#purple prose challenge

[thegoldenavenger]

Foggy Mtn LQG please :3

the bai zhan war god for your pleasure~

id by @princess-of-purple-prose : Scum Villain fanart of Liu Qingge done in a color palette of deep blue, light gray-blue, and yellow. He's posed like he's sitting and scowling down at the viewer, and he's depicted with dark skin. The background is divided into colored stripes with decorative curlicues, and the words "Bai Zhan" are above and below him. End ID]

[loverboydotcom]

purple prose might be another term that needs to be put on the high shelf of writing advice cause why does nobody seem to agree on what it actually means 😭😭😭

[nulfaga]

looking at the goodreads reading challenge top 40... reading is dead, long live reading

[mortalityplays]

This is a dangerous sentiment for me to express, as an editor who spends most of my working life telling writers to knock it off with the 45-word sentences and the adverbs and tortured metaphors, but I do think we're living through a period of weird pragmatic puritanism in mainstream literary taste.

e.g. I keep seeing people talk about 'purple prose' when they actually mean 'the writer uses vivid and/or metaphorical descriptive language'. I've seen people who present themselves as educators offer some of the best genre writing in western canon as examples of 'purple prose' because it engages strategically in prose-poetry to evoke mood and I guess that's sheer decadence when you could instead say "it was dark and scary outside". But that's not what purple prose means. Purple means the construction of the prose itself gets in the way of conveying meaning. mid-00s horse RPers know what I'm talking about. Cerulean orbs flash'd fire as they turn'd 'pon rollforth land, yonder horizonways. <= if I had to read this when I was 12, you don't get to call Ray Bradbury's prose 'purple'.

I griped on here recently about the prepossession with fictional characters in fictional narratives behaving 'rationally' and 'realistically' as if the sole purpose of a made-up story is to convince you it could have happened. No wonder the epistolary form is having a tumblr renaissance. One million billion arguments and thought experiments about The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas that almost all evade the point of the story: that you can't wriggle out of it. The narrator is telling you how it was, is and will be, and you must confront the dissonances it evokes and digest your discomfort. 'Realistic' begins on the author's terms, that's what gives them the power to reach into your brain and fiddle about until sparks happen. You kind of have to trust the process a little bit.

This ultra-orthodox attitude to writing shares a lot of common ground with the tight, tight commodification of art in online spaces. And I mean commodification in the truest sense - the reconstruction of the thing to maximise its capacity to interface with markets. Form and function are overwhelmingly privileged over cloudy ideas like meaning, intent and possibility, because you can apply a sliding value scale to the material aspects of a work. But you can't charge extra for 'more challenging conceptual response to the milieu' in a commission drive. So that shit becomes vestigial. It isn't valued, it isn't taught, so eventually it isn't sought out. At best it's mystified as part of a given writer/artist's 'talent', but either way it grows incumbent on the individual to care enough about that kind of skill to cultivate it.

And it's risky, because unmeasurables come with the possibility of rejection or failure. Drop in too many allegorical descriptions of the rose garden and someone will decide your prose is 'purple' and unserious. A lot of online audiences seem to be terrified of being considered pretentious in their tastes. That creates a real unwillingness to step out into discursive spaces where you 🫵 are expected to develop and explore a personal relationship with each element of a work. No guard rails, no right answers. Word of god is shit to us out here. But fear of getting that kind of analysis wrong makes people hove to work that slavishly explains itself on every page. And I'm left wondering, what's the point of art that leads every single participant to the same conclusion? See Spot run. Run, Spot, run. Down the rollforth land, yonder horizonways. I just want to read more weird stuff.

[its-your-mind]

ALEX NEWALL BE NICER TO MARTIN CHALLENGE

[ID: Excerpts from the transcript of episode 7 of The Magnus Protocol.

1. Alice: Who, Chester? He's not so bad. Better than Norris, whiny little toad.

2. The Magnus Protocol: Episode 7, "Give and Take" -- Written by Alexander J Newall, Edited by Jonathan Sims. End ID]

[Plain text: Alex Newall be nicer to Martin challenge. End PT] ID by the glorious @princess-of-purple-prose

[thorin-is-a-cuddler]

This scene is hauntig me.

@princess-of-purple-prose Thank you so much for these accurate additions:

[ID: A gifset from the 2011 production of Much Ado About Nothing featuring David Tennant and Catherine Tate. Benedick looks pained and sorrowful as he takes one of Beatrice's hands. Beatrice is speaking, uncaptioned but visibly passionate and upset.

Benedick takes both her hands and asks her seriously, "Think you in your soul the Count Claudio hath wronged Hero?" Beatrice sobs, "Yea!" Benedick holds her at the elbows and looks her in the eyes as he says, "I am engaged. I will challenge him. I will kiss your hand, and so I leave you."

He pulls up her hands and presses a kiss to them, and Beatrice seems shaken and stunned. Benedick draws himself up, and they look at each other silently before Benedick says "Farewell," and walks away purposefully. Beatrice moves after him before stopping herself. End ID]

[jesncin]

please do tell about why woman of tomorrow sucks i love reading your takes they’re always so well written

Sure! And thank you for throwing me this bone because WOOF

(btw it's totally fine for people to like Woman of Tomorrow, and I can even see why! This is just my experience with it that I wish was talked about more)

Quick context: Woman of Tomorrow is about a space farmgirl named Ruthye who seeks revenge on Krem, a guy who killed her dad. Supergirl guides her on this journey so they can learn lessons about grief and revenge.

The biggest flaw of the comic is the narrative prose. Ruthye's dialogue is a rambly, over-indulgent, stylized mix of an attempt at medieval Shakespearian speak, but then in the last few issues the writer remembers she's a farmgirl so he decides she should suddenly say "ain't" more often and speak in double negatives to sound a bit more Southern. I can enjoy wordy comics! But Ruthye's dialogue and narration is blatantly excessive purple prose. So many scenes would hit harder with a less-is-more approach while still being stylized and characteristic. Sometimes the narrations pairs nicely with the art to create layered irony, but most of the time it feels like it's disregarding the comics medium altogether.

The other thing about Ruthye's narration is that it holds the story back. I get that the narration is Ruthye writing from the future, but the way it's done gives us a very passive relationship with the events of the story. We don't get to be with the characters in the action heavy moments because we're reading caption boxes of Future Ruthye rambling about poetry recounting The Battle of Capes. I'm not experiencing grief or dread with the characters, I'm being told about it. All of Ruthye's narrative rants boil down to "Supergirl is really badass, sad and kind. I promise this is deep." and "here's how my farm girl experience is relevant to this". Ruthye also speaks in glowing admiration, idealization and worship of Supergirl; it makes it really hard to get to know Kara in a humanizing way. I'm sure the purple prose hits differently for others, but I personally think the story would have more room to breathe without it.

You know how people like saying "Superman is boring because everything is too easy for him, he's too powerful" yeah that's Woman of Tomorrow. The conflict Kara faces are not challenges to her character, they're inconveniences. The resolutions to each story don't feel clever or earned. Kara just knows where to find the murdered purple aliens, Kara just happens to have a silver age-reference magical horse that can outrun the suffering-ball Krem throws at her, Kara just toughs out 10 hours in the green sun. Why be a smart storyteller when you can just give your heroine the upper hand every single time? There could've been a great bonding moment where Ruthye uses her famer-smarts to build shade for Kara, she could've crafted a salve to protect Kara's skin. But I guess having her guard Kara from dinosaurs is ok. Kara helps of course, even though she's dying because she's so cool, badass, sad, kind, etc.

Kara's internal conflict is that she was hoping that taking Ruthye on this journey would teach the farmgirl a lesson about revenge, but has Kara herself learned to move on? She's still thinking about Krypton after all. The problem with how this is presented is that it's not a flaw that we get to see evolve with the story. We see Kara act mopey, get an origin story flashback and then Kara tells us this- in hopes it'll recontextualize everything you've read before. By the time we make it to the end, the characters act like they've learned so much and I'm just standing here wishing I got to see all this growth they're talking about.

At the heart of it, I feel like Woman of Tomorrow represents the side of Super-fandom that wants to see the Kryptonians deified by the narrative. They hate seeing Kara do silly girly rom-com teenager things, she needs to be SERIOUS and EDGY and SAD and ALONE but like a god would be and not how a young woman would be that way. How else will boys take her seriously? Don't forget to remind the reader that she's STRONGER than her boy scout wholesome cousin! There's potential in a short revenge story about young girls finding hope in seeing a role-model woman survive loss, but not like this.

"You don't think I could've solved all those problems? C'mon I'm Supergirl." I sure love seeing female characters be badass girl-god legends who don't get to be humanized by being unflatteringly flawed people. Anyway the better Supergirl grief+revenge story is "Supergirl: Being Super". I don't think it's perfect because it misses the crucial difference between Kal and Kara among other things- but as a story about a teenage heroine learning how grief shapes her and those around her, it's way better.

Woman of Tomorrow's art is stellar though lmao would get a copy just as an artbook to reference.

[steddieunderdogfics]

For colors in the title challenge Monday I'd like to nominate 'sepia dreams of devotion and laughter' by the lovely @flowercrowngods. Still one of the most poetic things I've ever read & the ultimate feel-good fic that deserves as much love as there's pouring out of it🥹archiveofourown[.]org/works/46655677

sepia dreams of devotion and laughter by flowercrowngod

@flowercrowngods

Rating: Teen and Up

1,278 words, 1/1 chapters

Archive Warning: No Warnings

Tags: Established Relationship, Boys In Love, Soft Steve Harrington, Romantic Fluff, Purple Prose, POV Steve Harrington, Soft Eddie Munson

Summary:

“What’s that face then?” Eddie asks, but Steve just smiles. Hums. Dismisses the question, locks away the answer. It’s the face that says, I love you so much, I can’t even stand to look at the world because that would be one sensation too many and I would break. Surely, I would break.

Thanks for the rec!

Know a fic that deserves extra love? Submit through our asks!

[firenati0n]

fic pride friday

yeah it's not friday idc idc thank you to @kiwiana-writes @anincompletelist @anchoredarchangel for the tags <3

Rules: Post your favourite line or passage from as many of your published works as you’d like. Let yourself feel proud of your creations! Tag as many people as you post snippets, so your fellow fic friends can be proud, too.

i only have 7 fics so I'm using snips from all of them...maybe this will motivate me...hoping it helps :)

snips below the cut so it's not a pain on your dash lol. also they're in order of posting, so if you haven't read something just scroll on by lol:

from our world, mine and his alone (the midnight train to go) aka cracky brain worm fic:

In a poorly executed non sequitur, he settled to comment on the first thing he could think of. Fatal error.  Deep breath in. “By the way. Digging the cardigan, Henry. Very…” He rifled through his extensive vocab for literally any appropriate adjective. Refined? Boring. Professional? Practical, but also boring.   “Very…?” Henry raised an eyebrow, long fingers wrapped around a cup of tea. Earl Grey, Henry had said a while ago, but Alex couldn't be sure. He had been terribly distracted by said fingers, wondering where else those fingers could— What Alex’s distracted, useless worms in his left temporal lobe decided to supply him with as a response was: “Slutty-English-Literature-professor core.” Alex was going to jump off the train. He was going to change his name. He was going to get a lobotomy, as a treat. 

+

from An Amateur's Guide to Piping That Cream and Beating That Meat aka thirst trap tiktok au:

and my favorite part is the end when henry makes a bold ass move on alex through an old tiktok comment while he's sat across from him LMFAOOOO king shit:

+

from each time we touch / i wanna take too much aka fingers in mouths dreamy fic:

Eyes still closed, Henry kisses Alex's thumb, a soft touch, and Alex sucks in a sharp breath. He presses his thumb inside for a second, resting it on Henry's tongue. Henry's eyes open, slow and steady, and he grasps Alex's hand gently, pulling his thumb out and wrapping his long pale fingers around Alex's index and middle finger instead; pulls them into his mouth, closing his lips around Alex's digits. Alex lets out a stuttered gasp as he leans into the touch, his fingers sliding in a little deeper. The sound of his shaky exhale sits for a second, heavy in the silence. The air around them crackles. There's a weight on Alex's chest, pressing and pressing and pressing, until he can barely get a breath in or out within the inches of shared space between him and Henry. Henry swirls his tongue around Alex's fingers, and his eyes are clear as ever as they bore into Alex, a challenge. And who is Alex to deny him anything?

+

from keep me up all night / i wanna scratch your surface aka lovely prose all over fic:

Alex is determined to give him the world, even if it’s narrowed down to a strip of smooth skin just below Henry’s clavicle, a constellation of purple and red hues littered in places no one can see, in spots wandering eyes can’t reach. Alex’s heart pouring out of his mouth, sliding past his tongue and right onto Henry’s skin, the universe contained in Henry’s rib cage that protects the air they share in impassioned exhales and the heartbeat that intertwines with Alex’s when they’re like this; a sacred harmony of bodies and spaces. He’ll never tire of this.

and also this:

Alex does his worst, and then some; a reminder that they get to have this. It’s theirs, and it’s the universe in Henry’s ribcage, and it’s the moonlight reflected in Alex’s eyes, and it’s the world narrowed down to bruises on a pale canvas and bite marks on golden skin. Marks that they can run delicate fingertips over, press into with devotion; tucked away for safekeeping in the morning, their starkness harsh in the sunlight. There are no eyes worthy of Henry in the daytime.

+

from cause you're classic, and i'm reckless aka ryan gosling / rachel mcadams inspired actor au:

When Alex was called up for his award, he felt himself go right back to where he was on day one of rehearsals—transparent, with his heart on his sleeve and voice a little wobbly. Being recognized for his accomplishments felt so novel, so intense, so foreign. After fighting tooth and nail to proudly sport his biracial and bisexual identity, he was thrilled to be accepted for who he was, and told he was good enough for the masses, his intersectionality a standout and not something to hide; good enough for Henry as a costar, holding his own opposite an industry darling. He couldn’t keep the tremor out of his voice as he accepted his trophy, thanking everyone for their hard work on this movie, the studio for backing a movie about unapologetic queer love, and Henry for being his faithful guide and cheerleader in a new landscape for Alex, giving him space to be his authentic self free of judgment and fear of failure. He’s so, so grateful for this. He will never stop being grateful; after pouring his heart and soul into this movie, he got so much back in return, and then some. He’s completely rearranged, made up of brand new parts next to his old, rusty ones; a patchwork heart beating erratically yet earnestly, hands that have traversed new spaces and swaths of skin, people pouring themselves back into him and sanding down the rough parts, caressing the scared ones. Alex feels not just reborn, but also like the person he always was deep down, just waiting to have a chance to emerge with all his heart to show for it.

+

from who truly stuck the knife in first aka spy au aka sexually charged wrestling:

Alex averts his gaze, rolling onto his back to gaze at the cracks in the ceiling. The thing is. The thing is, Alex doesn’t know where the fuck to go from here. Between the barbs and the knives and the tension and the rolling around on the floor and the bed in a sexually frustrated heap, Alex didn’t take a second to consider he could have this, could have Henry in a way that mattered. Now that it's just within reach, he's scared it's going to slip away from his fingers and into the night if he holds on too tight, wants too much. He’s spared the need to respond by the sound of a crackle coming from Henry's laptop, then clothes rustling as someone groans. Manu’s bug is up and running, the man probably fielding a killer hangover and hazy memories of Alex and unbuttoned shirts and hands wrapped around throats. Alex clears his throat, scraping away any remnants of lingering affection. “Back to work, Foxy,” he says with a cheeky grin. Before he can help himself, though, he leans into Henry, planting a sweet kiss on his parted lips. Henry sighs into him, cupping his cheek with a tenderness Alex hasn't felt in a long while. He tastes like a future Alex dreams of having one day. For now, that's enough. It has to be.

+

from and all i can taste is this moment, and all i can breathe is your life aka angel!henry fic aka city of angels au with a happy ending:

Henry forges on, the words pouring out of him, spilling all over the cliffside for Alex to see. “It is a sin worth committing, a fruit worth eating—at least I’ll get to taste you. You will never be a lapse in my judgment. You are my salvation, through you I get to reclaim myself. Isn’t that beautiful, isn’t that everything you’ve taught me about life and love and humanity?” Alex gazes at him, mouth slightly agape, taking in Henry’s impassioned words. Alex has spent his life fighting for others, extending himself beyond his limits. Now it’s Henry’s turn. “Darling, I’ve spent years, centuries even, pondering the question of what makes you human, what sits in your core. After all this time, the answer is unchanging—it’s love. Love, and care, and the unflinching determination of the human condition. With this, with you, I’ve experienced the absolutely soul-crushing realization that our hearts are built to endure when you have hope.” Henry’s voice wavers a bit, but he presses forward, determined to make the words land. “You are my hope, the hope I never thought I’d get to have, the hope I never thought I deserved to keep. With you, I want to endure.”

xoxo roop

open tag but also some no pressure tags : @wordsofhoneydew @cha-melodius @cricketnationrise @hgejfmw-hgejhsf @whimsymanaged

@nontoxic-writes @alasse9 @ships-to-sail @leaves-of-laurelin @myheartalivewrites

@sherryvalli @ninzied @rmd-writes @suseagull04 @inexplicablymine

[onlycosmere]

Writing Styles

Would Nabokov’s writing be considered “purple prose” in today’s writing climate? by meadowillow_ 

meadowillow_ : Vladimir Nabokov is praised as one of the most gifted writers of the ornate style. Interestingly, somebody wrote an article—its title eludes me—about sending a sample of Nabokov’s writing for review. This sample was sent under a pseudonym. The advice was to make the writing simple and economical.

That made me wonder. How much of our judgements about ornate writing are post-hoc rationalisations? Do we fish for reasons to judge the writing as good because we know the author is a masterful stylist? Would we judge their writing the same if it were written by a nameless, faceless stranger on the internet?

I’m denying neither that Nabokov is an excellent writer nor that his work is immune from criticism. I just wonder how much established authors fairly evade and unknown authors bear the brunt of a certain type of criticism.

With all of this in mind:

Do you think that Nabokov’s writing would be well-received if he were an unknown author in 2024?

[I’d like to keep the focus on his writing style not on the controversial nature of some of his books.]

Great_Ad_5561:  I used an alt account to post an excerpt from an award-winning novel in r/writers, and it was torn apart. I think people these days don't appreciate anything that isn't straightforward. Of course, there are those who still enjoy it, but for the most part, lives are busier now than they were then, and to some, it is easier to read straightforward books.

Bridalhat:  Also, judging by the types of work most commonly posted here, r/writers and r/writing is not full of literary scholars, writers, or readers. Which is fine! But there’s probably more people here who like Sanderson’s prose than who have read Nabokov period, maybe excluding Lolita. 

SizeableDuck: I'm not a fan of this trend at all, though everyone's obviously entitled to their opinion.

I read Lolita recently and absolutely loved it mainly because of how witty and poetic the prose was - completely unlike anything published nowadays, not to mention its subject matter. It's clear from the first page that Nabakov was a genius.

Tried Way of Kings for the first time shortly afterwards and found it to be the driest, most watered-down thing I've ever read by comparison. The only thing about it that challenged me was reaching the final page.

I get that Sanderson has a different style and his writing is -meant- to be completely lacking in spice, style and charm in order to make his stories more palatable for the average fantasy fan nowadays, but look me in the eye and tell me you've ever laughed at the constant, god-awful wordplay in those books.

He just describes exactly what's happening in the plot and the character's heads. There's no poetry and it makes me a little bit sad to see so many people praising him as an amazing fantasy writer purely because of his plots.

You can find a ton of writers nowadays that're like Sanderson, but you can't find any closer to Nabakov.

Brandon Sanderson:  While I agree that taste is completely subjective--and it's never offensive for someone to simply not like a book--I think you're spreading some misinformation here.

Those of us trying for clean, striking prose aren't doing it to make "stories more palatable for the average fantasy fan nowadays." We do it because we like this style, and would rather the ideas--and not the method by which they are expressed--be the challenging part of a story. I find it insulting that you'd imply prose choice is anything but a literary decision made for the merits of the narrative.

This division isn't new. George Orwell was advocating for clean, crisp prose in the 40s, a full decade before Lolita was written. This push and pull between clarity and ornament stretches back to Shakespeare, whose contemporaries would lambast his flourishes as incomprehensible. (Not that I mind, obviously, literary genius being in the ornaments. It's only that I find multiple kinds of writing worthwhile.)

Moreover, you can absolutely find writers closer to Nabakov today. Guy Gavriel Kay is still writing, and is one of my favorites. (Try Under Heaven.) Hal Duncan is still writing, and is amazing, though rarely releases anything. And, of course, there's N. K. Jemisin--not the same, but most certainly "closer to Nabakov." Even the majority of the writers in the New Weird experimented with style in the same ways as I think you'd like.

Many varieties of writing are valuable to the craft, and I suggest new writers (many of whom frequent this subreddit) practice multiple styles to find the ones that appeal to them and match their narrative goals. It's totally fine to prefer one over another, but I find abundant "spice, style, and charm" in something crisp like Harrison Bergeron--indeed, I find just as much of it as I do in something like Lolita, if for different reasons.

SizeableDuck:  Much more level-headed and correct than what I was typing last night. Thanks for the recommendations, too.

Edit: Just realised you are the man himself. I take everything back.

Edit 2: By this I mean I take back my previous rudeness twofold. I had a think about it this morning when I read his reply and realised that the creatives I love to shit on have, in most cases, accomplished more than I could hope to. And in addition, probably know more about the topics I'm criticising than I do.

[nerdieforpedro]

Weekend Update 04/14/2024

Nerdie, you’re kinda late tonight.

Yeah, it was all taxes this weekend. 😭 Ugh. But it’s done. Let’s not talk about it anymore.

OK…So what’s new?

Back to work after time off. Adjusting and writing. I did watch the Ryan Gosling SNL episode. I laughed so hard.

I did get a manicure and pedicure - 💜 purple hehe!

I did read some fics this week:

1. Something Old by @fhatbhabie (Javi G x plus size female)

2. Sexting by @reallyrallyauthor (Steven Grant x Marc Spector x Jake Lockley x You)

3. Enchanted to Meet You by @beskarandblasters (Din Djarin x f reader)

4. Fires at Midnight by @inept-the-magnificent (Lucian Flores x f reader)

5. A Midnight Plea by @soft-persephone (Marc Spector x fem reader)

6. A Galaxy Far Far Away part 6: Halloween at Juniper Cottage - Pick your own pumpkin by @grogusmum (Din Djarin x earthling f reader)

7. I’ll Give You The Moon by @soft-persephone (Marc Spector x fem reader)

8. Mi Santa by @fhatbhabie (Frankie Morales x reader)

I did write some this week 👀 I’m sorry I’m advance. Things ended up dark. 😭 Those are marked with the red.

Back & Nose, Hair and Hat - (Only Parts of you Mr. Morales Series)

Her smile was worth it - for the iamasaddie writing challenge 2.0 (Pero Tovar modern AU DARK FIC)

Interlude Two - Tell me about her and Part Seven Merging the Star Clusters - (The Lake between us Series)

Scarlet Stains and their Echoes (DARK FIC) - Post Apocalyptic Fluff and Stuff

Chapter 3: Can we talk for a minute? - This is the Neighborhood Din Series.

This week there were a few things, like the writing challenge 2.0 @iamasaddie put together. We sent in asks, pick a color (I did it to myself, I asked for mob enforcer- where else was the fic to go but dark?) Despite being kinda freaked out at what I wrote (I’ll need to process that later) I like it. I usually don’t do dark fics but given recent themes in my writing it’s there. 👀 So I’ll write it if it pops up in the brain.

And this past weekend (I totally missed but sweethearts @perotovar and @honeyedmiller tagged me in) was the @swiftiscruff friendship exchange. From what I saw, people are writing fics for each other, making gif and moodboards and proving much needed friendship and fun. 😎

I’m sure there are other things. But I dunno what they are. 🤣 I hope everyone enjoys what they’re working on. And if you need to rest, drink some water, dance around, nap, all the things.

This week there will another chapter of Din’s neighborhood, I FINALLY have more Din fluff. Well in the neighborhood and Star Ocean Series. I should have another chapter of Benny and actual fluff post apocalypse. It escaped last week. So we’re bringing it back.

No more Ezra and his gumbo or tanktop 🥺 Part 8 will be up next Sunday. His prose will be no more for now. 🙃

My Frankie miniseries will be almost done. This Friday and the next Friday of my math is right. lol

Special thanks:

@mysterious-moonstruck-musings for finding an excellent pic of Frankie’s back and giving me notes on smut that I chose not to use for now

@connectioneverywhere for letting me talk their thumbs off and putting them to sleep. 🤣

@soft-persephone I see you 👀 Two words: Dem noses. 👃 You know. 😄

@megamindsecretlair You need to write about some curls! Telling me and Softie to write about them. You know which curls. 🤭

@soft-girl-musings Songbird, Cabbie and loud ass Marcello on drums. Why did I half expect him to be playing drums on SNL? 😂 He was wearing a very loud shirt so half credit.

@tinytinymenace it’s always fun seeing your namesake laying and just relaxing. 😎 With a dope poof.

@604to647 I really appreciated your ask and messages this week. 💜

Have a great week everyone! 🥰

Love Nerdie ❤️❤️❤️

[porcelainmortal]

Single Sentence Sunday Monday!

Thank you to @rmd-writes and @onthewaytosomewhere for the tags and @kiwiana-writes for the open tag!

This was a super fun challenge and I got sappy af with it bc that's my brand. A little college au sentence that I actually had to cut down if you can believe it.

the rules are: write a true drabble, aka exactly 100 words, that is also one sentence long. That’s it. Topic, fandom, etc is up to you. Let your emdashes, semicolons, and purple prose run free, and just have fucking fun with it.

It's not every day Alex gets to see his classmate Henry like this – doors blown wide open in a stunning way that makes him desperate to know more – but watching his wide smile across the bar; hearing the joyful, mellifluous sound of his unrestrained laugh; seeing those blue eyes shine bright with mirth; witnessing that beautiful flush creep across his cheeks and down his neck; following the long line of his throat as he downs the last of his drink; locking eyes when Henry’s gaze sweeps the room – it’s enough to break Alex’s reverie as his feet begin to move.

Tagging @iboatedhere @cha-melodius @firenati0n @clottedcreamfudge @getmehighonmagic

@thinkof-england @blueeyedgrlwrites @cricketnationrise @priincebutt @littlemisskittentoes

@ninzied @theprinceandagcd @myheartalivewrites @wordsofhoneydew and of course an open tag for whomever wants it!

[sumiblue]

Delving back in to learning a new language has been a challenge when I'm prone to turning "Could I have the WiFi password?" into "Could I possibly trouble you for a spot of Internet?"

I've spent a lot of time playing around with words in English to give VERY specific flavours to the meaning of a sentence, so now I've become acutely aware of the layers I have to peel away to get to the base level of what I'm trying to say. It's extremely frustrating as a lover of specificity, purple prose and general lingustic fuckery BUT endlessly exciting to 1) become aware of what you've subconsciusly absorbed in your native language and culture and 2) observe the subtleties of your learned language as you build competency 3) figure out how you're going to do niche language fuckery in this one. Feels refreshing, can't wait.

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 8/29/2023

my ENTIRE SUMMER has been either worrying about moving or actually moving. ALL OF IT. however an incredibly hot butch milf on the gay community bulletin board/dating app lex has finally answered my piteous call for gun safety classes with an invitation to her private range. unfortunately she is a landlord who owns a VERY large apartment complex. houston is a land of contrasts

listening

more joywave! one of my favorite bands bc they are best listened to in full album format, and i did a fuck of a lot of driving this weekend. little lies you’re told has an opening like a big machine warming up while you are in a control room way high up on a gantry somewhere. spotify

-

reading (2x bonus round)

All The Trimmings by Tesni Morgan (published 2001 in the UK) is a gift from @believerindaydreams. it is “erotic fiction written by women for women” (debatable) and “the publishers recommend that this book should be sold only to adults”. also, “Black Lace novels contain sexual fantasies. In real life, make sure you practise safe sex.” idk i’ve ever seen that kind of notation on an american novel before? fascinating precursor to the saccharine little “stay safe kids” ao3 authors notes

i do find the premise genuinely fun and compelling— two divorced milfs opening a hotel/bordello with historically themed rooms. i have had to look up a lot of british purple prose and i refuse to believe anyone says “rogering” in real life.

im being edged with glimmerings of bisexuality. every time one of the milfs gets turned on and goes out roaming to distract herself from being turned on, i go “oh?” like at a pokemon go egg, but so far all the dalliances and encounters have been dudes.

had a very strange experience with cormac mccarthy's blood meridian. i don’t normally interrogate whether or not i am the intended audience for a work except when it’s literally made for children, bc i as a modern bisexual woman am the intended audience for vanishingly few works. for example, many entire genres (westerns) are very challenging to enjoy.

a western has never made me go "wait so why DO i like westerns at all" so hard. like, what AM i doing here in this genre that is often deeply fucking uncomfortable to consume as a woman, and where the most foundational american and european works of the genre often uncritically embrace the worst parts of the american mythos in the most violent way possible? i do believe critics when they say mccarthy is not embracing violence for the sake of, and in fact has something to say with his revisionist western, but my god is it hard to wade through. anyway, dad media will not fuck me and i still have only a tenuous grasp on why i try so hard to glean enjoyment from it.

i know what mccarthy is trying to do and the overall tone of “weird old maybe-uncle” spinning a yarn to a big group of you and your cousins around a fire somewhere is pretty effective. unfortunately I have less tolerance for mccarthy’s style now than when I read The Road thirteen years ago in high school. i was immediately super invested in The Road’s single dad and how he and his kid were surviving, which does not need a lot of interiority.

blood meridian also has very little interiority. the first five chapters are a teen falling in and out of various fights. i was not, and am still not invested. if im reading A Man Goes On A Journey western (as opposed to A Stranger Comes to Town western) i would like to know two or three things about the man, especially if it seems to be angling at a bildungsroman. i don't typically care for third-person objective narration when it is this closely focused on one guy, and i really don't care for loving descriptions of maggots. comforting to know a lot of critics were also squicked out by this book. so it goes.

-

watching

finished watching s1 of spy x family! a Legally Not West German spy in Legally Not East Berlin has to go into deep cover and pose as a family man in order to gain access to Legally Not Erich Honecker, because the only social events Legally Not Erich Honecker goes to are the ones at his son's elite prep school.

this man FLINGS himself into being the absolute best husband and father possible. for the mission, of course.

i found the first few episodes the best, which is generally the opposite of my normal anime experience. i think it does a really good job of balancing high-octane spy hijinks and chases and explosions with very domestic concerns (he PROPOSES. with a THE RING OFF A HAND GRENADE. AFTER THROWING IT), and once you're really hooked on these characters it turns into a bit of a curtainfic. curtainanime? i had fun with all of it and anxiously await season two, but the actual applied spycraft does drop off significantly as the series goes on.

-

playing

we're going to continue with out of context genshin screencaps for the duration. the watery land of fontaine has a neat smorgsabord of visual style-- freshwater but also saltwater but also the aquarium section at petsmart.

-

making

unpacking mostly. acquired this coffee table and its mother. needs a very deep cleaning and some touchups but is intact. the individual tables are a bit large for like individual party drinks tables but all six together are QUITE large. four tigether would be a comfortable coffee table size for many apartments imo but! bc everything truly is bigger in Texas including my apartment it works for right now. for the first time in my life i am considering a sectional sofa bc the living/dining room is that dang big.

[zigraves]

Wyllstarion Mini Challenges!

(Crossposted from the Wyllstarion Community on here, originally via the Wyllstarion discord server)

Writers: Write a Wyllstarion drabble! We're using the original definition of drabble: a short story of exactly 100 words, no more and no less. The structure offers a real challenge, especially to those of us who like to get purple with our prose, and can be great for helping you develop very intentional writing.

Artists: Draw a colouring page! We're putting together some Wyllstarion colouring pages - this is just a casual fun project, not a sign up artbook zine situation, but join on in by drawing a clean black & white illustration for other Wyllstarion fans to have fun colouring in.

These can be SFW or NSFW, so please have fun with your themes!

Feel free to share these challenges outside tumblr, too.

[anoramactir]

book recs! tagged by @rosenfey & @jennystahl. blows kisses to both of you <3 i'll tag @a-treides, @katsigian, @dekarios, @shellibisshe, @devilbrakers, and @frankensteined.

last book you read. the salt grows heavy by cassandra khaw.

horror/fantasy, kind of a little mermaid retelling? i had mixed feelings about it. there was definitely an interesting plot in there, but i thought it was bogged down by purple prose. felt more like a challenge to write the prettiest sentences possible - and there were v lovely lines! - than a story at times.

book you recommend. fight club by chuck palahniuk.

hard q, but i went with this one because i feel like the reputation the movie + it's fans have makes people avoid it. i could repeat all the soundbites about it being a brilliant satire & criticque of toxic masculinity (especially if you read the narrator as closeted) but tbh... i'm reccing it because i think it's fun. that's really it.

book you couldn't put down. bunny by mona awad.

disclaimer: i've seen this one hyped as the weirdest shit you'll ever read in your life but i didn't think it was that weird. lower your expectations. i did like it enough to finish in three days, though. idk what to say about it that won't spoil the plot— kinda heathers meets frankenstein? more eerie than scary.

book you've read twice or more. the queen's thief series by megan whalen turner.

society if this was the old school ya fantasy that blew up on booktok instead of shatter me: ☀️🌊🌳 i read this one back in high school and it rewired my brain permanently. attolia irene is the only girlboss that matters. i come back to it every few years (rereading book 4 now) & i think it still holds up.

book on your tbr. last call at the hotel imperial by deborah cohen.

it's a non-fiction about a group of reporters that covered ww2. i picked it up randomly at a bookstore because the cover was pretty, lol.

book you've put down. the priory of the orange tree by samantha shannon.

i know i'd love it if i finished but it's just so long. 😭 i've tried like three times and i always lose steam about halfway through. at this point i'll finish it by 2050.

book on your wishlist. hollow places by christopher hadley.

ambie actually recced this to me ages ago and i've been dying to read it. it sounds so interesting! but it's not available as an ebook or at my library, and i'm banned from buying physical books until i get through my stupidly tall tbr stack. one day.

favorite book from your childhood. howl's moving castle by diana wynne jones.

nobody is surprised. it's probably my favorite book of all time. a+ vibes, characters, romance, everything. i own three copies and refuse to get rid of any. if i could find an autographed version, i'd own four.

book you would give a friend. interview with the vampire by anne rice.

i need you all to become obsessed with lestat & louis and then watch the amc series so it gets renewed for season 3. please & thank you.

book of poetry or lyrics you own. time is a mother by ocean vuong.

haven't read it yet, but i've heard great things!

nonfiction book you own. girl sleuth: nancy drew and the women who created her by melanie rehak.

goes into the creation of nancy drew & how it evolved through the years, especially how it was shaped by the original ghostwriter and the daughter of the creator, and their decades-long beef with each other. i came out of it with a parasocial grudge against a woman who died in 1982.

what you're currently reading. a conspiracy of kings by megan whalen turner.

book 4 of the queen's thief series. crown prince sophos has been kidnapped and sold into slavery and it's all very dramatic.

what you're planning on reading next. moby dick by herman melville.

i've never gotten around to this one and i feel like i have to eventually. there's a 75% chance i'll get sidetracked and pick up something totally different, though.