#thank you sagiow!

[tough-n-dumb]

Chapter 1 — to ease us with warm touching

Their touches begin slowly. Cornelia shoots a man down with an arrow, making a kill Eli could not. His hand wraps around hers when he removes the bow from her tight grasp—gentleness amongst a deadly act. There are fresh tears in her eyes and the brush of his skin against hers nearly sends them cascading, unbidden.

Eli and Cornelia's time together riding through Colorado, with Wyoming ahead and Kansas behind. Set between Eli's rescue and their kiss.

[laiqualaurelote]

First Lines

Tagged by @nostalgicatsea (forever ago but I'm only getting to my tags now). Thank you!

Rules: list the first line(s) of your last 10 (or however many you have) posted fics and see if there’s a pattern!

speak easy, swing hard

When the shots rang out in the Arc, the band didn’t stop playing. It was twelve minutes into the new year at a Stark speakeasy and the joint was jumping, the floor crammed with gin baby socialites essaying the Charleston, mobsters clustered around tables, petty thieves circling and dipping into the pockets of the unwary; when the bullets started flying the crowd screamed and sought to scatter but the bandleader barely blinked, just led his crew full tilt into another chorus of ‘I Wish I Could Shimmy Like My Sister Kate’ while the singer, a svelte Sokovian songbird in a shimmering scarlet number, sidestepped a bullet that buried itself in a piano leg and kept right on crooning, All the boys in the neighbourhood know she can shimmy and it’s understood, while all hell broke loose on the dance floor.

well-versed in etiquette, extraordinarily nice

“You must know, Mr Crowley, that this is to be my last job,” said Jane.

all the men and women merely players

In with the wind blows the news that the Players are coming to town. 

constant as a northern star (constantly in the dark) 

Sachiko Crimm meets Ted Lasso for the first time in a Lidl.

The Lady With The Recorder Asks The Questions

“You took out the line about the threesomes, didn’t you?” 

ain't practical, a world you can't touch

Just a whole lot of aiming, he’d told Cornelia once. But it’s Martha Myers who misses.

maybe everything that dies someday comes back

“He don’t look like much,” said the client. “You sure he’s the chap we’re after?”

a song that will keep sky open in my mind

We knew Eli was back because of the baby. We could hear it crying clean across the wheat fields. 

can't start a fire without a spark 

It was a whole thing when Eddie Munson and Chrissy Cunningham blew town together and ran off to start a rock band.

A Gentleman's Guide To Love And Piracy

Day seven of my return to the high seas, wrote Stede in his journal. Since Lucius was no longer around to take dictation, the journal existed only in his head. Morale is low, I will not lie.

Patterns - I'm a big fan of in media res (it worked for Homer and it works for me) and so I like to start in the middle of things. I'm also trained to write hooks for people with short attention spans, so my first lines tend to be crunchy. The one exception is the first on the list, which is from speak easy, swing hard, the 1920s Prohibition-era Avengers AU I wrote for @nostalgicatsea as part of @marveltrumpshate. I wanted it to evoke the wild, chaotic tempo of a hot jazz number (something like the intro to this) so most of it is a pile-up of a long run-on sentence, and the writing continues in this fashion until Tony shows up to calm things down, whereupon the paragraphs go back to being a brief couple of lines each. I learnt this trick from seeing how translators handle action sequences in wuxia novels.

Tagging: @leupagus, @themardia, @auntieclimactic, @nagia-pronounced-neijia, @eisoj5, @swallowtailed, @justplainsalty, @bropunzeling, @st-clements-steps, @sagiow and anyone else who'd like to do this!

[jomiddlemarch]

Last Sentence Tag Game

Last Sentence Tag Game: Write the latest line  from your wip (or post where you last left off in your art) and tag as many people as there are words in the line. Make a new post, don’t reblog.

Tagged by: @tortoisesshells and @aquitainequeen

I bring you, at looong last, the last line of Chapter 29 of what it is to be a thin crescent moon. (Thanks should go to @tortoisesshells, whose recent ask box prompt inspired me to write this...)

“It wasn’t only General Kirigan who has needed you for a time beyond time, Starkova Kirigana.”

Tagging @orlissa @vesperass-anuna @amarguerite @oldshrewsburyian @asteraceae-blue @samsylviasmoustache @broadwaybaggins @fericita-s @sagiow @kivrin @holy-muffins @incognito-princess @saathi1013 @lucyemers @mistressdickens @helenvader

[tortoisesshells]

Writing Patterns

Tagged by @jomiddlemarch - thank you, kind friend!

Rules: list the first line of your last 10 (posted) fics and see if there's a pattern.

1. “Miss Winters,” said Jeremiah Collins, stepping out of the night into the gloom of her lamp: he had a half-shuttered lantern of his own in one hand, and a bundle of heavy wool in the other. 2. It had been late when they left the Cushings’ party; it was later, now. 3. In stretches of silence, along the long dark road from Bangor, she had had the strange sense of being alone in the world – that it was only Roger Collins and her left alive, and all the rest had gone. 4. “Spenser, from our Chaplain? Has Holy Scripture been exhausted already?” 5. Things change in Collinsport, Joe Haskell believes – the weather, hourly; Carolyn’s moods, the same – the tides, the light, the seasons. 6. There had been noise – now there wasn’t. 7. “Captain –” an embarrassed cough, trailing into an equally uncomfortable silence; the tall, grim being (thing, some part of Elizabeth Swann thought unkindly) that had been James Norrington in life bowed, and settled on formality. 8. Her mother died twice. 9. Victoria Winters woke thinking of what she had gone to bed dwelling on: that her best handkerchief was missing, and she’d lost it in the dining room of the Collinsport Inn of all places. 10. “It’s unusual, that’s all I’m saying,” said one of the men at the oars to another, shivering.

I tend to do a lot of scene-setting, I think? Not as much as I used to, maybe. I have two starting lines under 10 words, which is possibly a sign of the end times? Collinsport gets namechecked twice, which I suppose is: have I mentioned we're in (fictional) Maine recently? we're in Maine.

Tagging: @boltlightning, @enchi-elm, @kazoobreakdown, @fatherramiro, @admiraleyk, @foolishpsychopomp, @itsalongwaytotipperary, @sagiow, @starsuncounted, @shoshiwrites, and you, tumblr denizen reading this!

[undisclosed-serendipity]

Rules: list eight TV shows for your followers to get to know you better

Thank you for tagging me @sagiow !

The English - yes I talked months on end about this for a good reason

The Good Place - basically I think my philosophy of life (or what I hope happens when we die?)

Sense8 - the sense (pun intended) of community

Gilmore Girls - kinda explains itself lol

Midnight Mass - meaning of religion and belief

Russian Doll - meaning of life / overcoming traumas

A Series of Unfortunate Events - reminds me of my adolescence

Happy Endings - my sense of humour

I tag @tortoisesshells @iamwerepandahearmeroar @minnesotamedic186 to do this as well!!

----

I know we probably did not need to write about the series but I like to explain my thought processes. I chose these series that I have finished (and in fact except Midnight Mass which is little too scary to watch again on my own, I have watched all the series more than once) Most of them are quite heavy? Had a little struggle with the final choice, was choosing between Community, Happy Ending and Schitt's Creek. I would choose Schitt's Creek but I hadn't finish it yet and Community is funny but I think Happy Endings I thoroughly enjoyed and had a lot of fun watching and rewatching it.

If anyone wants to discuss any of these series with me, I welcome you with open arms!

[combat-librarian]

thanks for the tag my dear @sagiow!

last song: Pocketful of Sunshine by Natasha Bedingfield, only instead of "sunshine" in my head I substitute "gremlins". You kind of have to be there.

currently watching: Just wrapped up the latest season of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, which I cannot recommend highly enough even if you are not a Trekkie. It's a good enough show to stand on its own.

currently reading: my own older work, as a matter of fact, which I haven't touched in years. My beloved enablers, you know who you are.

current obsession: same as @sagiow - the delightfully deranged pack of women worldwide who have come together in the world's tiniest fandom and now have enough energy to power the sun. I cannot get enough of you all! 😍

tagging pretty much all the same people that Sagiow did, give or take: @undisclosed-serendipity, @tough-n-dumb, @fernmusing, @asalookslikeloki, @werewolfsmile, @laiqualaurelote, @divinecomedienne

[divinecomedienne]

Getting To Know Me

Rules: Tag 10 people you want to get to know better.

Thank you for tagging me @sagiow and @tough-n-dumb.

Relationship Status: I'm gonna go with the French "concubinage" as it sounds so much more exciting than "living with a partner."

Favorite Colour: Red although people usually assume it must be purple as I wear a lot of purple and often have purple hair.

Song Stuck in My Head: I don't have one right now.

Last Song I Listened To: "I Need My Girl" by The National, purely because Spotify put it on one of my daily mixes. (I had never even heard of The National before Spotify somehow decided I love them and started playing them at me all the time.)

Three Favourite Foods: I don't think I can narrow it down to three precise ones. Three types of food I like are proper Italian pasta dishes where the pasta itself is homemade; comforting milky puddings such as bread and butter pudding and most kinds of dim sum.

Last Thing I Googled: Probably something medical; I'm a massive hypochondriac.

Dream trip: Japan!

Tagging: I'm pretty sure all my mutuals have already been tagged!

[mercurygray]

Rules: list eight TV shows for your followers to get to know you better.

thanks for the tag @ewanmitchellcrumbs!

Mercy Street

TURN: Washington's Spies

M*A*S*H

Babylon Berlin

Downton Abbey

Life (2008 writers strike, I still haven't forgiven you.)

Peaky Blinders

Home Fires

Tagging @broadwaybaggins @fericita-s @jomiddlemarch @tortoisesshells @sagiow @treasureplanetsheep

[emeraldsilvercabbage]

Rules: list eight TV shows for your followers to get to know you better

Appreciation to @divinecomediennefor tagging me. It’s not easy to list only eight shows from many I watched these years. But here they are:

Yes Minister

Agatha Christie’s Marple

The IT Crowd

Leverage

Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries

Elementary

Miranda

The English

I am mostly a person of sitcoms & detective stories especially when there’s a lady detective as the leading role. I’d list “Bones” “The Closer”and “Sex and the City(not the movies)” in but rules are rules:-)

I haven’t been used Tumblr for like seven years and I registered specially for The English recently. So very few followers and seems I have no one to tag. But it’s quite fun to be in this game. Thank you@divinecomedienne@sagiow

[theimprobable1]

Five Things You Might Find In My Fics

Thank you @sagiow for the tag, this is fun!

Pining. Definitely my number one feature. If a character doesn't (mistakenly) believe their love is one-sided, is it even a fic by me?

Related to the above: Cannot Risk Our Friendship. "I could tell my best friend I'm in love with them, but what if it ruins our friendship? Better suffer in silence forever."

Also related to the above: low self-esteem. The protagonist is convinced that they are simply not good enough for someone as amazing as their love interest who could have anyone they want.

Excessively selfless lovers. They just want their partner to feel good, their own needs are secondary.

Little to no involvement of side characters. I struggle with juggling more than two characters so I usually just focus on my ship du jour and that's it.

Tagging @slutabed, @1mechanicalalligator, and @imaginedmelody and anyone else who wants to give this a go!

[luarenah]

10 songs

Rules: You can usually tell a lot about a person by the type of  music they listen to. Put your playlist on shuffle and list the first 10  songs, and then tag 10 people. No skipping!

@tough-n-dumb thanks for the tag!

radical face - the mute

fleetwood mac - skies the limit

chromeo - play the fool

hippo campus - south

alabama shakes - don’t wanna fight

bonny light horseman - deep in love

the decemberists - shankill butchers

tei shi - say you do

nothing but thieves - soda

brockhampton - honey

tagging: @acquaclara @wnine @the-molecularbio-kitten @atlasfalling @comacalm @hoths @jasminefruit @sagiow @oswim

[tough-n-dumb]

Getting To Know Me

Rules: Tag 10 people you want to get to know better.

I was tagged by @undisclosed-serendipity & @sagiow thank you!!

Relationship Status: in one

Favorite Color: big fan of orange and yellow, especially neon

Song Stuck in My Head: one of my coworkers was singing "closing time" while we were closing and yeah now it's stuck there

Last Song I Listened To: "plants and worms" by girlpool (it was a rainy day here so i put on my nostalgia playlist but maybe not great that it's a nostalgic song? hm. like sad nostalgia)

Three Favorite Foods: panicking trying to think of three favorites, so I'll say three favorites from today: iced coffee, breakfast sandwich, and chocolate (iced coffee is definitely an all-time favorite though and i drink it no matter the weather)

Last Thing I Googled: "slavic countries" (literally just wanted to know which countries. no good reason)

Dream trip: i don't know if i necessarily have a dream trip right now. i think just anything that would give me a break from... everything lol but i'm going to be going on a backpacking trip in September and i'm really looking forward to that! love me my pnw mountains

Tagging: @little-kinger @luarenah @divinecomedienne @combat-librarian @emeraldsilvercabbage @friendsofabracadaver @desdemonaspace

[laiqualaurelote]

List 10 songs with names in the title that I like, and then tag 10 people

thanks @kiraziwrites for the tag! I actually have an entire Spotify playlist dedicated to songs with names in the title (it is more than 140 tracks and counting) but these are my absolute favourites (I left out musicals, otherwise Hamilton would be most of these):

1. Aïcha by Khaled

Khaled is an Algerian raï singer and his voice in this is spectacular (definitely listen to the French-Arabic version). He’s singing about a beautiful woman who walks past him as if he does not exist, and he offers her jewels, gold, poems, songs, everything - and she’s like “keep your treasures, all I want is to have the same rights as you”

2. Alexandra Leaving by Leonard Cohen

This is based on the C. P. Cavafy poem ‘The God Abandons Antony’ (which is also the inspiration for one of my favourite Miss Fisher fics): “Say goodbye to Alexandra leaving/ Then say goodbye to Alexandra lost”.

3. Isis by Bob Dylan

A classic Dylan story song! The Rolling Thunder Revue live versions are far weirder and more thrilling than the album recording. I listen to it every year on the fifth day of May, in the drizzling rain.

4. Kathy’s Song by Simon & Garfunkel

“I stand alone without beliefs/ The only truth I know is you”

5. Maria by Blondie

“She doesn’t know your name/ And your heart beats like a subway train”

6. Mary Hamilton, anon

This is a Child ballad originating in 1500s Scotland; it’s also known as ‘The Four Marys’. Mary Hamilton is an attendant to the Queen of Scots who bears the King’s child, casts it out to sea and is hung for infanticide. This is Joan Baez’s quietly devastating cover.

7. Samson by Regina Spektor

My favourite of all the songs on this list: “You are my sweetest downfall/ I loved you first”

8. My Sharona by The Knack

Really great driving song, A+ guitar solo

9. Tom Traubert’s Blues by Tom Waits

A quintessential Waits song - the raw growl of his voice, the potent sadness of the lyrics, “it’s a battered old suitcase to a hotel someplace and a wound that will never heal”

10. Valerie by Mark Ronson ft. Amy Winehouse

This song never fails to pick me up. Oh, Amy.

Tagging (only if you’d like to!): @bropunzeling @eisoj5 @glamorouspixels @heydoeydoey @justplainsalty @leliesblou @nagia-pronounced-neijia @sagiow @swallowtailed @tiltedsyllogism

[jomiddlemarch]

20 questions for writers

Tagged by @asteraceae-blue who is Very Nice Indeed.

1. How many works do you have on AO3? 876

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

1,544,499

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Brace yourselves. Mercy Street, Shadow and Bone, Foyle's War, Poldark, The Last of Us, GLOW, A Discovery of Witches, Anne of Green Gables, Little Women, Shogun, Harry Potter, Downton Abbey, Frozen, Dune, Ted Lasso, Star Wars, The Hour, Sanditon, Leap, Brooklyn 99, Far From The Madding Crowd, Beauty and the Beast, Wonder Woman, Gilmore Girls, Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, The Avengers, Parks and Rec, Betsy-Tacy, Wandavision, Rogue One, The Mandalorian, Bridgerton, Community, Solo, Iron Man, Call the Midwife, Lord Peter Wimsey, Fleabag, The Little Mermaid, Emma, The Guernsey Potato Peel Pie and Literary Society, Timeless, Rebecca, The Age of Innocence, Beecham House, World on Fire, And Then There Were None. A few more but I am tired now.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

what it is to be a thin, crescent moon

A Wife--at daybreak I shall be

Point and Click

Bear with the truths I would tell you now

The subtlest fold of the heart

5. Do you respond to comments?

I do try and answer everyone, even if I just say thanks. I will delete really rude comments, which have fortunately been rare.

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

I wrote "Because I could not stop for Death" for Mercy Street and killed basically every character at least once, making remaining characters miserable. Except for the last chapter, where I killed the guy we all loathed.

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

This is tough because I mostly write happy endings. I think "But let thy silk twist down" counts as one, because Jed Foster is convinced that Mary is dying or has rejected him and then she surprises him by showing up and locking them into the sitting room. And in GLOW, "everything could yield him pleasure" allows Sam and Ruth to get back together over Christmas.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Not very often. It's mostly been in big fandoms (Reylo, Shadow and Bone, I'm looking at you) but it hasn't been a big issue on AO3 or Tumblr. And I'm comfortable deleting and blocking.

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

Yes, when I feel it's called for. I write grown-up sex scenes, so there are no wacky positions (unless someone talks about how they're going to throw out their back) and sometimes a breastfeeding mother's milk lets down or a woman struggles to have an orgasm. It's pretty vanilla though and all cishet. In the cock v. dick debate, I lean cock. I don't use other euphemisms for male genitals unless someone is quoting a poem. (I'm not sure that has happened but it totally could with me.)

No one in any of my sex scenes has had any bodyscaping and a not insignificant number of times, someone has left their socks on.

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

OMG, YES. I love a crossover. Probably my Mercy Street/Sesame Street crossover has to be up there for zaniness. I did put Shadow and Bone characters in AOGG Prince Edward Island and I have also crossed over All Creatures Great and Small vets (James and Tristan) into the Grishaverse.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I'm aware of.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

I've been asked for permission but I don't think I gave it.

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

Yes. During the pandemic, there was the Mercy Street Murder Hotel round robin with @tortoisesshells @fericita-s @broadwaybaggins @sagiow @mercurygray and also the Cruise Ship with @sagiow and @fericita-s.

(Pro tip: it's easier if you agree on your murderer BEFORE you start writing but it was fun writing clues that were 50/50 going to be red herrings.)

14. What’s your all time favorite ship?

Given the number of fics I've written for them, I have to say Mary Phinney/Jed Foster but it really could be smart-woman-who-is-underestimated/quippy-guy-who-gets-he's-smart-but-not-as-smart-as-she-is-and-that's-the-turn-on

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

This may make people sad, but I have a hard time seeing my way clear to an ending on "what is it to be a thin crescent moon" largely because I'd have to do some more plotting to get where I'd want to go. It's never say never but the truth is, I originally intended to stop when they got to the Little Palace, so everything after that was basically improv.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I think I'm pretty good at capturing a character's voice and I've often been told my work is poetic, which I appreciate, as I am a poet.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Long-form plotting. I love to read it, but I get tired trying to create it and often resort to lily-padding (my own term for jumping from scene to scene.) I overuse the word just. I don't play chess well but I cannot resist writing about gambits.

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

I try to keep it minimal, since I'm only fluent in English.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Mercy Street.

20. Favorite fic you’ve written?

What is this, Sophie's Freaking Choice? I really like my GLOW zombie road-trip story "Music shall untune the sky" because I gave them a good ride and there was so much angst! "Hope is the thing with feathers" is a fic I wrote for myself, when I was despairing about Real Life and US politics and human rights, where I let Christopher Foyle offer the comfort I desperately wished for.

Tagging @tortoisesshells @fericita-s @sagiow @broadwaybaggins @oldshrewsburyian @orlissa @amarguerite @aloveforjaneausten and @aquitainequeen but anyone else is welcome to hold forth!

[tortoisesshells]

last line tag game

tagged by the lovely and thoughtful @jomiddlemarch & @aloveforjaneausten. thank you, friends!

“Impulse,” he replied, looking at her closely. She might have been an animalcule under the ingenious lenses of the Dutch draper Lady Hammond had thought so highly of – or a foolish lamb lured away from the herd by greener grass, too close to the trees. “I told you, little governess: Collinsport has eaten hardier men than you alive – I hope I shall see you again, but I doubt it.”

(yeah yeah it's more than one sentence but it's one whole line. no it doesn't make sense.)

tagging: @boltlightning, @johnbly, @shoshiwrites, @widowshill, @sagiow, @enchi-elm, @kazoobreakdown, @teamtadpole, @admiraleyk, @foolishpsychopomp, @starsuncounted, & whoever else wants to play. <3

[undisclosed-serendipity]

10 Songs + 10 People

Tagged by @tortoisesshells - thanks for tagging me always!!

Rules: Put your music on shuffle and list the first ten songs that come up, then tag other people.

Betty by Taylor Swift

Disappointment by Anna Akana

What If I? (The Grocery Store Song) by Molly Grace (the mv is really cute!)

Are We Alright Again by Eels

Five Years by Bo Burnham

Miss Missing You by Fall Out Boy

That's Not How This Works by Charlie Puth ft. Dan+Shay & Sabrina Carpenter

Best Mistake by Ariana Grande and Big Sean (love this version the most)

I know it won't work by Gracie Abrams

Fade Into A Dream by LEON

Tagging @combat-librarian @sagiow @minnesotamedic186 @digitalmoss @rifle-yes @nature-played-a-trick-on-me @iamwerepandahearmeroar