm alone. Everything is bottled up nice and tight until I can find the right time to let it out and cry to myself. I have panic attacks, and I have anxious breakdowns, but they're all by myself and I never get worked up because there's no one around to be worked up against. It's... peaceful, I guess. I really yearn for something more with a person... but when it gets too real I chicken out. I'll often ghost people that try to text me too often (or at all), and I hate that. These people aren't just romantic options either, they're people I want to be friends with. People that I want to spend more time with. But that's the horrifying and terrifying part to me. If I spend more time with them, if I get too close and become too comfortable... they'll see the real me, the person who can't hold it together. The person who's prone to self harm, struggles with not starving herself, has the most hideous of internal thoughts on her looks and their struggles. I'm not someone who should be with someone else romantically. And... I hate that...

Despite my ability to allow someone to be sexual with me, I think I'm really asexual. I like... the attention that sexuality brings in the moment, but I hate that that's all there is. I truly feel like anyone who wants to be with me only wants me for my body and what I can offer to them with it. That makes me fear sexual connections to a point that makes me socially awkward. It doesn't help that I have... ugh... the incel type of mentality that makes me think that anyone who is nice to me likes me. It's ridiculous because who would like someone like me? I may have a witty and humorous outer shell, but I'm awkward, and indecisive, and I get too giddy over stupid things and it makes me look ridiculous getting overly excited over small insignificant things. I've never been formally diagnosed, but I really wouldn't be surprised if I was autistic. I know that's the trendy internet thing going around, but it's not trendy. It's a fucking struggle and it's harmful to my life at the very least; I can't speak for other people's lives. I feel like an unlovable freak, really like I'm some gross middle school girl who doesn't know how to dress herself and says cringe things at all the wrong times. I feel like I'm the special girl in everyone's lives. Maybe I'm a narcissist? I guess that'd make sense.

[justslowdown]

I posted 1,773 times in 2021

606 posts created (34%)

1167 posts reblogged (66%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 1.9 posts.

I added 491 tags in 2021

#lepidoptera litter - 201 posts

#kestrel tag - 41 posts

#gigi tag - 39 posts

#mari tag - 35 posts

#kiwi tag - 35 posts

#kai tag - 32 posts

#weller tag - 32 posts

#valentines litter tag - 29 posts

#puppies - 26 posts

#magpie tag - 21 posts

Longest Tag: 140 characters

#i miss how when i used one particular blanket with a hole in it he loved to do his normal blanket fort thing but poke his head to gaze at me

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

Etta

680 notes • Posted 2021-11-17 04:04:57 GMT

#4

Saint-Anne-de-Beaupré, Quebec, 1934

THE SUNGLASSES.

No information known about the photo, which wasn't published til the Archives section of a 1997 National Geographic

Makes me think about the intersection in that era of European dogcarts and North American dogsled practices. I wish I knew more. Look at those harnesses! And what mix are the dogs? What other things did they help with?

708 notes • Posted 2021-11-20 06:34:52 GMT

#3

See the full post

1269 notes • Posted 2021-05-03 03:10:07 GMT

#2

Etta's mini-me ❤️

1336 notes • Posted 2021-03-02 23:05:03 GMT

#1

Some tips on eating as a poor person that aren't "live on dry beans and rice that take time and effort to make"

Food Banks Exist For YOU!! I don't need one anymore but am so thankful for them. You may hesitate to go to them bc you don't think you need it as badly as others... but from someone who spent years with their dad going to several, the food is there and they want to help. It isn't embarrassing; the people who volunteer are doing it for a reason, and ime treat you as a shopper, not a charity case. There are sites to find food banks. If you go to one, they usually have pamphlets for all the ones in the area. We never had to prove income or anything like that. They want to help, I promise.

If there's a local farmer's market, check to see if they have a subsidy program for people on food stamps. Another thing my dad and I used. At two separate markets 5 hrs apart, both had a program where you could DOUBLE your food stamp money in farmer's market coupons. Healthy, fresh, local, ethically raised food for less than the grocery store

If you go to a store more than once in a blue moon get the discount/membership/whatever card. It's usually super easy and almost always saves you a LOT of money

When in a supermarket, look at price per ounce if comparing items. Do not look at total price vs visual package size. Companies are experts at packing less and less food into larger packages. Grocery stores with a price per oz on the tags are so so helpful, but if they don't, sometimes it honestly makes a difference to use your phone calculator

CHECK IF YOU HAVE AN ALDI IN YOUR AREA. They sell actual seriously good, usually healthy food way cheaper than crappy stuff at other stores. This is for a lot of reasons I won't get into. But, it's also just a more ethical system for their workers, who make well above minimum wage. Aldi is Life. Tip: if you don't have reusable bags, keep an eye out for empty boxes as you shop. They don't bag anything for you.

BIG LOTS or other similar clearance/discount stores. They get an ever-changing stock of things at deep discounts. Lots of nice luxury and/or healthy groceries at half price as well as your normal staples. Also my go-to for home items and pet supplies

Shop Sales. This one is obvious to some but others just aren't in the habit. I almost exclusively buy things on sales where I save at least 1/3, usually 1/2. You can have a fully stocked pantry and freezer and spend half as much as if you only buy things when you want to eat that particular thing. It does mean less fresh food, but y'know. Just develop a laser eye for a sale tag and know where the clearance section is. Second nature to people who grew up poor but I was amazed shopping with college friends who bought full price name brand food and had trouble paying rent

I haven't done this but my brother swears by it. He went in with a few friends on a communal Costco membership. Could also do this with Sam's Club. They shop together, and then split bulk items if there's a great deal on something one person couldn't eat on their own. Bulk is the way to go if you can find a way to have the up-front cash. Impossible for many which is why the communal thing is so genius!

If this helps even one person it was worth writing out! I've realized last year, I learned a Lot growing up under the poverty line. It doesn't just appear in your brain when you're 22 and can't pay your bills for the first time.

Please feel free to add other tips if you have them. Just don't shame people for eating what they choose to eat like those "vegan dollar cookbooks" or whatever.

17080 notes • Posted 2021-01-26 01:49:53 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

[skypied]

AO3 Tag Game Tagged by @anchoviesinthenightsky wh- who me?

Ty for the opportunity to not shut my mouth ahhah

1. How many works do you have on AO3? 6

2. What is your total AO3 word count?  57,343 wtf

3. How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?  well I did write two oneshot Zelda fics at 13 and one oneshot Harry Potter fic at 15 but we don't think about those. (and i just remembered I have a trashed Ace Attorney wip buried deep in my drive somewhere) So I honestly consider Luca the only I've written for for real.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

actually it's the same order for hits/bookmarks/comments except one of them

Cliff's Edge (450 (you nasty people <3))

make me crescendo (176)

you've been hiding all your life (139)

sickeningly sweet like honey (108)

always be this close (82)

5. Do you respond to comments, why or why not? Yeah I try to reply to all. I think there's like two with just an emoji I haven't replied to. But it usually takes me a little time, esp right after publishing something, to reply, I save them up a little. But like now, when it's been a while since publishing and I think a week or more since a new comment, I get excited and rush over immediately haha.

6. What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending? well all that are ended have happy endings. The angstiest rn is probably the Alberto angst one, hold my breath for me, but if it actually goes somewhere story-wise and not just short standalone chapters, I'm hoping to veer it somewhere happy. Boy deserves to heal. I kind of doubt I'd ever write something w an angsty ending. For me what's the point of escapism if it's not happy and carefree (I say, following Eli's planned tragedy with hawk eyes HAHA). I'll get out more angst when I finish the untitled Big Sad Gay Fic but that'll have a happy ending too.

7. Do you write crossovers? Never tried or considered.

8. Have you ever received hate on a fic? No

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? Well. You already know. I write anything I want to, tbh. I think my "genre" is "spicy vanilly" like I'll add elements of kink but keep it pretty soft and gentle still. Sorry to go on a tangent here but truly believe that's to do w my identity being somewhere on the ace spectrum, if kink goes too far I just don't understand it. I feel like I write all my pwps from a very emotional perspective rather than a physical perspective, and for me it's hard to grasp kinks where I don't understand the emotions of it. I guess! I do enjoy occasionally reading stuff that's kinkier and more physical, just yeah. I don't understand it enough to write it.

10. Have you ever had a fic stolen? I don't know! Probably not?

11. Have you ever co-written a fic before? no, though I'm working on some stuff with @albertolovesluca! not co-authoring but we're bouncing ideas for each others' fics and it's lovely and he's helped me a LOT! I've not really interacted enough w people before to have anyone to talk ideas with so it's been a very fun and rewarding experience<3

12. What’s your all time favorite ship? Well I'm a hyperfixator at heart so that changes whenever I change fandoms but the actual OTP that remains after years are probably Klavier/Apollo from Ace Attorney, I periodically fall back into them even now, something like 12 years (fuck! I feel old) after getting into them. All the rest have mostly faded away, though the biggest ones have been Davekat (Homestuck) and Wolfstar (Harry Potter) but I feel like nothing can compare to Luberto since I haven't actively participated in fandom or writing before them.

13. What was the first fandom you wrote for? Zelda

14. What’s your favorite fic you’ve written? Hmm I think my favorite published one is you've been hiding all your life bc that one's so intensely personal to me. Like reading it back I'm a little more "eh, it's alright I guess", but it was such a profound and transformative experience to write. I feel like it untangled some knots inside me. As a whole I think make me crescendo is my best pwp at least. I think it's hard to compare the pwps with always be this close but that one was really, REALLY fun to write. 3

Though I feel pretty certain the Big Sad Gay Fic will be my fav when it's done, simply bc I have never done anything properly multichapter, it's very personal to me, and I believe in its concepts and am in love with some of the more pivotal scenes I've written... I think! We actually made some progress on completely rearranging a lot last weekend but aren't done so it's all a little up in the air rn!

Ok I'll tag everyone I can remember are authors, but really anyone who wants to, grab it! Have fun!

@morganskii @love-your-enthusiasm @imbeccablee @sgtalligator (yours is on Wattpad but I suppose the questions will work either way!) @albertolovesluca @someonehidethetequila @big-meows @beartofry @themeganator5000 @annie-mantic @jofngve @curioserprime I'm not sure how many of the tags work, think I exceeded max tagged but hope you get the memo! but no pressure ofc! (aka most of the people on my to-read-list but I haven't gotten around to... sorry! 😬❤️ I hope to get a little more energy and time when my cold finally fucks off!)

[pega-chan]

Book Commentary: Friend Zone (by a romance-exhausted aroace)

okay i'm reading the one published Wattpad novel in my household: Friend Zone by Vanesa Marcella (@/mylullaby_ on WP). no i wasn't the one who bought it, my sibling did, i don't waste my money on subpar romance stories. i've attempted to read it twice since my sibling bought it, but i got so exasperated reading it that i haven't gotten further than the 11th chapter. it's so nonsensical (in a bad way), i can't stand it.

"but Pega, why read it if you don't like it" it's called gross fascination. allo romance is so weird to me i read about it just to see what all the fuss is about and to understand it more just bc it's fun. it's fun bc i have no idea how allo romance works and even if i tear my hair out reading this i'll learn things

quick summary before i start: as you can glean from the title, the story is about a tomboy named Abel who's in love with her best friend David and wants to ruin their friendship but David is oblivious to her feelings. David is villainized for not noticing, of course. but what's new really. also they're both high school teenagers. here's the cover:

Abel sounds so fucking annoying djfb she's SO catty, i probably wouldn't be able to stand her irl

this situation makes no sense tho. yeah high schoolers can rent a kos (boarding house you can rent) sometimes if their school is far from home and they have no relatives to stay with in the area, but i'm pretty sure no parent would ever let a boy and girl with no blood relation and is unmarried stay together in one kosan. i don't care if they've been best friends since they were five. i don't care that they have two of Abel's college-age cousins watching over them. this country is too conservative to let anything like that happen.

who the fuck starts school this late?? the latest i've ever heard a school in jakarta start is at 07.15, and that's a private school. Abel and David do go to a private school but...i've never heard of a high school starting at 8 AM lmao if anyone following me has ever heard of it please reply

wait. these kids are just starting their second year of high school. which means they're probably still 16 years old. why is David driving a car without a license to school? 1. there are only two of them, they could use a motorbike instead. it's way more common and plausible for a high school student to own and drive a motorcycle even if they're underage; 2. he can't park at school; they don't allow underage drivers to park their vehicles at school. unless Season Sky High is too lax on the rules. i guess rich people can really do whatever they want 😒

"seragam sekolah khas anak SMA" who approved this?

why does David happen to be regarded as the most handsome in their grade

what do you mean Lunetta is your only female friend? if Abel is on the basketball team and considers some of her teammates friends, then she should have more than one. bc girls who play basketball in school play in an all-girls team…what

okay?? Abel doesn't have to act catty towards girls who like David and glare at her for hanging out with him?? but she does?? is she supposed to be likeable??

"even though she's a tomboy, her appearance is nothing like a tomboy's" Abel i'm not sure you know what being a tomboy means. playing basketball doesn't make you a tomboy

several things make me uncomfortable with the way Abel describes and idolizes her best friend Lunetta for her beauty:

Lunetta fulfills eurocentric beauty standards that run deep in indonesian society; Abel waxes on about her fair skin, upturned nose and long hair with waves at the bottom, the kind a lot of indo celebgrams have

Lunetta is also regarded by Abel as automatically more beautiful bc she's half-white, the kind of biracial Indonesian that's idolized if they fulfill beauty standards

this kind of harmful shit is all over Wattpad and it gets published. in 2016. we should contribute to the country's literacy, but not with books like THIS

tbh Abel sounds like she harbours internalised misogyny with how much emphasis she puts on being a tomboy and on how girls supposedly don't like her bc she hangs out with a group of guys

they laugh for no reason??

btw what was the point of the lunch scene? what does she even establish?? David's friend group? you can do that with other scenes that actually contribute to the story and aren't just filler. bro i don't need to hear you fight over siomay

my first positive comment about this book: this line, i can appreciate.

"Lo kenapa, sih? Dari tadi udah kayak emak-emak mau lahiran," tanya David tiba-tiba. translation: "What's wrong with you? You've been acting like a mother who's giving birth," David suddenly asked.

for context, Abel was breathing heavily bc she got high off David putting an arm around her shoulders lmao

there's too much dialogue. barely enough action. literally nothing is happening. it's line after line of dialogue interspersed with a few actions

also, what does happen has no impact on the plot and sometimes comes off as cringey

even Abel's FRIENDS have a car, does nobody ride a motorcycle??

their kos is not even a REAL kos, it's Abel's family's spare house that her father doesn't know what to do with so he rents it out. and it has a POOL. what is this?

Abel. is. so. ANNOYING. i know good friends can playfully be mean to each other but it comes off as her being insulting to her friends bc she's just so angry all the time. it's exhausting to read. maybe bc I don't communicate with my own friends that way

it's also exhausting to read the supposedly 'cute' banter between Abel and David. i don't think there's a piece of dialogue when they're not being "mean" to each other in a friendly way

not liking a lot of mean banter is just my preference tho, it's not necessarily super bad

at this point Abel's inner monologue (the story is in first person POV) is getting on my nerves. she'll say stuff like "aaa my thoughts are SO cringey, angsty hour is over!!" whenever she obsesses over David or whatever. the book is written in very casual language–specifically bahasa gaul used in Jakarta–and that's not what bothers me, it's her narrative voice that is grating. perhaps i would relate more if i did inner monologues in indonesian, but when i think i usually think in english bc that's my most fluent language and occasionally indonesian bc insults in indo just have more bite.

on second thought, Abel sounds more like a middle-schooler tbh. Dork Diaries type beat if you've ever read that

there it is! the "just friends" line! bc amatonormativity! /s

"i don't know why i keep a diary" Abel isn't even fleshed out enough to know why she likes journaling

Abel thinks she's quirky for writing in a diary bc she's a tomboy and owning a diary is 'girly' and 'for kids'

here it is. the classic quotable WP line

hmm Abel and Lunetta are the type to create a sort of alay ruckus in class bc the get overexcited when they talk.

Abel is such a “not like other girls” girl, and not in a way that can make me sympathize with her

David's friends tell him he's oblivious and dense and that they noticed Abel is possibly crushing on him. one of David's squad, Finn, gives him terrible advice to "let it flow" and to be...more observant. in true romance novel fashion David doesn't understand what they're talking about. and tbh i think Finn's advice is rubbish. personally as someone who hasn't had as much practice in socializing as other kids have, i don't know how to read a lot of body language, and i don't know how to spot someone covering up their true feelings even if they're bad at hiding it. it's not David's fault he doesn't recognize body language. my man i'm on your side for this one

"photography is easy" Abel as a media major who has to learn photography and videography in college, i can assure you it is not

"i'll wait as long as i need to to be with you" uhh what if...the time never comes...you don't know if David is aro /j

backstory! even if a little bit. Abel reveals that she's liked her BFF since 7th grade.

David can see spirits/ghosts now? since when? and why does everyone believe this? how is this relevant to the story? why are they all so casual about it? i thought urban kids aren't that superstitious

poor David. he keeps saying he doesn't like Abel romantically but no one believes him. man i feel you. apparently he "has feelings he hasn't realized yet"

by the way the story's first person POV switches between Abel and David at the author's whim, with no rhyme or reason, and they both have literally the same narrative voice so i can't tell who's narrating if i don't look at the top of the page for their names. that's bad

if Abel talks about melting when she sees David's smile ONE MORE TIME—

i've read other romance books before and even they're not this annoying with the "melting"

you've invited the entirety of David's squad to SLEEP OVER at your SHARED KOS??

again with the mundane morning routine of waking David up with insults. this is getting old

the author's really pushing the "David is a medium" plotline for comic relief, huh?

backstory again; this time of how David made a flower crown for Abel when they were kids and they made a pact to stay bEsT fRieNdS foReVer. David still holds this promise to this day btw. also apparently Dav told Abel to promise she'll keep the flower crown as they grow older…to all the men following me and reading this rn, would you ask your girl best friend to keep a flower crown you made forever? asking for research purposes.

also uhhh assuming they didn't grow up in the area around Abel's family's spare house, why is it that the place where they made their pinky promise to be bffs with the flower crown shebang around that area? weren't you all living with your families far away from that estate when this happened? it's never explained if that happened when they were visiting the spare house.

oh, the ghost prank. i remember reading this from last time. still as irrelevant as ever

Are you sure Abel actually treasures David as a friend? Bc she sure complains an awful lot about him, and she doesn’t ever regard him in a positive light except if it’s in a romantic light. She claims to not want to ruin their friendship but she barely acts like a friend, and i doubt it’s bc of the so-called banter, bc it feels to me like there’s no playful undertone to it the more i read

"aren't you bored staying as just best friends? i want your status to change to romantic couple" what parent would say that? not mine. but it seems really far fetched even if there are parents who tease you about getting an s/o. also friendship isn't boring, yikes

Well okay?? Why does David ask who Abel’s ideal s/o is like?? There’s no buildup to this like, at all. He hasn’t even allegedly realized his feelings yet. What

No...no...the tomboy is feeling pressure to be more feminine… nooo

Lunetta don’t tell your friend she needs to shorten her school skirt

Ugh. the makeover scene.

David’s friends’ teasing legitimately hurts Abel but she still puts up with them, why?

Also her guy friends are assholes for making fun of her efforts to become more feminine. Yes, she’s doing it for her crush’s attention, which i’m not excited about, but i’ve been in this position before. Being androgynous my whole life with people misinterpreting my affinity for unisex clothing and gender-neutral presentation for being masculine, i always got labelled as a tomboy even though i still heavily liked a lot of “girly” stuff and still dressed with stuff in the women’s section. They refuse to respect me as a woman when i present as GNC, and they mock me for being more feminine bc it’s not what they’re used to. It fucking sucks being told that you don’t deserve to be a girl bc people don’t want to change their perceptions of you. End rant

Wait...what exactly is unfeminine with putting your hair in a ponytail? Is it bc it’s a low maintenance hairstyle for girls who don’t care enough to style it? Ponytails have very stylish variations, btw. more stylish than just letting down your hair, which is what Abel and Lunetta believe makes a girl more girly

Speaking about gender expression, i hate how much the author uses sentences like “you’re acting like a girl if you do THAT” or seeping the notion that David, as the guy, is “supposed to take care of” Abel. this book is thick with gender roles and i loathe it with every atom of my being

How to know the book is written by an upper-class teenager: their characters can afford to eat out at Grand Indonesia as a casual brunch. (for context, Grand Indonesia is a huge, popular and incredibly expensive mall in Jakarta. As a mall rat, i’ve been there and i love the aesthetic, but go broke immediately if i spend money in there. It really is only for the rich)

Why why why does the author feel the need to write about every single time they wake up in the morning. With the SAME dialogue even though sometimes there are different people involved. Bc everyone just communicates in insults and nobody is fucking civil. It’s like talking amongst my family, it’s so tiring to read

Wh-why does David suddenly like Lunetta?? Literally the foreshadowing was only a few pages ago. And now he’s claiming he’s liked her for a few months now?? What?? Bro you showed absolutely no sign of liking Lunetta, you expect me to believe this?? The foreshadowing is what, him blinking when Lunetta talks to him exactly once and him saying he likes feminine girls?? There are MANY feminine pretty girls at school??

Abel you don’t actually care for David outside of making him your boyfriend, that much is clear to me, so why are you waxing poetic about preserving your friendship?

WHY is Abel making such a big fuss over the sole of her shoe peeling off?? You can still fucking walk?? You don’t need to whine about it?? Or shuffle?? Just walk with that shit slapping against your foit, it’s fine, you’re not gonna die and you don’t need David to run to your side. Gosh, some rich people, i swear...

David pestering Abel to cook for him makes me uncomfortable, simply bc none of my male relatives in my household like helping with chores. And according to the story this isn’t the first time he’s done it. I would be okay with this if he’s ever shown to contribute to chores, but he never is

Also why does Abel, the girl who owns a spare house and drives a car to school every day, NOT have a spare pair of shoes? Even i own two pairs, so i can wear the backup when my regulars get soaked in the rain, and i’m middle class

“Let your boyfriend pay for it, it’d be romantic, like in the movies” oh shut up /srs

I’ve reached chapter 11! What a trek. And it was just as bad as I remember

We’re 12 chapters in and still none of the characters have any personality. and there's so much dialogue. i can read it quite quickly bc the language is so light and also things are dragging along so slowly lol. I understand the author was a teenager and is not a professional, but even i knew as a hobbyist writer at 16 that you don’t have to describe every single part of their day every chapter. Friend Zone really DOES read like a bored teen’s scattered diary entries. and this is the cleaned up, FINISHED book. WHAT did the rough one look like on the orange platform?!

to be continued, i've had enough for today

[purlturtle]

Fic Writer Review

Borrowed from @ussjellyfish who is a writer that I deeply admire and adore. If any of my mutual who's a writer would like to do these to, please feel free!

1. how many works do you have on AO3?

55, of which:

34 for Warehouse 13 18 for Star Trek Voyager 6 for Star Trek The Next Generation 2 each for Star Trek Deep Space Nine and Discworld 1 each for Star Trek Discovery, Doctor Who, and Wonder Woman (2017 movie) and 1 original work!

2. what’s your total AO3 word count?

1,379,172 as of today August 26th, 2021

more under the cut, including a clean list of these questions!

3. how many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

Eight, as listed above!

4. what are your top 5 fics by kudos?

#1, In The Warmth of Friends, a Bering and Wells kidfic - 343 kudos #2, And Now You, a Bering and Wells High School AU - 149 kudos #3, Iron Woman and Iron Woman 2, a Bering and Wells retelling of Iron Man - 143 and 126 kudos respectively #4, 24th century t...echnology, a Kathryn Janeway/Beverly Crusher PWP, 124 kudos #5, Moscow, a Bering and Wells one-shot, 123 kudos

5. do you respond to comments, why or why not?

Yes, I absolutely do. I even strive to do so quickly! I love to receive comments. I love that my words moved someone enough to leave a comment, from "extra kudos" to pages-long odes (you know who you are! I love you!) and/or quoted words/sentences/paragraphs. I feel that the least I can do is take some time to show my appreciation in return. I also want to tell anyone who reads my stories and feels reticent to comment because it seems like overstepping to them: it's not. It's absolutely not. I adore comments, and so does every author I know. They give me warm fuzzy feelings, they make me squee, they make my whole entire day, month, year - they are never an overreach or anything remotely negative or off-putting. At all. Ever. So please go and comment! I'll be happy to hear from you!

6. what’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

For sure At The Heart of The Paradox, a timey-wimey Warehouse 13/Doctor Who Crossover - I might be cheating here a bit, though, because that's part one of a two-parter, and the second part ends in a much nicer way.

7. do you write crossovers? if so what is the craziest one you’ve written?

Yes, I do, but I don't think them crazy at all, or even whacky. I think the most ambitious is one I haven't published and will need to re-work extensively before I do; it's a re-write of ST:VOY with some Warehouse 13 thrown in. Anyone wanna collab on that?!

8. have you ever received hate on a fic?

No. Not ever, as a matter of fact! The most was a comment along the lines of "I don't know where your muse went; tell her to come back" which... I didn't really get. *shrug*

9. do you write smut? if so what kind?

Hell yes I do! F/F mostly, but sometimes other kinds as well. I'm quite proud and happy with it; some of my fics are sheer smut fics, mostly I write porn with plot, though, when I write smut, or put smutty scenes in where they fit.

10. have you ever had a fic stolen?

Nope. Not to my knowledge, anyway.

11. have you ever had a fic translated?

No - I'm open for it, though! The funny thing is that I'm writing in my non-native language (I'm German), but I never considered writing in German or translating my own English stuff into German. Though if anyone wants to, go ahead! Just let me know when you do!

12. have you ever co-written a fic before?

Nope, though I'm absolutely open for that too!

13. what’s your all time favorite ship?

Bering and Wells, baby. OTP from Day One until today.

14. what’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

Stranded, a VOY fic - it is at a kind of open end, and I frankly have no idea where it would go from where it stands, so that's where it'll remain unless someone else picks it up. Which you'd be free to do; again, just let me know! Same with Facing... Death?, which never really got anywhere.

15. what are your writing strengths?

Emotions - describing/depicting them, and evoking them in the reader. That's something I can easily say, because I've been told so, and because I think so too. Not sure about the rest, because I have never really gotten a lot of "professional" feedback, if you want to call it that - never had a Creative Writing class or project, never got a teacher's opinion on my stuff. I've been trying to get in contact with editors and writing coaches to change that, but I am frankly STARVING for getting feedback that'll help me improve. So hey, if you, dear reader of this, are in a position to give that and would like to do so, please hit me up!

16. what are your writing weaknesses?

Pacing/Plotting, I think. Maybe sometimes wordiness? Although that usually serves a purpose. See my reply to #15, though - this is all based on my own perception, and I'd love to get some outside opinion.

17. what are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

Well, German flows quite easily LOL. I've also had some Italian, IIRC. I think there are several approaches that work - having the dialogue explained by a character (for example to another person in the same conversation who doesn't speak that language), having a translation directly follow the words in parentheses or whatever, footnotes (doesn't work so well in AO3, though, or other places where you'd have to scroll far to see them and then return to where you were), putting it in English but somehow signifying that it is spoken in another language, and other ways that I can't think of right now. I think it's okay to put a different language in where it fits and makes sense; I also think it's important to find a way to do so that doesn't stop the reader's flow too harshly.

18. what was the first fandom you wrote for?

Star Trek Voyager, with a Self Insert Story that I still look very fondly at. I haven't been writing all that long, though (almost a decade now), so there isn't any teenage cringiness or anything to deal with.

19. what’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

Oh my stars, that is so hard to answer. I'd say there is barely any fic that I've written that I don't still love, even my abandoned WIPs. Like I said, I'll always have a soft spot for my Kathryn/Marie fics even though they're self inserts; I still like my early B&W work... I am proud of Roppongi Tokyo Butler Cafe, which I wrote in the space of an afternoon and which has a very different vibe than my other fics; I am also proud of Angel, Sinner, Dragonslayer, which was a plot bunny that blindsided me and INSISTED I write it... I am immensely proud of my novel-length Bering and Wells High School AU And Now You... I've written a few continuations of fics that I've read that I'm all really proud of even though I have no idea (at least in one case) what the author of the original fic thinks of it.

Here are the blank questions for anyone who wants to do this too!

Fic Writer Review

how many works do you have on AO3?

what’s your total AO3 word count?

how many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

what are your top 5 fics by kudos?

do you respond to comments, why or why not?

what’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

do you write crossovers? if so what is the craziest one you’ve written?

have you ever received hate on a fic?

do you write smut? if so what kind?

have you ever had a fic stolen?

have you ever had a fic translated?

have you ever co-written a fic before?

what’s your all time favorite ship?

what’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

what are your writing strengths?

what are your writing weaknesses?

what are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

what was the first fandom you wrote for?

what’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

[maybeeatspaghetti]

1) I'm not sure if this has been asked before, but do you have fics that you haven't posted, or don't plan on posting? If so, and if comfortable with sharing, are there any particular reasons, be it the content, how it's written, etc?

2) Somewhat generic question, but as someone who is interested in writing, be it fanfiction/smut (possibly?) or otherwise, do you have any tips? I know that reading more is the big one, but y'know.. still.

Have a great day/night! ♡

1) I have three fics that I haven’t posted and don’t plan to post. Two are short fics that are so similar to fics I’ve already posted that it would be redundant if I did post them. The third one is a 150k novel that was a Whizzvin fic, but the characters changed so drastically as I wrote the book that I changed the names and developed them into different characters. Maybe it’s a little bit selfish, but I wanted to keep that one for myself and not share it. And I actually cut down the sex scenes, to make it less about sex and more about the story—so instead of four or five sex scenes, I cut it down to two and rewrote it to sound more like Warm Baths, where there are no typical erotica words (like “cock” or “thrust” or “hard”) it’s more about feelings than anything else. 

2) Write, write, write. That’s the biggest tip, and I know it gets thrown around a lot to the point of “I’ve heard this so many times already,” but it’s because it’s true. If you’re starting out writing and you look at it and think, “this is terrible” and you stop writing forever, then you’ve prevented yourself from ever getting better. The more you write, the better you’ll be. I’ve been writing for 15 years, and I can tell you, the writing I did when I was in middle school is horrific. It’s really bad. And I got marginally better in high school, and a lot better in college, and even better now, beyond college, when I’ve really been able to develop my voice without being encouraged to write a specific way by my teachers and professors. So allow yourself to write badly.

Write and get feedback. It’s not as easy to improve if you’re writing into a vacuum and you’re the only one seeing your work. As hard as it may be, share your work with other people; let them tell you what works and what doesn’t. If you’re uncomfortable sharing your writing with people you know, look for beta readers on the Internet. Feedback is key to helping you grow as a writer.

Yes, reading is important, but I’d rank it lower than writing. Reading helps get a sense for how authors structure their sentences, pace their stories, weave in subplots, and split their chapters, but ultimately, I personally lean much more heavily on the writing than I do on the reading, though I do read, just not as much as some authors. Some authors say to be a good writer you must 1) read x number of books a year, 2) read with a pen in your hand, and 3) read “good” works of literature only. I disagree with all of those: 1) There’s no certain number of books you have to read a year that makes you a reader or a writer. Go at your own pace and read how much you want to. I know some people good-naturedly compete to see who can read more books, but if that’s not the way you work, then don’t feel bad about not reading as much as other people. 2) Taking notes while you read doesn’t necessarily make you a better writer. If you like marking up texts and it works for you, go for it! And I do it sometimes (my Falsettos script... there’s hardly any white space left), but it can make you feel like you’re at school when you do mark in the books or take notes, and that might kill your interest in reading it. Just by reading (without taking notes or writing in the text), you’ll unconsciously absorb a lot of information about what makes a story work. 3) “Good” is subjective. What’s considered “good” by the people who say things like this is usually confined to the literary canon. And while I agree that some knowledge of the literary canon is valuable, there are so many wonderful works beyond it that are just as good. So when people talk about “good literature,” they’re usually deliberately denigrating and stepping on everything beyond the literary canon (which excludes a huge range of diverse works/voices). So don’t listen to them. There’s plenty of good literature outside the literary canon, and who’s to say something they personally didn’t like isn’t good? It’s all about personal taste. So read what you want, be it novels or nonfiction or comics or manga or fanfiction—whatever it is, it can be valuable to you as a writer.

Going back to writing—sometimes, you just have to write something bad to get it out and then take it out and start afresh, and I know that takes extra time and effort, but sometimes you need to do it. For example, I was writing a serious story about depression and I just couldn’t keep from writing a specific scene in a humorous way. So I wrote the scene that way, with a completely different feel and tone and pacing to the rest of the story, and then copied and pasted it somewhere else and went back to the beginning of the scene. Once I had gotten that awkward funny stuff out of the way, I could write it seriously. 

I’ve never been particularly good at plot, as I’m a much more character-driven writer, so I’m afraid I can’t offer too many tips about that. I usually let my characters lead the story, no matter whether it’s a short piece like what I mostly post on AO3 or it’s a longer, more involved piece like What a Wonder You Are.

In terms of writing smut... let me tell you—my first attempts at writing smut about five years ago were dreadful, and I actually gave up until this summer, when I jumped right off the deep end into my Shameless Whizzvin Smut series. And I’d grown a lot since the last time I tried to write it, and I did my research and tried to focus on the language and the emotions over the actual acts themselves (though some fics require a level of detachment, like Pretty Little Thing, where the fic is about the acts rather than the emotions), and I thought I did alright. And in the last four months, I’ve gotten better.

If you want to learn how to write good smut, turn to fanfiction authors. I have rarely read a good sex scene in a published, literary, mainstream novel (but for god’s sake, don’t read Fifty Shades of Grey; I know that was fanfiction, but it really doesn’t depict healthy or safe sex in any way—The Atlantic article “Consent Isn’t Enough” is great at explaining why). A lot of novels do the “fade to black” type scene where they cut away just as the characters are falling into bed together (Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin is a “fade to black,” but it’s done really masterfully). But if you want to learn how to write good smut, read fanfiction and remember that you can write smut that’s sexy without foregoing safety, communication, and consent. 

There’s kind of a fine line between what’s sexy and what’s absurd, and it’s all too easy to step over the line into the absurd, and this is sometimes as basic as word choice—if you say “his cock was flushed and quivering,” it sounds much better than “his flushed and quivering manhood” or “his flushed member was quivering.” If you’re going for the absurd, then use all the ridiculous words you want (manhood, member, manmeat, prick, rod, love muscle, meat stick, loins, etc. etc. etc.)! Just know it’ll be more amusing than sexy and people will probably make fun of it. But if that’s what you’re going for, then go all out! 

If you’re wanting some more specific advice about writing in general or smut writing, you’re welcome to send an ask or message; this response would get entirely too long if I were to go into more detail here. 💕