#nice things people say to me

[anghraine]

I do appreciate getting AO3 comments that encourage me to keep going! But I got a comment on an on-hiatus multi-chapter WIP that said absolutely nothing about it being unfinished and just listed things they liked, and it was really sweet.

[snickerdoodlles]

your trademark is writing very ridiculous premises with insane tone/rhythm that somehow feel perfectly in character. Your KimChay is unhinged, and they're my new canon <3

*cackles* I'm DELIGHTED by this, I'm really proud of how I characterize characters and I love that they carry thru even my more silly fic ideas <3

also the unhingedness

all characters should be more unhinged 😈

[ tell me my trademark ]

[chronically-ghosted]

Please don’t ever stop writing about dieter 🥺 I think you just write him the best. You always get his personality so perfect and I just love it so so much. That last one was so perfect, the little bit of angst but then at the end, we know they’re happy together every day and he loves her 😭

You’re the best dieter writer and please tell me you have more requests for him 🥺🥺

okay ngl this made me squeal in delight. i know dieter is not the fandom's favorite, but he is mine -- i don't know why i've imprinted on him like a duckling but i have and it's not going away 😭

in my humble ass opinion, i think for dieter there's a super fine line between idiot and childish. I've read a lot of fics where he's almost mean with his disregard for other people, and while he certainly has an ego, i think he does have a soft side that he doesn't really know how to nurture? i think on some level he is deeply unhappy and he doesn't like to be alone as result of it, but there is a part of him that really loves what he does and he does try to be happy. on a good day, dieter is funny, curious, a little silly/dramatic, and he draws his energy from other people. on a bad day, dieter is selfish, self-destructive, egotistical, and paranoid.

i know you didn't ask for a freakin' character analysis but i could literally write an essay on dieter bravo. but to actually refer to your ask: yes, i do! I have one more for the 100 followers event: “We should probably leave, before we start a scandal" -- I'm trying to do a foodie dieter with this one, so stay tuned!

i find it personally offensive that pedro had a say in how dieter dressed, with the rings, the bracelet, and earrings. if i ever meet the man, that's going to be my one question: "do you know what you did to me with that character?"

thank you so much and this ask genuinely means the world to me!

[caelum-in-the-avatarverse]

Shout-out to the person who kudosed and thus read at least 32 of my fics last night, congrats dude, that’s, like, a lot of words.

And it’s always a nice feeling when you know someone’s been binge-reading. ^_^

Sometimes I’m blown away by the fact that I’ve written 56 ATLA fics. Like, I actually can be binge-read now. Teenage me would be in awe of myself.

[herawell]

green!

green - creature in the forest, you mind your business if others mind theirs

[rowenabean]

❤️❤️❤️

[awkwardpenguinproductions]

Yo you good? You haven't updated DotY in about a year. Is everything cool? Do you need like a care package or something?

Bro i am so good thanks so much for asking!

Basically life has been happening and i took on a side hustle a while ago that eats up a lot of free time, and also i had a lot of difficulty with the last couple of installments of DotY that i’ve been working on. i think i’ve got that aspect mostly ironed out, and knock on wood finishing the series should be smooth sailing from here, but i’m still working that side hustle as well as prepping for a new job that i am MASSIVELY unqualified for but got headhunted specifically for it. I have an end date for the current job (rip to the Beans but it’s getting to the point where i am not paid NEARLY enough to deal with their bullshit), a tentative start date for the new one, a meeting next weekend where details will hopefully be hammered out and an official job offer will be made and accepted, and (potentially, hopefully, if i can scrape enough out of my last several paychecks) an entire MONTH in between where i will do nothing but drive down to the fam, frolic at beaches and the pool, do silly tourist stuff, and WRITE WRITE WRITE. It will be GLORIOUS, and i REALLY REALLY hope i’ll be able to afford it because friends, your friendly neighborhood penguin needs a GODDAMN BREAK.

So that’s what’s happening right now, thanks for asking!

[solrika]

I’m thrilled to see you posting art again! Your art is some of my favorite fanarts in the Kalluzeb fandom. I Hope you’re doing well <3

Thank you so much! That makes me so happy to hear. :) I’m doing okay—in the middle of a med change, but riding inspiration as far as it will take me.

[kaelinaloveslomaris]

So I went back and forth on actually saying anything, but I have to let you know that I adore Allegiance AND it’s totally valid that you’re not updating. It’s still a definite reread and favorite of mine. I’m so pleased you wrote and posted what you did. I think your work has improved the fandom, finished or not. If you did update, I have no doubt it would be lovely. As it is now, it is still a masterpiece of a fic. Thank you for writing it.

May peace and willful chaos ooze from your pores 💜💜💜

Thank you very much! This is a lovely ask. ❤️

I’m never ruling out coming back and finishing it, which is why it’s on indefinite hiatus rather than abandoned, I just don’t know when that might be. I’m so very happy you find value in it anyways, incomplete though it is.

Also. That message close is phenomenal.

[sassysnowperson]

Would you ever consider/have you ever considered writing and publishing an original novel? Some of your original works seem like they're just the beginning to a novel/novella that I'd read over and over again

Ahhh this warmed my heart so much!! Thank you - and yes, I have considered it! Been considering it quite a bit, lately - writing and posting original works to AO3 has been really fulfilling, and I've gotten so much amazing feedback.

I've been in a rest period with writing in general, but I'm feeling the desire to write again, and I've definitely been wondering what I can do with more story space. There's not a strong story idea pending yet, but I'm kicking a couple of things around. So this ask is incredibly happy-making and motivating, thank you!

[anghraine]

rubynye replied to this post:

Olaudah Equiano: enslaved as a child, bought his own freedom, campaigned eloquently for abolition, his memoir went through nine printings at least. An erudite Black man from before many people think Black people were invented. I can't adequately express how happy seeing him in your list made me.

Equiano is a truly fascinating, compelling figure. His memoir was assigned in a grad school seminar I took on 18th-century British literature focused on various forms of resistance and dialogue among/between/about the oppressed, and it was really intriguing to read abolitionist poetry and tracts mainly by white English people across the political spectrum of their era and then Equiano's Interesting Narrative. The contrast is incredible.

He's in my dissertation for basically one passage—the account of his capture and lifelong separation from his sister. But it's a hell of a passage.

(Now that I'm thinking about it, he was also in the curriculum I designed when I took over my advisor's upper-division 18th-century class for a semester, and my undergrad students loved the Interesting Narrative, way more than the grad students in my own seminar had. Most of my students had no idea he'd even existed and they just really got into it.)

[snickerdoodlles]

I love all your kimchay stuff so so much. KP was like the second bl I ever watched (immediately after bad buddy LMAO) and it's not something I would spend too much time thinking about were it not for all your headcanons - not even just kimchay but the way you write all of them (but also very much kimchay). Just, I love your writing, thanks for sharing all the stuff that you do <3

😭😭 friend i am CRYING thank you??? half the time i feel like the world's most annoying and inconsistent chatterbox hjfdhjd, i'm so glad i can bring smiles to other people's faces with my shenanigans for silly fictional men ❤❤❤ esp kimchay, they're such a sweet spot of just enough presence in canon to hook me and but so much left uncovered i'm still finding new nuggets for what i love about them. i love that i'm still dragging everyone else along with me as i cry over them two years later XD

[chronically-ghosted]

I’m so sorry for essentially spamming you, because I legit stayed up until 2 AM reading Recovery Road because I just COULDN’T stop, and I def left you several novellas in the comments on ao3 because I couldn’t contain myself, lol.

But, in all sincerity, RR is one of the best things I’ve ever read. Ever. I mean fics, published works, anything.

As someone with a past history of substance abuse, I’m often wary of reading fics that touch on recovery or addiction at all, because I’ve been burned a few times by careless mishandling of what’s obviously a sensitive topic, or seeing it reduced to nothing more than a trope. But holy mother of god, the care and empathy you obviously took the entire fic was SO apparent. So many times while reading, I had moments of “oh, I have BEEN Natalie or Dieter or Heidi, I KNOW I exactly what’s going on right now and EXACTLY what it feels like, and this is IT.” Even when it was ugly and messy and painful, it was obviously written with such care in a way that was just beautiful.

And I’m seriously FLOORED by your ability to describe the hurricane of emotions through it all in such a visceral way. There were times where I could just FEEL the heat of shame burning in my gut, the sinking weight of grief, or my heart just damn bursting during their moments of triumph and happiness. And I so appreciate the time you took with the story and characters; a story like theirs, together and separately, just takes time, especially to have any hope of ending up where they did, and I love so much that you allowed them that (even if I did gasp out loud at the ten years reveal lol). I was truly just clutching at my chest, covering my mouth, and near tears the last two chapters especially.

Thank you so, so much for writing this absolutely beautiful story and for sharing it. I absolutely can’t wait to positively devour anything and everything else you go on to write. 🖤

this, without a doubt, made my entire week 🤍 i have no idea how to respond to this because this level of dedication and thoughtfulness towards something I wrote . . . i am gobsmacked!

first of all, the fact that you wrote an individual review on multiple chapters -- it's totally not spam and i read every single one of them twice and i think i'm a little bit in love with you??? seriously, that is like every writer's wicked fantasy 🤍

secondly and this is a big one - THANK YOU?!?!? addiction and recovery are things that have definitely affected me too, and I've always been the Heidi of the situation. But the way people treat or talk about addicts as if they are less deserving of care and empathy is horrific. In my own life, I struggle to find that balance of boundary setting and empathy all the time so I was genuinely worried about taking these sensitive topics and putting them in the realm of fantasy fanfiction. Of course, things are going to end well because it's fanfiction, but in real life it doesn't always and there's always that concern of relapse (which, in my opinion, makes addicts rather incredible to have to wake up every single goddamn day and make an active decision not to do the easy thing -- I struggle with doing my skin care routine daily).

I really have to shout out @spookyxsam for the realism -- she helped me through a lot of the scenes of Dieter's downward spiral, how someone on that many drugs might react or what they might say. And she diagnosed both Dieter and Natalie and wrote out their prescriptions! That is a very weird text chain to have in your phone! 😆

I had a couple of different phrases running through my head while writing this: "right person, wrong time", "loving someone is as much of a choice as it is to stay sober", (and if it wasn't totally obvious by Andrew's speech) "love above all else is what makes life worth living". I think by the end of it, both Natalie and Dieter made their own little families, independent of each other and then as one themselves. I genuinely hope you got some of that sentiment while reading this. There's something so desperately tragic about Dieter as a character (even in the original movie) that I am just obsessed with. Have I done way too much character analysis for a character from a Judd Apatow movie? Yes. Is that ever going to stop me? No.

*on my hands and knees* thank you for taking the time to write all of this out. this is a very close and personal fic for me, so to hear it affected you even at all, it means so much! 🤍🤍 I promise I will get to your request from my 100 followers event -- that one is SO DIETER IT HURTS! thank you thank you thank you and see you next time!

[brynnmclean]

I want you to know I just read some of your cassian/melshi ficlets this morning and when I saw it was you I thought "oh of course its you" like yeah that makes sense

I'm choosing to take this as a compliment!!!!! If I can be recognized by vibes, writing style, and/or Friendly Exes then that is cool!!!!

(ficlets are here for anyone wondering what on earth we're discussing)

[herawell]

shiny + fruit for the color asks!

shiny

friends?

I’ll give you cat/frog pics

We should steel a shopping cart

fruit

hey buddy are you okay

please take care of yourself

<3

[writingfics-passingtime]

I just spent all morning reading your Perfect Alibi story and the drabbles you have for it, and I am absolutely in love with it!!!! Andrew’s Peter Parker is my favorite and this little group of stories is everything I needed!!

Any idea on when the next drabble might come out?? If not I totally get it! I love your writing and can’t wait to read what’s next! 💕

What a compliment !!! Thank you, sweet anon 🥺 I’m thrilled you’ve enjoyed the fic and drabbles so far and I so appreciate your kind words 💜

I would love to give you an approximate date but I’m just not sure! It’s in progress but my focus is on Off the Record for the time being because it is very much looming over me and I’m very eager to finish it.

I hope the next drabble will be soon! The last one is written, and so is most of number seven, so it’ll be a smooth ride to the end once I can finish that sixth one 💜