#why are we making hob and Johanna friends in fics

[rainbowvamp]

I would really like to spend more time talking about how hilarious the conversation Dream and Johanna have is if you know comics lore. Like... I'm obsessed.

[avelera]

I posted 3,276 times in 2022

That's 2,766 more posts than 2021!

709 posts created (22%)

2,567 posts reblogged (78%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@avelera

@fishfingersandscarves

@the-moon-loves-the-sea

@rosietherivendell

@pellaaearien

I tagged 3,267 of my posts in 2022

#the sandman - 940 posts

#our flag means death - 881 posts

#dreamling - 706 posts

#lol - 354 posts

#ofmd meta - 270 posts

#hob gadling - 264 posts

#1689 fic - 248 posts

#arranged marriage au dreamling - 202 posts

#maggie's writing progress - 175 posts

#blackbonnet - 173 posts

Longest Tag: 136 characters

#he finally breaks the paralysis of the abused kid watching his father attack his mother imo that’s why he’s so frozen before it’s trauma

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

God, there's something so horrifying about Johanna Constantine telling Dream that she'd heard rumors about the Burgess estate and how the Magus had, "The Devil locked up in his basement."

To her, it was just a rumor. To Dream, it is a reminder of the inhuman torment he suffered, but it's more than that.

Johanna Constantine hearing that rumor means that people knew where Dream was. Oh, they didn't necessarily know it was Dream. It was perfectly reasonable that the rumor would be treated as outlandish, that no one would piece together the absence of a mysterious figure like Dream and one ridiculous rumor about a "Magus" who was almost certainly a charlatan.

But from a survivor's perspective, from Dream's perspective, I think the tears in his eyes and the devastation are because it's so much worse to know that the clues to find him and save him were out there. That others heard rumors about the suffering he was going through, but that no one followed up on them. No one out there searched for him. No one tried to help.

(The one friend that tried was murdered for it, in front of him, and he had to sit alone with that grief, without hope, for years.)

It would be better to emerge from that living hell to hear that no one, anywhere, had any idea where he was. It would be better than to hear that his suffering was known, or possible to know had someone just looked a little deeper, and that no one did.

5,622 notes - Posted August 28, 2022

#4

Some critical rules for writing coherent genre fiction, courtesy of my writing teacher, who is very wise. I don't pretend to have mastered all of these, but their application can do wonders for a story, their lack can cripple it:

Employ the causal chain - every action must be connected to what comes before and after. Each action and beat needs to have impact. They don't all need to be shown but the author needs to know what they are. It is impossible to build suspense without this principle. Things can't happen "just because" or there's no reason for the audience to become engaged with your sequence of events or do things like make predictions. All subsequent rules follow from this principle.

When showing a new type of fictional magic or science, you must show it work before you can show it break. For example, if a character has the ability to summon objects into their hand, we need to see them do so successfully and see how it works, before we see it break at a critical moment during the climax. Otherwise, the audience can't be expected to follow why this situation is unusual because they don't know how it works during normal circumstances.

When claiming a character is good at something, you must show them succeeding at it before you show them failing at it during a moment of pressure. Otherwise, we don't believe you when you establish your character's competence or badassery. For example, when saying your character is an excellent military commander, we need to see them win a fight using those skills and tactics. We can't open with a fight they lose, or else the character and author lose credibility. By all means, show the experienced hero/military leader/ruler/assassin/mage etc break down during a moment of intense pressure, fall down sobbing in terror at a truly insurmountable foe, or otherwise fail to meet the moment, but don't do this before we've seen them succeed at least once, or the moment loses impact.

During the build-up of tension, coincidences should hurt the hero and help the antagonist. This plays into the causal chain rule. Coincidences that help the hero feel cheap. Coincidences that help the villain raise the tension.

Every beat, whenever possible, should be connected to conscious action by central characters (hero, love interest, or villain). The more events are connected to purposeful action by key characters, the more satisfying the causal chain for the reader.

Avoid things that happen "just because" whenever possible. You can have one or two, sure, but the more often things happen "just because" the less interesting the story is, especially if those "just because" moments are core to the story. Fiction is not real life. Audiences are drawn to stories where purposeful actions dictate the success or failure of the characters.

5,670 notes - Posted September 5, 2022

#3

If posting fic online has taught me anything, it’s that I have no idea how the reader will react to anything. Nada. Zip. Zilch. Not the faintest clue.

Fics that I think I scribbled off just to get them out there get the kindest, most rapturous feedback. Fics I slaved over, agonized over, bled my soul into get a couple tepid replies. Fics I thought were me revealing the darkness and weird kink that lives in my brain, scared to even post it for fear of judgement, get, “Aaaw that’s so sweet!” replies. Baffling.

My conclusion? You just never know. You really just can’t know. When I did a workshop with 20 other writers I would try to guess what their critique of my story would be and I was right maybe 1 in 20 times. Only one other writer would have the same critique for my story that I had. And it wasn’t even always the same person.

The encouraging part about this is, if self recrimination, the fear that you know what people won’t like about your story, is holding you back, just say fuck it! You’re almost certainly wrong! All you can do is make it the best story you can for the energy you have. And yeah, sometimes that means scribbling it out in an evening and kicking it out to the void of the internet before you can change your mind or worry about editing it more than once because then you’ll never post it.

It’s all chaos, man. You don’t get to decide what the audience thinks. All you can do is create it and put it out there for them to decide.

13,486 notes - Posted August 25, 2022

#2

Job seeker pro tip that is paying dividends for me (literally in the not too distant future if I’m lucky). Repeat after me:

“What is the budget for this role?”

Memorize it. Internalize it. Practice it like a martial artist with their 10,000 or whatever punches. You need to be able to rattle it off in a moment of panic and that moment of panic is when they ask your salary expectations. Do not be the first person to name a number if you can at all avoid it. You’re gonna drop this baby like the Reverse Uno card you’ve been waiting the whole game to play and you’re going to drop it before even thinking about answering that question first.

Not once has it backfired. No one has gotten angry or offended. Bonus points if you can frame it as you not wanting to waste their time either (makes you sound more senior than you might feel, might not work for someone looking for their very first job but hey still worth a shot).

Every interviewer I’ve tossed this at has been gratified and clear and quoted a number, the only exceptions were when the interview was more exploratory (didn’t have a specific role when we spoke) or they needed to ask a different hiring manager and even then both apologized profusely for not quoting me the number first.

Every single time it has been more money than I would have asked for. Sometimes literally double what I was making before, in calls where the recruiter reached out to me first. I was aghast. As a millennial who got screwed every which way by the recession and still has ptsd over it, finding out what I’m “worth” in this current labor shortage was mind boggling.

(Final disclosure, I’ve been working office jobs for 10 years. This advice might not work for everyone. Many it will work for already know it. But boy howdy, has it been working to levels that have me absolutely floored.)

TL;DR: Never be the first to quote a number if you can at all avoid it. HR people I’ve encountered won’t be mad, they’ll respect you for it, especially if you frame it as doing both of you a favor by making sure you’re both on the same page and the magic words are, “What is the budget for this role?”

20,505 notes - Posted June 22, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

This is an anti-creampuff-ification of Stede Bonnet account. Yes, he is nice but Stede is also insane. He clearly has the eyes of a madman. The most fearsome pirate that ever lived is his soulmate and he regularly impresses this guy with how unhinged he can be. He reads bedtime stories to bloodthirsty pirates, among whom is one who openly talks about his cannibalistic inclinations. Another of his crew was raised by a murderous nun to be god’s perfect killing machine. This is Stede’s found family and he is perfectly aware of these facts about them. Stede ran himself through on Izzy Hand’s sword to win a duel and he smirked as he manipulated a bunch of poncy nobles into setting their own ship on fire. He felt completely at home in Spanish Jackie’s bar until they actively attacked him to get him to leave and he screamed FUCK at the top of his lungs while trying to find the right inspiration to scare the shit out of a bunch of Dutch merchants then SUCCEEDED at scaring the everloving shit out of Blackbeard accidentally in the process. His only notes on Blackbeard’s crew going on a murder spree to demonstrate how to capture a ship was to appreciate their gusto and the efficiency of not missing the chance to rip the gold teeth out of a dead man’s mouth.

And yes, this is the same man who thought making a turtle fight a crab was mean, because he has standards. Very, very unhinged standards. He is a walking contradiction of genteel upbringing and an unabashed craving for a violent life of crime, like a duck raised by chickens discovering the water. All in all, I find this very sexy of him and in the privacy of my brain I will be fighting to the death anyone who tries to morph him into a sweet inoffensive cinnamon bun who is too good for this world, too pure.

20,972 notes - Posted April 18, 2022

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