#i think that's going to be my new fairytale/folklore tag | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

concerningwolves · 4 years

Text

When Dealing With Wolves \ Project Info

What if Little Red Riding-Hood's mother had reached out to the wolves in the woods? What hidden truths would she have found out there in those cool, green depths, where the earth itself sings and the trees know your name?

WDWW is my debut novel, coming in late 2021. It's a very loose retelling of Little Red Riding-Hood in a high fantasy world and features an autistic lead character, polyamorous families, a magic system inspired by yarn & fibre crafts, and strong fairytale/mythological vibes. Oh, and talking wolves. If you're curious, the first two chapters are available to read free [here].

OVERVIEW

GENRE: Epic/High fantasy

SUBGENRES: Mythopoeia; thriller

TARGET AUDIENCE: Adult

STATUS: Final revisions; self-publication prep

SERIES?: Yes – Book one. [Book two is The Kindness of Ravens; info on that WIP is here]

KEY THEMES & TROPES: Redemption & personal growth \ trauma & recovery \ magic & witchcraft \ found family \ the importance of compassion and empathy \ emotion-based magic \ fairytales \ mythological worldbuilding \ mystery & intrigue \ character-driven plot

SYNOPSIS

Ys is a wild and restless place, ruled by the ancient magics that lurk there. At its southernmost tip is the town of Erdansten, surrounded by fear and crumbling walls; to the north is Deothwicc, the forest of the Wolvenkind, dark and ancient. Between them lies a land marked by the ghosts of a history nobody can remember, rich with secrets that could tear apart everything the Kinds think they know.

[full synopsis, character overview and other info below the cut]

Rostfar is supposed to protect the people of Erdansten from the wolves and magic, a duty she takes seriously – despite being the very thing that her people fear. For years she has kept a tenuous balance between her duty and her own magic, clinging on to her secret with everything she has. She knows that the line she walks is a perilous one, but she can’t escape this lie she has built now. Not if doing so would tear apart her world and put her family in danger.

When her lover’s estranged brother arrives in Erdansten, however, the delicate balance she has maintained all her life is thrown into turmoil. Things from beyond the walls start to close in, attacking her people, and increasingly it seems that her only hope lies far to the north. In Deothwicc. But Rostfar’s absence from Erdansten sends the careful structure of power crumbling down, and those she has left behind must fight to maintain order as the worlds of wolves and humans collide.

CHARACTERS

► MAIN CHARACTERS

Rostfar → human || 36 || Arketh's mother, lover to Isha and Mati || autistic with a special interest in folklore, mythology and history || white; red hair, freckles, blue eyes; short and stocky build; small scar on her upper lip || As the Dannaskeld of Erdansten, it is Rostfar's job to oversee the security and defence of the town. It is difficult to protect people from magic, however, when you are the very thing they fear.

Arketh → Human || 4 || darker, copper-toned skin, auburn hair, brown eyes; small for her age; likes colourful clothes || autistic || daughter of Mati, Isha and Rostfar || Bright, curious, optimistic and wise beyond her four years, Arketh is well-loved in Erdansten. While her mother fears the magic that hounds them both, Arketh loves it – even as night-terrors and sleepwalking episodes threaten to expose her to the world.

Grae → wolf || grey-brown coat and brown eyes || has PTSD and depression || yearling || One of the youngest of the Deothwicc pack, Grae has grown up under the shadow of his litter-brother's death. While all the wolves around him seem content to live and move on, he has struggled in silence with an anger that now threatens to consume both himself and everyone he loves.

Aethren → human(?) || 18 || nonbinary || trainee hunter under Rostfar || white; black hair, grey eyes; gangly build || For all their skill at hunting and tracking, Aethren has never felt good enough. Never felt right. They're always too prickly, too surly, too quick to take offence. Nothing makes sense right now, but they're certain this new power uncoiling in the back of their head is only going to make matters much, much worse

Yrsa → wolf || reddish coat, amber-brown eyes; small and slight compared to most of her kind || Although Yrsa agrees that wolvenkind must stick close together to survive, she cannot help but feel curious about the odd, two-legged beings beyond the marshes and mountains. Her packmates call her naive, but Yrsa is sure there is something they could learn from the humans – and she is only too eager to prove her theories right.

► SECONDARY CHARACTERS

WDWW has a large supporting cast, but some of the foremost secondary characters are —

Isha → human || 33 || One of Arketh's fathers, in a triad with Rostfar and Mati || Copper-brown skin, darker than Arketh's, and close-shorn hair, brown eyes; very short and lean; calloused hands || blacksmith || trying to grow beyond the ghosts of his past

Mati → human || 37 || Arketh's other father, in a triad with Rostfar and Isha || Long brown hair and beard, green eyes; extremely tall and bulky build || always slightly scared of his own strength, so he never does anything fast || solid as rock with a warm, compassionate heart

Marken → human || 40 || Rostfar's best friend, Aethren's father || foremost healer in the Isles of Ys; nobody is quite sure where he learned such revolutionary medicine || grave and closed-off, he is often accused of aloofness, although anyone treated by him can see the deep compassion behind his eyes.

Natta → human || 36 || Rostfar's twin sister and Dannhren (head of the council) of Erdansten || cool-headed, driven and ambitious, with a bad habit of forgetting to share her emotions with the people she cares about

Kristan → human || 15 || Natta's son || Apprentice healer || Born with one arm || Both gullible and headstrong, Kristan's fear of the dark and the mysteries beyond the walls of Erdansten may prove to be his undoing. And the undoing of the town.

Myr → wolf || father of the Deothwicc pack || world-weary but determined to find a better future for his pack

Estene → wolf || mother of the Deothwicc pack || scarred deeply by the deaths of her last litter, Estene now believes that the only hope for her pack is to trust a human. Unfortunately, she is yet to meet a human who could be worthy of such trust.

Thrigg → no longer human || 200-ish? (She can't remember) || Thrigg longs to rejoin the world outside of the magic-bound city of Hrafnholm, but her longing is kept in check by her fear of what she will find.

► ANTAGONISTS

Faela → human || 42 || Isha's estranged half-brother || arrives in Erdansten in the dead of night, with old wounds on his body and deeper wounds in his psyche. Guilt surrounds him like a shroud.

Ethy → human || mid-late 60s || retired hunter who now tends to the half-tame ravens in Erdansten. She wields her love for the town like a weapon.

Unwolf and Other → no longer wolves || ?? || strangers from another land, wreathed always in a malicious, living fog that covers their tracks.

OTHER INFORMATION

► MISC. INFO

As of writing this post (17.03.2021), I have one (1) chapter of copy-edits left to revise.

I hope to have a solid release date for the novel by the end of April.

It will be self-published, with both ebook and print versions available.

► TAG LISTS & TRACKING

Taglist members will be tagged in important milestones/updates, and in longer excerpts from the book. If you'd like to be added, please reply to this post or tell me that you'd like to be added on the reblog (or send an ask if the askbox is open). You can ask me to take you off at any time :)

To keep track of the project progress or learn more about it, check out the #When Dealing With Wolves tag

► SUPPORT ME

I have a Patreon for my writing, with £1 and £5 tiers. You can also support me on Ko-Fi, where I cross-post monthly Patreon stuff, either through one-off tips or monthly support.

#writeblr #when dealing with wolves #writers on tumblr #writers of tumblr #high fantasy

110 notes · View notes

reincarnated70sbaby · 3 years

Text

maritime madness

led zeppelin x reader

warnings: swearing, drug use

an: so I was sailing yesterday and I was thinking about this the entire time I might have nearly capsized the boat

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“I can’t believe we’re actually doing this” I spoke, staring out at the large blue yacht that rested on the waters of Normandy. It all started the day before, when we were all throwing around tripped out ideas in our hotel room.

“What are we gonna do tomorrow?” Jimmy asked. I sat by his side, my head resting on his bony shoulder. My dose of LSD had just kicked it, and as it was my first time it probably hit me quicker than the others. I tried to speak, but it felt like every time I moved my mouth, it felt like I would stretch my mouth out of shape, like putty.

“Let’s go explore that cathedral, the big massive one, y’know? The one with the hunchback. Maybe we could bump into him or something”

As soon as the words left Robert’s lips, our entire entourage burst out in giggles. I myself, was having hard time controlling my breathing. I had to rest my head in Jimmy’s lap, Jimmy being doubled down over me clutching his stomach.

“Percy, you dumb fucker, y-you know that’s not a real story” Jonesy informed, all his words all broken up by loud chuckles.

Roberts jaw immediately dropped open in shock, along with his eyes widening and brown trashing in confusion.

“Nah, yeah it was, the uh, the hunchman did the um, bells. Yeah, the bells”

“No he didn’t, because he never existed you nonce. It’s a fairytale from the 19th century” Jimmy piped in, adding his extensive knowledge of mythology and folklore into the conversation.

“But me ma said he existed, you’re gonna say my mum lied to me all those years?”

“Well obviously Perce, it’s just a bedtime story” Jonesy added, still chuckling to himself at Robert’s gullible nature.

“Fine then, someone else give an idea since all of mine always get ridiculed” Robert stated, crossing his arms and craning his head back against the footboard of the bed and staring at the ceiling in a huff.

“How about Père Lachaise?”

“What the actual fuck is pear la chair Pagey?” Bonzo asked, pronouncing the words all wrong in his thick Englishman accent.

“It’s Père Lachaise” Jimmy corrected in a perfect French accent, “and it’s a graveyard in Paris, loads of famous people are buried there - Oscar Wilde, Frederic Chopin, Jim Morrison, Edith Piaf”

“Jimmy you must be as mad as Morrison to think we would waste our day off in a fucking dead person museum. Jesus Christ how did we pick you up” Bonzo sighed, rolling his eyes.

“Okay, what about Mont Saint-Michel? It’s this cool island off of the coast. There’s a bridge but once the tide comes in you can’t get in or out. Wouldn’t that be good craic eh?” Jonesy suggested

“No” Bonzo, Jimmy and Robert all said at the same time.

“Ah! You’ve been outnumbered Mr Jones haha. Maybe you and I could go out another time Jonny boy, we could go exploring and see the spirits trapped on the island” I said with a chuckle, the psychedelic in my system making this whole situation very funny.

“Jesus Christ what the fuck did she even say. That her first time on acid?” Robert asked to Jimmy.

“Must’ve been, it hit her pretty quickly” Jimmy replied, staring into my largely dilated pupils. He swore he could’ve seen something dancing in my pupils, but maybe that was just the drug in him.

We all sat in silence for a couple minutes, all of us enjoying our high.

“Innnnnnnnnnnnnnn fourteen hundred ninety two, Columbus sailed the ocean blueeee” I sang, the lyrics being the only words of a song I could think of to fill the silence. A beat of silence passed and I wondered if everybody suddenly passed out, either into sleep or another dimension.

As I started the next line, everyone else joined in with me. We eventually finished the entire song, even an encore requested by the boys. I sung the encore in a horrendous, deep operatic voice while prancing round the hotel room. A round of applause sounded, and I took my theatrical bows in front of my supportive crowd.

“That’s It! I know what we can do tomorrow. God that is a good idea!” Bonzo declared, jumping up to his feet, not before nearly tumbling backwards.

“Go on then Bonz, don’t leave us guessing mate” Jonesy suggested, breaking the dramatic silence that had ensued.

“Rent a yacht! We can go out early in the morning and stay overnight since our flight back home is in the evening anyway! All we need to do is hire a skipper or something”

We all were stoked at idea of having a private boat to ourselves. Sure, none of the boys were experienced sailors, but that’s what a professional skipper was for, driving rich people around in yachts right?

“Do we really have to do this” I said, making our way through the marina to our yacht.

“The skipper will probably dive off the boat when we get started tonight” Jonesy commented, sharing my lack of enthusiasm for the maritime adventure. “We should have ditched them and gone to Mont Saint-Michel”. I only hummed in response, dragging my overnight suitcase over the gaps in the planks of wood on the dock.

“Um yeah, about that skipper. We couldn’t exactly book one on such short notice” Cole confessed.

“What the actual fuck Cole? Are we just supposed to sail ourselves and drown? I can’t tie a knot to save my bloody life” Robert shrieked. We all stopped in our tracks and turned to the tour manager, glaring at him through our sunglasses.

“Of course not Percy, why would we do that to our cash cows hm? And this is a motorboat, no ropes involved. It’s basically like driving a car. In water. In fact, all you need to drive it is a drivers license, which I’m positive you all have judging by your expansive car choices. Forgot to mention that myself and Peter have opted out” With that note, Cole dropped the yacht keys into Bonzo’s hand and scuttled away.

We all stood there, bags in hand, confusion over our faces as we watched Cole’s figure disappear behind the hundred of other boats.

“Well shit” Jonesy said, the sourness in his voice barely hidden.

“Let’s just go check it out, we don’t even have to leave the marina if we can drive it, we’ll just park out all night” Bonzo affirmed, being unusually optimistic.

We all found the boat and as the boys started embarking aboard, I thought out loud.

“I can’t believe we’re doing this”

“Cmon darling, let’s just see what it’s like. If you hate it we’ll do something else” Jimmy compromised, outstretching his hand to me.

The boat bobbed a bit on the water as I stepped on.

“It’s not hating it I’m worried about, I was practically raised on a boat Jim, I’m just not sure 4 rockstars and a boat is a great combination”

“It’s okay we won’t go too hard, at least one of us won’t, I guess. Anyway, you were raised on a boat? Like a houseboat or something?”

“No, my dad was a skipper. Whenever he was home from trips, he would teach my and my siblings to sail. Y’know the whole nine yards, all the different knots, pulling in the ropes, steering, navigating charts. It’s just been a while since I’ve been on one and I hope I can remember everything”

“Gosh you are fabulous, my dear, I learn something new about you everyday” Jimmy said, pulling me in for a kiss. There was a loud bang of the engine, which we both jumped apart at.

“What the fuck are they at now, Christ” Jimmy sighed.

“Here, go set down our stuff in the biggest room, I’ll go see what they’re messing with”

We both parted, Jimmy heading downstairs, myself climbing onto the helm.

“Oi, Bonz, Percy, step away from the wheel until I get us out of this parking lot” I commanded. Both Robert and Bonzo looked at me funny, before slowly raising their arms and stepping away.

“And you know better?” Bonzo asked, still not sure where my bossiness came from.

“I think I do, unless you have your skipper license on hand?”

“Wait, you have a sailing license?” Robert interjected.

“I actually don’t, but I know everything you need to not drown. My father was a sailor and he taught me how to run a boat. Thank god we have a motorboat, as we might’ve been a little trouble if we have a proper sailing yacht. If we were, it wouldn’t have been as relaxing as simply steering a wheel” I answered, switching the engine on.

We warmed up the engine for a couple minutes, then casted off and finally escaped the madness of the marina. Soon were out on the French coastline. We continued sailing perpendicular to the coast, not wanting to stray too far. All the boys took turns steering, with Jonesy being the best skipper in-training out of all of them. Only once had we had anchored the boat again was the real party going to start.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

if only sailing was this easy in reality 😒

anyway I’m gonna do a spicier part 2 riiight now😎

leave any comments/ideas down below!!!!

navigation

tag list : @rebel-without-a-zeppelin @princesspagey @dreamersdrowse

#led zeppelin #led zeppelin x reader #jimmy page #john bonham #john paul jones #robert plant

38 notes · View notes

jaydicksummerexchange · 4 years

Text

JAYDICK EXCHANGE: AUGUST 24, 2020

[ ❤ Works posted so far! ❤ ]

Here are today’s fanworks! Please leave a comment and kudos for the author if you enjoy their work. Authors/artists will be revealed August 31st!

Alone Together by anonymous for Nottak [FIC, T, No Warnings, JayDick]

Additional Tags: JayDick Summer Exchange, BatCat wedding, Wedding blues, or is it bachelor blues?, Dick's impressive list of exes, Loneliness, Drunkenness, Slight Abandonment Issues, Fluff and Angst, Open Ending

Summary: “Everybody’s off… getting married and going away. But you and me, we could be our own family.”

Dinnertime by anonymous for firefright [Art, Gen, No Warnings, Dick Grayson & Jason Todd]

Additional Tags: JayDick Summer Exchange, Fanart, Digital Art, just jason taking care of dick, Domestic Fluff, But also, Mild Hurt/Comfort, because of the premise/prompt

Summary: “That’s enough, Dickiebird. It’s dinnertime.”

Dick Grayson suffers from a very specific form of tunnel vision when lives are on the line, leaving him a) unable to take care of himself; and b) unwilling to take care of himself. Between his day job as a cop and his (actual) job as Nightwing, that's pretty much his new normal. Enter Jason, back from the dead and wherever he's been with the Outlaws, who may or may not have inherited the combined forces of Alfred's and Bruce's mother henning tendencies despite his claims otherwise.

we're just dancing in the dark by anonymous for naol [FIC, Teen, No Warnings, JayDick]

Additional Tags: no capes AU, fairytale AU, curses and spells and such, Memory Loss, Transformation, brief description of animal death as associated with hunting, absolutely no research done into the proper historical setting

Summary: Deep in the forest, there is a mysterious old man, a cursed manor, a blue-eyed wolf following his every move, and a hauntingly familiar young man who knows something he is not sharing.

Jason, a hunter in the nearby village, is just trying to survive the winter. But he'll have to unravel the mystery of it all, including his own missing memories, if he wants to protect the people he cares about and save himself.

Running on Fumes by anonymous for salvadore [FIC, Ten, No Warnings, JayDick]

Additional Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Humor, Missions Gone Wrong, Drug Use, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Pining, Banter, Pre-Slash

Summary: Dick’s day goes from bad to worse but luckily, Jason is there to pick up the pieces.

Don’t let me go (don’t leave me) by anonymous for AlannaofRoses [FIC, Gen, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Dick Grayson & Jason Todd]

Additional Tags: Whump, ambiguous ending, does he die?thats up to u!, Dick Grayson Whump

Summary: "Does it hurt?"

"Dickie, please," he begs. "Come on."

He doesn't respond, glazed over eyes making Jason wonder if he'd even heard him at all. "I think it might be nice," he murmurs, fingers stilling in their exploration of Jason's face. "To see my parents again." No.

"Di-"

"I'll miss you, Little Wing."

They Are Out There Saying by anonymous for empires [Fic, Not Rated, No Warnings, JayDick]

Additional Tags: Misunderstandings, Cultural Differences, Japanese Culture a tiny little bit of a case, don't get too excited about it, Getting Together, Marriage Proposal, of sorts, ou will see what I mean, Japanese Mythology & Folklore, POV Jason Todd, POV Outsider, Jason Todd is Red Hood, Jason Todd Swears, Dick Grayson is Nightwing, Everyone Loves Dick Grayson, Everyone Fears Red Hood, The author is a nerd, The Author Regrets Everything, Rumors, Poetry, Undercover Missions, Shy Jason Todd, can this work remain anonymous forever?, Unreliable Narrator, Canon-Typical Violence, JayDick Summer Exchange, Kissing, my tags are a mess, I don't know what this is anymore stop looking at me

Summary: There was a rumour going around the Hida Province that the infamous wandering monk was secretly courting the blue-eyed ninja. Not only has the monk not discarded his earthly desires, said some, but he actively sought to indulge them, insisted others. Something ought to be done, proclaimed few, lest he would turn into a demon or come back as a vengeful ghost, feared all.

Meanwhile, Jason and Dick were just trying to live their best life.

“So you’re saying,” Jason decided to sum it all up, “that a rival clan of surprisingly sloppy ninja,” properly trained ones wouldn’t stomp all over the place, after all, “is trying to enact revenge by going after an old calligrapher? Because you found a piece of rock?”

Who would have thought huh? by anonymous for geckoholic [Art, Mature, Now Warnings, JayDick]

Additional Tags: Fanart

Summary: Somewhere over the desert.

we wanted miracles (they didn’t happen) by anonymous for pentapus [FIC, Mature, Graphic Depictions of Violence, JayDick]

Additional Tags: Telepathic Bond, Soul Bond, Space Flight, Sharing a Bed, Communication Failure, BAMF Dick Grayson, BAMF Jason Todd, Canon-Typical Violence, Major Character Injury, WhumpHurt/Comfort, Developing Relationship, Psychological Trauma, Nightmares, Panic Attacks, Jason Todd Needs A Hug, Dick Grayson Needs a Hug

Summary: “It gave us an edge.” Dick shook his head. “I couldn’t risk the city blowing up just to spare your feelings.”

“So you didn’t even ask.” Jason looked disgusted.

“No. In the end, you’ve always done what’s necessary.” Even after everything, Jason was still a bat, and that sentence might as well be their family motto.

Like a good little soldier.

That brought Jason up short. His mind was static, and he gritted out: “Whatever. I want it gone.”

“Oh, believe me, so do I.”

(In order to defeat some aliens, Dick and Jason enter a soulbond. To get rid of it, they embark on a galactic road trip.)

#2020 jaydick exchange #jaydick #dickjay #this week is so excellent #dcu fanfic #dcu fanart #jaydick summer blues

157 notes · View notes

displayheartcode · 3 years

Text

2021 in review: fanfic writer edition

BY THE NUMBERS:

words written: 25652

words published (AO3): 25652

# of published one-shots: 42?

# of completed multi-chaps: 0

# of fics in progress: 0

# of ongoing multi-chaps: 0

# of fic ideas waiting their turn: too many

longest work: along the churchyard green

shortest work: the care and keeping of your alien skin

most chapters in a fic: none

highest # of kudos: when the dust turns back to life

highest # of hits: when the dust turns back to life

top 3 fics by kudos: when the dust turns back to life, out the window, thorns in her heart

top 3 fics by hits: when the dust turns back to life, rearranging the spaces in my mind, out the window

i was tagged by @theroomofreq.

open to anyone!

BEHIND THE NUMBERS:

most challenging fic to write:

prophecy boy because there’s so much backstory and exposition i had to cut out. if i had continued, it would have been more original than fic. like, oh, the concept of the au has a lot of fun potential but it leaned too closely into some of my orig projects.

that being said, i do love the simplicity of the dialogue.

fic that came easiest to write:

into beasts and flames and hateful things! you can tell that i’ve been wanting to write a tam lin au for ages. i have a whole childe ballad soundtracks for reasons like this.

most true-to-the-outline fic:

i started along the churchyard green with a simple outline full of links to urban legends and folklore. this one i am very proud about. never doubt my ability when it comes to niche research topics.

most unlike-its-outline fic:

throw silver and gold onto me was originally going to be a cinderella au (in the grimm version, she asks for the tree to throw silver and gold onto her) but things spiraled because i love fairytales. now i have shelved some of them for original writing instead.

favorite reader freak-out:

you all had me laughing with the reactions for you're all I think about that I had to write a follow up. it was inspired by the song i used in the title and from one of my favorite scenes in superstore

most controversial scene:

none!

hottest ask box topic of the year:

uhh... i think it was the kissing prompts

most loved OC:

i guess...well, I haven’t had any except for harry and ginny’s neighbors in along the churchyard green. i love me some meddling neighbors who know more than they let on.

also, all of the references i had for narnia and the dark is rising sequence

most hated OC:

none!

favorite villain to write:

uh...

favorite character to write:

sam wilson in when the dust turns back to life. not only is his immediate reaction to bucky is to roast him endlessly, but i love all of the layers the show gave him as a brother, partner, and a hero.

most i've cried while writing a scene:

nothing in my fanfic made me teary-eyed. My original work, however...

most i've laughed while writing a scene:

it was more what caused experience the wonders, see the sights to be written because of the reactions to this post

carl’s ripped

smuttiest smut scene:

no smut was posted that year 🤷🏻‍♀️

favorite kiss i wrote:

There was no denying it. Even now, Harry had his arm around Gideon’s shoulders. His green eyes were wide behind his glasses; his black hair was in adoring disarray, just begging for Gideon to sink his fingers…

“We were two threstals in the night,” Gideon said at last. His face felt like it was on fire, half hope, half embarrassment. “Probably missed a number of chances back at school.”

Harry’s hand moved from his shoulder to his jaw, gently tracing the edge with surprising tenderness. “Have we?” Sunlight glinted off his glasses. He looked too beautiful at the moment. The light over his collarbone with the first few buttons of his shirt undone, his shoulders fully relaxed. “We could’ve had months…years…”

There was a new hum of awareness between them.

Their foreheads touched. Gideon whispered Harry’s name. The hand on his jaw moved to the back of his neck, guiding him in a gentle, open-mouthed kiss. Harry tasted like champagne. The touch of him went straight to Gideon’s head, filling him with desire. Oh, some part of him went. Oh, oh…

“Or now,” he mumbled between kisses. His heart had never felt so light. “We can have now.”

hardest trope/thing to write:

ugggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

it’s not that i hate them, but you can tell in birds of a feather that i haven’t written a proper action sequence in a while.

easiest trope/thing to write:

when characters are in a weird liminal space! you guys have no idea how much i super love this trope. all is now in place, katabasis, along the churchyard green... When you’re neither alive nor dead is the best kind of sandbox.

proudest fic moment:

being able to to merge the old guard with this is how you lose the time war in all the night-tide. i remember waking up on my day off, my brain on fire with the idea as i procrastinated working on my thesis edits. there is something deeply satisfying about writing a story that hits you in an instant.

also – be gay, break time.

any fic regrets?

i wish awake, arise had been written better...

2021 fic habits to break:

uh. your self-worth isn’t tied with your productivity.

2022 fic habits to make:

be happy?

#rachel in real life #fic #i should write something today.......

2 notes · View notes

princessofmarvel · 3 years

Text

I posted 137 times in 2021

7 posts created (5%)

130 posts reblogged (95%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 18.6 posts.

I added 27 tags in 2021

#marvel - 3 posts

#murder house - 3 posts

#ahs murder house - 3 posts

#ahs - 3 posts

#american horror story - 3 posts

#violet harmon - 3 posts

#tate langdon - 3 posts

#ahs red tide - 2 posts

#ahs 1984 - 2 posts

#bucky barnes - 2 posts

Longest Tag: 34 characters

#american horror story murder house

My Top Posts in 2021

The next season of American Horror Story should just be about what is going on in Texas right now , Honestly .

33 notes • Posted 2021-09-04 01:37:21 GMT

Marvel characters as Taylor Swift Albums .

Ahhhhhhh, My first big post!! I am both excited and terrified, Please be nice to me, lmao.

Steve Rogers - Fearless

I can totally see Steve jamming out to “you belong with me”

Definitely loves “Today was a fairytale”

Favorite song : Fearless

Tony Stark - Folklore

Lovessssss “betty”

Listens to “august” while working

Favorite Song : “the last great american dynasty”

Bruce Banner - Speak Now

Mumbles the words to “Mean” all of the time

Stans “The story of us”

Favorite song : “Mine”

Peter Parker - Lover

This boy sings “Cruel summer” almost 24/7

Loves “Me!” but won’t tell anyone

Favorite Song : “Paper Rings”

Thor - 1989

Thor dancing to “Shake it off” lives rent free in my mind, Even if it is not a real thing, Lmao.

Screams “Blank space”

Favorite song : “Wildest Dreams”

Loki - Reputation

Did we really expect anything else, Lol

Plays “Ready for it” in his mind right before a fight

Seriously loves “Look what you made me do”

Favorite Song : “I did something bad”

Bucky Barnes - Reputation

Likes to think of his partner when “Delicate” comes on

Sings “Don’t blame me” While in the shower

Favorite song : “Dancing with our hands tied”

Sam Wilson - Taylor Swift

The thought of Sam singing “Picture to burn” is something that I think about a lot

Stans “Our song”

Favorite song: Should’ve said no”

Natasha Rommanoff - Evermore

Adores “No body no crime”

Hums “Dorthea”

Favorite song : “Long story short”

Wanda Maximoff - Red

She likes to sing “I knew you were trouble”

And cries at “All too well”

Favorite Song: “Red”

Pietro Maximoff - 1989 .

Runs to “Bad blood”

Struts to “Style” when no one else is watching

Favorite song : “Wonderland”

Helmut Zemo - Every.Single.One.

I hope everyone likes this!! feel free to like, Comment, Or Reblog!!

43 notes • Posted 2021-07-04 03:50:42 GMT

jumpscare

Summary | You go to watch A horror movie at your friends place and Tate comforts you after

Pairing | Tate Langdon x Reader!

Warnings | Maybe just cursing?

Genre | Fluff!

Author's Note | This is just A little Halloween Blurb That I meant to have up by Halloween but I got extremely busy with the show that I was doing but It just ended So hopefully I Will Be Able To Get More Stories Up Soon !!! Not completely proof Read so Sorry For Any Mistakes!!! Enjoy!!!

You keep telling yourself “Don’t go”, “Don’t watch it”, “You know what will happen”. And, what do you do? You go and watch it. You were kind of new at school, there for about 2 months, going on three, and your friend group had invited you over to watch a horror movie to get into the Halloween spirit, and they scare the living hell out of you sometimes, and what do they pick? Of course, something with a bunch of jump scares. The friends’ house that you went to was not too far away from your place so you just walked there. A decision that you instantly regretted the second you had to walk back home. Every crunch of a leaf that you had stepped on, Every sudden noise from a family inside their house that could be heard from the outside in the silence, Every car that drove down your street, made you jump, if not a slight scream. You were almost back to your house when something jumped out in front of you and made you run home, and when you turned around to look at what it was, all you saw was a small squirrel, going back up its tree.

You get inside of your house that was your own personal horror movie and lean on the door to catch your breath before going to take your shower. As you were washing the soap off of your body you felt eyes staring at you through the glass of the door but as you stepped out onto the shower mat, you saw nothing, just a foggy mirror. Knowing that you were just freaking yourself out you quickly dry yourself off and rush to put on what you were sleeping in just to hurry and get to the safety of your bed.

You get into your bed and cover yourself up with your favorite and warmest blanket to help yourself feel like you were in a safe, warm hug. Once your breathing had calmed, you got up with your blanket still wrapped around you and went downstairs to grab yourself a drink and when you get back to your room you light a candle next to your bed on your nightstand and You grab the book that you were currently reading and get back into bed with the blanket wrapped around you.

As you sit there reading, getting lost in the story, You feel two arms wrap around you unexpectedly and scream as you turn back to hit whoever it was until you realised that it was just your ghostly boyfriend Tate, the only scary thing that you actually don’t find to be all that frightening.

“Woah! Woah! It’s just me Babe!” Tate says as he grabs your wrist to keep you from hitting him in the chest.

“Tate! Why would you do that?!” You say while playfully slapping him in the chest once he let you go.

“Why did I hug you?” He asks with a bit of a confused look on his face. “Um, I don’t know, maybe because I love you?” He says more as a statement rather than a question.

“No, I mean sneak up on me!” You say to him while trying to catch your breath.

“That bad huh?” He asks while pulling you down into his chest to help you calm down. You nod into his chest to answer his question while he runs his fingers through your hair.

“Wanna talk about it?” He asks you while you raise your head up some.

“No, I just want to lay on your chest and sleep.” You say while getting him to lay down and you laying on his chest not long after.

“You’re safe with me.” He said while he kissed your forehead. “I love you”

“I love you too, Tater Tot” You mumble while falling asleep on his chest.

“No one will hurt you as long as I’m Here,” he says once you fall asleep all nuzzled into his chest, Tate knowing how far He would go just to keep you safe as he blows Out the still lit candle sitting next to your bed.

64 notes • Posted 2021-11-04 02:33:13 GMT

I know places. (Soulmate!au Bucky Barnes x Fem reader )

Summary | In a world where you can not see a certain color until you lock eyes with your soulmate, you ended up with two colors that you could not see. One day you meet your soulmate, when he kills your partner.

Pairing | Soulmate!au Bucky Barnes x Fem Reader.

Warnings! | Death, Killing, Language?

Genre | Fluff!!

Word count | 1.8k

A/N : this is my first real story that I am publishing!! this is very loosely based on the Taylor Swift song ‘I know places’, please feel free to like, comment, or reblog!! It is appreciated!! This is been read over, but I may have accidentally missed some mistakes, Sorry In Advance!!

( Not my gif!! Found on Pinterest!! Creds to the owner!! )

James.Buchanan.Barnes the man who you have waited and waited for. You did your research, you found his real name, who he really was. The man you met when he killed your partner,

This idiotic soulmate thing was tearing at you, everyone has one, A color that they can not see until they lock eyes with their soulmate, But you have two, and you also have no idea why. You always assumed red was the color you couldn’t see because, well, It was, but when you were asked what color the sky was and your response was “Grey” is when you found out that you also can not see the color blue.

There is no record of this ever happening before so everyone said that it just had to be a coincidence. You kept the secret to yourself letting people think that it was just red that you could not see.

Now older, and still unable to see those stupid colors. Dating a shield agent who was kind, but not your soulmate. They knew it as well, not being able to find theirs, but assuming you just had the best that you both would ever get.

You knew your partner was working on their assignment about the winter solider, which you thought was a stupid ass name, and constenly made fun of. They were getting closer to finding who the soldier was. They planned on informing the rest of shield in the morning and invited you over for a celebratory dinner. Just as the night was coming to a close, you went to the bathroom freshen up. When you return though you witness your partner being shot by a man with a metal arm.

“Who the hell are you?” You shout at the stranger, and then you reginoized the metal arm with the star. His back was turned to you.

“The man with the stupid name” you say while walking over to the couch and taking a seat, legs crossed, oddly calm considering what just happened.

“Walk away and I won’t have to kill you, Unless you just want to join your soulmate”

“They are not my soulmate” You cut the man off quickly, his back still turned to you.

“Then get your things and leave before I change my mind” He says while holding his gun up.

“Letting me go would be stupid, I know just as much as they knew, And I know exactly how to get it to Sheild, Leaving no witnesses would be your best option.” You didn’t know why you were being so calm, Why you were basically inviting this random man to kill you, you just had the feeling that he wouldn’t.

“Fine” The man says as he turns around and points the gun directly at your face.

All of a sudden the star on his arm turns into a pinkish shade and his eyes a purplish one.

“Holy shit” you mumble as the man slowly brings his gun down.

“ Who are you?” he demands coming closer

“Y/n, and you?” you ask standing to get a closer look at him.

“I-I don’t know” He says looking down then back at you.

“Excuse me?” You ask confused. How can someone possibly not know who they are?

“I’m the winter soldier, That’s all I know”

“I like the name more now, Reminds me of your eyes” You say smiling as you cup his cheek.

“I’ve heard their blue, saw it in a file once.”

“My new favorite color” You say staring into his eyes.

“Go” He mumbles, barely loud enough for you to even hear.

“What?”

“Go, somewhere safe, I will come find you once I can, I have to go, you would be murdered if I don’t”

“Alright” you agree, understanding his reason. He kisses your hand before getting to the window that he used to come in.”

“Don’t forget me.” You say, his back turned to you as he jumps. You are almost certain that he didn’t even hear you.

That was 3 years ago, you had resided in a place in the countryside that shield had hooked you up with. You told them that when you came back from the bathroom, the person who did it was already gone. They also have had no leads on The Winter soldier since later that same year.

The colors that you saw that night, That were so bright once before, were starting to fade, your hope going with it. Little did you know that He was working on finding you.

“Steve, I have to at least try to find her before this fight” His memories of the night were fuzzy but definitely there, He knew your first name and what you looked like, and that was it.

“What was her name again?” Steve asks while sighing.

“Y/n, have you not been listening to him, He won’t shut the hell up about her” Sam says while looking through old shield files.

“Y/n L/n, Agent Williams Ex partner, Residence : 1313 Mockingbird Lane , A small manor like house in the middle of a field, with no neighbors for 14 miles. Status: Alive as of 5/18.” Steve says while reading your file that had not been updated since.

“This her?” Steves points to a photo of you on file.

“Yeah….. Yeah, that’s her” Bucky says while grabbing ahold of the file, hands shaking as he does, with a small smile on his face.

“He’s smiling? I didn’t think he was capable of such a thing.” Sam says while walking out to get in the car. You are sitting on your couch, about to doze off while flipping through a magazine when you hear a car pull up. You immediately run into your kitchen and grab a knife as you hear footsteps on your porch. Not the easiest choice of protection, but the quickest. There are a few knocks at the door, which you ignore because no one is supposed to know where you are. As the knob on the door turns you stand with your knife waiting to attack. Until you see those damn blue eyes again.

“Y/n? Y/n, are you here?”

“J-james?” you ask, even though you know the answer, while walking out of the kitchen.

Both of you are speechless as you look at eachother, you almost didn’t notice the two men standing behind him, Recognizing one of them as The Captain America

“Well, Damn it machine man, hug her!!” the man standing next to Captain America said, You could almost swear there were tears in his eyes.

“I-I, May I?” James questions while looking at you.

“Of course you may.” Before you can even take a step forward he was already walking over and holding you in his arms. You could feel the cool metal of his arm through your shirt and it was oddly comforting. As he pulled away, his hands went up your arms, to your shoulders, and then your face, he stared at you for a good 3 seconds, even though it felt like 3 hours before he locked his lips with yours. They were a bit rough, as if he had been nervously biting them the entire way to your place. Little did you know, he was. When he pulled away he smiled before wrapping his arm around you.

“I’m Steve Rogers, this is Sam Wilson. It’s a pleasure to meet you. It's nice to see Bucky smile.”

“Bucky?” you question while looking up at your blue eyed soulmate.

“It’s a nickname, The main thing people call me.”

“Yeah, Robot we gotta go.” Sam says while jestering towards the door.

“What? Nooooooooo, I just got you back.” you say while holding on to you man harder than before.

“I’m sorry, but we do Buck, you should be back in two weeks.” Steve says, Going towards the door.

“I’ll come with!” You perk up. “If that would be alright of course.” you say pulling away from Bucky a little bit.

“I’m sorry Doll, But they're right, This could get you hurt, and we can’t have that now can we?”

You pull away from him completely while crossing your arms. “You know I dated A Shield agent, Said shield agent trained me to defend myself and a little more, And I confronted the winter soldier while he was threatening to kill me if i didn’t leave, I think I can handle myself.”

“Buck it’s up to you, Honestly, We could use all of the help that we can get.” says Steve, obviously just wanting to get back on the road.

“I’m going, He doesn’t make my decisions”.

“Do you even have a suit?” Sam says as he goes to the door.

“I have one shield made for me, They gave me a few things when they set me up with this place, I guess they felt bad over my partner being killed over them.”

“Excuse me?” Sam asks, stopping in his tracks and turning around to see you grabbing a suitcase that was already packed.

“How do you think I met James?” You say going to stand next to Bucky.

“You killed her partner?” Sam asks while walking out the door with Steve. “Man,we gotta work on your people skills or something.”

“Hey James?” You say while tugging his arm to get him to stay back.

“Yes, Doll?”

“Thank you for coming to find me, I was about to lose hope.” You say while pulling him into a hug, and nuzzling into his chest some.

“Well of course, Darling. They would wipe away my memories, but it was always in the back of my mind to find you.” He says while pulling you closer to his chest and petting your hair.

There was silence as he held you. He held you with enough tightness that made you feel like he never wanted to let you go, but with enough gentleness that he feared he would break you if he held on just a little tighter.

“I’m not going to say ‘I love you’ quite yet, we are soulmates of course, but i’m old fashioned, I wanna wait until I really feel it, not that I don’t feel for you, o-of course I do, I-I jus-” You were able to cut off his nervous rambling with a quick kiss to his lips.

“It’s ok, I agree.” You say while smiling up at him.

“Come on!!” You hear Sam yell as Steve honks the horn.

The two of you make your way to the car with you sitting in the seat behind Sam and Bucky sitting next to you. Sam moves his seat up, noticing that you seemed a little cramped when you got in the car.

“Thanks Sam!!” You say as you lean into Buckys’ side.

“So you do know how to move your seat up?”

120 notes • Posted 2021-07-11 04:59:41 GMT

Tate: *Watching everything that was going down in the first two episodes of American Horror Stories* And there's a million of us just like me, Who cuss like me, who just don't give a fuck like me, Who dress like me, walk, talk and act like me, And just might be the next best thing, but not quite me, 'Cause I'm Slim Shady, yes, I'm the real Shady, All you other Slim Shadys are just imitating-

133 notes • Posted 2021-07-16 03:59:35 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

#my 2021 tumblr year in review #your tumblr year in review

2 notes · View notes

bananaofswifts · 4 years

Link

Your guide to the singer-songwriter’s surprise follow-up to Folklore.

CARL WILSON

When everything’s clicking for Taylor Swift, the risk is that she’s going to push it too far and overtax the public appetite. On “Mirrorball” from Folklore, she sings, with admirable self-knowledge, “I’ve never been a natural/ All I do is try, try, try.” So when I woke up yesterday to the news that at midnight she was going to repeat the trick she pulled off with Folklore in July—surprise-releasing an album of moody pop-folk songs remote-recorded in quarantine with Aaron Dessner of the National as well as her longtime producer Jack Antonoff—I was apprehensive. Would she trip back into the pattern of overexposure and backlash that happened between 1989 and Reputation?

Listening to the new Evermore, though, that doesn’t feel like such a threat. A better parallel might be to the “Side B” albums that Carly Rae Jepsen put out after both Emotion and Dedicated, springing simply out of the artist’s and her fans’ mutual enthusiasm. Or, closer to Swift’s own impulses here, publishing an author’s book of short stories soon after a successful novel. Lockdown has been a huge challenge for musicians in general, but it liberated Swift from the near-perpetual touring and publicity grind she’s been on since she was a teen, and from her sense of obligation to turn out music that revs up stadium crowds and radio programmers. Swift has always seemed most herself as the precociously talented songwriter; the pop-star side is where her try-hard, A-student awkwardness surfaces most. Quarantine came as a stretch of time to focus mainly on her maturing craft (she turns 31 on Sunday), to workshop and to woodshed. When Evermore was announced, she said that she and her collaborators—clearly mostly Dessner, who co-writes and/or co-produces all but one of these 15 songs—simply didn’t want to stop writing after Folklore.

This record further emphasizes her leap away from autobiography into songs that are either pure fictions or else lyrically symbolic in ways that don’t act as romans à clef. On Folklore, that came with the thrill of a breakthrough. Here, she fine-tunes the approach, with the result that Evermore feels like an anthology, with less of an integrated emotional throughline. But that it doesn’t feel as significant as Folklore is also its virtue. Lowered stakes offer permission to play around, to joke, to give fewer fucks—and this album definitely has the best swearing in Swift’s entire oeuvre.

Because it’s nearly all Dessner overseeing production and arrangements, there isn’t the stylistic variety that Antonoff’s greater presence brought to Folklore. However, Swift and Dessner seem to have realized that the maximalist-minimalism that dominated Folklore, with layers upon layers of restrained instrumental lines for the sake of atmosphere, was too much of a good thing. There are more breaks in the ambience on Evermore, the way there was with Folklore’s “Betty,” the countryish song that was among many listener’s favorites. But there are still moments that hazard misty lugubriousness, and perhaps with reduced reward.

Overall, people who loved Folklore will at least like Evermore too, and the minority of Swift appreciators who disapproved may even warm up to more of the sounds here. I considered doing a track-by-track comparison between the two albums, but that seemed a smidgen pathological. Instead, here is a blatantly premature Day 1 rundown of the new songs as I hear them.

A pleasant yet forgettable starting place, “Willow” has mild “tropical house” accents that recall Ed Sheeran songs of yesteryear, as well as the prolix mixed metaphors Swift can be prone to when she’s not telling a linear story. But not too severely. I like the invitation to a prospective lover to “wreck my plans.” I’m less sure why “I come back stronger than a ’90s trend” belongs in this particular song, though it’s witty. “Willow” is more fun as a video (a direct sequel to Folklore’s “Cardigan” video) than as a lead track, but I’m not mad at it here either.

Written with “William Bowery”—the pseudonym of Swift’s boyfriend Joe Alwyn, as she’s recently confirmed—this is the first of the full story songs on Evermore, in this case a woman describing having walked away from her partner on the night he planned to propose. The music is a little floaty and non-propulsive, but the tale is well painted, with Swift’s protagonist willingly taking the blame for her beau’s heartbreak and shrugging off the fury of his family and friends—“she would have made such a lovely bride/ too bad she’s fucked in the head.” Swift sticks to her most habitual vocal cadences, but not much here goes to waste. Except, that is, for the title phrase, which doesn’t feel like it adds anything substantial. (Unless the protagonist was drunk?) I do love the little throwaway piano filigree Dessner plays as a tag on the end.

This is the sole track Antonoff co-wrote and produced, and it’s where a subdued take on the spirit of 1989-style pop resurges with necessary energy. Swift is singing about having a crush on someone who’s too attractive, too in-demand, and relishing the fantasy but also enjoying passing it up. It includes some prime Swiftian details, like, “With my Eagles t-shirt hanging from your door,” or, “At dinner parties I call you out on your contrarian shit.” The line about this thirst trap’s “hair falling into place like dominos” I find much harder to picture.

This is where I really snapped to attention. After a few earlier attempts, Swift has finally written her great Christmas song, one to stand alongside “New Year’s Day” in her holiday canon. And it’s especially a great one for 2020, full of things none of us ought to do this year—go home to visit our parents, hook up with an ex, spend the weekend in their bedroom and their truck, then break their hearts again when we leave. But it’s done with sincere yuletide affection to “the only soul who can tell which smiles I’m faking,” and “the warmest bed I’ve ever known.” All the better, we get to revisit these characters later on the album.

On first listen, I found this one of the draggiest Dressner compositions on the record. Swift locates a specific emotional state recognizably and poignantly in this song about a woman trapped (or, she wonders, maybe not trapped?) in a relationship with an emotionally withholding, unappreciative man. But the static keyboard chord patterns and the wandering melody that might be meant to evoke a sense of disappointment and numbness risk yielding numbing and disappointing music. Still, it’s growing on me.

Featuring two members of Haim—and featuring a character named after one of them, Este—“No Body, No Crime” is a straight-up contemporary country song, specifically a twist on and tribute to the wronged-woman vengeance songs that were so popular more than a decade ago, and even more specifically “Before He Cheats,” the 2006 smash by Carrie Underwood, of which it’s a near musical clone, just downshifted a few gears. Swift’s intricate variation on the model is that the singer of the song isn’t wreaking revenge on her own husband, but on her best friend’s husband, and framing the husband’s mistress for the murder. It’s delicious, except that Swift commits the capital offence of underusing the Haim sisters purely as background singers, aside from one spoken interjection from Danielle.

This one has some of the same issues as “Tolerate It,” in that it lags too much for too long, but I did find more to focus on musically here. Lyrically and vocally, it gets the mixed emotions of a relatively amicable divorce awfully damned right, if I may speak from painfully direct experience.

This is the song sung from the POV of the small-town lover that the ambitious L.A. actress from “Tis the Damn Season”—Dorothea, it turns out—has left behind in, it turns out, Tupelo. Probably some years past that Xmas tryst, when the old flame finally has made it. “A tiny screen’s the only place I see you now,” he sings, but adds that she’s welcome back anytime: “If you’re ever tired of being known/ For who you know/ You know that you’ll always know me.” It’s produced and arranged with a welcome lack of fuss. Swift hauls out her old high-school-romance-songs vocal tone to reminisce about “skipping the prom/ just to piss off your mom,” very much in the vein of Folklore’s teen-love-triangle trilogy.

A duet with Dessner’s baritone-voiced bandmate in the National, Matt Berninger, “Coney Island” suffers from the most convoluted lyrics on Evermore (which, I wonder unkindly, might be what brought Berninger to mind?). The refrain “I’m on a beach on Coney Island, wondering where did my baby go” is a terrific tribute to classic pop, but then Swift rhymes it with “the bright lights, the merry go,” as if that’s a serviceable shorthand for merry-go-round, and says “sorry for not making you my centerfold,” as if that’s somehow a desirable relationship outcome. The comparison of the bygone affair to “the mall before the internet/ It was the one place to be” is clever but not exactly moving, and Berninger’s lines are worse. Dessner’s droning arrangement does not come to the rescue.

This song is also overrun with metaphors but mostly in an enticing, thematically fitting way, full of good Swiftian dark-fairytale grist. It’s fun to puzzle out gradually the secret that all the images are concealing—an engaged woman being drawn into a clandestine affair. And there are several very good “goddamns.”

The lyrical conceit here is great, about two gold-digging con artists whose lives of scamming are undone by their falling in love. It reminded me of the 1931 pre-Code rom-com Blonde Crazy, in which James Cagney and Joan Blondell act out a very similar storyline. And I mostly like the song, but I can’t help thinking it would come alive more if the music sounded anything like what these self-declared “cowboys” and “villains” might sing. It’s massively melancholy for the story, and Swift needs a far more winningly roguish duet partner than the snoozy Marcus Mumford. It does draw a charge from a couple of fine guitar solos, which I think are played by Justin Vernon (aka Bon Iver, who will return shortly).

The drum machine comes as a refreshing novelty at this point. And while this song is mostly standard Taylor Swift torrents of romantic-conflict wordplay (full of golden gates and pedestals and dropping her swords and breaking her high heel, etc.), the pleasure comes in hearing her look back at all that and shrugging, “Long story short, it was a bad ti-i-ime,” “long story short, it was the wrong guy-uy-uy,” and finally, “long story short, I survived.” She passes along some counsel I’m sure she wishes she’d had back in the days of Reputation: “I wanna tell you not to get lost in these petty things/ Your nemeses will defeat themselves.” It’s a fairly slight song but an earned valedictory address.

Swift fan lore has it that she always sequences the real emotional bombshell as Track 5, but here it is at 13, her lucky number. It’s sung to her grandmother, Marjorie Finlay, who died when Swift was in her early teens, and it manages to be utterly personal—down to the sample of Marjorie singing opera on the outro—and simultaneously utterly evocative to anyone who’s been through such grief. The bridge, full of vivid memories and fierce regrets, is the clincher.

This electroacoustic kiss-off song, loaded up with at least a fistful of gecs if not a full 100 by Dessner and co-producers BJ Burton and James McAlister, seems to be, lyrically, one of Swift’s somewhat tedious public airings of some music-industry grudge (on which, in case you don’t get it, she does not want “closure”), but, sonically, it’s a real ear-cleaner at this point on Evermore. Why she seems to shift into a quasi-British accent for fragments of it is anyone’s guess. But I’m tickled by the line, “I’m fine with my spite and my tears and my beers and my candles.”

I’m torn about the vague imagery and vague music of the first few verses of the album’s final, title track. But when Vernon, in full multitracked upper-register Bon Iver mode, kicks in for the duet in the middle, there’s a jolt of urgency that lands the redemptive ending—whether it’s about a crisis in love or the collective crisis of the pandemic or perhaps a bit of both—and satisfyingly rounds off the album.

#taylor-swift #pop #rock #country-music

16 notes · View notes

verecunda · 4 years

Text

The ancient history tag

Tagged by @pythionice. Thankee, dear! :) This has been sitting half-done in my drafts for ages - sorry! x__x

1. The Stone Age: One of the first books you ever remember reading.

The first one that springs to mind is this huge book of nursery rhymes. I can’t remember the exact title or who collected them, but each one had really fantastic illustrations. Every page was so bright and colourful. And now I think about it, Bobby Shaftoe looked suspiciously Nelson-like. ;)

2. Ancient Greece: Your favourite myth inspired book.

Right now, I’m gonna have to say Sword at Sunset by Rosemary Sutcliff. She does such a masterful job of paring away the later medieval trappings of the Arthur legend and setting him in the immediately post-Roman period. Despite going for a gritty, realistic take, without Merlin and the fantasy elements, she imbues the story with so much raw folkloric symbolism that it still feels like great myth all by itself. (Admittedly, a lot of this symbolism is drawn from older theories ie. Margaret Murray, which are largely discredited today, but in terms of the cosmology of the fictional universe, it’s so expertly woven in and coherent, and resonates so wonderfully through the story, that it works.)

3. Roman Empire: A book that features an impressive Empire or a Kingdom.

I'm not long after finishing Cinder by Marissa Meyer (a rec from my sister @fandom-butterfly). It’s a sci-fi retelling of Cinderella, set in the futuristic Eastern Commonwealth, a conglomerate of former Asian nations ruled by an emperor based at New Beijing. There’s also a kingdom on the moon, ruled by mysterious beings (evolved humans? I’m not quite sure yet) who have the power to manipulate human minds.

I enjoyed it a lot. The characters are cute, there’s some good banter, the anime influence is very present (the author’s notes at the end indicate that Meyer is/was in the Sailor Moon fandom, and it shows!), and the fairytale elements are woven in nicely to the sci-fi setting. There’s a good amount of intrigue too, which I imagine is only going to get thicker, since this book is the first in a series.

There’s also a major subplot about a deadly global pandemic, which... yeah.

4. The Middle Ages: A book that is an absolute bummer (positive or negative).

I had to wrack my brains a bit for an answer to this, because I don’t generally read books that look set to be a bummer. Tragic, yes. Devastating, absolutely, but I’m not a fan of books that just make you go :| What’s the point of that?

That said, coming back to Rosemary Sutcliff, I’m going to say The Shining Company. You know what the end is going to be, but even when it comes, I felt the book lacked Sutcliff’s usual poignancy - that theme of hope and healing despite great loss and pain, of the lantern being carried forward into the dark, that usually makes her books so emotional. I think, too, the fact that I never got hugely attached to any of the characters meant that the final twist wasn’t as devastating as it should have been. So it was pretty much just a bummer.

(As you can probably tell, this is my least favourite Sutcliff novel.)

5. Renaissance: A book that you have learned a lot from OR a book that made you think a lot.

This is a strangely hard one to answer! I read and mine through lots of history books for research purposes, so I’m always learning some new fact or anecdote or other. But books that have rocked me to the core and made me re-evaluate fundamental truths... um... nothing recent springs to mind. (Which probably tells you everything you need to know about the sort of literature I consume, but... ehhhh.)

So - a history book rec it is! The Victorian House, by Judith Flanders. It’s a lovely big doorstopper absolutely crammed full of fascinating stuff. She takes you round a typical Victorian terraced house room by room, and by doing so explores how Victorian daily life, upstairs and downstairs, was acted out in these rooms. It’s a brilliant book, eminently readable, full of fascinating information about how domestic life was theorised and compartmentalised in the Victorian mind. It’s great stuff.

6. The Enlightenment: A book about knowledge, science, discovery, or exploration.

Admittedly it’s been a while since I delved into this particular corner of the Age of Sail, but as I recall, Richard Hough’s biography of James Cook was really good for this, setting his life and voyages in the context of the scientific history - advances in geographical and astronomical knowledge, development of accurate measures of timekeeping, cartography, navigation, etc., etc. (which in turn spirals out into the history of trade- and empire-building, etc.) Just... yeah, there was a lot going on in that book.

7. The Industrial Revolution: A book featuring an invention or a concept that you would love to have in your own life.

Gosh, I don’t know! I hardly read any sci-fi, so I can’t think of any books featuring technology or anything that I really wish existed in my own life.

8. World War I. and II.: Your favourite historical fiction book featuring either of the world wars.

I love Carrie’s War - I reread it last year and it was just as great as I remembered! - but even though I don’t think it technically counts as historical fiction, the WW book that has had the most enduring effect on me is definitely All Quiet on the Western Front. There are so many scenes and passages that I remember so clearly (often more clearly than I’d like).

9. Present day: A book you think everybody should read in present day.

I really don’t know what this means. I don’t think there’s such a thing as one book that everybody should read. Apart from like, Shakespeare. Everyone should try Shakespeare at some point. On your own, out of school.

Not sure how many people I’m meant to tag, but here goes: @themalhambird, @drusilla-951, @vicivefallen, @bryndeavour, @ciceros-ghost, @seaglassandeelgrass.

#meme #books!

9 notes · View notes

margridarnauds · 5 years

Text

I was tagged by @lochley (thank you!) to do The Thing and share five of my fics, so without furthur ado.....

1. A fic you are proud of?

Pour la Peine was begun at a particularly bad point in my life, when I was really IN Solène’s shoes at that moment, and since I’ve begun it, so much has changed, not the least being my writing style. The Toho 1789 obviously came out in November, which really, really changed how I viewed certain characters and dynamics. I think I would have written it very differently, for example, if I’d known that in the Toho, Olympe and Solène hold one another after Ronan’s death. And it’s really, really hard to keep the characters consistent when you have that kind of constantly shifting idea of who the characters ARE. That being said, it’s also currently my longest running fic, despite being for a “MINI-FIC” prompt, it’s one of my first real experiments with a running plotline and plot twists, even if I feel like most of them are probably easy to see coming (but, then again, that’s because I KNOW them, so there is definitely that), and it’s also one of my first times working with a developing relationship. I’m going to be absolutely thrilled to see the back of it and I’ll never be fully happy with it because to me, it will never be up to what I HOPED it would be, but I’ve learned a LOT from it.

2. A fic you are excited about?

God, I have so many ideas on the backburner that I’ve been itching to get to. I have a few Margrid/Orléans ideas that I’m really excited to toy with, because I really, really enjoy working with this ship since it’s such a break from the norm.(What, a tragic interclass love affair where one ends up killing the other, ft. the French Revolution? I’ve never done that before.)

One that I’ve really, really been pumped to write for MONTHS now is the Fairytale AU, in no small part because it was really a chance for me to go back to my roots in the Fantasy genre. I DID put research into it as far as looking up folklore motifs and variations that I could use, but a LOT of it is much more freeing than really....the type of hard-ish historical fiction I tend to write. It’s very different, and in the end, I’m not sure how much it’s a fairy tale and how much it’s 1789 or whether it’s really...EITHER of them at this point, but I’m happy with what progress I DO have.

3. A fic that was challenging to write?

Personally, I don’t believe in a completely pain-free experience when it comes to writing. I learn something new from each fic, but it’s definitely knowledge that I have to fight for every ounce of. Honey Plunged Into Water, though, is probably the SINGLE most difficult to get off the ground.

I started it for a fic writing exchange treat, thought “Okay, I can write smut that’s 300 words. A little tight, but sure thing. After all, these exchanges are about expanding our horizons, right?” It was a little darker than I was used to, M/F, and smut, all three of which are generally things I would NOT go for (see below for Me VS Smut: The Ongoing Conflict), but, hey, I could do it, right? And I wanted to work with new fandoms and new ideas that I normally wouldn’t work with, so it seemed like a fun little challenge.

Then I realized. Triple drabbles weren’t allowed. Neither were double. I had to cut out 200 words of material that included some lines I was very proud of and try to figure out how to keep as much as I COULD in 100 words. Because I COULDN’T really give it up when I already had THAT MUCH DONE (and nowhere to really dump the scraps, anyway). It was a truly monstrous, brutal editing process, but it taught me a lot in a short span and I got a positive response from the person I wrote it for, so....win/win?

Note: Next time the drabble exchange comes around....nope. Sorry. Been there, done that. Y’all will have to get your dark femdom smut drabble from somewhere else.

4. A fic that was something you hadn’t tried before?

A Pressing Matter. On multiple levels. I don’t CONSIDER myself as a smut writer; the whole thing’s personally a little embarrassing for me. I really, really don’t think that I have any particular knack for it, and so the final product always seems stilted and awkward when I DO try it out. So, it was terrifying to publish it, it was terrifying to know that ANYONE could read it and judge the contents, but I am happy that I did after ages of threatening and that it’s been warmly received.

5. If you had to choose one fic above all to share, what would it be?

Probably Forgiveness (Can You Imagine?). Or Fowl Play. I’m incredibly, incredibly honored that both of them have garnered the attention that they have and that people are still INVESTED in them after all this time, not the least because they were also a lot of fun to write and work with.

Tagging: @circecular @mooncastle @fallenidol-453 @a-promise-that-i-keep @cicelythereaper

#thanks for the tag Avery!#long post

5 notes · View notes

rhetoricandlogic · 7 years

Photo

“Truth is Their Weapon.” – A Review of Under the Pendulum Sun by Jeannette Ng

Some time ago, there was an article on Lithub titled “The Greatest Goths in Literary History”: something fun and light that poked gentle fun at some notable writers. Since I have some friends who are fascinated by goth culture and even participate in it, I posted the link on my Facebook and tagged the friends in question. One of them pointed out that Arthur Conan Doyle’s belief in fairies is actually very much goth – especially if one believes in “old-school” fairies: by which she means the Fae of European folklore.

That is an idea I very much agree with. After all, if “gothic” can be broadly defined as “dark, eerie, and slightly macabre”, then the Fae very much fit into that definition. It takes some digging, since so much of the older stories has been obscured by more recent interpretations of fairies, but a quick reading of the older stories shows that the Fae are not the bright, happy, cherubic creatures so often portrayed in children’s literature and media. They are harbingers of death, or givers of blessings. They are impish pranksters who mean little to no harm, or wilful deceivers who lead mortals into harm’s way. They steal men, women, and babies; sometimes they return them, but always with caveats. Oftentimes, they are all those things, all at once. The Fae occupy a space in the imagination that seems limned with light, but if the reader looks close enough, looks hard enough, he or she realises that all that light actually hides – or creates – some very deep, very dark shadows.

This is the vision of the Fae that Jeannette Ng presents in her novel Under the Pendulum Sun. Set in an alternate history of the 1800s, the narrator is Catherine Helstone, who journeys to Arcadia, the land of the Fae, in search of her brother Laon. Upon arrival, however, she is brought to Gethsemane: an old mansion where she is told to await her brother’s return from whatever journey he has gone on. But Gethsemane hides secrets within its walls, and as Catherine starts piecing those secrets together, truths are gradually revealed that could alter her perspective of Arcadia, the Fae, her brother – and herself.

One of the first and most important things readers need to know about this book is that it is multilayered, and those layers go pretty deep. On the surface, it looks like the standard gothic novel with some fairytale elements, but if the reader digs deeper then he or she begins to find threads that point to other sources. The literary references are fairly obvious: traces of Spenser’s The Faerie Queene, Shakespeare’s The Tempest, and Keats’ La Belle Dame sans Merci can all be found quite easily, and likely spring to mind easily as well, given the references to the Fae.

But less obvious are the theological references: callbacks to Milton, Dante, Calvin, and other theological authors and philosophers are littered throughout the text. Then there are other, far less obvious references that I cannot tease out due to my lack of knowledge of said texts. On one hand, this makes sense, since Catherine and Laon are meant to be missionaries converting the Fae to Christianity, but on the other the references go deeper than that. They all tie into the themes: questions about the nature of God, faith and the soul are obvious, of course, but there are also more philosophical questions buried in there, questions about how to define truth, and how stories and storytelling play into the creation of truth.

Of course, all of this means that this is a rather complicated, multilayered read. Indeed, reading this novel reminded me of Ada Palmer’s Too Like the Lightning. In Too Like the Lightning, Palmer uses Enlightenment philosophy as the primary underpinning for the novel; similarly, Ng uses theology and medieval and Renaissance literature as the primary underpinning for Under the Pendulum Sun. If the reader does not have the same level of knowledge that the author does, then he or she is likely going to miss something, or have a reference go over his or her head.

Personally, I do not think this is a bad thing; part of the reason why I read books in the first place is to learn new things, and if a book exposes gaps in my knowledge then that’s quite fine with me. It just means there is more to discover out there, more things to learn, and I am one of those people who is always happy to know that the horizon of my knowledge has not yet come so close that I am running out of new things to know.

I am aware, however, that all of this subtlety is not to other readers’ tastes. That is understandable, since some readers just do not have the patience for untangling all the small references that the author has layered into this book. In some novels, this might be a make-or-break kind of deal, but fortunately in this one, that is not the case. This novel does not require a degree in theology, or one in medieval and Renaissance literature, to enjoy – though of course, such knowledge certainly adds to the enjoyment. Readers are free to read this purely as a gothic horror story, but if they have the kind of background knowledge to understand all the references included in the story, then they will derive that much more enjoyment from it.

And speaking of plot, this novel has an amazingly well-crafted one. I like it when I cannot always predict which way a plot will turn, and this novel had quite a few twists and turns that I rarely saw coming. I encounter such books fairly rarely, so when I do read one it is always a genuine pleasure for me.

I must note here, however, that one of those twists makes use of a trope that I am not sure other readers will enjoy. I shall not mention it, since to do so would be to give away a particularly large spoiler, but I would like to reassure readers that the author manages to handle it fairly well, all things considered – especially given how other creators have handled this particular trope. Still, it is there, and if readers of this review are concerned about it, I would be willing to inform them of it in the comments.

Overall, Under the Pendulum Sun is what I call a “Chinese puzzle ball” story: beautifully crafted and structured, but containing a deeper, hidden heart that takes patience to reach. As is often the case with many puzzles, the pleasure is not in solving the puzzle, but in the journey to that solution: the many possibilities and options the mind considers as it tries to get to the heart of the matter. That is very much the case with this novel, and while some readers might not enjoy its intricacies, I am certain there are plenty more out there who will derive great pleasure from this rich, multilayered read.

#Jeanette Ng #Under the Pendulum Sun #mahreviews

2 notes · View notes

elizabethrobertajones · 7 years

Photo

3x05 & 3x06 - Dean & Sam’s moons

I am assuming they're both on full moon a month a part as part of season 3's year-long schedule, although tbh it was probably an aesthetic choice and no one stopped to consider it. 3x05 is near Halloween, 3x06 must therefore be in November, and the Christmas episode is 3x08.

Anyway some musings on the moons because I love that they both have one with this same transition.

The one in 3x05 is placed directly over Dean's bed and the camera continues to pan down over him sleeping (which I didn't gif because it would have been huge and I made aesthetic choices >.>) which to me represents it as a thought bubble, almost, showing him dreaming. Dean's pastoral fairytale dream I am pretty sure is photoshopped because it reappears in 3x10, the dream episode, in Bobby's hotel room, sans moon but representing the same sort of thing since it was already here representing a dream:

http://www.homeofthenutty.com/supernatural/screencaps/displayimage.php?album=54&pid=12108#top_display_media

in that case I think it's pretty ironic that it's the sunny daytime version of the pastoral dream. Almost like the scene Sam steps into when he leaves the house, but of course it's so much worse inside, not like it seems on the surface.

Giving Dean this transition I think is exceptionally beautiful because it shows the prosaic normal of their motel-living lives as the sort of landscape they truly inhabit, and then transitioning to Dean's dream, the fairytales they metaphorically inhabit. I wrote this 2 years ago in my last rewatch because of this moment:

I have a lot of feelings about Supernatural as actual folklore, like, with the stories that are told, and how they’re told, and the main characters as folkloric heroes and blah blah, stuff I’d need to dust off some old books of mine to really talk about properly. :P Suffice to say, going from the hum drum exterior shot of the realities of life on the road to this mystical fairytale woodland with the puddle as a great lake and the dull motel as a mill, bigger hills, bigger trees, no sodium lights or bright vending machine… Sort of putting the magic into what they do and making the leap of imagination into the stories that happen around them.

There's something that really soothes me about this episode because of this shot. Dean's so prickly to fairytales and yes there's been meta written about his deflecting behind porn, his calling Sam gay for knowing the details, and his instinctive reaction that he's not gonna kiss the frog and how he still kinda thought it was going to be his role to be the "princess" there on first take. All been done before, but still. (I'm sure my 3x05 tag doesn't have a whole lot in it but I'm pretty sure I reblogged commentary about all of this in more detail one time or another)

Dean has defensive walls a mile high about liking this sort of stuff because it might make him seem weak, and there's a real thread through this season and season 4 about their strength, where Dean is stuck behind the facade but even before he goes to hell it's obvious he's putting a lot of it on in many moments. Sam becomes more and more manipulated by a lot of the baddies they pass that he has to be stronger than Dean, and by 3x09 Dean calls him out on it and Sam says he's trying to be more like Dean - that is, a harsher, more vicious hunter. In 3x11 mystery spot!Sam betrays that's more like John once he's gone all the way to the far end of that mindset, but anyway, Sam puts a name to it as trying to be more like Dean, and in season 4 he feels he's supassed Dean and become stronger than him through Ruby's manipulations, taking this to the logical end of their fight.

(As I was saying last night this season establishes Cain & Abel as the template early on in 3x04 and 3x06 - I watched the little behind the scenes bit about 3x06 on the DVD and it was the VFX guy congratulating themselves on a job well done, but he did agree that the ghosts taking each other out was where the show might go "this season" (oh season 3) so I'm feeling more certain than ever that the show decided this was the new template for the brothers all the way back here and started to apply it...)

Anyway. This episode, then, Dean gets to have the macho fight with the Big Bad Wolf (which he might think is silly but is a pretty brutal fight and he was this close to killing him before the doctor broke through to the little girl, so he at least physically defeated the Big Bad Wolf in a sort of metaphorical way) - I kind of feel like that moment might have set him more at ease, defeating a strong masculine element, as the Big Bad Wolf was the same guy in a couple of stories - the 3 Pigs as well as Little Red Riding Hood, which just goes to show the whole basic pool of characters being drawn from nature of fairy tales.

In some ways Dean is always trying to defeat the masculine elements that provide him the toughest opposition... Compare the Big Bad Wolf fight to (everyone rolls their eyes) 12x22 and the fight with Ketch - brutal, man-on-man, smashing up all the furniture and wrestling brute strength against each other. In season 3 the masculine influence on Dean is the ongoing ghost of John, who metaphorically got sucked up into Gordon, who Sam (the one who identified this idea out loud) defeats in 3x07 after he also goes fully monstrous as a result of his black and white view on monsters.

Dean defeats yet another metaphorical representation of this in the Big Bad Wolf and goes to bed to sleep, and we get this transition to what he dreams of - a peaceful, pastoral fairytale scene. No pretentions or anything, just a reconciliation. Dean can occupy the motels and gritty Americana as much as he likes, and still dream of fairytales if he damn well wants to, and there is a calm and innocence to his sleep in this scene, contrasted to Sam sneaking out to confront the crossroads demon.

In 3x06, Sam's moon, it's after he has the brilliant idea of how to defeat the ghost and save Bela from a seeming fatal, inescapable and twice self-inflicted curse. The ghost hunts those who killed their own family, and Bela's theivery has sold the one thing that she could have used to save herself simply.

Sam has the bright idea to take this all back to the start - the river ends at the source - and to use a spell to summon the original combatants of this ancient sibling rivalry to take each other off the board. We're shown the moon huge and ominous and clear, but as Sam does the incantation (hi Castiel) the clouds gather over it. Sam's moon is an omen, fading to him doing spellwork that involves blood (the clip again continues to pan downwards, this time showing Sam tipping a bottle of blood into the bowl), and the moon is a spell circle. One of invokation, rather than protection or warding, as we most often see in this show.

Of course it mirrors Chuck & Amara, Cain & Abel and in the words of the VFX dude, Sam & Dean. I don't know exactly what was going to happen in season 3, but the staging of one ghost lunging into the other and taking them both out also has echoes of Michael charging at Lucifer in 5x22 and both falling into the cage together, and of course their fight was another step in the siblings pitted against each other.

Also, of course, Sam using magic to achieve this, to me is a part of the old "season 10 is the new season 3" stuff... Mel sent me a bunch of stuff after I talked about this last night (and, sorry, I talked about this one last night so I have slightly less to say here :P) so I'll link that

https://justanotheridijiton.tumblr.com/post/114299870202/63-the-final-scene-of-the-episode-drives-the https://justanotheridijiton.tumblr.com/post/126306223069/season-10-is-the-new-season-3-some-parallels-from https://justanotheridijiton.tumblr.com/tagged/season-10-is-the-new-season-3

#3x05 #3x06 #season 3 #spn rewatches #weird rewatching #my stuff #lizbob gifs #queue

36 notes · View notes