#you get torn from your former self and trapped in a book

[arthurtaylorlester]

so like do you ever think about john doe

[pangtasias-atelier]

A Berry Bad Trap

The last commission in the batch! This one for @pluusshie who absolutely deserves more followers cause her art is great!

This story is a bit different from the usual fare, involving blueberry TF. But, it was fun writing this and I hope y'all enjoy

Also, I hate this title adbsjnsns so I might change it if I can think of anything halfway decent

_____________

Walking through an Agarthan base, Felix and Sylvain remain focused despite the building’s abandoned state. The area in varying states of disrepair, the entire base lacks any sign of prior occupancy. Located not too far from Fhirdiad, the former Blue Lions had figured on getting rid of the Agarthan’s closest base to Fhirdiad being the key to swiftly dismantling their chances of gaining political power. Though, Sylvain’s and Felix’s search shows the Agarthans own cunning, any sort of records purged or taken. In hopes of finding any sort of clue or stragglers, Dimitri, along with Dedue and Ashe, scours the perimeter of the base. The rest of the Blue Lions, Ingrid, backed up by Mercedes’ and Annette’s proficiency in magic, search the left side of the base.

Sylvain peaks his head around the corner. The room seemingly empty, he motions for Felix to follow him. All sorts of books are missing. Even the Agarthans’ technology is missing, all of their knowledge taken by them in their rush to leave. “Well what do we have here?” Sylvain gloats to himself under his breath. Though not too under his breath, Sylvain purposefully glancing at Felix after ensuring to be just loud enough to catch his ears.

A lone crystal catching Sylvain’s attention, the vivid blue item rests at the corner of the room, as if accidentally forgotten. “I wonder how much you could go for?” Sylvain opens his hands; he immediately heads towards the crystal, the rest of the room devoid of anything of note like all the other rooms.

“If you touch that, I swear,” Felix checks behind himself. The hallway devoid of anyone else, he keeps watch by the door. “Why care what the damn thing’s worth? It’s not like you’re hurting for cash,” Resting against the doorway, Felix clicks his tongue. Crossing his arms over his petite yet defined chest, he grumbles as he focuses on the hallway.

“Hey, a little curiosity never hurt anyone,” Stepping to the side of the crystal so as to keep an eye on Felix, Sylvain grins at him as he reaches for it. “Come to papa,” Grabbing the crystal, Sylvain begins to cough as it shatters into an infinitesimal number of pieces. A heavy blue dust of sparkles spread throughout the room. Sylvain attempts to wave away the dust in front of him. He covers his mouth and nose with his free arm as he coughs. Despite the clear lack of any wind underground, the dust swirls throughout, enveloping the entire room in a blue haze.

Turning around from Sylvain’s commotion, Felix immediately begins to cough, caught off guard with the dust. His chest heaving, he desperately clears his throat in an attempt to get rid of the dust stubbornly lodged inside.

“Sylvain! What did I just say!” Stomping towards him, their different height is completely unimportant to Felix, Felix ready to slice Sylvain with his sword. Sylvain remains in the corner of the room, staring back at Felix with wide eyes, as if a child reprimanded over breaking curfew. Felix stands some few feet away, standing in the center of the room.

“Did you get dust on your face?” Sylvain squints his eyes, staring intently at the miniscule blue dot on Felix’s nose. Sylvain misses the entirety of his own face turning blue, his pale skin completely replaced with the same deep blue hue from the crystal.

“No, you idiot. You have blue dust on your face!” Shoulders tense, Felix points an accusatory finger towards Sylvain. He recoils with a shout as he spots flecks of blue paint on his hand. “What did you do?” Felix brings a hand to his face. His eyes focus on the flecks of blue. Shaking his hands, as if to rid the blue hued dots marring his porcelain skin, the tiny flecks continue to turn into larger splotches. His stomach bubbling, the not quite searing sensation reminiscent of the sauna back when he attended Garreg Mach, Felix wraps his arms around his stomach. He groans. Something clearly off, he shuts his eyes. Heavy, suddenly oh so heavy, Felix huffs. Readjusting his arm to rest it on his stomach, the resulting squish catches his attention.

Felix winces. Daring a glance, his shout hitches in his throat; any sort of anger wells into concern as his eyes stare at the growing mass that is his stomach. His outfit enabling his limber, agile self, the lack of armor perfectly gives away the bump in his stomach. His outfit having only a little give to them, the minimum amount necessary to not impede him during combat, his bulging midsection stretches out his clothes. Belts growing unbearably tight, Felix winces. Far more important matters at hand, he grips his stomach with both hands. His stomach lacks any sort of give, his stomach sloshing as he holds it. The mass nearly spherical, any softness coinciding with fat is unfound. Two snaps ring out. The two belts around Felix’s midsection fall uselessly to the floor as he stares dumbfoundedly at them. Huffing, Felix barely notes how overly bloated he feels as his thighs join alongside his midsection, his upper chest rounding out as well. His strained breathing rings in his own ears as he continues to feel off, something clearly wrong with whatever Sylvain touched. “Sylvain,” Felix’s mind shouts at him as it remembers the culprit for his own misfortune. Checking for Sylvain, Felix simply lifts his head to find him, Sylvain resting against the wall.

Having touched the crystal responsible for their situation, the cursed item’s effects are farther along on Sylvain. His midsection positively bulging, Sylvain stance is wide; his thighs far more filled out closer to his stomach, the straps holding his leg armor are torn. The armor on his legs bulges from its wearer's engorged body, the armor looking as blown out as Sylvain. His midsection squished behind his armor, Sylvain leans his head back against the wall. Discomfort or concern is completely absent from his face; Sylvain has a puffed-out smile from his blue bulging cheeks as he keeps his eyes closed, as if taking a nap under the sun’s warm embracing light. “This,” Unabashed moans come out of Sylvain, the guttural noise petering out into silence only for another one to come as he feels himself fill out further. “Damn, this feels great,” Cradling his stomach, his arms soon begin to struggle with so much girth crammed inside his body. His interlocked pieces of armor stretch as his midsection continues its engorgement, the durable armor giving away with loud metallic shatters as it completely falls apart. First, the section covering his stomach gives way, the massive blue ball of mass staring directly at Felix’s face with Sylvain’s black shirt riding up the surface of it. Sylvain not quite as large the further away from his center, it only takes a few moments for the other portions of armor to fall to the same fate, bits of metal clanking to the floor as he continues to expand and bulge out. His arms and legs eventually suffer the same result as his massively engorged torso. Sylvain’s midsection wider than the doorway they entered, the armor soon comes apart. Left in his plain clothes, his black shirt and red pants stretch and tear, the already taut fabric meant to show off his slim yet built figure instead shows off his bulbous blue body, the material ripping as it gets torn to shreds from Sylvain’s expanding body. His arms and legs bulging, the dark blue appendages seem to shrink as Sylvain’s torso seems to explode with mass. An overly apple shape turns into a near spherical form, the blue mass expanding at a far greater rate and seemingly absorbing Sylvain’s arms and legs. His tall lithe figure disappears under a great blue bulbous body as Sylvain continues to fill out, more and more of his arms and legs sinking into his jiggly blue body. His face filling out, his tire for a neck gets enveloped by his body as well. His overly puffed out cheeks, the same hue of blue as the rest of body, rest on his large ball of a body. Sylvain’s fiery orange mop of hair is the only contrast against his blue body. His eyes dwarfed by his bulging cheeks, his pupils nearly recede to the back of his head, Sylvain clearly in no concern over his state of transformation.

“That damned idiot is enjoying this!” Seething to himself, Felix’s teeth clench, his pearly whites grinding as he stews in anger. Eyes focused on Sylvain’s bulging bulbous body, his moans fill the room alongside the two’s tearing clothes. Felix feels a warmth spread across his face. The warmth not from his expansion, Felix clenches his teeth tighter as he enjoys the sight of Sylvain unabashedly enjoying himself, Sylvain looking so squishable. The thought is saved for later as a pain jolts through Felix’s left shoulder. Checking for the cause, the overburdened shoulder strap is digging into his body. Nowhere near Sylvain’s size, Sylvain still somehow growing, Felix unstraps the protective gear. He hurls the piece to the side, Felix glaring at it as though it were the culprit for his predicament and his current enjoyment, however small the latter is. His eyes shift from side to side. He places a hand on his stomach, giving it a pat. A small smile threatening to adorn his face, Felix yanks his own arm away from his stomach. He tries to ignore how his body continues to swell, his thighs slowly thickening and widening to match his midsection. His boots begin to creak, the fine material unwilling to bend much. Empty shelves and empty walls stare back at Felix, the only other point of interest being Sylvain’s expansive globular blue body, and the doorway. Any sort of possibility better than being completely stuck, though the idea of becoming so large that leaving a room is impossible does leave a small unwanted thrill. Felix offers a passing glance at Sylvain. Sylvain’s eyes closed; his breathing continues to come out hitched.

Felix grabs his own body. The swelling even more noticeable with his hands feeling the filling sensation, he shakes his head with a grumble. His cheeks swish. Better to be found with Sylvain than to explain it all by himself, Felix resigns himself, telling himself that it’s not because he finds the idea of being stuck enticing. Felix huffs as he moves spots. Having unmoved from his spot in the center, he waddles over to the other side of the room. Upon taking a single step, Felix swiveling one leg past the other just to move, he pauses as something squishes underneath his foot. Glancing down, he merely comes face to face with his own bulging body, his globular blue belly protruding farther out than he could possibly fathom, the stomach still maintaining a firm spherical shape to it. Shifting around so as to not stare at his own girth, Felix finds a liquid pooling onto the floor. The same exact shade of blue as himself and Sylvain, Felix’s eyes follow the trail to its source.

Felix having barely moved from his own spot, Sylvain’s body is nearly in his face. He focuses; his eyes barely make out the origin of the liquid, Sylvain’s tits. His nipples are a slightly darker shade of blue. They leak some sort of juice, the liquid flowing freely down his body and onto the floor. Shaking his head with a sigh, Felix glances down at his own chest. Free of any liquid, he finds himself a tad disappointed, his lips forming a frown as he presses a hand against the growing curve of his chest. Grunting, he continues his laborious waddles to the other end of the room; his continuously growing body makes it increasingly hard as his legs and arms become more constrained with his bulging midsection beginning to overtake the appendages. The tearing fabric fills the room, Felix’s ragged breaths filling in the interspersed tears. His blue body soon comes into view as his clothes tear further apart. His legs slowly getting swallowed by his expansive body, he barely reaches the wall before giving in, his legs losing contact with the floor. Eyes half lidded, he shakes his arms. Only his fingers move in response, his arms sloshing with juice instead. Barely immobilized, his body continues to expand in all directions. The sensation of occupying so much space, of feeling so heavy is completely foreign to Felix, Felix wishing for it to end. A smaller portion of his brain whispers to him, wishing to experience and bask in his immensity. His vision mostly filled with his own expanse of a body, he remains unaware of Sylvain’s stopped growth. His chest welling up, a slight bit of definition to set it apart from the monstrosity that is his stomach, Felix winces as a quick jolt of pain rushes through him. His breasts positively aching, he groans gutturally, his usual relaxed, stoic disposition momentarily replaced with bliss as soon as the pain ends, his rounded heavy chest freely leaking juice. Not to the same extent as Sylvain; Sylvain’s chest nearly gushes copious amounts of juice compared to the tiny creak of a stream coming from Felix’s chest. His concern grows as his body begins to press up against the walls, fearing that him and Sylvain could possibly outgrow the room. The fear subsides with a great gurgle in his stomach, Felix sensing his growth having finally ended. Unable to see anything besides his own body, or what he assumes is his own body, what with him and Sylvain being under the same predicament, Felix groans. Unable to move his body either, any sort of help is relegated purely to outside help, the two great immobile men completely helpless. Their churning overtaxed bodies fill the room, the area sounding not too far off from water splashing about.

Felix finds himself wishing that no help had come as he hears a voice sound out. His wish mainly occurring due to the warmth he feels in his face as he somehow manages to spot Mercedes, her figure so small in comparison to his own mass. He briefly wonders how she must feel, so dwarfed by his figure. Felix shuts his eyes, blaming Sylvain for his mixed feelings on his transformation.

“Oh my!” A high pitched voice breaking out, the pitch is even higher as Mercedes spots the two’s unrecognizable bodies. Lifting up her outfit, she watches out for the puddles of juice while getting closer. Completely dwarfed by the two massive men, her eyes drift between the two.

“Ugh, Mercedes,” Felix tsks to himself as he hears his own voice, the uttering of a simple name far more taxing and even deeper sounding than before.

“Felix? What happened?” Recognizing the voice, Mercedes wastes no time in waiting for an explanation. Despite her question. Placing a hand a few inches away from Felix’s body, she begins chanting a restore spell.

“Mercie! You’re supposed to be behind us!” Caution thrown to the wind just like her best friend, Annette comes bundling after Mercedes. Upon arriving at the scene, Annette remains by the doorway. Her eyes shift back and forth, examining the entire scene while Mercedes continues her spell.

“You two need to remain behind me so I can prot…” Ingrid calmly rushes behind Annette; her calm exterior promptly fades away, her eyes wide open with her mouth agape. “Mercedes get back!” Annette places a hand on Ingrid’s arm, her eyes still on Mercedes. Ingrid’s eyes shift over to the other massive blue pile. The entire round, swollen figure encompassed in nothing but blue, the vibrant red-orange hair catches Ingrid’s attention. Her brows furrow into a grimace, Ingrid taking a cautious step backwards from the jiggling, sloshing mass.

Bringing her hand back to herself, Mercedes’ eyes lower as her restore spell fails. “It’s just as I feared. This magic is incompatible with mine,” Felix groans, his body relaxing for a faint second as he hears he’ll be stuck like this for longer. His bloated cheeks occupying most of his vision, the rest of it is mostly overtaken by his corpulent, round body. Felix huffs, a dark blue hue for a blush dusting his cheeks. Felix’s huffs reach Mercedes ears, though she mistakes his desperate attempts at silencing his moans as puffs of complaint, Mercedes knitting her brows. Bringing a gloved hand to the curve of Felix’s stomach, his stomach similarly rounded just like the rest of his body, her hand stops a few inches, Mercedes unsure of what to do or what to say, her usual kind, comforting words unable to come to her.

“Annette,” Ingrid whispers at Annette. She beckons Annette towards the hallway, her eyes trained on the hallway’s corners. “Give the signal,”

“Understood,” Taking a step back into the hallway, Annette feels Ingrid’s focus as she keeps watch. Taking in a deep breath, Annette’s chest rises as she raises her hand. Having placed a magical trail, the welling of magic nigh undetectable to those inexperienced in magic, the trail swirls with a gentle breeze as Annette lowers her hands. The trail meant to guide the group back to the entrance in case of an emergency, the trail’s secondary usage as a signal had been hoped to have gone unused. Standing beside Ingrid, Annette sighs. “So, what happens now?” Glancing back into the room, Annette spots Mercedes still hard at work, Mercedes now attempting her magic on Sylvain. “Mercedes’ magic isn’t working, so I doubt mine will have any effect,”

“You two are the experts in magic. Any ideas we have will be based on you or Mercedes’ knowledge,” Ingrid shakes her head.

“I was unable to affect Sylvain either,” Mercedes announces her return. “Normally I would feel some spark upon casting restore, yet…” Mercedes pouts, staring back to Sylvain and Felix. Ingrid and Annette follow her line of vision, all three staring at the massive men and failing to hear the two’s huffs and moans as they remain transfixed. “Yet ,I simply felt emptiness, as if nothing was wrong with either of them,”

‘Then we’ll need Agarthan tomes,” Annette concludes, Ingrid nodding in agreement to her suggestion.

The sound of footsteps coming closer, they immediately quiet down. Three pairs of feet approaching, Ingrid remains cautious, her lance ready.

Dedue’s shield coming around the corner first, Ingrid relaxes upon the arrival of the rest of the Blue Lions. Dedue spotting them back, the giant of a man lowers his shield, revealing Dimitri and Ashe. Ashe pulls back his arrow with a gleeful smile, placing it back in his quiver. Dimitri rushes ahead, worryingly staring down at the three women.

“What happened?” The rushed nature of his question betrays his stoic face.

“Sylvain and Felix….” Ingrid pauses, unsure of how to explain herself without sounding like a maniac. Standing tall, a hard task next to Dimitri, Ingrid leads him to the room.

Dimitri eyes widen at the scene. Supposing the two sloshing figures to be Felix and Sylvain based on Ingrid’s hesitation, his assumption holds true as they suddenly speak, a tiny blush on his face.

“Ugh, enough with the gawking,” Felix complains, an indistinguishable blush over his face from the attention, not entirely unwanted.

Ashe and Dedue follow suit, the two shocked speechless upon spotting their friends.

“Oh please, gawk all you want,” Sylvain moans out, pathetically wiggling his fingers in a desperate attempt to grope himself, his body so pleasantly full. “Grab all you want too,”

Dedue’s concern quickly turns into a sigh of disapproval. He heads back to Annette and Mercedes, his voice hushed as he speaks to them.

Ashe ignores Sylvain, instead heading towards Felix.

“Why am I the one being ignored!” Sylvain shouts, his entire body wobbling as he kicks at the air, his legs swallowed by his blue body.

“How are you holding up Felix?” Nearly dwarfed by Felix’s overly engorged body, he places a hand on Felix’s body.

Felix squints his eyes, Ashe’s hand a wonderful reprieve on his body. His mind screams at him to beg for more, to be squished and prodded all around, for some reprieve of his exaggerated fullness. Felix instead lets out a growl. “Keep your hands to yourself,”

“Ah, my apologies!” Quickly removing his hand, Ashe wipes off the juice from his hand.

“I am fine,”

“Fine? I expected you to be seething, truth be told,” Ashe jokes, laughing to himself.

“I would rather the lot of you solved this issue that Sylvain caused. But since you’re all completely inept, fine will have to do or else I’ll lose my mind,” Felix winces as his chest churns once more, the heavy load of juice nearly causing him to let out a moan.

Ashe simply laughs, shrugging off Felix’s usual harsh words. “Well, I’m sure that they’ll figure something out soon,” Ashe offers a smile.

Dimitri still gawking, his mind races as the two massively inflated men occupy the entirety of his vision like they do his mind. He briefly registers his name, snapping out of his trance as glances around.

Dedue speaking with Mercedes and Annette, Ashe does the same with Felix. Ingrid focused on keeping watch, Dimitri turns towards the only possibility.

Sylvain grins. Biting his lip, the act somehow harder in such an engorged state, a few huffs still escape his lips as Dimitri turns to him. “Finally, some attention,” Everyone else ignoring him, Sylvain chalked it up to pure disinterest. Except for Dimitri. So trained in spotting any sort of attraction, aimed at himself or others, Sylvain immediately noticed the underlying cause of Dimitri's state of confusion.

“What now, Sylvain?” Sighing, Dimitri takes a few steps closer. Simply as it’d be rude to speak from such a distance, nothing more, nothing less. Though, he does note the extra deep blue hue of Sylvain’s body, his juice flowing down his body without a care.

“Figured someone like you might appreciate this,” Shifting his arms, they remain stuck, encased by the rest of his globular body. “I wouldn’t mind if you cop a feel,”

Dimitri’s eyes widen before glaring. “Sylvain…”

“I wouldn’t mind you doing whatever you wanted. Especially if you were a bit thirsty,” Sylvain’s own heart races at that thought, Dimitri’s lips wrapped around his tits as he guzzles his juice. The resulting possibility of Dimitri growing, his muscular form becoming engulfed in fat, soon, becoming unable to move despite the extreme strength granted to him by his crest. Perhaps even growing so large that the three of them would outgrow the room and-

Dimitri’s heavy breathing reaches Sylvain’s ears. Barely able to make him out past the hemisphere of his body, Dimitri stands hunched, his face burning as he glowers at him.

“I will do no such thing,” He spits out, more to himself than to Sylvain. “You’re hopeless,” Taking deep breaths, his chest rises and falls. Dimitri closing his eyes.

Dimitri turns as Dedue clears his throat. He joins the rest of the group, clearing his own throat as he hopes no one notices the light dusting of a blush blossoming onto his face.

“His Highness will be heading to Garreg Mach alongside Annette and Mercedes,” The entire room ready to erupt into arguing, all of them immediately fall silent as Dedue raises a hand. “We have no way of transporting Sylvain or Felix, therefore some of us must remain watch. His highness will contact the archbishop for aid. In the meanwhile, Annette shall be researching for any possibilities to reverse this,” Standing proud, Dedue looks at the other Blue Lions for any questions.

“We’d be lost without your planning, Dedue,” Dimitri radiantly smiles at Dedue, ever grateful for his assistance.

“What will Mercedes be doing?” Ashe speaks up, walking back towards the main group.

“I’m going to try and find Emile. He’s our only other lead into other Agarthan bases and he’ll only be willing to speak with me,” Mercedes clarifies, a gentle smile on her face.

“Ingrid, Ashe and I will remain here in the meanwhile. While we may lack offensive magic between the three of us, Ashe’s healing shall suffice. And with Ingrid’s pegasus, we’ll have decent contact and provisions with the nearest village”

“That’s actually a well thought of plan,” Ingrid nods her head in agreement. “We better not waste any more time chatting. I’ll be grabbing some food then,”

“So, we’re stuck here? Come on, I’m sure plenty of people would be dying to get a glimpse at me,”

Everyone choicely ignores Sylvain as they say their goodbyes. Annette and Mercedes walk behind Dimitri and Ingrid, the two magic users chatting as some normalcy is regained with a plan in motion.

The room suddenly much quieter with half the Blue Lions gone, Felix gives a sigh of relief from the reprieve. Ashe and Dedue quietly conversing to themselves, Sylvain’s incessant little groans reach his ears, Felix gritting his teeth as he tries to divert his mind to anything besides his engorged state. The constant churning of his own body’s juice reverberates in his ears, Felix mostly wishing that this would all end soon. A sticky feeling sprouting on his chest, Felix fails to hold back a moan as more juice gushes forth from his breasts. His wish for this to end as quickly as possible fades a bit as he closes his eyes, hoping the others can’t hear him enjoying himself.

[bouncyirwin]

🔥 Steamy Fics - Rec List 🔥

I decided to compile a list of some of my favourite smutty fics for you guys to enjoy as well! Remember to let the author know if you like their work ✨

Room Service by mummapaintstheblues || KakaSaku || 11.6k words

“If you've got a kink there, I can help work it out for you.” Sakura almost choked on her drink. Turning her whole body to regard him fully in a show of, what she hoped was obvious disgust. The sight of his smirk reigniting her fury. While it was attractive enough to send tingles of anticipation through her before, right now it only served to add to her misery

AU where Sakura struggles to resist the charms, and fingers, of Hotel Masseuse Kakashi.

Watching You Watching Me || KakaSaku(Gen) || 2.1k words

Sakura reveals that she wants to be on display for Kakashi. Kakashi asks Genma to help out.

Kakashi Candyman by Endoh || KakaSaku || 7.6k words

"Just how much did you drink before coming down here?" "Sakura," Kakashi murmured darkly, trailing his hands down her thighs as he knelt at her feet, "I'm still thirsty." Kakashi notices that his wife could use a little 'de-stressing' before hosting the Halloween Benefit Gala….

Better Man by Kakashisgf || KakaSaku || 179.7k words

Sakura and Sasuke have been married for over a decade, but things are far from perfect, and Sakura's beginning to realize that maybe she deserves better.

Follow Your Nose by TipsyRaconteur || KakaSaku || 8k words

Sakura decides to find her signature scent. Kakashi “helps”. Things get out of hand.

Icha Icha Fanfiction by TipsyRaconteur || KakaSaku || 12k words

Kakashi suspected that Sakura was writing Icha Icha fanfiction. And if she was the author… and she was pairing Junko with her former teacher… well, that had some very interesting implications.

Pin Me Up, Pin Me Down by J-Pop Princess || KakaSaku || 20k words

Sakura is in her third year of medical school and is struggling to pay the bills. When an opportunity comes to pose as a nude model for a men's magazine, she reluctantly takes it, but she didn't expect the magnetic pull toward her photographer.

Something Dangerous by moderndayportia || KakaSaku || 17.3k words

Sakura must submit to Kakashi's special training to prepare for a lethal mission.

Repercussions by AshleyTrecartin || KakaSaku || 3.9k words

Kakashi hates hospitals, and Sakura knows that. Usually she handles her boyfriend's checkups, but when he finds out that he made her an appointment to see Ino he decides to punish her.

The Gift that Keeps on Giving by ivegotpurple || KakaSakuShisui || 4.4k words

Shisui likes to buy his two partners gifts.

Based on the prompt "The skirt is short on purpose."

Hands To Yourself by TipsyRaconteur || GenIno || 6k words

Genma takes a very handsy, very drunk Ino home to NOT sleep with her. Yet.

Players by Kukaburraxxii || GenIno || 153.1k words

Ino joins the league of players.

Snapdragons and Steel by SomnificSheep || GenIno || 6.7k words

Fox doesn’t know why he continues to do this. Every mission he dons the mask it’s the same. He rolls deep in the oceans of regret, waves cresting and breaking over him with terrifying force. Years of this, and it never gets easier. Fox does his duty, comes home, pastes on a smile, and pushes through with a stoic determination he’s not sure anyone expects from him.~or~Genma comes home to something new.

magic in your hands by exarite || TobiSaku || 4.3k words

Haruno Sakura is a massage therapist. Senju Tobirama is her hot, older client.

Push My Buttons by mrssakurahatake || GenSaku || 5.7k words

Ino has set Sakura up on another blind date, but she gets trapped in the hospital elevator before her date can even begin.

Sakura looked around at the worn-out speaker and the dead security camera and for a brief moment considered just punching a hole in the floor. It would serve the board right for refusing to fix the stupid machine properly.

Genma's voice brought her out of her own spirling thoughts, "I don't like that look."

"I was thinking of just punching my way out, but the board would probably take the cost of fixing it from the general budget, and that would affect my patients."

"I guess we finally found a situation you can't just punch your way out of?"

"Don't push it, Shirunai. I would be more than happy to punch you."

Ask Me Nicely by TheCopyMistress || GenSaku || 4k words

He could give her what she needed. All she had to do was ask for it.

Supplemental Training by ohayohimawari || KakaOC || 5k words

At Jiraiya's insistence, Kakashi learns the art of seduction, as well as how to keep his inner demons at bay. A Konoha Brothel story.

Overindulgence by ohayohimawari || KakaMei || 2.7k words

Thanksgiving is a time to grow closer to your loved ones and indulge in the pleasures of the harvest from the year. Kakashi and Mei do both...with gusto.

Things you just don’t talk about by Enodia || ShikaSaku || 119.3k words

"Do you enjoy sex?" Shikamaru asked bluntly. I just can't believe I'm talking about this, and with Shikamaru, of all people, Sakura thought. Sakura is in for a surprise. Or, rather, a series of surprises.

Party of Three by J-Pop Princess || NaruSakuSasu || 63.1k words

Sakura has never really explored the world of sexual desire but after a little too much sake, all that could change!

Punishment and Reward by thetoxicstrawberry || KakashixKakashi || 2.2k words

Kakashi finds a unique use for his own Kage Bunshin.

Give and Take by Stark_Black || KakaGen || 113.9k words

Genma made a mistake, a tragic mistake that may have cost him everything. He can't hide it from Kakashi though, and now the Copy Ninja is being torn apart by his honor, and by his feelings for one of his oldest friends.

Welp folks, that’s it ... or is it?

Find below the cut some shameless self-promo ✨

Cravings || KakaSaku || 3.8k words

When you mix alcohol and pent-up frustration, things are bound to go somewhere. Phone sex, sexting and mutual masturbation.

Let The Truth Sting || KakaSaku || 3.1k words

Sasuke's first glance at Kakashi's face comes in the form of Kakashi's open mouth pressed over Sakura's. Or, in which Sasuke sees Sakura has found her happiness with someone else. Quite graphically. [KakaSaku, Sasuke's POV]

Make Me Lose Control || KakaSaku || 6.4k words

A mission to Ame turns into a paid vacation, and Kakashi and Sakura find themselves crossing all sorts of lines.

Nocturnal Activities || KakaSaku || 3.7k words

Actions have always spoken louder than words. Book vs. Movie.

Knock Knock, Let The Devil In || KakaSakuShika || 29.3k words

Kakashi had always appreciated Shikamaru's ability to turn any situation in his favour. He just never expected to become a willing target to his whims.

Mission Report || KakaSaku || 6.9k words

Through a haze of confusion and a killer hungover, Sakura discovers she’s in Kakashi’s bed.

Every Last Drop || KakaSaku || 3.3k words

“This isn’t about you. You’re amazing at what you do. I just … the shower—well—you’re just not a showerhead. And sometimes that’s what I want.”

When she chances a look at Kakashi again his eyes have widened slightly, and he looks entirely taken aback. “You—the showerhead?” The amount of disbelief packed into that word would’ve made a lesser woman dissolve into uncontrollable laughter.

The blush steadily spreads down her neck as she contemplates this bizarre conversation he pulled her into having. She really hadn’t wanted to ever discuss this with anyone. “Yes, the showerhead. Problem?”

Sakura looks away again, feeling the slow, simmering burn of embarrassment.

A few moments of silence later, Kakashi shifts, and when he speaks he nearly purrs.

“Can I watch?”

Serendipity || KakaSaku || 11.7k

It's tough being a med-student but between running into her ex-boyfriend and his actress fiancée, and meeting her favourite author Kakashi Hatake, Sakura thinks that could be the least of her worries.

Stay With Me || KakaSaku || 2.6k words

Falling for her doesn't leave him with bruises and broken bones, it leaves him with warmth and the colour green and the rapidly addicting revelation that it might all just be alright after all. KakaSaku Proposal AU.

When You Awake || KakaSaku || 4.2k words

Prompt: Could you please do "We slept in the same bed for space reasons but now we're just waking up and there's something about your bleary eyes and mussed hair"

Stolen Moments || ShisuiSaku || 1.8k words

Prompt: "all that blood really brings out your eyes"

Late Night Revelations || KakaOC || 4.1k words

Nousagi and Kakashi crash in an Inn after a gruelling ANBU mission. Things take an unexpected turn as Kakashi's more playful side makes an appearance.

[heliosthegriffin]

What to do after death; Vampirism

Preface -

I feel the name says it all.

But, I will elaborate anyhow.

I don’t intend on becoming a Vampire, at all. It’s a raw deal and one-way passage into a hell of my own making.

I suspect should I actively pursue becoming a Vampire I will lose my soul to damnation. Vampire’s are often the results of the foulest of magic and consorting with satanic entities with depraved offerings or just as often the results of those black souled individuals who find happiness in the torment of others. If I am not planning on becoming a Vampire, why I am I making this list?

Easy, it pays to be prepared. Just because I don’t seek undeath doesn’t protect me from being turned against my will. I am of the belief, once you have become a Vampire against your will you die and lose your soul, leaving a husk behind. A husk that has all your memories, personality, and desires, but none of the restraint, humanity or compassion. A sociopath with supernatural powers and a need for life essence of others to maintain my own parasitic existence.

I am making the list to give myself direction after death so as to prevent as much suffering as I can, and if possible, try and help humanity grow.

I can only hope my husk listens to my will.

My family is well armed otherwise, they will do what must be done, as I would do for them.

-----------

The List

-----------

Step One - Leave home, let’s not take any chances hurting my loved ones, or former loved ones, I owe them that much.

a) Construct a note though, tell them all how much they meant to me and why I am leaving, be through and leave nothing out, but don’t tell them where I am headed. Leave the code-word I have with our elder brother so he understands and tell him he’s free to what I leave behind.

b) Make a pack, get one of our knives in there and get a gun. Get some blankets so I can cover-up during the day, actually many blankets and some stones so that they’ll be weighted down. This is a temporary solution however.

c) Empty my bank account as much as possible. Cash and coin will be more beneficial if I’m going off the grid.

d) Leave town.

Step Two - Head north and head to a bigger city

a) Buy a sleeping bag and tent at the closest opportunity.

b) Keep an ear to the ground, find out who can go missing and people would be thankful that their gone. Pick my targets carefully, never more than one person at a time and always when their not expecting it, I’m a predator I should act like it. I might have supernatural powers, but I can’t be prepared for everything and people will know my weakness if I get found out.

c) Aim for the scum of the earth, get rid of them, but not until I have conclusive evidence. But, when I do have it, it’s feeding time, make sure to take their valuables, will need it for future plans.

d) Do that for about a month and move on, can’t stay anywhere for too long. But, before we leave buy a couple books on architecture, vampires, morals and ethics, stone-working, physics, building ect. We’re going to need it.

e) Find out if I can sustain our-self off animal blood.

Step Three - Rinse and Repeat. Go from city to city in our state till I’ve cleaned out what I can. Hopefully I’ll have a duffel-bag of money and valuables, along with those books.

a) Study those books. Find out what kind of vampire I am, make sure I learn about building castles.

b) Take some time to practice building.

c) Practice hunting; Hunt some animals to drink their blood if that helps, practice skinning and chopping up the parts. Donate the meat if I can, or leave at a poor home, they probably won’t be able to afford throwing it away.

d) Learn about interior decoration.

e) Get some better guns, drop off the gun we borrowed from our family along with a chunk of changes, leave them another note that we’re doing fine.

Step Four - Time to move. By the time I’ve hit this step I should have hit all the large towns, which depending we’re counting above or below ten thousand as a big town could take us from anywhere three years to around four if I cut off at nine thousand in population for a big town. It’s hard to say how much money I’ll have at this point, but It must be at least ten thousand dollars at a minimum if I’ve spent all my time eating, murdering, and robbing scum of the earth at least once a month for three to four years.

a) Head north. I need to get to Detroit. That place is so crime ridden no will notice a vampire. If there already vampires there leave, go find another crime-ridden hell-hole. I assume vampires get stronger, or at least craftier with age, I am not fucking with any old monsters.

b) On the way there repeat the Step three on any big cities on the way there, cover my tracks.

c) Make sure to pawn off what I can. Invest in urban camo and a bullet-resistant vest.

d) Keep practicing stone masonry, and improve my gun skills. I don’t need to chase anyone down if they can run, plus I can suck the blood from the wounds, it’ll be like a water fountain.

e) Read that book on physics and other science books, I am playing the long game, look into magic too. Nothing is better than magic or science than knowing the rules to both. Don’t fuck with demon’s though.

Step Five - Settle down for a while and then move again, once I get to my crime-ridden hellhole of my choice take some time to start eliminating the seedy elements. If not, start going for the low hanging fruit, I can’t help everybody, but I can help somebody.

a) Find some random kid and become their guardian, a great way to kill time probably.

   ai.) By guardian, I don’t mean parent, I’m talking more guardian spirit. A vampire rasing a child is a recipe for disaster.

   aii.) Don’t get too attached though, after their in a good place leave. I’m not       doing it for good, I’m doing it to maintain a little humanity.

b) By now I should have enough to fund a new identity and since I now live in a corrupt hell-hole it should be easy to enter the system. If I don’t have enough money, then attain it. Don’t try and intimidate anybody just yet me, I don’t have enough influence yet and it’ll just end up screwing me over.

c) Buy an actually house, fake a life for about ten years, then move to another corrupt hell-hole. Start saving valuable, no, start a war found, we’re going to need it.

Step Six - Start prepping for the End. Humanity has conflict in it’s blood, it’s only a matter of time before we go nuclear. Use the funds we have to buy some land in the mountains. Use the stone masonry skills and architect skills I’ve attained over the last several decades to build a fortified castle with space age materials.

a) Create a underground vault for my mortals.

b) Install anti-air defenses, install ground defences, booby-trap my land.

c) Creating a sustainable area for farming if possible, if not work on making sustainable green houses.

d) Start preserving all of human history, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Movies, games, books, porn, all of it. It needs to be preserves. Put it all in the vault. Record all the science, by hand if neccasary.

e) Start stealing relics so that they can be preserved by me. I am definitely going Trazyn the Infinite.

f) Start recruiting people for my cause, screen each and every one.

g) Put my room at the top of the mountain with as long stair case as possible, If these fuckers want to kill me while I sleep I want them to have leg cramps while they do it. Also put booby trap my coffin room.

Step Seven - Rebuilding Society or keep playing the waiting game. If the world has torn itself apart, I will then do what I feel is the best choice. Create bio-augmented techno-knights, or not. 

a) Hopefully decades of research on physics, matter, and engineering will allow me to create powered armor knights, but if not, just keep researching.

b) Make a secret castle deeper into the mountains no one else can reach without significant resources, or supernatural abilities. Start moving my lab, my vault, my copies of human history and media, plus my stored blood there.

c) When I finally succeed leave my first castle to my servants and teach them what I have to offer, leave them the blue prints for becoming techno-knights and leave. I no longer have a place among men or their future, I will merely safeguard the past and record it.

d) Go to my new castle and spend eternity studies reality and building more castles.

-------

Afterword: The probability of me becoming a vampire is close to zero, and the idea of my soul-less husk following is these steps is even less, but should it work it will have been worth it.

[ziracona]

Sorry if this has been asked before but, I'm really curious about how you would have written Max in the story if he were to be there? He's one of my personal favorite characters and finding redemption stories about him is kinda hard (You have no idea how happy I was when I read Claudette threw him a scarf to stay warm, like yes please; he's a feral child in a killer's body, but please stay warm)

I don’t think I have been, and no problem!

If Max had had a larger role in ILM, I am not 100% sure how I’d have written his perosnality, since I haven’t had to do it yet in-depth, but I know he’d be very angry and both defensive and aggressive towards everything, warry, skittish, hostile. Not bad necessarily, but humans will raise hackles and be ready to lash out and bite if they’ve all they’ve ever known is abuse the same way a mistreated cat or dog would, or like, most any living thing. I think he’s very lonely and unloved, and it’s hard for humans to survive without positive contact and affirmation and physical affection. I mean, if we’re left alone totally, we literally just die. But since his only experience with humans—and his parents/the people who should have loved him most no less—was nothing but danger and abuse and isolation and imprisonment, I think it’d be very hard for him to be approached. Not at all impossible, but man, it is really, really hard to convince someone who’s been through torrential rains of abuse that there’s something else to be given.

I do have ideas on how you could get through, but let me think about personality first. Well, aside from aggressive, defensive, skittish, warry, and hostile, like inborn traits to go along with learned, I think he is a very volatile person. He must be enduring and strong to survive what he did and live, and so determined and tenacious. —Oh! Hang on, big one before I forget. So, I am not a forefront authority in Disability as it relates to narrative, but I know quite a bit and was lucky enough to have a professor whose central areas were Disability, Horror, and Disability in Horror. I don’t know who exactly popularized the idea of Max as having basically a child’s mind in an adult’s killer body, though I think I’ve been told it was one person or story? Maybe it was just a big fandom take. But that’s one of the most prevailing and harmful disability stereotypes, especially for mental disabilities, and horror is a massive offender in general with both disabilities and disorders, and we need to do better & listen to the communities themselves more. I don’t mean this in a harsh way at all—I don’t even know if you meant ‘feral child in a killer’s body’ that way, or meant like, ‘this feral man in a killer’s body is my child TuT’—which is a totally different statement—and even with the former, I know people have had that idea of Max super popularized and are inundated with it, and most people I think just don’t know it’s a very harmful and prevalent stereotype period—I didn’t until I was in my 20s. But I think it’s important to bring attention to it when it’s brought up. Many of the bad things done to people with disabilities come from treating them as not fully actualized humans (I guess I should say ‘us’), and some of those ways are easy to spot, because they’re cruel, and some are harder, because they seem positive. The ‘child mind in an adult body’ is a huge one for disabilities that doesn’t seem awful at first glance, but actually is a huge problem. Unfortunately, human children also get treated by and large as not fully realized humans (as in autonomous & worthy of respect and self-determination—obvs there are some differences that are important, but a child is still an entire ass human & should be respected as such). The painting a physically and mentally disabled character as childlike or mentally trapped as a child is used to control and take autonomy and gravity from our opinions and lives. It’s also just like, not accurate. But the biggest thing is that it takes agency from individuals and paints them as less intelligent, less capable of wanting or pursing more ‘adult’ things [such as jobs or sex or protesting for their rights or having informed opinions on current events and doing something about it], and tries to paint that permanent, life-long dehumanization as a positive thing by making it cute or innofenssive at first glance. While still discounting disabled as kids, passing off autonomy and decisions to their caregivers, and ignoring our status as equal and actualized individuals. Stunted learning or growth or different ways of speaking, moving, and limitations understanding certain things don’t actually make disabled people like children. They’re just adults who sometimes have some very different ways of speaking or thinking or seeming or being. But it’s super important that we’re still adults and like, have the actualized self of adults, even if our speech patterns seem weird. There’s a huge and extremely important difference between an adult with social hangups around sensitive areas and social norms, and being a child. If you didn’t know any of that, don’t feel too bad, again like, people who aren’t disabled almost never talk about disability theory or issues, and I didn’t know this till I was in my 20s. But I feel really bad for Max and bad about how he is usually characterized, so it is important to bring this up.

Okay! That all said, I think personality wise, Max would be really fun to write. Because you have two levels—you have the taught things—fear, aggression, etc, and his inborn perosnality. There is very little canon about Max, but we know he never left home after freeing himself, he steals clothes from scarecrows or whatever he can find, and he’s probably in his early 20s or maybe to his mid 20s now. Since he never left home, I’d think he’s probably a little more cautious and anctious by nature, even with all that rage. I think he’d be sentimental if he ever was given something to love. He must have attachment to things pretty easily, and would I think have liked people a lot because of that, if life had been different. Would have been a shy but friendly and hopeful farm boy. Now, he’s kind of a broken mess, sadly. He’s had it super pounded in by family he is worthless and horrific and disgusting and a monster and an abomination, so I think he expects all humans to take one look and violently feel the same towards him. Taught humans are cruel, and he isn’t safe with them, and the only thing that will stop them and protect himself is unchecked aggression.

So, when it comes to like, getting close enough to him to redeem him, it’s rough, because again, he’d be very very aggressive. I mean, even after killing his parents, he mutilated the animals on the farm in rage, and continued to viciously hurt and then kill anything living he could find on the farm, so he’s got a lot of danger, and he really leaned into violence to protect himself. It’s what he knows now. I think he’s still lonely — like, so lonely he’s sick with it — but unlike Anna and Michael, he’s never known love, so I don’t think he’s even aware of that, and it’s on a pretty subconscious level. Plus, he has even less understanding of human communication and rules and gestures than the other feral killers, so it’d be really hard to get through to him. I think about the only plausible way is really, really, really fuckin slowly, through repeated gifts and kindnesses for no reason (like Claude with the scarf but every day for three years)—the same way you’d try to get through to a feral cat, since like other living things, humans also are wary and mistrustful when hurt, but can be socialized into new situations and do have a pretty set list of gifts and actions we appreciate. I mean, if I was feral, I would start to soften if repeatedly left chocolates and big warm coats and picture books to look at, pretty rocks. I have a crow heart.... >.> Or, the much more likely option, you’d have to catch him or find him captured and helpless, and then be kind instead of doing anything bad at all, and help him for a somewhat extended period of time, nurse him back to health or such, so he’d be forced to actually realize this person isn’t trying to hurt him—they’re trying to help.

I think Max would get less hostile slowly and cautiously because like, if you’ve ever been horribly abused you know you’re afraid to be hurt again. But also, if you’re alone, there’s a battle between wanting some kind of constact and love, and the fear of trying to trust someone only to be brutally torn up again and cast aside. It’s a painful place to be. But I think once he made it over that initial trust hurdle, and could bring himself to stop shuddering at a touch and to believe the person helping him was just trying to give him food, not poison or something to choke on, he’d be absolutely overcome, becuase if you’ve never been shown kindness and then are, overwhelmingly, it’s really hard to process. There’s a lot of psychology stuff about how we form our understandings and processing of each other and the world that I’m not gonna go into much bc convoluted, but it’d be like the opposite weirdly of a Just World break. The realization some things are less awful than your cemented life understanding structure. It would feel wrong and be hard to process (and rewireing a brain takes some time), but he’s been so alone for so long, I think the longing for people would get through, and he would cautiously start to trust and be just bowled over and kind of intimidated by the strength of like, the love and affection and gratitude and belonging he’d start to feel. I think he’d be afraid, becuase it’s not how life is meant to go, and jumpy, but he’d also just be lost to the happiness of actually having some kind of positive human connection, and become fiercely protective of whoever (or whichever people) was/were helping him. Got something he doesn’t want to lose now.

He’s young, so he’s going to still be figuring stuff out, and he had an awful upbringing, so lots of confusion and anger and un-learning too, but I’m really glad you liked that scene!! 😭 and that you like Max too, because he needs more love. I like him a lot too, that’s why he ends up with an undetermined fate instead of, like, dead in ILM. I’d like to give him a fully story role sometime, when there’s more space for it. He’s such a complex and unfortunate guy, he deserves a chance to grow more right and find people who are different and have a better future. TuT. It ain’t fair how his life was.

[popculturebuffet]

Ducktales: Challenge of the Senior Junior Woodchucks! and Quack Pack! Review/Thoughts

Hello errybody, I’ve decided being a huge fan of this verison of Ducktales, and someone who likes reviewing stuff and going on and on at length about it, to review this season’s episodes as they come out, both to get me writing critically again, and to get more non chat content on the old tumblr.  First, while you likely don’t care a little about my history with the ducks; While I , sadly though i’m trying to correct it, haven’t read MUCH of Carl Barks classic donald duck comics nor that of his avid fanboy and clear sucessor in quality and talent Don Rosa, I did read Rosa’s utter classic “The LIfe and Times of Scrooge” mcduck in high school and the story stuck with me sense. I’ll go into Life and Times another day hopefully, but naturally when the reboot was announced I was excited.. a great voice cast, and donald,my boy, as part of the main cast. The show has been a joy to behold and with steven universe having taken a bow JUST a week ago and Covid ravaging our lives, it coudln’t of picked a better time. But do these episodes keep the momentum from an utterly marvelous second half of season 2? The short answer is “Fuck yes” but the long answer is under the cut. 

Challenge of the Junior Senior Woodchucks! While “Challenge of the x” is a popular snowclone title I can’t help but think of superfriends with the title... or now I thought of it shortly before writing this, hearing “Meanwhile at the legion of doom” when they cut to fowl.. or rather “Meanwhile at FOWL” but in that same announcers voice. I”m a dork, that should be obvious But I was hyped for both episodes: Violet is a faviorite mine, I ship her with huey so them interacting for the first time was wonderful to me, and.. okay the subplot didn’t hook me and we’ll get to that, but we had her dads and one of my other faviorites (I have several, get used to it now) , Lena , at least putting in an apperance. And honestly.. the main plot lived up to it. As I said I didn’t really dig the sub plot, more on that in a second, but I REALLY enjoyed this. From the begining Huey was my faviorite of the three triplets, easily, as it’s fairly easy for me a grown ass dork with anxiety, self confidence, anger issues, depression and constant self doubt, to relate to a little duck with the same and I’ve loved Danny Pudi since community, so naturally I was excited for his turn for a spotlight season.  And again the show didn’t disapoint.. Huey has a rather decent arc with some unexpected turns: First unexpectly, the trailer lied as while Huey and Violet look ultra competiive, theirs no real confilct..s econds after that bit the two shake hands (after a good 20 seconds of adorable and hilarous failure to do so that fits both like a glove.), and try to be good sports. The problem is instead internal: As Huey muses to his siblings (Webby very much included, getting her own great bit of encouraging Huey while also assuring Violet she’s also great he just needs it more, which is accurate) “If i’m not hte best junior woodchuck who am I”. Like Louie last season towards the begining (when he didn’t have a clear purpose in their adventuring dynamic) and towards the end (When della nearly took it away from him), he’s nothing without his sense of who he is. It’s easily why he’s the one to comfort him when his other siblings are either torn between two friends or you know, Dewey. Louie knows what it’s like to be rattled about who you are.  And WHY Violet outclassing him rattles him so much is intreating and to me makes a ton of sense: Huey’s identity to me is so wrapped in his intellegence and woodchuckery because , besides being oldest, it’s what he HAS on his brothers. When you think about it, Louie is the charmer, Dewey is charsmaticin his own way and loves hogging attention not to mention being fairly athletic... to stand out Huey NEEDS his brains to be the one with facts, and plans and his book.  He may not be the first on the front lines but he’s the first to solve a trap or figure out where they are if scrooge or his mom hasn’t already.. and if someone’s markdely better at that, and worse in an activity that’s wholy his own and now it’s been revealed impmortant to his mom.. just who is he.  The poor kid simply breaks down at the thought and takes bigger and stupider risks, which is sad to watch.. and thankfully lightned by his delightful mental brekadown in the form of the stephen root voiced JW Guidebook, a talking hallucination who gives huey his knowledge and edge back in the contest.. but it’s STILL not enough. And that’s when the other intresting bit comes into play: Huey.. has a moment of weakness. Despite the guidebook saying to always save your fellow woodchucks when violet gets stuck slipping in a tree.. he does nothing and leaves, despite JW  , whose now become his concious, begging him not to. It’s a sad, well done moment, and one that makes the story richer. Naturally violet escapes and when huey falls off the lava bridge to the finish line in a nother moment of desperation, and after a returning JW burns because apparently ducks and sabrewings are fireproof but imaginary manfestations of knowledge arne’t, she saves him... and is a good friend and woodchuck in NOT chastizing huey for his moment of weakness earlier, but comforting him, revealing she’s tried three times before and adding some more depth to her character: Despite her awkardness with people, she’s a kind, caring person, and gives Huey the lesson he needs: faliure, and the ocasional bout of moral weakness, is okay.. what matters is you learn from it, dust yourself off and keep going. Huey bows out due to this, as while violet is more than willing to let him pass with her, Huey knows he hasn’t earned it, yet, but he can keep trying and that this is her moment, not his. And in that, I feel learns that he dosen’t NEED recognition to be his best self.. he just needs to be a good person and a good woodchuk. I’ts a damn fine story and despite not being the intended premire, works as a great one.. mostly. And also yes I ship them.. as much as two ten-elven year olds can be, but they are adorable and geninley have a good repore.  And before I get to the dispaointing subplot, i’d be an idiot if I left out Violet’s family: We meet her dads, hilariously wearing shirts that say i’m with dad which is also really fucking adorable, and have our first onscreen conformation that Lena’s now her adopted sister, with Lena loudly screaming it in one of the best lines of the episode.. it’s clever to me: it over the top makes sure that we know yes, these men are gay and her parents.. but in a needed way given disney’s tendncy to dance around that or loudly proclaim a minor character no one cares about is gay in a way they can edit out. It’s a great step forward for the channel and the company and good on the crew for going ahead with it and good on disney for not beign dumb about it, nor, like again they have a bad habit of doing, loudly shouting about it to the media. Excellent work. 

Now i’m done rambling about Huey’s psyche and america’s new faviorite gay couple, I gotta get the suplot out of the way: while the whiporwill is freaking adorable as is dewey’s bond with it, otherwise this plot is.. really damn weak: it has some good jokes (Louie’s blunt no when Scrooge asks if hte family wants to fight a bear, Webby’s disapointment when she finds their not walking in the path of literal giants, Donald’s runner with the spy drone mosquito (and Della’s instiance to just let it suck his blood), and Della proving she has the family temper with her own donald brand angry dance) it’s just.. not enoguh. It feels like it’s an oblogiatory plto for the family and while it does set up the season’s overaching plot with a strong character, as it’s intresting learning that Scrooge had an idol at adventuring and thus is following a legacy himself, overall the subplot itself is just there and distracting from the much more intresting A-Story. That being said it was at least sorta worth it for the ending bit where huey and violet suprisingly find launchpad at the end of the trial in a cave.. as do the duckfamily, both groups crying out “Launchpad?!” with launchpad giving out a hilarious “that’s me, i’m launchpad” and while the setup for it was weak, the idea of the family going around the globe to find missing mysteries wile fighting fowl over them is a great concept. Overall a really damn strong start to the season with a weak b-plot and i’m gald even if this isn’t what htey planned to start with it’s what they went with.  Quack Pack: Quack Pack.. is one of disney’s secret shames.. I mean it’s not SO secret as it’s on D+ while this show’s predecessor wonder over yonder and superhero fantasy classic american dragon jake long are not for reasons I sitll don’t get, but that’s a rant for another day. It clashed badly with ducktlaes,was meiocre most of the time (It helps the two episodes I did watch were donald focused as he, a nicely redeisgned dasiy, and their co-worker kent were the highlights), with the boys somehow being more obnoxious than they were at their worst in the original ducktales.  Now that’s off my chest the episode itself.. is really damn good and a nice take on sitcom parody, with the family getting ready for a photo. Dewey’s “since the internet” line in paticular killed because, having watched boths ome of the best sitcoms (roseanne, designing women) and some of the absolute worst (My wife and kids, last man standing,home imporvment etc), most modern ones i’ve seen, even the good ones, have kids written this terrible way. Otherwise though it was highly enjoyable and having Jaleel “Urkel/Sonic the Hedgehog” white here to take the piss out of his former genre as Gene (and doing such a great job I really want to see Gene back next season), is the icing. That and Huey going half insane trying to figure out what’s going on, as well as the unsettling reveal of the studio audience.  Really the ep is a laugh fest, as well as the glorious arrival of goofy who to my relief, wasn’t a hallucination.. which itself is a great gag as is the offscreen internal thought of “okay so now htey ahve to take goofy with them on this deadly adventure all the way back to the states?”. The using of the adults old designs, as well as having dewey do the triplets dance and wear an outfit similar to theirs from “Mr Duck Steps Out” (Which I saw earlier this year and other than daisy’s horrifying early voice it wasn’t half bad). It’s just hard to go into and throughly enjoyable. But analysis right the real meat is in my boy donald: Going into the ep I genuinely expected Dewey to be the obvious source of the wish: while knowing gene was involved meant it was easy to see it was his fault HOW was a good question.. but having Donald do so and throughly enjoyable, and naturally gives us two great gags int he rwo: Donald’s VERY donald response “I wish for that 6 times a day! how wsas I supposed to know I was rubbing up against a magical lamp” and everyone spouting off their catcphrases, all either actual ones, basically something she does all the time turned into one (della) or poor beakly who gets “i’m not a spy” for some reason an dis cross about it. But the fact Donald not only figured it out quickly but wants to stay.. is perfectly in character. Donald in general, and especailly here, dosen’t WANT to be an adventuer anymore: he does it for his family, but he’d probably perfer the tgif lifestyle where problems are minor and solved with heartwarming lessons.. not full of lingering restiments, damage you caused, or loosing a decade of your sisters life and having to struggle to care for her kids. The rest of the familys looks when he gives his reasoning say it all: they really get why he wants this.. but Huey, who nicely got to be the one to break the sitcom news to them on top of everything else, makes an even better one: their lives are who they are.. this.. isn’t real. LIkea tgif sitcom it’s a plastic imitation of life that’s nothing like it: it’s comforting sure since hte real world is fucking complicated and miserable at times.. but hiding from it dosen’t fix things.  And while Donald, of course angrily denies this while his family ends upf ighting the studio audience, it’s Goofy, loveable guest star and everyone’s other faviorite dad, who gets his friend to see the truth: eveyr family has thieir own normal. He and max are  widower and his kid. Just a family of three (I”m counting PJ since , by his tene years at least, Peg is missing, though Iw ish she’d come back as her and goofy would be cute and she deserves better than Pete but whatever, and his dad is an emotionally abusive douchehead). But their happy, they make memories even if goofy like donald can’t walk five feet without the universe, and that’s what counts> it’s a touching sentiment and i’m happy Donald now has a friend whose also a parent and probably made similar sacrifices, and some Donald hasn’t had to just yet and probably won’t now dellas back, but made it through. So donald helps his family fight the  humanoids, take sa picture and it’s just a genuinely sweet ending... a great episode with a great concept that also opens the door for the return of the world’s other best dad more times. And again I want to see him smooch pete’s ex wife. This is the hill I will die on apaprently.. and with that I leave you. it was a good start a fun thing ot dive into and I hope for more.. oh and before I go, while i’m not a GIANT max and roxanne shipper, Idon’t dislike the ship I just don’t hav ea large attachment, it was absolutley WONDERFUL to see that they went to prom together. Okay i’m done, until next week, courage and stay safe. 

[overthinkingkdrama]

hi! love in sadness anon again. if you can rec some good melos i would be thankful.

[Oh my gosh, anon. I suck. Seriously. I’ve been trying to sit down and get this done from the moment I got your ask and I just haven’t been able to do it. Anyway, hopefully you see this. Thank you for your patience.]

Little do you know how long I have been waiting for this moment. This is my time to shine! Jk, but I would be happy to give recs. It’s a delight. I started going through my MDL and realized just how many dramas in this genre I have actually seen and realized I would probably have to trim my recommendations somewhat not to seem like a crazy person. Also I have subcategories! Yay!

(I’ve included the *** next to titles that I have watched multiple times or that stand out from the rest of the pack.)

First of all, Movie Melos.

Sometimes you don’t have time for 16-30 hours of drama. Sometimes you want to get all your feels out in a single sitting and move on with your life. That’s where movies are so helpful. My favorite bite-sized melos are:

Always*** – An ex-con trying to get his life together falls in love with a blind woman, but his efforts to help her recover her sight might drag him right back into the violence he’s tried to escape.

Shoot My Heart – A young heir is forced into a mental hospital by his rich family where he meets a disturbed young man. They become friends, try to protect each other, and eventually escape. This one has a bit more of a comedic element to it than the other movies I’m recommending, but there’s plenty of the melo tone as the movie goes on.

Will You Be There? – After finding out that he’s dying of cancer, a man travels through time to beg his younger self to save the life of his first love.

Butterfly Sleep – This is a Japanese movie, but it also stars Korean actor Kim Jae Wook, who recently got a boost in popularity from Her Private Life. The movie revolves around a poor young man from Korea who ends up living with an older woman, a novelist who has just discovered she is in the early stages of Alzheimer’s, and the passionate relationship that develops between the two as he helps her finish what will be her final book. #tragedy_tag

High Quality, Human Melodramas

So, this category is for if you want something with all the emotional gut punch of a really wild family drama, but you also want your melos to have actual artistic merit so when you tell your non-drama watching friends and family members about them they don’t end up losing respect for your taste.

Just Between Lovers – This is the story of two young people involved in and scarred by the same horrific accident, but survived and end up finding solace in one another as they deal with their combined traumas. If you’ve seen this drama around the kdramasphere on tumblr you might have seen a lot of gifs of the soft romance. Don’t be fooled though. The romance is indeed wonderful, but the themes are heavy and it can be rough sit.

My Mister*** – I really am just looking for every possible opportunity to recommend this drama. It has supplanted my former favorites and become my top drama of all time. It’s about two people, a troubled young woman in her 20′s and a structural engineer in his 40′s who have become beaten down and broken by life. Their two lives end up intersecting and they develop a really complex friendship that changes both of their lives. Acting, writing, directing…I have nothing bad to say about My Mister. This drama is actually perfect. 

The Smile Has Left Your Eyes – Do you like your melos a bit murdery? I know I sure do. Give me a sociopath any day of the week and I’ll say, “Thank you. I’ll take two.” This drama is about a young man who might be a monster. He becomes a detectives prime suspect in a murder investigation. At the same time he meets the detectives younger sister and they begin to fall in love. #tragedy_tag If this sounds like your thing, but you don’t like super sad endings check out Hello Monster, also starring Seo In Guk.

Secret Love Affair – I think it’s probably safe to say this drama is considered a modern kdrama classic, and for good reason. A story revolving around a woman who gave up her dreams for security, trapped in a loveless marriage, who meets a piano savant from an extremely underprivileged background and he sets off a spark for passion, music and love that she hasn’t felt in a long time. This is a quiet, pensive drama with a lot of wonderful music and atmosphere. YMMV depending on your tolerance for cheating and a slow-burn pace.

Alright, Cut the Crap Jona, Show Me the Extra Soapy Guilty Pleasure Dramas We All Know You Like…

Maybe you don’t go in for this type of self-conscious, “serious” drama watching. You’re going to watch these things in the sanctity of your own room and never tell a soul about them. Or perhaps you’ve evolved past needing other people’s approval to enjoy the things you like. Good for you, I say! As it should be. In that case, I have some top shelf makjang crack to deal you. This is the part of the list where the sliding scale of quality gets a little wobbly. Most of these shows contain a little, if not a lot, of crazysauce. All of them are over-the-top melo fun.

Baker King Kim Tak Gu – A drama about the illegitimate son of a conglomerate CEO who has inherited his preternatural baking abilities looking for his place in a family that will never acknowledge him. Yeah, the premise is pretty “what”? When I first watched this drama I thought it was supposed to be a satire of the makjang genre. To this day I’m not sure how seriously this drama actually takes itself. What I will say is it’s hella entertaining, even as it piles on more than it’s share of craziness (machinations, murder, affairs, chaebol fuckery, love polygons, gangsters, birth secrets, and on and on.) I was surprisingly invested and remarkably satisfied by the ending.

Ms. Perfect – This drama is something of a gothic romance/makjang melo mash up. It involves a woman whose marriage shatters just as she loses her home and finds herself desperate to take care of her family. She’s enticed by a mysterious woman to live with her in her huge house, but this stranger has eerie motivations of her own. Really fun, weird show. But brace yourself to be blue-balled by the romance. It’s one steamy make out session from being noona-romance catnip. 

Money Flower*** – I unironically love this drama. It’s very close to the platonic ideal of the Revenge Melo. It involves a Dantes-esque male lead, Kang Pil Joo, who is willing to destroy himself to enact his multi-decade revenge on a wealthy family that took everything from him. He is the shadow of a spoiled young heir who he plans to use to take down the whole evil empire of Chungha group, but in order to do that he has to orchestrate the heir’s marriage with the innocent daughter of a powerful politician, the woman who Pil Joo himself is in love with.

That Winter, The Wind Blows – This one is a lurid conman tail about a gambler who, in his attempts to pay back a dangerous gangster out for his life, pretends to be the prodigal brother of a blind heiress. He tries to get the money and skip town, but ends up falling in love with the mark which comes with a host of other complications, not the least of which is she thinks he’s her brother. This one is high on the guilty-pleasure-o-meter for me.

Come and Hug Me – Some people might disagree with my putting this one on here, but for me the premise is too wildly melodramatic to omit. The leads start out as childhood sweethearts, but the problem is his father is a deranged serial killer and her parents end up two of his victims. As adults he becomes a detective trying to make up for his father’s legacy of cruelty and she becomes a famous actress like her mother. Traumas resurface when she becomes the target of an apparent copycat and their past connection becomes the fixation of a ruthless tabloid journalist.

Thank You – After his fiancee dies of cancer, a Doctor travels to a remote island to fulfill her last wish–to help the family of a little girl the late fiancee was responsible for inadvertently infecting with HIV. Unexpectedly he finds himself attracted to the girl’s single mother. However, he will have to contend with the prejudices of the island people about AIDS and the reappearance with the girl’s father. This one is as heavy as it sounds, and the oldest drama on this list, from 2007, with all the idiosyncrasies that go along with older dramas. But it’s remarkably well done. From the same writer of a bunch of classic melodramas (I’m Sorry, I Love You; A Love To Kill; Innocent Man; Uncontrollably Fond, etc) but this is my personal favorite of hers.

The Last Empress – Okay, I couldn’t omit this one. I tried. Average musical actress Oh Sunny winds up married to the Emperor in an alternate history version of Korea and becomes embroiled in the machinations of the corrupt royal family. With a nice side helping of revenge plot. It’s demonstrably not a good show. It’s one of the most ridiculous things I’ve ever seen. But it had me hooked early on and then I couldn’t get myself free. What a magnificent train wreck this drama was. If you’re looking for problematic nonsense melos that were MASSIVE hits in Korea and you’re torn between this and Baker King, go with the silly bread show and keep this one in your back pocket.

Fated to Love You – This one is probably the most off-brand on the list, because it leans heavily on the comedic tone, especially for the first half. There’s a definite turn at the midpoint of the drama where it becomes MUCH more melodramatic (with all the tropes you expect to go along with that), but I think it pulls of the transition impressively well. Besides, it’s a fun watch with a fluffy feelgood ending with a bow on top. It’s a dash of sugar for your melodrama sojourn, a genre that admittedly can be a bit of a bummer.

There it is. I tried to do an extra good job with my list because it took me so long to get it out. I’m sorry again. Happy watching!

Jona

[hollowedrpg]

CONGRATULATIONS, RILEY! — You’ve been accepted for the role of Emmeline Vance. Choosing who would play Emmeline was by no means easy, but your application really struck the perfect balance of every side of their character. No matter how far they try to outrun their past and the implications of the mark on their arm, there will always be a part of them that is everything their father and that curse shaped them to be. Throughout your whole app I really got a clear sense of the way you’d write and portray the character. 

Thank you so much for applying. Please create your account and send in the link, track the right tags, and follow everyone on the follow list. Welcome to Hollowed Souls!

ooc.

name: riley / ri

age: 21+

preferred pronouns: she/her

timezone: pst

activity: my activity should be fairly good for the most part. i find the time to get online at least once a day and therefore should be steady with replies and plotting, etc. out of ten i would probably rate it a six just to be safe because sometimes work is unpredictable but if anything arises i will be sure to send in notice of such.

are you applying for more than one character?: i said i would write multiple applications but however, it was only emmeline’s that came to be full force. so they will be the only muse i am applying for.

how do you feel about your character dying?: i would say fairly comfortable. i love in depth and painstakingly terrible plots and therefore i love putting my muses through such a thing. if the time does arise where it is fitting to the plot that emmeline has to die, i would absolutely be here for it.

anything else?: thank you for reading my application, hope you enjoy !

ic details.

full name:

EMMELINE / it is yours and yours alone, your only identifier. given to you by your parents, plucked from their brains as if some sort of hymn when they spoke it. your name meant more to them, the idea of regality and superiority. yet, when they spoke it, you couldn’t help but feel the strings within your heart tugged ever so slightly. they brought you into this world, made certain that your upbringing was filled with an array of darkness if only to make you face the reality that was to come. your name is all that remains now. you’ve shed your skin so many times it seems as though your childhood is but a mere memory, distant and out of reach entirely.

emmeline, they whisper. the viper. the master cursebreaker, the renowned dueller. the air that surrounds your name, the glory and shame that comes with it, is something in which you cannot truly stomach. your humble in your approach and yet you know there is pride to be had within your skills. you can only hope that when your name is etched upon the history books that it tells the story of a triumph, of a person reborn and redeemed in the eyes of those who seek to destroy, who seek to avenge.

ANITA / the same middle name as your murdered mother. the only thing that binds you to the family you once had. there was once a time in which you’re sure you were happy, when your eyes were closed to the sins in which your father took part in. it’s this that you believe is your most treasured memory, your greatest lie. an air of cruelty surrounds him as much as it leaks into your childhood. you look just like her, they’d whisper. as if it were a sin to resemble the woman whose death had allowed a volatile man to escalate his cruel intentions further. as if you were to blame.

as the years go on, you distance yourself from this identity. this regret. anita simply becomes a name, nothing more and nothing less. the mirror shows you nothing if not a ghost of your mother, a mirrored image of a woman damned by her connections to a man who’d watch with a wicked grin as the world burned around him. you were nothing more than a ghost. “a child weaned on poison considers harm to be a comfort.”

VANCE / you wear it with disdain, it wears on you as well as the dark mark upon your forearm. a constant reminder of where you came from, where you’ve never ceased to stop running from. your father was venomous and so you assume you are too. yet, your words slice into the necks of those who’d deemed themselves gods among men. those who found themselves neatly propped upon self made pedestals in which you’d had no time to cater to.

the vance name is renowned in the wizarding world and you yourself feel every bit as responsible as the father who’d wielded his wand like a sword as he’d sliced into your skin the dark mark. branded you like a beast and named you ruination. you attempt to scrub the vance family name from your history as much as you attempt to scrub away the tar black ink settled gently against your forearm. every time you fail.

date of birth: october 15th ( libra ) striving for nothing more, nothing less than justice and equality. libra’s have been known to do what is best for everyone. believing in such things as peace and harmony, libra is a sign that most would pair with leadership.

former hogwarts house: slytherin. a very crucial part of emmeline’s identity and her character arc overall.

sexuality: bisexual and biromantic.

gender/pronouns: non-binary with a preference for they/them pronouns.

face claim change: absolutely not, jessica henwick is perfect.

more.

how do you interpret this character’s personality? how will you play them? include two weaknesses & two strengths.

emmeline’s personality to me is a multitude of things. they are, as others like to call them, a viper of sorts. they shed their skin like that of a snake and relish in their victories. they are a chameleon soul, someone who can twist words and slink from skins in order to obtain whatever it is that helps them get ahead. much like the stereotypes for slytherin house, emmeline is filled with a ferocious determination to succeed in their ventures. the one with the most importance is, and always will be, to rid the world of the men and women who did this to them, who forced them to take a mark and

i plan on playing them, if given the chance, with the ferocity that they deserve. emmeline has lived a life filled with terror, shaped by events that weren’t entirely within their choosing. their father damned them to a life of self loathing no thanks to the permanent mark that rests upon their skin. it’s almost reminiscent of lady macbeth’s spot upon her hand, the way emmeline tries and tries again to rid themselves of a mark they did not ask for, one that haunts them. they are a part of the order, and a controversial one at that. some know the story of emmeline’s father, how his cruelty was sought out by powerful men, how he’d turned trinkets into treasures, cursing them with the harshest of spells for the shiniest of galleons. the vance family was never known for their generosity nor their acceptance and so emmeline is somewhat of an outcast in the sense of belonging when it comes to the order. i feel as though they really took a long time to find themselves comfortable enough to be in the presence of most within godric’s hollow, a place in which they once adamantly refused to live within. however, times have changed and emmeline has come around slightly. making an effort to settle, if only for a few months. someone used to running, someone used to never calling a house a home, now forced to remain within the confides of once boarded up, blood stained homes.

there’s a certain blood on emmeline’s hands that does not wash away with time. they’re tied to the very organization that they’re trying to destroy in such an intimate way. the dark mark upon emmeline’s forearm is kept a well hidden secret amongst the order, their greatest shame and burden. it causes something to erupt with emmeline that is almost inexplainable, a grief and a rage that can be seen every time they’re faced with the deaths of those they fight alongside with.

emmeline to me is redemption, a story of revenge and retribution. they are a revolutionary soul thrust into a war in which they wish to end. in which they feel slightly responsible for. mind you, emmeline’s father created the dark mark curse, and as such fed the fire and the hatred that stemmed for muggleborns and “blood traitors” alike. they lived without the love of a mother, that maternal affection torn from their grasp and in doing so, leaving a small whole in their heart where their mothers memory would lie. emmeline as a whole is a complex and closed off character. someone who is so filled with rage and anger towards the right people that it oft seems as though they might explode. surrounded by those with whom have lost more than they could ever imagine, emmeline feels a guilt that eats her alive, a stirring within her stomach that keeps her awake in the middle of the night.

STRENGTH : INSTINCTIVE. to trust ones gut, to be able to identify trouble before one finds it, it’s a gift that emmeline holds near and dear. for years they’ve been alone, always fighting and always searching. in that time, they learned motives and tells and how to identify traps from truths. it was something that buried itself deeply within their gut, their instinct. some would call it a gift, emmeline simply calls it sheer dumb luck.  it’s automatic, the way they reach for their wand before their opponent. it’s almost prophetic how they manage to predict every move and every ill fated nature. their instinct has gotten them this far. their instinct has kept them alive, told them to trust the likes of alastor and kingsley with their greatest shame. it’s their instinct, their blind faith in it, that is perhaps their greatest triumph and so naturally, may be their biggest downfall.

WEAKNESS : VINDICTIVE. there is no greater feeling than that of revenge. to plunge a knife deep within the throat of a man who’d wronged you, to watch as he suffered beneath your hand as he begged you for mercy. mercy in which they’d never shown you. a kindness would be to allow the man a quick death for his sins, yet emmeline revels in the merciless act of murder. in the slow, torturous death that comes at their hand. for, there is a desire that boils through their blood, courses through their veins and drives every action in which they do. the desire to get revenge, the desire to see those who’d harmed emmeline, in harms way themselves. the world was no longer safe, the gods no longer kind. there was no salvation and the wicked and saints alike were targets for hells gates. emmeline has accepted this fact. that they’re doomed for damnation. yet, they carry on. they fight for a cause that can help them tear down the very walls in which men like emmeline’s father had built.

STRENGTH : ADAPTABLE. to shed skin like a snake is to adapt. to thrive in cold weathers as much as one thrives beneath the blazing sun. there is no situation in which emmeline cannot conquer, it’s a thing in which they pride themselves on. to find a situation, once known as impossible, and come out the other side unscathed. there is something about the way they move, something about the way they carry themselves that gives an air of mystery. to some, they’re an enigma. as invisible as a black cat within the midnight hour. others, a small few, know the cause and the result. to live as a feral cat amongst the snakes pit, to be bitten with poison that runs so deeply within their bloodstream and become immune, was something to be proud of. however, emmeline, as humble as they were, had never wanted the glory that went along with becoming a different someone, a certain anyone, beneath pressure and circumstance. this, they told themselves, was the only way they could survive. the only way they could watch slowly as the blood drained from the men who’d bruised their wrists and branded their forearm against all cries, against every scream that echoed into the night. to adapt was to survive, and emmeline had made it this far.

WEAKNESS : IMPULSIVE. it’s impulse that might be your undoing. it’s impulse in which you act on. they tell emmeline time and time again. yet, there’s always been something so thrilling about the chase, about the hunt. they did, after all, force them into it did they not? a child of quiet nature ripped root from stem and made into a monster as much as they, only to become the hunter in search of the prey. emmeline’s impulsive nature has gotten them into trouble a time too many, but it has also allowed them an excuse to run, an excuse to hide, to fight. while they may seem calculating and calm, emotions are something in which they cannot fully control and more oft than not, they act upon them before fully thinking.

EXTRAS : TENACIOUS, RECKLESS, PASSIONATE, EMPATHETIC

how has the war affected this character, emotionally and otherwise?

the war began for emmeline at such a young age it was as if they’d never known a life before it. they’re endured a life within four walls with a man who sought to destroy and a legacy in which emmeline would once hope to shed. to follow a man so wicked, to be forced down a path so unrighteous and wrong it turned their stomach and caused knots to erupt from within. all emmeline ever wanted was to be free, to condemn the men who’d branded her and to rid the earth of them entirely. war, it had seemed, was imbedded in their very bones. it was the cause of every move they made, of every whisper they relayed in a hushed voice.

emotionally, emmeline has always been slightly closed off to others. that much is certain due to their lack of commitment in anything but their livelihoods. ie. their job, their purpose of bringing down the death eaters. war breeds nothing but grief and death, but emmeline had seen both of these things, had known both of them since their childhood. to some, the war is something new. but to emmeline, it is their everyday, their reoccurring nightmare.

they hear the whispers and the sins of those who bare the mark upon their arm, they’ve seen it first hand how wicked they can be towards those they deem unworthy. it’s this that takes a toll upon emmeline the most. they were, after all, one of the first. one of the many to be branded by a man who sought glory. who would rip apart villages and families in the name of genocide. it weighs down upon them like guilt, washes over them and swallows them whole.

war wears down their heart, it rips soul away root from stem. it has spared no one, not even the seemingly cold and closed off emmeline vance. war has ruined them all, and it will continue to do so until it is over. when will it be over, they ask. never, emmeline replies.

where does this character currently stand? with those who wish to hide in godric’s hollow until the war ends, with those who wish to rebuild the order and continue fighting the war, or on neither side? why?

emmeline is firmly planted upon the same side as alastor moody and amelia bones. they will stop at nothing to right the wrongs in which they’d endured, in which others endure as well. so long as there are death eaters still out there, emmeline believes there is a war to fight. to be part of the greater good, to bring peace to a world that has only ever shown emmeline pain, hatred and discourse. with war there is hope, in their mind. with war comes the death of men who’d wrong them, who’d murdered innocents out of their own vanity. the order has become the closest thing emmeline has to a home, to a solid rock to lean against and they’ll be damned if they have to lose it at the hands of the death eaters. there is a war in their very soul, an ache that yearns for the blood of blood supremacists to spill.

dark times lie ahead and emmeline has fully prepared themself for it. they would greet death like an old friend if it came after the order had been named victor and the vengeance upon the death eaters was handed over to them with an iron fist. it’s always been about the war for emmeline, always been about how they will go down fighting the men who their father had allowed into their home. it seems as though a cruel twist of fate has struck emme, their life is pledged to a bitter sense of revenge. without it, do they serve a purpose? should they truly be the ones to rebuild if all they ever do is seek to destroy the enemy entirely? the why is simple. there is no greater desire than that of death by emmeline’s hand. there is no greater drive, no greater push than that of the promise that men will die by their hand. they branded emme, humiliated them, pained them for years to come and they simply continued to run. to never know a home again, to never lay ones head down to rest gently and know that by morning they will be alive. every day is a fight and every day a war goes on not only on the outside, but the inside as well. the world does not forgive those who’ve blood on their hands, and so emmeline has chosen to abide by their desires. they want to continue the fight, for they know as much as the next person that the war is never truly over. it lives on.

Has Emmeline showed the dark mark to anyone other than Kingsley and Alastor? How has being a part of the Order been for them when they’re marked by the enemy?

surprisingly, no. emmeline’s sleeves cover their dark mark and so i would like to say the only people who have seen the tattoo upon their forearm are alastor and kingsley and i would assume arabella knows of it but has yet to see it. it’s something that haunts emmeline, something that reminds them of why it is that they’re fighting, who it is that they’re fighting. the shame that comes with the vance name, with their family name, is enough to stir demons within emmeline’s stomach. it’s something they carry, a weight upon their shoulders.

becoming a member in the order was something expected of emmeline, from themself of course. to help in the downfall of men and women who are unjust and cruel, not only for personal vengeance but also for the safety of others around them. there is no going back, no repentance for the sins of their father. this, it had seemed, was their only option. to find a temporary “home” in the order, to find people who they could “trust” for the most part in order to further an agenda. however selfish it may have begun, emmeline would do anything it takes to bring an end to voldemort’s reign, and that proved truthful in the war itself.

on some days, emmeline feels as though they don’t belong, as if they’re lying to everyone around them. if they found out about the mark that is soaked into emmeline’s skin, if they knew just how deep the vance familiy’s loyalty to voldemort went. would they accept emme? would they fight side by side with the child of a cruel sadist? would they allow emme to fight for their justice, all the while wearing the mark of the enemy? it haunts emme. every morning, every night. always there, as if a secret just beneath their noses.

extra.

i’ve got a tag dedicated to emmeline located here on my blog , there you will find original and reblogged inspiration.

PATRONUS : polar bear. ( Those with a polar bear as their patronus are very adaptable individuals, but stubborn. They put up strong emotional barriers and are very oriented on one aspect of their lives, such as a career or volunteer work. This can make them seem cold to others, and they can be blunt in their ways of communication. Despite this, they are very connected to everything, however small that connection may be. x  )

BOGGART : as simple as emmeline standing in a black cloak, side by side with death eaters and their father.

[slverjohn]

If you're still taking them: Silverflint and 29!! 😍😍😍

i decided to challenge myself and try to not write about 4x03 (there are already so many amazing oh-my-god-you’re-not-dead fics, and I’d constantly be comparing myself!), so have a post-Charlestown drabble

29. “I thought you were dead.”

Silver floats in and out of consciousness for almost a week after he loses the leg. The one constant - excepting the pain - each time he wakes, is Flint. He is always there: sometimes sitting next to Silver’s window bed, reading a book; sometimes working at his desk, glancing over what feels like every ten seconds; sometimes asleep on the hammock across the room, depending on the hour. 

He doesn’t remember Flint spending so much time in his cabin before: either something happened in Charlestown that lead to this self-imposed isolation, or Flint is watching over him, like some sort of angry, violent guardian angel. 

This prompts him to imagine Flint in a toga and holding a lyre, and Silver very nearly snorts out loud (that it is Flint, however indirectly, who has prompted a smile from him since he’s lost his leg, is not lost on Silver).

Still, the thought that Flint cares enough to sit with him as he recovers, it’s - well, it’s more than Silver deserves, to say the least, no matter how it makes his cheeks warm.

So when Flint finally tells him he’s been voted quartermaster, tells him he’s essentially trapped here (we’ll take care of you, they’d said, and oh, how it haunts him) tells him they’re nearing Nassau, Silver in turn tells the most half-assed lie he has in years.

Flint suspects him, he can tell. They’ve both become too in tune with one another these past few weeks for Silver not to notice the minute tics in his face, the twitches and furrowing of his brow. Flint, in turn, surely notices that Silver cannot bear to meet his eyes, how his breathing has gone tight not simply because of the pain. 

Maybe if he’s lucky Flint will cut him down right here. Maybe Flint will kill him where he lies, and Silver won’t have to spend the rest of his days as an invalid.

At this point, Silver’s not sure he’d even try to talk his way out of it.

Instead, Flint simply clenches his jaw and storms out, slamming the door behind him. Silver’s almost disappointed.

Howell and Billy come in soon after, the former to check his stump and the latter to update him on his newly elected position. After he’s faked a suitable level of surprise, he manages to get Billy to tell him what happened in Charlestown.

“None of us know for certain. Flint won’t say, but - ” Billy hesitates, glancing toward the closed door as if the captain is listening at the door.

“But?” Silver prompts, squeezing his eyes shut and biting back a groan as Howell starts to wrap his stump again. 

“Mrs. Barlow is dead.”

“What?” Silver asks, shooting upright from where he’s slouched on the bench. Howell shoves him back down against his pillows, and it’s only Silver’s complete shock that stops him from putting up more of a fight.

No wonder Flint’s been hiding out in here: he’s grieving, for fuck’s sake.

Billy and Howell take their leave not long after, and Silver is left to his thoughts. It’s not the most pleasant place to be, right now, his mind, and so when the door opens again an hour later he’s almost grateful for the interruption.

Until he realizes that it’s Flint, returned from whatever it is he’d been doing to calm his temper and avoid Silver.

For a time, it’s quiet, Flint moving about the cabin, reorganizing his desk as Silver watches silently. Eventually, though, it’s as if Flint can’t help himself:

“Howell’s satisfied with your recovery?”

Silver nods, surprised that it’s concern for his wellbeing that’s prompted him to break the silence. “As well as he can be, given that we’re on a moving ship.”

Flint nods, turning back to his papers. Silver, though, can’t just leave it there, now that he knows, now that he can see the grief in the slump of his shoulders.

“Billy told me. About - about her,” he starts, watching as Flint stiffens where he stands. “Captain, I’m so sorry - ”

“Don’t,” Flint says quietly. “Just - don’t.”

“If you want me to leave, to move down below with the other men, so you might have some privacy to grieve - ”

“No,” Flint interrupts harshly, turning to face him, eyes bright.

Silver frowns at this. “I know there’s little trust, if any, between us, but surely you know that you don’t have to keep such a close eye on me. Not anymore.”

He can see the tic in Flint’s jaw as he tries to keep himself calm. “That’s - that’s not it.”

Now Silver’s just perplexed. “I don’t understand.”

Flint seems torn, briefly, as if he’s not sure it’s worth the effort to explain himself to Silver, before he sighs and moves to sit with him. When he finally speaks, it’s halting, hesitant. 

“It was only after the dust had settled at Charlestown, after we finally were underway and heading back toward Nassau, that I realized you weren’t there. I’d been so caught up in my rage, my righteousness, that I barely registered who was standing next to me as we fired upon the bay. I asked Billy where you were, and the look on his face - ” He stops then, hands clenching into tight fists. “I thought you were dead. I thought you had been killed when Vane took the warship, and that Billy didn’t know how to tell me.”

Silver almost wishes he had been killed, but he doesn’t say this.

“And all I could think, for that brief moment, was - Not him too. I can’t lose him too. I’d lost so much, and - ” he cuts himself off, shaking his head as if to clear those angst-ridden thoughts. “I hadn’t realized, until then, how important you had become to me. I needed you. I need you. I would not cast you aside, leave you with the rest of the men, as if you were not the most important among them.”

Silver, for once in his life, is speechless. He stares at Flint, completely astounded, for several long moments.

“For fuck’s sake, say something, would you?” Flint snaps, obviously uncomfortable with how vulnerable he’s made himself. 

He reaches over, resting his hand over Flint’s fist. “I - I didn’t know.”

Flint slowly, cautiously, loosens his fist, turning his hand over until their palms are touching, until Silver can lace their fingers together. It’s perhaps the first truly affectionate touch they’ve shared, and yet it feels almost - familiar. It feels right.

“Nor did I,” Flint admits, staring at their joined hands.

“Well, I’m not going anywhere,” Silver jokes half-heartedly, gesturing to his mangled leg. Flint’s grip on his hand tightens, and he looks back up at Silver.

“Good,” he says firmly. His eyes, now that Silver can see them, are damp, and there are dark circles under them. Silver, in a moment of madness, tugs on his hand, until Flint is standing over him.

“Come here,” he says insistently, gesturing to the space by the window next to him. He scoots closer to the edge, and gives Flint his best stern, authoritative glare. It’s good practice, he thinks, for when he’s quartermaster. Flint hesitates for all of ten seconds before he starts taking off his boots, before he clambers over Silver and curls up on his side. There’s a brief moment, where Flint’s hand simply hovers over his chest, as though he’s not sure such a touch would be welcome. But he does, in the end, let it rest on Silver’s chest, just over his heart. 

There are countless obstacles facing them, Silver knows; many of his own making. Flint still suspects him, still doubts the story he told about Vincent. They have a war to fight, a crew to manage, and their own complicated relationship to navigate. 

But for now, as Flint holds him close and keeps his darkest thoughts at bay, as they share warmth and comfort as best as they know how, this will be enough. 

[hauntedbunkbeds]

Day 1: Thin Walls

Writing Prompt: Day 1, Surreal and Mundane: In today’s work, take something mundane and make it surreal, just like it says on the box. Play around with something normal until you make it strange!

Thin Walls

The floor of my first apartment was covered in a dense, beige carpet that I wanted to hate, but I couldn’t. I loved the way I could slip silently from my room to the tiny hallway bathroom like a cat. I loved lowering my feet to the floor in the morning and scrunching up my toes in the shag. I had always dreaded getting out of bed in my dorm room, where the floors were an ancient grey tile that made me feel like I lived in a janitor’s closet. The tile was always frigidly cold in the winter, and weirdly moist in the summer months, a result of an overworked A/C window unit. I had come to college in the city expecting a more idyllic experience, surrounded by hardwood floors and tattered paperbacks, the sound of coffee brewing while I would sit writing, blowing cigarette smoke out the window of our eighth-floor dorm room. I don’t even smoke. I don’t know what I was thinking. The dorms were shit, of course. My roommate was a business major with a Disney obsession that bordered on fetish territory. Instead of the vintage maps and photos I would have gathered from thrift shops on lazy Saturdays, our room was covered in Moana and Finding Nemo posters. On the deadline to renew our space in the dorm, neither of us asked the other if were going to continue living together. I felt somewhat panicked about the prospect of finding an apartment in the city, but I knew the alternative was hating my life. I’m a nester, and I was trapped in a cage with nothing but torn up newspaper for bedding.  

My first night in my new apartment was exhilarating. The blank walls, the vast expanse of beige carpet--it felt like a newly-stretched canvas begging for a Pollock-esque attack of color. I had spent my freshman year living like a monk, saving every penny from my job stacking books at the school library. Even still, the only apartment I found in my price range was, by any first-world definition, a complete dump. The carpet was, admittedly, hideous and filthy. The oven face was half-consumed with rust, the fridge howled like it was in its death throes, usually in the middle of the night, and as I set my last box of things down in the middle of the living room floor, I heard two voices through the thin walls. They were fighting.

 Hey, I thought, That’s the city! This will be character building.

I don’t mention this as an excuse, but I am from a small town a couple hours out from the college I enrolled in. My father was a farmer, my mother sold MAC cosmetics, her eye on a pink Cadillac that would never materialize. I don’t feel like a country bumpkin, as a coworker would meanly (he thought endearingly) sometimes address me. But in retrospect, maybe in some aspects I was overly naive. I suppose the reason I’m writing all this is so you can be the judge. Are my experiences tainted by my inexperience? Or are they, as I suspect, a little...off?

I ask because I am biased, mostly due to the fact that I am terrified.

Too exhausted to put together the cheap IKEA bed frame I bought the weekend before, I slept on a mattress in the middle of my bedroom floor. “Middle” is literal but not what you think. On three sides of my mattress there was less than a foot of carpet before you reached the wall. At the foot of the bed, there was a generous yard of space before you reached the door. I could literally jump off the bed and into the bathroom across the small hallway, if I wanted to, which I did, but I was scared of scaring the people who lived below me. I was on the fourth floor of a building that reminded me of the Happiness Hotel from The Muppets Take Manhattan (if you haven’t seen the movie, it’s not what you think, i.e. “happy”). I saw a couple other students there, but none that would make eye contact with me, or return my polite, tight-lipped nods in the long cement hallway that led to the underground laundry room I was secretly terrified to use. Mostly, the building housed adults in their late twenties to early thirties who looked so beaten down by life it made you wonder if they were ever innocent, or if something happened when they were born that stole that from them. There were not many older residents, as the building had no elevator, but the people who lived there were ancient enough in their stone-faced weariness to feel as alien to me as an octogenarian. It does not help that I am also painfully shy.    

As I fell asleep that first night, the voices on the other side of the wall were no longer fighting. They seeped through the plaster as a warm, muffled hum. I couldn’t make out the words, just the cadence of two voices in a rhythmic back-and-forth, speckled with occasional laughter. I enjoyed the seeming ease of their conversation, something I rarely enjoyed in my own social life. I just wasn’t good at talking to people. I got lost in my own head, and none of what I found in there felt good enough to say out loud. There were always awkward silences, and I felt boring.

That first night in the apartment, I was exhausted and happy, and drifting off to the sound of their muffled conversation was oddly comforting to me. I dreamt about throwing my first party. I would introduce everyone by their first and last names, everyone would dress up without being told to, and we would debate philosophy and drink martinis. Note to self: Take a philosophy class, figure out what a martini is.

The next morning, I made an entire pot of coffee. Not because I would drink an entire pot of coffee, but because I loved the sound of it hissing and bubbling, and I wanted it to go on for as long as possible. I had spent almost every penny in my bank account on the move from the dorm, and cheap thrills were all I had. When it was done, I poured myself a cup in a mug I had found at Goodwill (“#1 Grandpa”) and began unboxing what few things I owned. It wasn’t long before I heard the voices again.

The first voice that spoke was a man, the second was a woman. This made sense to me, as it seemed that the apartment building I had settled in acted as some kind of beacon for couples who looked more like cellmates than lovers. The men carried themselves like middle-aged coal miners trapped in the bodies of twenty-something weed dealers. The women squinted like they were trying to harness their telekinetic potential. I later learned that the squint was a warning: Look at my boyfriend and I will spit on you. I learned this the hard way.

I easily assumed the couple with whom I shared both a living room and bedroom wall with was one such couple. I felt an smug superiority to them. I was nineteen: A glowing, vibrating ball of potential. They were....some other age: Two gas station Bic lighters, burning the finger of whoever tried to keep the little flame alight for too long. In retrospect, I was grossly pretentious and judgmental, and while I blamed my shyness for the fact that I didn’t have a lot of friends, I can admit now that it was definitely also my own fault.

As I arranged my books in alphabetical order on the mismatched thrift store bookshelves I had acquired, the voices raised again. This time I could make out words, some phrases.

Your job.

Stupid.

Gone.

(or was it “Done?”)

Fucked.

You do it.

We do it together.

No, your job, you do it!

Fucked forever.

Back and forth, an endless game of tossing blame to each other. My superiority complex tingled as I envisioned the day I lived with my future (hypothetical) boyfriend. We’d be renovating an old Brownstone together, a herculean effort for two graduate students studying English and Egyptology, but we’d cobble together our resources and return the property to her former glory on a shoestring budget. A montage of playful paint fights and blanket forts played in my head as I arranged my books to the sound of my neighbors screaming at each other over something one of them had fucked up at their dead-end job.

Later that afternoon, I went for a walk. Down the street from my building there was a hospital, and I discovered on accident that behind the building there was a small courtyard where patients could smoke, but almost never did. It became my secret garden, this patch of grass with a smattering of benches marked with bronze plaques bearing the names of people who never made it out of the hospital. I would read there, the peaceful silence only broken by occasional wailing, which was something I had grown used to since I moved to the city.

I had been in the apartment for a month when classes started back up. I had settled in, a stack of unwashed dishes and a cleared path from the bedroom to the bathroom cut between mounds of unwashed laundry were the tedious reality of life on my own. The fantasy of living on my own unmasked for its true monotony.

It was nearly Christmas, and the frigid weather outside made my increasingly-sad little apartment feel finally, suddenly, precious to me, as it had been only in my fantasies, and only because winter had metamorphosed the world outside into something so ruthless and unpleasant that even the dingiest of apartments felt like a vacation retreat. When classes let out for Christmas break, I tried not to leave the house unless absolutely necessary. It was then that I heard the familiar sound of my neighbor’s voices through the walls again, yelling at each other as if this argument were the one to end them all (though I knew better than to think that, at this point). I wasn’t sure if the walls had grown thinner, or their voices had just grown louder, but for whatever reason, I could hear them more clearly than ever.

She: Worthless bum!

He: That’s not fair. I’m trying. I’m trying to help us! I want to (unintelligible).

She: You had a job to do and you didn’t do it.

He: I need more time!

She: Time? You’ve had time!

He: (Unintelligible)

She: (Laughing cruelly) You’ve had hundreds of years!

The voices stopped suddenly, as if they had been caught, and my bedroom fell silent. Alone in my bed, I swear to God I could feel them staring at me through the walls. I held my breath, willing them to keep arguing. I didn’t move for what felt like hours, and they remained silent. As I finally fell asleep, the only sound was the ticking of the radiator pipes.

The next day my mom picked me up to drive me home for Christmas break. I gave her a tour of my apartment, to which she responded with an enthusiasm that felt very sad and forced. I almost didn’t show her the bedroom, but she pushed the door open ahead of me and stepped inside. I had cleaned up in anticipation of her arrival, but the room still looked very sad. I was seeing it through the eyes of an outsider for the first time, and I felt embarrassed.

“Oh, honey,” she said. “What happened here? This doesn’t look good.”

She gestured towards the wall, in the direction of where the voices had come from last night. A dark, amorphous stain had formed on the wall around eye level. It was a sickly brown, the kind I had seen before, when I pipe burst in our bathroom at home and on our dining room ceiling the ring of water damage bloomed until my dad finally had to cut out a huge section of the plaster.

“Oh geeze,” I said. “I hadn’t noticed that before.”

She touched it.

“This is moist,” she said. “You better call the super ASAP or whatever burst could ruin this whole wall.”

I reached out toward the stain, but couldn’t bring myself to touch it.

“This is a shared wall,” I said. “I can hear my neighbors on the other side.”

“Well,” my mom said, turning to return to the living room. “You should tell them, too.”

Christmas break was perfect. I hadn’t realized what a relief it would be to fall asleep in my childhood bedroom again. The nights were so quiet it almost freaked me out. I joked with my dad that I needed an ambient sound machine that just playing ambulance sirens now. I helped him out with farm work (even the cold felt less oppressive out here, in the open air) and my mom and I got our nails done at the salon inside Wal-Mart. They let me drink wine with them at dinner. Mom bought me a trunk-full of groceries. She ordered Chinese food on New Years Eve. The smallest things felt so opulent to me. I hadn’t realized how completely broke I was, how adding cream to coffee had become a budgetary extravagance.

Returning to the city was like being sentenced to another year of hard labor. My mom helped me carry the groceries up to my apartment and tearfully hugged me goodbye. It was dark when I finally opened my bedroom door and saw it.

The water stain on my bedroom wall had grown to nearly triple its size. Now, it reached from eye-level to knee-level, its brown rings of soggy blotches drooping towards the floor. But it was not only larger. It had changed. Once just a shade or two darker than the yellowish paint, the spot had taken on the color of whatever it was that had begun seeping through the plaster surface--a dark brown, black in spots. I didn’t have to touch it (I wouldn’t touch it) to know it was wet. Parts had dripped onto the carpet, leaving dark stains on the beige shag.

God, I’m so fucked, I thought, remembering my mother’s warning to tell the building superintendent about the water stain, which I had immediately forgotten as soon as I locked the door behind me. I grabbed my pillows and blankets off the bed, thinking it was probably a good idea to sleep in the living room, and I was about to retreat to the safety of my couch when I heard it.

It was the woman’s voice, but she was alone.

She was alone, and she was laughing.

The next morning I called the superintendent, who took far more convincing than I had expected to agree to come look at the damage. I had imagined him rushing up with an old metal toolbox, sweaty and panicked, furious at me for my negligence of his precious building. Instead, I was met with a series of, Now you’re sure? I almost began to doubt myself, until I opened my bedroom door to peek in, just to remind myself that I wasn’t overreacting. I was almost knocked back by a scent I recognized from working on the farm--wet, decaying earth, alive with rich rot and mold.

The super was up in forty-five minutes, setting the record for slowest climb up four flights of stairs in recorded history. At the risk of becoming a lazy narrator, he was exactly what you might imagine the superintendent of the worst apartment building you’ve ever been in to look like. Instead of a toolbox, he held a bag of sunflower seeds.   

When I opened the door to my bedroom, his face didn’t change, but he said “Mama Jama” and shook his head.

He reached out to touch it and without thinking I cried out, “Don’t touch it!”

“Why not?” he said, looking back at me with a squint that made me think I was going to be spit on soon.

“I don’t know,” I said, embarrassed. “Sorry.”

He shook his head and touched the wall. His fingers came away wet and stained with a black mucus-like substance.

“I thought maybe a pipe had burst,” I offered.

“No pipes in this wall,” he said, popping a couple sunflower seeds in his mouth thoughtfully.

“Oh,” I said. “Well, what about the people in the other apartment? Have you heard anything from them?”

“Which apartment?” he said, not looking at me, still eyeing the stain like it was a stand-off.

“The one that shares this wall with me,” I said. “Do you think something this big would affect them too?”

He shrugged.

“It could,” he said. “If there was an apartment on the other side of this wall.”

A wave of goosebumps made me involuntarily shiver.

“This wall,” I said, pointing in the direction of the massive brown mass that took up most of it.

“This wall,” he said, tapping the stain, his fingers making a soft squelching sound. “Why would you think that? The other side of this wall is just insulation, wiring, and brick.”

“I don’t know,” I lied.

“Anyway I’ll try to have someone out here tomorrow to get this...issue, taken care of,” he said. “In the meantime, don’t sleep in this room.”

“Okay,” I said.

As soon as he left, I packed my backpack and went to the hospital. I sat in the garden and read until my fingers were shaking so violently from the cold that I could no longer turn the pages of my book. In the hospital lobby, there was a vending machine that would spit out paper cups and fill them with hot coffee with that hissing, bubbling sound I had grown to love. I put in three quarters, got my coffee, and took my little paper cup to a chair in the corner. A nurse was typing away at a computer and hadn’t noticed me yet, as far as I could tell. I wondered how long I could feasibly stay there, sitting in that chair, sipping my watery coffee, before someone asked me to leave. Hours? Days? If I could just wait it out until the repairman came, I wouldn’t have to see, or smell, the stain again. Even still, that didn’t solve the larger issue, which I could not name.

I sat there, reading the same sentence of my book over and over again, tearing my now-empty paper cup into smaller and smaller shreds, until exhaustion finally took over.

If I go home, I reasoned, and I’ll be so tired at this point that I’ll fall straight asleep on the couch. I’ll be too tired to worry about whatever the fuck is going on with my neighbors. The super was wrong. He just got the floor plan confused. It’s a big building, and he seemed pretty out of it anyway.

I compiled a convincing list of explanations, convincing enough that I was able to return to my apartment, unlock the door, toss my backpack down, and flop down on the couch without realizing that there had been two voices yelling when I arrived, and that they had suddenly gone quiet. I had fallen asleep so fast I had not noticed when the two voices began whispering again, when they became frantic. In fact, it was not the voices that woke me at all. It was the tapping.

It was still dark when I woke, and I was in such a haze I did not recognize the sound that had done it. It was rhythmic, but not mechanical.

Tap tap tap.

Pause.

Tap tap tap.

Pause.

Tap. Tap tap.

I sat up on my couch, half wondering if the mechanic was already there, if I lost track of time and it was already morning. In my half-dream state, I tried to find the source of the sound. I wish I had not looked towards the wall. I wish I had not noticed the vintage map (that I had so sought after for so long) which hung above my couch, gently quivering. Quivering in time with a tap.

Tap.

Tap tap tap.

Coming from the behind the wall.

I stopped breathing.

And everything was quiet for a moment.

Until the whisper.

“She’s awake.”    

[bluethepaladin]

This is probably a really weird ask but, do you have any book recommendations?

ooooOOOOOOoooo boy, oh buddy oh pal, this is the best ask I’ve ever gotten. Little do any of you know, I am an extreme book geek, I haunt all the book festivals, I regularly maintain my relationships with the publishing houses, and I frequent author’s conferences and writer’s workshops. Partly because I’m prepping my own manuscript and partly because I love books so much.

I real a lot, like 200 books a year on a bad year, so if you’re looking for something more specific, you just have to say so!

Here are some top ones that I think are great reads that I recommend from a variety of genres in no particular order.

And I Darken by Kiersten White

No one expects a princess to be brutal. And Lada Dragwlya likes it that way. Ever since she and her gentle younger brother, Radu, were wrenched from their homeland of Wallachia and abandoned by their father to be raised in the Ottoman courts, Lada has known that being ruthless is the key to survival. She and Radu are doomed to act as pawns in a vicious game, an unseen sword hovering over their every move. For the lineage that makes them special also makes them targets.Lada despises the Ottomans and bides her time, planning her vengeance for the day when she can return to Wallachia and claim her birthright. Radu longs only for a place where he feels safe. And when they meet Mehmed, the defiant and lonely son of the sultan, Radu feels that he’s made a true friend—and Lada wonders if she’s finally found someone worthy of her passion.But Mehmed is heir to the very empire that Lada has sworn to fight against—and that Radu now considers home. Together, Lada, Radu, and Mehmed form a toxic triangle that strains the bonds of love and loyalty to the breaking point.

The Lotus Eaters by Tatjana Soli

In the final days of a falling Saigon, The Lotus Eaters unfolds the story of three remarkable photographers brought together under the impossible umbrella of war: Helen Adams, a once-naïve ingénue whose ambition conflicts with her desire over the course of the fighting; Linh, the mysterious Vietnamese man who loves her, but is torn between conflicting loyalties to his homeland and his heart; and Sam Darrow, a man addicted to the narcotic of violence, to his intoxicating affair with Helen and to the ever-increasing danger of his job. All three become transformed by the conflict they have risked everything to record.

In this much-heralded debut, Tatjana Soli creates a searing portrait of three souls trapped by their impossible passions, contrasting the wrenching horror of combat and the treachery of obsession with the redemptive power of love.

The Host by Stephanie Meyer

Melanie Stryder refuses to fade away. The earth has been invaded by a species that take over the minds of human hosts while leaving their bodies intact. Wanderer, the invading “soul” who has been given Melanie’s body, didn’t expect to find its former tenant refusing to relinquish possession of her mind.As Melanie fills Wanderer’s thoughts with visions of Jared, a human who still lives in hiding, Wanderer begins to yearn for a man she’s never met. Reluctant allies, Wanderer and Melanie set off to search for the man they both love.

The Queen of the Tearling by Erika Johansen

Magic, adventure, mystery, and romance combine in this epic debut in which a young princess must reclaim her dead mother’s throne, learn to be a ruler—and defeat the Red Queen, a powerful and malevolent sorceress determined to destroy her.On her nineteenth birthday, Princess Kelsea Raleigh Glynn, raised in exile, sets out on a perilous journey back to the castle of her birth to ascend her rightful throne. Plain and serious, a girl who loves books and learning, Kelsea bears little resemblance to her mother, the vain and frivolous Queen Elyssa. But though she may be inexperienced and sheltered, Kelsea is not defenseless: Around her neck hangs the Tearling sapphire, a jewel of immense magical power; and accompanying her is the Queen’s Guard, a cadre of brave knights led by the enigmatic and dedicated Lazarus. Kelsea will need them all to survive a cabal of enemies who will use every weapon—from crimson-caped assassins to the darkest blood magic—to prevent her from wearing the crown.Despite her royal blood, Kelsea feels like nothing so much as an insecure girl, a child called upon to lead a people and a kingdom about which she knows almost nothing. But what she discovers in the capital will change everything, confronting her with horrors she never imagined. An act of singular daring will throw Kelsea’s kingdom into tumult, unleashing the vengeance of the tyrannical ruler of neighboring Mortmesne: the Red Queen, a sorceress possessed of the darkest magic. Now Kelsea will begin to discover whom among the servants, aristocracy, and her own guard she can trust.But the quest to save her kingdom and meet her destiny has only just begun—a wondrous journey of self-discovery and a trial by fire that will make her a legend … if she can survive.

The Martian by Andy Weir

Now, he’s sure he’ll be the first person to die there.

After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he’s alive — and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive.

Chances are, though, he won’t have time to starve to death. The damaged machinery, unforgiving environment, or plain-old “human error” are much more likely to kill him first.

But Mark isn’t ready to give up yet. Drawing on his ingenuity, his engineering skills — and a relentless, dogged refusal to quit — he steadfastly confronts one seemingly insurmountable obstacle after the next. Will his resourcefulness be enough to overcome the impossible odds against him?

Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein

Valentine Michael Smith is a human being raised on Mars, newly returned to Earth. Among his people for the first time, he struggles to understand the social mores and prejudices of human nature that are so alien to him, while teaching them his own fundamental beliefs in grokking, watersharing, and love.

Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Allire Saenz

Aristotle is an angry teen with a brother in prison. Dante is a know-it-all who has an unusual way of looking at the world. When the two meet at the swimming pool, they seem to have nothing in common. But as the loners start spending time together, they discover that they share a special friendship—the kind that changes lives and lasts a lifetime. And it is through this friendship that Ari and Dante will learn the most important truths about themselves and the kind of people they want to be.

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

Pachinko follows one Korean family through the generations, beginning in early 1900s Korea with Sunja, the prized daughter of a poor yet proud family, whose unplanned pregnancy threatens to shame them all. Deserted by her lover, Sunja is saved when a young tubercular minister offers to marry and bring her to Japan. So begins a sweeping saga of an exceptional family in exile from its homeland and caught in the indifferent arc of history. Through desperate struggles and hard-won triumphs, its members are bound together by deep roots as they face enduring questions of faith, family, and identity.

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

Oct. 11th, 1943-A British spy plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France. Its pilot and passenger are best friends. One of the girls has a chance at survival. The other has lost the game before it’s barely begun.When “Verity” is arrested by the Gestapo, she’s sure she doesn’t stand a chance. As a secret agent captured in enemy territory, she’s living a spy’s worst nightmare. Her Nazi interrogators give her a simple choice: reveal her mission or face a grisly execution.As she intricately weaves her confession, Verity uncovers her past, how she became friends with the pilot Maddie, and why she left Maddie in the wrecked fuselage of their plane. On each new scrap of paper, Verity battles for her life, confronting her views on courage, failure and her desperate hope to make it home. But will trading her secrets be enough to save her from the enemy? A Michael L. Printz Award Honor book that was called “a fiendishly-plotted mind game of a novel” in The New York Times, Code Name Verity is a visceral read of danger, resolve, and survival that shows just how far true friends will go to save each other.

When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi

For readers of Atul Gawande, Andrew Solomon, and Anne Lamott, a profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir by a young neurosurgeon faced with a terminal cancer diagnosis who attempts to answer the question What makes a life worth living?At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade’s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated. When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi’s transformation from a naïve medical student “possessed,” as he wrote, “by the question of what, given that all organisms die, makes a virtuous and meaningful life” into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a patient and new father confronting his own mortality. What makes life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when the future, no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a perpetual present? What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new life as another fades away? These are some of the questions Kalanithi wrestles with in this profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir. Paul Kalanithi died in March 2015, while working on this book, yet his words live on as a guide and a gift to us all. “I began to realize that coming face to face with my own mortality, in a sense, had changed nothing and everything,” he wrote. “Seven words from Samuel Beckett began to repeat in my head: ‘I can’t go on. I’ll go on.’” When Breath Becomes Air is an unforgettable, life-affirming reflection on the challenge of facing death and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a brilliant writer who became both.

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller

Achilles, “the best of all the Greeks,” son of the cruel sea goddess Thetis and the legendary king Peleus, is strong, swift, and beautiful irresistible to all who meet him. Patroclus is an awkward young prince, exiled from his homeland after an act of shocking violence. Brought together by chance, they forge an inseparable bond, despite risking the gods’ wrath.They are trained by the centaur Chiron in the arts of war and medicine, but when word comes that Helen of Sparta has been kidnapped, all the heroes of Greece are called upon to lay siege to Troy in her name. Seduced by the promise of a glorious destiny, Achilles joins their cause, and torn between love and fear for his friend, Patroclus follows. Little do they know that the cruel Fates will test them both as never before and demand a terrible sacrifice.

Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card

Andrew “Ender” Wiggin thinks he is playing computer simulated war games; he is, in fact, engaged in something far more desperate. The result of genetic experimentation, Ender may be the military genius Earth desperately needs in a war against an alien enemy seeking to destroy all human life. The only way to find out is to throw Ender into ever harsher training, to chip away and find the diamond inside, or destroy him utterly. Ender Wiggin is six years old when it begins. He will grow up fast.But Ender is not the only result of the experiment. The war with the Buggers has been raging for a hundred years, and the quest for the perfect general has been underway almost as long. Ender’s two older siblings, Peter and Valentine, are every bit as unusual as he is, but in very different ways. While Peter was too uncontrollably violent, Valentine very nearly lacks the capability for violence altogether. Neither was found suitable for the military’s purpose. But they are driven by their jealousy of Ender, and by their inbred drive for power. Peter seeks to control the political process, to become a ruler. Valentine’s abilities turn more toward the subtle control of the beliefs of commoner and elite alike, through powerfully convincing essays. Hiding their youth and identities behind the anonymity of the computer networks, these two begin working together to shape the destiny of Earth-an Earth that has no future at all if their brother Ender fails.

Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie

In this enchanting tale about the magic of reading and the wonder of romantic awakening, two hapless city boys are exiled to a remote mountain village for reeducation during China’s infamous Cultural Revolution. There they meet the daughter of the local tailor and discover a hidden stash of Western classics in Chinese translation. As they flirt with the seamstress and secretly devour these banned works, they find transit from their grim surroundings to worlds they never imagined.

La Belle Sauvage by Phillip Pullman

Eleven-year-old Malcolm Polstead and his dæmon, Asta, live with his parents at the Trout Inn near Oxford. Across the River Thames (which Malcolm navigates often using his beloved canoe, a boat by the name of La Belle Sauvage) is the Godstow Priory where the nuns live. Malcolm learns they have a guest with them, a baby by the name of Lyra Belacqua …

Exit West by Mohsin Hamid

In a country teetering on the brink of civil war, two young people meet—sensual, fiercely independent Nadia and gentle, restrained Saeed. They embark on a furtive love affair and are soon cloistered in a premature intimacy by the unrest roiling their city. When it explodes, turning familiar streets into a patchwork of checkpoints and bomb blasts, they begin to hear whispers about doors—doors that can whisk people far away, if perilously and for a price. As the violence escalates, Nadia and Saeed decide that they no longer have a choice. Leaving their homeland and their old lives behind, they find a door and step through. Exit West follows these characters as they emerge into an alien and uncertain future, struggling to hold on to each other, to their past, to the very sense of who they are. Profoundly intimate and powerfully inventive, it tells an unforgettable story of love, loyalty, and courage that is both completely of our time and for all time.

Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward

A searing and profound Southern odyssey.In Jesmyn Ward’s first novel since her National Book Award winning Salvage the Bones, this singular American writer brings the archetypal road novel into rural twenty-first-century America. Drawing on Morrison and Faulkner, The Odyssey and the Old Testament, Ward gives us an epochal story, a journey through Mississippi’s past and present that is both an intimate portrait of a family and an epic tale of hope and struggle. Ward is a major American writer, multiply awarded and universally lauded, and in Sing, Unburied, Sing she is at the height of her powers.Jojo and his toddler sister, Kayla, live with their grandparents, Mam and Pop, and the occasional presence of their drug-addicted mother, Leonie, on a farm on the Gulf Coast of Mississippi. Leonie is simultaneously tormented and comforted by visions of her dead brother, which only come to her when she’s high; Mam is dying of cancer; and quiet, steady Pop tries to run the household and teach Jojo how to be a man. When the white father of Leonie’s children is released from prison, she packs her kids and a friend into her car and sets out across the state for Parchman farm, the Mississippi State Penitentiary, on a journey rife with danger and promise.Sing, Unburied, Sing grapples with the ugly truths at the heart of the American story and the power, and limitations, of the bonds of family. Rich with Ward’s distinctive, musical language, Sing, Unburied, Sing is a majestic new work and an essential contribution to American literature.

Artemis by Andy Weir

Jazz Bashara is a criminal.Well, sort of. Life on Artemis, the first and only city on the moon, is tough if you’re not a rich tourist or an eccentric billionaire. So smuggling in the occasional harmless bit of contraband barely counts, right? Not when you’ve got debts to pay and your job as a porter barely covers the rent.Everything changes when Jazz sees the chance to commit the perfect crime, with a reward too lucrative to turn down. But pulling off the impossible is just the start of her problems, as she learns that she’s stepped square into a conspiracy for control of Artemis itself—and that now, her only chance at survival lies in a gambit even riskier than the first.

Sleeping Giants by Sylvain Neuvel

A girl named Rose is riding her new bike near her home in Deadwood, South Dakota, when she falls through the earth. She wakes up at the bottom of a square hole, its walls glowing with intricate carvings. But the firemen who come to save her peer down upon something even stranger: a little girl in the palm of a giant metal hand.Seventeen years later, the mystery of the bizarre artifact remains unsolved—its origins, architects, and purpose unknown. Its carbon dating defies belief; military reports are redacted; theories are floated, then rejected.But some can never stop searching for answers.Rose Franklin is now a highly trained physicist leading a top secret team to crack the hand’s code. And along with her colleagues, she is being interviewed by a nameless interrogator whose power and purview are as enigmatic as the provenance of the relic. What’s clear is that Rose and her compatriots are on the edge of unraveling history’s most perplexing discovery—and figuring out what it portends for humanity. But once the pieces of the puzzle are in place, will the result prove to be an instrument of lasting peace or a weapon of mass destruction?An inventive debut in the tradition of World War Z and The Martian, told in interviews, journal entries, transcripts, and news articles, Sleeping Giants is a thriller fueled by a quest for truth—and a fight for control of earthshaking power.

American War by Omar El Akkad

Sarat Chestnut, born in Louisiana, is only six when the Second American Civil War breaks out in 2074. But even she knows that oil is outlawed, that Louisiana is half underwater, that unmanned drones fill the sky. And when her father is killed and her family is forced into Camp Patience for displaced persons, she quickly begins to be shaped by her particular time and place until, finally, through the influence of a mysterious functionary, she is turned into a deadly instrument of war. Telling her story is her nephew, Benjamin Chestnut, born during war – part of the Miraculous Generation – now an old man confronting the dark secret of his past, his family’s role in the conflict and, in particular, that of his aunt, a woman who saved his life while destroying untold others.

Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil Degrasse Tyson

The essential universe, from our most celebrated and beloved astrophysicist.What is the nature of space and time? How do we fit within the universe? How does the universe fit within us? There’s no better guide through these mind-expanding questions than acclaimed astrophysicist and best-selling author Neil deGrasse Tyson.But today, few of us have time to contemplate the cosmos. So Tyson brings the universe down to Earth succinctly and clearly, with sparkling wit, in tasty chapters consumable anytime and anywhere in your busy day.While you wait for your morning coffee to brew, for the bus, the train, or a plane to arrive, Astrophysics for People in a Hurry will reveal just what you need to be fluent and ready for the next cosmic headlines: from the Big Bang to black holes, from quarks to quantum mechanics, and from the search for planets to the search for life in the universe.

The Leavers by Lisa Ko

One morning, Deming Guo’s mother, an undocumented Chinese immigrant named Polly, goes to her job at the nail salon and never comes home. No one can find any trace of her.With his mother gone, eleven-year-old Deming is left with no one to care for him. He is eventually adopted by two white college professors who move him from the Bronx to a small town upstate. They rename him Daniel Wilkinson in their efforts to make him over into their version of an “all-American boy.” But far away from all he’s ever known, Daniel struggles to reconcile his new life with his mother’s disappearance and the memories of the family and community he left behind.Set in New York and China, The Leavers is a vivid and moving examination of borders and belonging. It’s the story of how one boy comes into his own when everything he’s loved has been taken away–and how a mother learns to live with the mistakes of her past.This powerful debut is the winner of the 2016 PEN/Bellwether Prize for fiction, awarded by Barbara Kingsolver for a novel that addresses issues of social justice.

The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzie Lee

Henry “Monty” Montague was born and bred to be a gentleman, but he was never one to be tamed. The finest boarding schools in England and the constant disapproval of his father haven’t been able to curb any of his roguish passions—not for gambling halls, late nights spent with a bottle of spirits, or waking up in the arms of women or men.But as Monty embarks on his Grand Tour of Europe, his quest for a life filled with pleasure and vice is in danger of coming to an end. Not only does his father expect him to take over the family’s estate upon his return, but Monty is also nursing an impossible crush on his best friend and traveling companion, Percy.Still it isn’t in Monty’s nature to give up. Even with his younger sister, Felicity, in tow, he vows to make this yearlong escapade one last hedonistic hurrah and flirt with Percy from Paris to Rome. But when one of Monty’s reckless decisions turns their trip abroad into a harrowing manhunt that spans across Europe, it calls into question everything he knows, including his relationship with the boy he adores.

These are just some good ones that I’ve read or reread recently! Let me know if you need more, or are looking for something from a more specific genre! Chances are I can find you something good to read!

[laularlau8]

The history of India’s independence and the creation of Pakistan had been unfamiliar to Gillian Anderson when she took the role of Lady Mountbatten for her new film Viceroy’s House. The actor had once hired a private history tutor, a dozen years ago, to fill in some gaps of history she was hazy on – “Stuff that just wasn’t in my brain” – but this had not been one of them.

“No, I’d thought let me start with a couple of things that I don’t actually know that much about, or I can’t remember that much about, which was the first and second world wars.” She starts to laugh. “But it was a disaster. Because I have no memory. I took notes, blah, blah, blah, but couldn’t remember a thing he taught me. Nothing. I’m not even sure, if you’d asked me the next day, I could have told you what I’d learned. You know, even my favourite books, I couldn’t tell you what they were about. It’s always been that way.”

The menopause hasn’t helped, and lately things have become so bad that she’s going to get herself tested to see if she might actually be dyslexic. “Somebody had said to me that dyslexia isn’t just about seeing words backwards, it’s also about the assimilation of information. I’d always been afraid to look into it, because I was afraid that if I found something out, I would think that I couldn’t do anything that I wanted to do. I have this impression that I can do whatever I make up my mind to. But the reality is...” She lets the sentence fall away with a grimace.

By a bit of luck, the one thing the actor has always been able to remember are her lines. “But of course that’s terrifying for me, thinking, well, what if this problem that exists in the rest of my life shows up in that respect, too? Then I’d be buggered.”

If this creates an impression of a ditzy blonde, it would be misleading. We meet at the photographer’s studio, where a rack of stylist’s clothes stands unused; she chooses to be photographed in her own, and the way she chuckles about this makes me think the preference is par for the course for Anderson on shoots. Her fitted black trouser suit and heels are a sort of corporate/fashion hybrid, and her manner is similarly friendly but business-like. Apart from her enormous eyes, everything about Anderson is tiny, and the compactness reinforces the sense of efficient self-possession she conveys. She was just 24 when, as FBI agent Dana Scully in the paranormal TV drama that would make her a global star, she captivated X-Files fans for 10 years with her hyper-rational cool, before moving to London where her career has been equally sure-footed. From period dramas (Bleak House, House Of Mirth, War And Peace) to big-budget TV series (Hannibal, The Fall), to independent movies (The Last King Of Scotland, A Cock And Bull Story), comedy (Boogie Woogie, Johnny English Reborn) and theatre (A Doll’s House, A Streetcar Named Desire), Anderson seems to get busier the older she gets. It’s a tall order for a beautiful blonde to play consistently powerful, intelligent women, but Anderson has pulled it off.

The actor brings her air of serious purpose to the role of Lady Mountbatten, giving us a less flighty version of the aristocrat than the good-time girl caricature we’ve been accustomed to. She evokes her character’s classic colonial glamour, but depicts her dashing about nursing the sick and injured, and being a generally good egg.

“One of the things that I was surprised by in studying Edwina was that there was certainly a turning point in her life when she went from being predominantly a socialite, and wafting around and having affairs, living pretty much from holiday to holiday and leaving her children at home. But when the war happened and she started to participate in nursing et cetera, her escapism completely switched over to being of service, so everything she did from that moment on was about properly digging in and working around the clock.”

Viceroy’s House opens with the arrival in India of Lord Mountbatten and his wife in 1947, to oversee the nation’s transition from colonial rule to independence. Hugh Bonneville plays Edwina’s husband, and their official residence – Viceroy’s House – is not so much the film’s setting as the third star member of the cast. Sumptuously filmed, at moments the movie is a sort of Downton Abbey of the Raj, with all sorts of romantic intrigue going on below stairs among the 500 Hindu, Sikh and Muslim household staff. But there is not so much as a hint of the affair Lady Mountbatten was rumoured to take up with the man about to become India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru. Their romance was to have been the subject of a 2009 film, Indian Summer, until the Indian government took exception to the salacious storyline and forced the movie to be cancelled. In the hands of British director Gurinder Chadha, whose own family were among the 14 million displaced in the violence and bloodshed of the period, this new version of India’s independence is less racy, if rather more substantial, and concerns itself with the politics of partition.

Anderson says she was always conscious while making the film that some viewers will find the concept of a “good” colonialist inherently problematic – “yes, absolutely, absolutely” – and 70 years after independence, she found herself revisiting colonialism’s dynamics on location. They filmed in Jodhpur, staying at the Umaid Bhawan Palace hotel, where the film was also shot, using the palace to double for the real Viceroy’s House. “And, you know, we’re in a situation where we’re in a developing country and we are filming at the height of luxury and, yes, there’s an uneasiness to it. There was one actor we worked with, who does a lot of work around the world in – I can’t remember whether it’s around poverty or Aids – who would not stay there. He refused to stay in the hotel, and wanted to stay in some place that felt more like India.”

Even by the standards of activist actors, Anderson’s own involvement in social and political causes is prolific. The 48-year-old has campaigned variously for women’s rights in Afghanistan, against sexual violence towards girls in Myanmar, for better access to HIV treatment in South Africa and education in Uganda, against domestic violence in the UK and child trafficking across the globe, for the rights of indigenous tribes in South America and conservation of cheetahs in Namibia, against deforestation in the Amazon and rabbit fur farms in China – and that is nothing like the full list. I was therefore expecting her to be quite forthright about current political affairs, but am completely wrong.

“I generally have a tendency to steer away from outright political discussion in interviews, because I am an actor, and there’s so much that I don’t understand, and I don’t for a second feel like I have a right to that platform. I don’t want to get into a discussion about Trump or about Brexit or any of that – I feel it’s best left to people who really understand the very, very complex issues. Not for a second am I going to pitch in, because I don’t really know what it is that I’m talking about. I have opinions, but I don’t think my opinions are more valid because I’m an actor and have more of a platform than others.”

I wonder if this is her way of saying she shares the view that actors ought to stop turning awards ceremonies into anti-Trump rallies, but she looks faintly alarmed. “No, no, no, I’m not saying that at all. I’m only talking about myself. I don’t have an opinion on whether or not actors should speak out.”

She has, on the other hand, just co-written a book called We: A Manifesto For Women Everywhere. Rather like Anderson, it is less polemical than one might guess from the title, and more a manual for spiritual self-improvement. Co-written with her close friend Jennifer Nadel, a former barrister and BBC documentary maker, Anderson has described it as a work of advice to her younger self. “I have struggled with self-esteem myself,” she said last year, “and in looking at the ways that I have dealt with overcoming those things, I started to think that maybe some of it might be potentially useful for other people of all ages.”

According to the introduction, it is a “manifesto for a female-led revolution”, and Anderson stresses that it is “not a self-help book”, although it reads a lot like one. Chapters are called things like Acceptance: Making Friends With What Is, and Courage: Ending The Victim Trap, and its pages promise to “change your life”. It prescribes a detailed programme of fairly recognisable techniques, which range from meditation, affirmations (“This is who I am and I’m glad to be me”), messages to oneself on Post-it notes stuck to the bathroom mirror (“My name is Decca. I am a good and kind person. I do not need to please everyone. I do enough. I am enough.”) and a nightly gratitude list of reasons to feel grateful to the universe. As is often the case with this sort of book, I find myself torn between cynical giggles and the mesmerising thought: what if it works?

Anderson swears it does, but she has such cut-glass British poise that I struggle to picture her solemnly reciting affirmations. It might have been easier to reconcile her voice with the book’s rather Californian, new-age tone had we met in America, for she is what’s called bidialectal; when in the US, she speaks in an American accent, but here she sounds completely British, and says she has no control over it. “I was in Los Angeles recently with a couple of Brits and I thought, I’m going to see what it’s like to talk among Americans with a British accent, and I felt so uncomfortable. It felt so disingenuous, and I kept thinking they must think I’m a complete twat. But when I’m here, it’s nearly impossible for me to maintain an American accent.”

Anderson was born in Chicago but moved to London aged five, while her father attended film school in the city. When she was 11, the family moved back to the States, to Michigan, but continued to spend summers in London, and by her early teens Anderson was rattling off the rails. Punk rock, drugs, an addict girlfriend and a much older boyfriend all featured heavily in her adolescence, and her classmates weren’t wrong when they voted her “most likely to get arrested”. On the night of graduation, she broke into her school to try to glue the locks shut, and was charged with trespass.

She has been in therapy since the age of 14, and the book is interspersed with personal passages on her own experience of mental-health difficulties. “There were times,” she tells me, “when it was really bad. There have been times in my life where I haven’t wanted to leave the house.” But there’s a bit of a dance between disclosure and discretion, because whenever I ask her to elaborate on the personal vignettes in the book, she shuts down.

I kept hearing myself say, ‘I’ve got to slow down, I’ve got to slow down, I’ve got to slow down’

The book contains enough 12-step-style advice to make me think addiction issues went beyond teenage experimentation for Anderson, and when I say so, she nods. Could she say a little more? “No.” After 24 years in therapy, and writing the book, I’m guessing she has a good idea where her problems stem from, but the question receives a chilly, “Pourquoi?” There are “quite a few”, she says, but “I would have put them in the book if I wanted to talk about them out loud.”

Her first husband was a Canadian art director she met on the set of The X-Filesand married at 25. Their daughter Piper was born a year later, but the marriage was over within three years; her second marriage, in 2004, to a journalist and producer, ended within two. Months later, she announced she was pregnant, and had two sons – Oscar, now 11, and Felix, nine – with a British businessman, before they split up five years ago.

I’m curious about how a single mother who has been working flat out for 25 years (she was back on the X-Files set nine days after giving birth to Piper) can even find the time to practise all the spiritual techniques her book recommends.

“Well,” she smiles, “I’ve definitely deliberately slowed down. Because I kept hearing myself say, ‘I’ve got to slow down, I’ve got to slow down, I’ve got to slow down.’ I must have said that for 10 years, or maybe even 20 years. I was just sick and tired of hearing myself. I just thought, why do I do this to myself, and why have I done it for so long? People would laugh at me because I’d be like, ‘I had an extra 10 minutes, so I stopped in to say hi, you know.’ It became enough of a joke among my friends that I had to start paying attention to it. So one of the things I try really hard now to do is, no matter what, after I drop the kids, I go back home so I can meditate.”

Why has she always pushed herself so hard? “Well, the bigger-picture part is that I’m responsible for quite a lot of people financially, so it’s that. But it’s also a little bit of fear of what happens when one slows down. When I think about an empty period of time, fear comes up. I’m quite good at being on my own, so it’s not necessarily fear of myself, but probably fear of facing those things like: why do I drive myself so hard?”

Does she really compile a list of things to feel grateful for every day? “Yes! I do a gratitude list every night. I mean, it’s in my head now, but I go through stages where I think I’m just complaining all the time again. It’s too floating in my head, it needs to be on paper.” Complaining all the time is “probably one of the things I struggle with most. I suffer from great intolerance. Such intolerance of so much.” Such as? “Oh, intolerance of myself. Intolerance of situations. Intolerance of people on the street. Intolerance of whatever. So I have to constantly settle myself down from the state of being aggravated.”

I try to picture her stropping about, grumbling about roadworks or noisy neighbours, and find this image easier to conjure than the new-age version of her intoning, “My name is Gillian Anderson, I am a good and kind person.” She has a steeliness about her that I really like, but whether it’s proof of the success of her spiritual techniques or indicates the limits of their powers, I can’t decide. She certainly feels like someone in full control of herself and her life, and if this keeps her at a slightly cool distance, it is also rather enviable.

She says she used to be pitilessly intolerant of her own physical self, but won’t elaborate on how that manifested itself, because she refuses to allow herself that line of thinking. “I will not go there. I simply will not allow it any more. Because the things that we might be critical of ourselves about actually don’t matter. The only thing that really matters in terms of our peace of mind is our peace of mind itself, and how we react to things. All I know is that when I meditate, one goes beyond the physical, and it is possible to tap into a sense of absolute contentment and joy in that place. So if that’s where you’re starting, then actually none of this,” and she gestures to her body, “means anything, really.”

How is it possible for a working actor to liberate herself from concerns about physical appearance, when her existence is so entwined in it? After eight seconds of silence, she replies: “I don’t know. I mean, as I get older, I imagine the roles that I’m able to get are going to change. There will be a certain point where I’ll make the decision to go grey, you know. There might be a certain point where I decide that it’s silly for me to continue being blond when I’m in my 60s. I’ve also always wanted to direct, I’ve also always wanted to be an artist. Maybe when the kids are out of college, I can decide to downsize and go grey and get less work.”

The art of acceptance is one of her new book’s biggest themes. As someone who is terrible at it, I’ve never been sure how realistic an ambition true acceptance really is.

“Well, there’s an opportunity for fear around every corner, fear of the future, fear of what if,” Anderson says. “But the acceptance of wherever we are, whoever we are, is freedom. So, you know, I can sit and bemoan the fact that I don’t get the same roles, or bemoan the fact that my skin is starting to look like chicken skin, or bemoan whatever it is. But that’s not reality. That’s fighting reality.”

[inloveandwords]

This post was inspired by Ally’s series (which was inspired by Lia at Lost in a Story).

It works like this

Go to your Goodreads to-read shelf.

Order on ascending date added.

Take the first 5 (or 10 (or even more!) if you’re feeling adventurous) books

Read the synopsis of the books

Decide: keep it or should it go?

  Trial by Fire (Worldwalker #1) by Josephine Angelini

The exhilaratingly seductive new series from the author of the bestselling Starcrossed series

Love burns. Worlds collide. Magic reigns.

This world is trying to kill Lily Proctor. Her life-threatening allergies keep her from enjoying many of the experiences that other teenagers take for granted… which is why she is determined to enjoy her first (and perhaps only) high-school party. But Lily’s life never goes according to plan, and after a humiliating incident in front of half her graduating class Lily wishes she could just disappear.

Suddenly Lily is in a different Salem – one overrun with horrifying creatures and ruled by powerful women called Crucibles. Strongest and cruellest of all the Crucibles is Lillian… Lily’s identical other self in this alternate universe. This new version of her world is terrifyingly sensual, and Lily is soon overwhelmed by new experiences.

Lily realizes that what makes her weak at home is exactly what makes her extraordinary in New Salem. It also puts her life in danger. Thrown into a world she doesn’t understand, Lily is torn between responsibilities she can’t hope to shoulder alone, and a love she never expected.

But how can Lily be the saviour of this world when she is literally her own worst enemy?

Date added to TBR: Dec 06, 2016 Keep or Ditch? Keep Comments: This one is actually on my bookshelf. I think it looks super interesting.

♥ ♥ ♥

King of the Stars (Starcross Series Book 1) by Elle Michaels

With the galaxy in upheaval, its future rests in the hands of a usurped warrior king and the farm girl that appears in his dreams.

Vi Junrah has never left her home planet. She spends nights staring into the stars, feeling as though she belongs among them, despite the Ansuli people being a humble, unassuming race. She’s always felt different, taller, paler, questioning, and alone. When a spaceship crash lands in the plains during the harvest festival, Vi’s curiosity gets the better of her. A brawny alien man lumbers out and sweeps her into space…for better or worse.

Orin Tarrastone spends restless nights toiling over haunting dreams of a beautiful woman appearing in darkness, a woman he can never reach. When his father, the galactic king, dies at the hands of an invading rebel army, Orin is forced into exile. After blacking out at the controls of his ship, he awakens to find the dream girl on a planet at the edge of the galaxy. Facing few options, and finding their mysterious meeting serendipitous, he steals her in hopes that she holds the key to a triumphant return to the throne.

The two attempt to unravel the mysteries of both their pasts while fate seemingly entwines their futures. Against the backdrop of galactic chaos, interstellar empires, invading rebels, pirates, and outlaws, Orin and Vi find themselves inexplicably drawn together facing it all.

Date added to TBR: Dec 06, 2016 Keep or Ditch? Ditch Comments: I’m 100% judging a book by its cover and rating here, but this just does not appeal to me anymore.

♥ ♥ ♥

Half-Blood (Covenant #1) by Jennifer L. Armentrout

The Hematoi descend from the unions of gods and mortals, and the children of two Hematoi pure bloods have godlike powers. Children of Hematoi and mortals–well, not so much. Half-bloods only have two options: become trained Sentinels who hunt and kill daimons or become servants in the homes of the pures.

Seventeen-year-old Alexandria would rather risk her life fighting than waste it scrubbing toilets, but she may end up slumming it anyway. There are several rules that students at the Covenant must follow. Alex has problems with them all, but especially rule #1:Relationships between pures and halfs are forbidden. Unfortunately, she’s crushing hard on the totally hot pure-blood Aiden. But falling for Aiden isn’t her biggest problem–staying alive long enough to graduate the Covenant and become a Sentinel is.

If she fails in her duty, she faces a future worse than death or slavery: being turned into a daimon, and being hunted by Aiden. And that would kind of suck.

Date added to TBR: Dec 06, 2016 Keep or Ditch? Keep Comments: I really need to give this author another chance. I didn’t love the first book in her Lux series, but she’s so popular and this seems to be a pretty popular book.

♥ ♥ ♥

Silver Shadows (Bloodlines #5) by Richelle Mead

Sydney Sage is an Alchemist, one of a group of humans who dabble in magic and serve to bridge the worlds of humans and vampires. They protect vampire secrets—and human lives.

In The Fiery Heart, Sydney risked everything to follow her gut, walking a dangerous line to keep her feelings hidden from the Alchemists.

Now in the aftermath of an event that ripped their world apart, Sydney and Adrian struggle to pick up the pieces and find their way back to each other. But first, they have to survive.

For Sydney, trapped and surrounded by adversaries, life becomes a daily struggle to hold on to her identity and the memories of those she loves. Meanwhile, Adrian clings to hope in the face of those who tell him Sydney is a lost cause, but the battle proves daunting as old demons and new temptations begin to seize hold of him. . . .

Their worst fears now a chilling reality, Sydney and Adrian face their darkest hour in this heart-pounding fifth installment in the New York Times bestselling Bloodlines series, where all bets are off.

Date added to TBR: Dec 06, 2016 Keep or Ditch? Ditch Comments: I’m not saying I will never read another book in this series, I’m just saying I won’t read it right now… but I probably won’t finish this series lol

♥ ♥ ♥

The Ruby Circle (Bloodlines #6) by Richelle Mead

THEY WILL BE TESTED

Sydney Sage is an Alchemist, one of a group of humans who dabble in magic and serve to bridge the worlds of humans and vampires. They protect vampire secrets – and human lives.

Their forbidden romance exposed, Sydney and Adrian find themselves facing the wrath of both the Alchemists and the Moroi in this electrifying conclusion to Richelle Mead’s bestselling Bloodlines series.

When the life of someone they both love is put on the line, Sydney risks everything to hunt down a deadly former nemesis. Meanwhile, she and Adrian becomes enmeshed in a puzzle that could hold the key to a shocking secret about spirit magic, a secret that could shake the entire Moroi world and alter their lives forever.

Don’t miss their unforgettable final chapter…

LOVE WILL CONQUER ALL

Date added to TBR: Dec 06, 2016 Keep or Ditch? Ditch Comments: ” ”

♥ ♥ ♥

Night of Cake & Puppets (Daughter of Smoke & Bone #2.5) by Laini Taylor

In this stand-alone companion to the New York Times bestselling Daughter of Smoke & Bone series comes the story of Mik and Zuzana’s fantastical first date—as a gorgeously illustrated gift edition with bonus content included.

Petite though she may be, Zuzana is not known for timidity. Her best friend, Karou, calls her “rabid fairy,” her “voodoo eyes” are said to freeze blood, and even her older brother fears her wrath. But when it comes to the simple matter of talking to Mik, or “Violin Boy,” her courage deserts her. Now, enough is enough. Zuzana is determined to make the first move, and she has a fistful of magic and a plan. It’s a wonderfully elaborate treasure hunt of a plan that will take Mik all over Prague on a cold winter’s night before leading him to the treasure: herself! Violin Boy is not going to know what hit him.

New York Times bestselling author Laini Taylor brings to life a night only hinted at in the Daughter of Smoke & Bone trilogy—the magical first date of fan-favorites Zuzana and Mik. Originally published as an ebook, this new print edition will include breathtaking black and white illustrations, plus bonus content in a gorgeous package perfect for new and current fans of the series.

Date added to TBR: Dec 06, 2016 Keep or Ditch?  Keep Comments: I will absolutely read this one! I love this series!

♥ ♥ ♥

The Lost Prince (The Iron Fey: Call of the Forgotten #1) by Julie Kagawa

Don’t look at Them. Never let Them know you can see Them.

That is Ethan Chase’s unbreakable rule. Until the fey he avoids at all costs—including his reputation—begin to disappear, and Ethan is attacked. Now he must change the rules to protect his family. To save a girl he never thought he’d dare to fall for.

Ethan thought he had protected himself from his older sister’s world—the land of Faery. His previous time in the Iron Realm left him with nothing but fear and disgust for the world Meghan Chase has made her home, a land of myth and talking cats, of magic and seductive enemies. But when destiny comes for Ethan, there is no escape from a danger long, long forgotten.

My name is Ethan Chase. And I may not live to see my eighteenth birthday.

Date added to TBR: Dec 06, 2016 Keep or Ditch? Keep Comments: What I’m realizing here is that I’m heavily influenced by high ratings from a lot of people. This is one of those books, so on my TBR it stays.

♥ ♥ ♥

Stay by Deb Caletti

Clara’s relationship with Christian is intense from the start, and like nothing she’s ever experienced before. But what starts as devotion quickly becomes obsession, and it’s almost too late before Clara realizes how far gone Christian is and what he’s willing to do to make her stay.

Now Clara has left the city and Christian behind. No one back home has any idea where she is, but she still struggles to shake off her fear. She knows Christian won’t let her go that easily, and that no matter how far she runs, it may not be far enough….

Date added to TBR: Dec 06, 2016 Keep or Ditch? Keep Comments: I don’t even have to read the synopsis. Yes. It is my mission to read all of Deb Caletti’s books.

♥ ♥ ♥

Honey, Baby, Sweetheart by Deb Caletti

Right away I got that Something About To Happen feeling. Right away I knew he was bad, and that it didn’t matter.

It is summer in the Northwest town of Nine Mile Falls, and sixteen-year-old Ruby McQueen, ordinarily dubbed The Quiet Girl, finds herself hanging out with gorgeous, rich, thrill-seeking Travis Becker. But Ruby is in over her head, and finds she is risking more and more when she’s with him.

In an effort to keep Ruby occupied, Ruby’s mother Ann drags Ruby to the weekly book club she runs. When it is discovered that one of the group”s own members is the subject of the tragic love story they are reading, Ann and Ruby spearhead a reunion between the long-ago lovers. But for Ruby, this mission turns out to be much more than just a road trip….

Date added to TBR: Dec 06, 2016 Keep or Ditch? Keep Comments: ” ”

♥ ♥ ♥

The Story of Us by Deb Caletti

Cricket’s on a self-imposed break from her longtime boyfriend—but she’s picked a bad week to sort out her love life. For one thing, her mother’s romance is taking center stage: After jilting two previous fiancés, her mom is finally marrying Dan Jax, whom Cricket loves. But as wedding attendees arrive for a week of festivities at a guesthouse whose hippie owners have a sweet, sexy son—Ash—complications arise: Cricket’s future stepsisters make it clear they’re not happy about the marriage. An old friend decides this is the week to declare his love for Cricket. Grandpa chooses to reveal a big secret at a family gathering. Dan’s ex-wife shows up. And even the dogs—Cricket’s old, ill Jupiter and Dan’s young, lively Cruiser—seem to be declaring war.

While Cricket fears that Dan is in danger of becoming ditched husband-to-be number three, she’s also alarmed by her own desires. Because even though her boyfriend looms large in her mind, Ash is right in front of her….

Date added to TBR: Dec 06, 2016 Keep or Ditch? Keep Comments: ” ”

♥ ♥ ♥

Here are the stats

Starting Total TBR Count: 2041 Updated Total TBR Count: 2038 Total Ditched Today: 3 Total Kept Today: 7

This post was inspired by Ally’s series (which was inspired by Lia at Lost in a Story…

[biofunmy]

Alexander Acosta, Twitter, Rip Torn: Your Wednesday Briefing

(Want to get this briefing by email? Here’s the sign-up.)

Good morning.

We’re covering the Jeffrey Epstein case and its consequences for the Trump administration, Twitter’s new guidelines on offensive speech, and the death of the maverick presidential candidate Ross Perot.

Breaking

Britain’s ambassador to the U.S., Kim Darroch, is stepping down. A leak of his memos had elicited a furious reaction from President Trump.

Pressure builds on Trump’s labor chief

Alexander Acosta, the labor secretary, is facing growing calls to resign over a plea deal he cut as a U.S. attorney in Florida in 2008 that allowed the financier Jeffrey Epstein to bring an end to a sex crimes case and to serve only 13 months in jail. Mr. Epstein was newly indicted this week on charges of child sex trafficking.

The 2008 deal was seen by many as far too lenient, and, while Mr. Acosta cited new evidence and testimony in welcoming Mr. Epstein’s latest indictment, his critics are unlikely to be satisfied.

Voices: In a series of meticulously researched articles for The Miami Herald, Julie Brown, an investigative journalist, identified about 80 of Mr. Epstein’s alleged victims and revealed the secret negotiations behind the 2008 plea deal. She spoke to The Times on Tuesday about the latest developments in the case.

Go deeper: The Times has profiled Mr. Epstein, a money manager who once socialized with princes and celebrities while remaining an enigma.

Notable: Mr. Epstein’s influential friends included former President Bill Clinton. President Trump once called the financier a “terrific guy” but now says he is “not a fan.”

New Twitter rules for a president (and for everyone else)

A federal appeals court ruled on Tuesday that President Trump had violated the Constitution by blocking Twitter users who criticized or mocked him. Because he uses Twitter to conduct government business, the court said, he could not exclude Americans from reading or engaging with his posts because he did not like their opinions.

The ruling was one of the highest-profile decisions yet in a growing constellation of cases addressing what the First Amendment means in a time when political expression increasingly takes place online.

Related: Twitter unveiled its first official guidelines on Tuesday on what constitutes “dehumanizing” speech, starting with language it considers unacceptable when directed toward religious groups.

Ross Perot, gadfly who shook up politics, dies at 89

Mr. Perot was a Texas businessman who ran for president twice in the 1990s on a third-party platform that idealized small-town life and tarred Washington as a hotbed of corruption. He died on Tuesday.

French bosses are accused of driving employees to suicide

A decade ago, top executives at France Télécom wanted to shrink the company by thousands of workers. But most of those workers were state employees with jobs guaranteed for life.

The executives, prosecutors say, resolved to make life so unbearable that workers would leave. Instead, at least 35 — feeling trapped and betrayed — took their own lives. The former executives now face charges of “moral harassment.”

Big picture: The trial has riveted a country that is deeply conflicted about capitalism and corporate culture, and raises questions about how far companies should go in search of profit and efficiency.

If you have 8 minutes, this is worth it

A legendary newspaper stops the presses

A newsboy selling The Chicago Defender in 1942.CreditJack Delano/Farm Security Administration, via Library of Congress

For generations, The Chicago Defender was a voice for African-American communities and an essential outlet for any politician who hoped to win black voters.

The Defender — which first went to press in 1905 — will cease printing after today, though its digital operation will continue.

Here’s what else is happening

Court blocks census moves: A federal judge in New York rejected the Justice Department’s request to switch its legal team midway through a case that challenges the Trump administration’s effort to add a citizenship question to next year’s count.

Democrats bicker: Tensions between Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the House, and three liberal freshmen have reinvigorated an argument within the Democratic Party about how best to stand up to the president.

Obamacare under fire: A panel of federal judges heard oral arguments on Tuesday in an appeals case that challenges the Affordable Care Act’s constitutionality — and they sounded skeptical of the arguments in its defense.

Border arrests drop: Arrests at the southwestern border dropped by 28 percent in June, to 104,344. In May, they had reached the highest monthly total in 13 years. (Border crossings typically increase in the spring and slip in June and July.)

Snapshot: Above, floods inundated Washington on Monday, demonstrating the vulnerability of an aging storm-water system in the era of climate change.

Late-night comedy: Most shows are in reruns, so our column is taking the week off.

In memoriam: Rip Torn, who starred on “The Larry Sanders Show” in the 1990s, died on Tuesday in Connecticut. He was 88.

Ex-champion advances at Wimbledon: Serena Williams beat Barbora Strycova to reach the semifinals. If Ms. Williams wins the tournament, she would match Margaret Court’s record of 24 Grand Slam singles titles.

A new “fish” for sale: Impossible Foods, creator of a meatless burger, is introducing a (fish-less) fish product. The company has promised to design replacements for every animal-based food on the market by 2035.

What we’re reading: This first-person essay in Harper’s Bazaar by Serena Williams about her heated U.S. Open match last year, accompanied by unretouched photos. Alisha Haridasani Gupta, on the briefings team, says, “It’s the tennis star at her most raw, unfiltered self.”

Now, a break from the news

Cook: They’re s’mores without the campfire, but these blondies are still great.

Listen: The video to Miley Cyrus’s “Mother’s Daughter” offers assorted fetish wear, a determinedly inclusive cast of extras, and slogans. It’s an anthem to share.

Watch: The writer and director Ari Aster narrates a scene from his film “Midsommar” featuring Florence Pugh and some powerful mushroom tea.

Smarter Living: Don’t struggle for perfection. Two strategies can help you just get a job done. First, break the task into small, achievable steps. Second, focus on the process rather than the outcome so you can enjoy the progress you’re making.

And here’s how you can make small changes in your behavior, surroundings and relationships for a happier life.

And now for the Back Story on …

Modern manners

For a psychoactive substance that’s still nominally illegal in most of the world, cannabis has never been more popular — and that means it’s time to mind our manners beyond “don’t bogart that joint.”

Lizzie Post, the great-great-granddaughter of the American etiquette doyenne Emily Post, delves into the finer points with a new book called “Higher Etiquette,” which Dwight Garner, a Times book critic, calls “helpful and inquisitive.”

Among her recommendations: Thoughtful hosts should provide finger bowls so a guest can dampen a joint that’s burning unevenly, and should place vape pens “to the right of the setting or across the top of the setting either between the place card and dessertware or behind the place card.”

As for bogarting — that’s wastefully hanging on to a joint without smoking it — Ms. Post notes that the term is “derived from the way Humphrey Bogart would just let a cigarette hang out of his mouth, not seeming to actually smoke it.”

That’s it for this briefing. See you next time.

— Mike

Thank you To Mark Josephson and Eleanor Stanford for the break from the news. Adam Pasick, on the briefings team, wrote today’s Back Story. You can reach the team at briefing@nytimes.com.

P.S. • We’re listening to “The Daily.” Today’s episode is on the plan to elect Republican women. • Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Site of a recent Trump/Kim meeting, for short (3 letters). You can find all our puzzles here. • The travel editor for The New York Times, Amy Virshup, announced that her desk would buy carbon offsets for airplane travel by staff members on assignment, including our 52 Places Traveler.

Sahred From Source link World News

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[les-bi-katamari]

SESSION 12

We pick up right there in the middle of the road. The carriage-driver has taken off - Brianne tells Ghorza her demon book was in it.

Ghorza turns to the soldiers, unarmed, and says, “I hope you can believe that we are not your enemies.” We start talking about the undead in the forest - the soldiers were entirely unaware of them, saying it sounded impossible since ranger captains regularly patrol the forest. We started asking them more about Theris, and tell them the real story, and ask if any of the rangers have gone missing. They suddenly start to remember many, many, many people who have vanished, that they hadn’t been thinking of, how could they not have realized -

Ghorza suddenly remembers the thing Megs had saw, that had stolen their memories of it. When she brings it up, Megs doesn’t really know much, but says that it’s very “out of sight, out of mind.”

While Ghorza tries to comfort them, Apphia and Brianne go to investigate the Purifier’s sword. Apphia managed to pick it up, with no adverse affects aside from getting a faint sense of the violence inherent in it.

Brianne examines the sword more. The Abyssal text is similar to what we’ve seen before; only the gold in the runes is different. Gold is, of course, a metal associated with purity - and Lyrae’s scales and leaves were also gold. It seems to be significantly associated with more powerful monsters. This transformation was also instantaneous, with no prolonged ritual necessary, and produced a much stronger creature. The ritual may have been prepared ahead of time?

Reminder note: one of Galaias’s epithets is ‘the golden-scaled’

Most of the people the soldiers have been talking about are outriders, rangers. Apphia recognizes a couple from her friendship with one of her dad’s guards? Brianne retrieves the fake warrant from the ground; Ghorza talks soldier talk with the remaining elves and invites them back to Vassarein, where their patron might help protect them.

Apphia asks Ghorza to carry the body of the fallen soldier over to her. Since the fire, everything smells like blood and fire and Ghorza… likes it. When she approaches the corpse, broken and bloody, torn by the Knight’s jaws… GOD it smells good. She’s hungry again. She carefully avoids drooling, sets the body down, and backs the hell off. Apphia lets the soldiers say their goodbyes and give last rites before the pyre.

We start discussing plans for getting to Vassarein. The soldiers have two horses; Cadence is a third. That accounts for six riders: we have the three elves, Ghorza, Apphia, Brianne, Megs, and Nemeth. Nemeth (and then Megs) offer to stay and wait for the next carriage.

“Megs says, ‘We’re basically best friends now!’ Nemeth stares at you like she’s on the Office.”

We also decide to leave the sword with Nemeth, since it doesn’t seem magicky any more. She’ll bring it and we’ll have it melted down.

[I, OOC, insist that Ghorza should ride with one of the elves, since that will leave Apphia and Brianne together on Cadence. Plus she’s like bonded with the soldiers and stuff.]

There’s a LONG discussion between Gwen and Megan about which of Brianne and Apphia should be in front, whether animal handling proficiency would be necessary to ‘steer’ Cadence (Lin: “CADENCE IS NOT ACTUALLY A HORSE!”), and land vehicle proficiency (Lin: “yes, she would count as a land vehicle”) before we finally set out.

We get back to Vassarein and track down the carriage pretty easily - it’s more Fantasy Amtrak, it’s a public service, core infrastructure of the Marches thing - and tip him very heavily as we retrieve our stuff. I give the elves some money for a meal, send ‘em to the Orcish Forge and tell them to tell her moms that Ghorza sent them. It’ll be an hour until the next carriage arrives.

While waiting for the tieflings, we read up on demons:

“Bloody-Handed Galaias was once summoned at the behest of a sadistic elven warlord who desired the subjugation of another elven city that had resisted his assaults up until then. Having long nursed his hatred and arcane power from the depths of the Abyss, she answered his call and led an army of elves and demons to reduce his enemies to ruin. Then the Purifying Light tortured the elf to death, trapped his soul, and forced him to watch her devour his family before devouring him as well. Drunk on the blood and terror of her summoner’s former subjects, she was later banished by an alliance of powerful heroes, and the tyrant’s nascent empire collapsed in her wake.”

…Ghorza’s resolve to not give in to Galaias is strengthened because WHAT THE FUCK.

We wonder if this might be the history of Isvanir and Tarjanir, the ruined elven city where the Oneiric Lens was found? It is NOT, according to Apphia; this is something else. That said, it IS kinda similar. “Two is a coincidence, more is a pattern.” Galaias ‘the Feybane’ seems to be targeting elves again, and places linked to the Fey like Azure Glade.

The fall of Tarjanir: it was besieged by the dwarves, and the desperate elves did… something. The dwarves vanished from their mountain halls shortly after - at least, they haven’t been heard from since, and they are presumed dead. The site of Tarjanir is abandoned now, said to be haunted by the ghosts of elves and dwarves, and people Do Not Go There. Tons of refugees from Tarjanir settled in Vassarein, living mostly in slums.

[Various ooc quotes: “Yeah, I’ve plotted Apphia’s family all the way back to the dragon and the dragon-fucker.” “Dragons are too powerful for gender” “True vers / Neutral bangin” “With Ceremony, I could only marry humanoids within 10 feet of me, so we’d be limited to a 25-person marriage.” “Unless… we create new geometries in defiance of the DnD rules…” “Okay so how many wives could we stack into a 10-foot cube?” “Well, a dome is a more stable structure.” “Okay, so for the stability of the WifeDome…” “You know, in the Astral Plane there’s no gravity, so we could make it a complete sphere, maximize the number of wives in the spell’s volume.”]

OKAY BACK TO THE BOOK “Galaias was a giant in life - a Fomorian. She is a patron to them, but is a minor power, despite her immense strength, because the Fomorians were cursed by the Archfey to lose their beauty, their magic, and their minds. There are few Fomorians remaining who have the mental capacity remaining to understand Galaias, let alone worship her. Thus she reaches out to the lesser races.”

The next carriage arrives after an hour with the Tieflings - Megs is riding on top, sprawled and clinging to a luggage rack. We hear laughter from inside - a older gentlewoman in fine clothes, middle merchant class, is blushing and saying “Oh, you’re TERRIBLE!” Nemeth says, “Oh, you have no idea yet how terrible I can be. I’ll see you again.” She flirts a lot more as the woman leaves. Ghorza gives Nemeth a high-five.

It becomes apparent that no one else remembered that The Orcish Forge is a bakery, so we just stash the sword there for now, and do not melt it down in the bread ovens.

Megs suggests that she could probably sneak in, like, you know, she could. Apphia says her plan is to Alter Self into a specific maid, get to Ivandra, and get her to bring Silenne with her. Megs says “okay, well, I was just saying I could. I don’t have to or anything. I’ll just go try to swipe some food-” “Did you literally just tell me you’re planning to go steal from my parents.” “NO, I’m not going to steal from them! Just like see if they would give-” “You said swipe!” “I just meant, like, they might give me some, cause we’re friends now!” It was beautiful. Lin plays Megs REALLY well.

We head off - the rest of us are going to go into the castle too, but try to hide in the conservatory to ambush not-Silenne. Apphia will get a head start.

[She heads up first - the servants’ entrance is unlocked. She enters, holding a cloth bundle that is actually her cloak. She heads up to Ivandra’s room - it appears to be just the two of them. Ivandra looks exhausted, her chambers disorganized. Apphia’s plan goes off without a hitch and she heads on down to meet us.]

The rest of us just kinda headed on up to the servant’s entrance and didn’t know what to do. We don’t know the way to the conservatory. We decide to just walk in and act like we’re supposed to be there. Ghorza absolutely talks chummily to the chefs and offers to help them out, and there’s no problem. I chat with them a bit. Apphia comes to fetch us and we go to hide in the Solarium, waiting for Ivandra to bring not-Silenne. It’s empty and beautiful. We all take up positions.

Megs tries to hide behind a flower arrangement and Ghorza herds her back to the wall. M: “I totally had it under control, and it was fine, and you just had to cramp my style-” G:“Yeah, I hate fun.” M: “You kinda do?” G: “Sorry. I’ll make it up to you, okay?” A: “Please keep quiet!”

As not-Silenne walks in and the doors shut, Apphia immediately charms her. We start investigating and discover Silenne is alive, locked in a cupboard in her room. We convince her Ivandra is on the cult’s side now to keep her talking, making allusions to killing off Aren.

Spy: “Well, he is busy - facing the Hordes of Ardazhan alone - if I was facing them down alone I’d be worried”

Uhhhh. We press for more, what the fuck?

Spy: “Whole lot of nasty characters went dormant after a failed conquest of this region. And now… they’re waking up. Dwarves, from the north. They’ve fallen to demons. You know. Aron’s gone up with soldiers to try and stem the tide. He’s hoping Isvanir will send help, but I think we both know it won’t be coming! Soon Cyric will have what he wants.”

G: “…and what does our God want, again?”

Spy: “Heh, you should ask this one [Ivandra]. It wasn’t too long ago you were playing for the other team.”

I: “No more! No more talk! We need to stop her, now!”

And it’s a fight, as a teal-green light builds up in Ivandra’s hands and she hurls a spell at the spy. “Silenne” flickers, and the illusion drops, revealing a gaunt woman with messy brown hair and a twisted scar across her cheek and jaw, dressed in studded leather armor. We drop her EXTREMELY fast, nonlethally. Ivandra says, “What are you doing?! Finish her!” but we talk her down. Ivandra rushes off to find the real Silenne, and we loot and tie up the spy.

She had some standard armor and shortsword, as well as thieves’ tools and a poisoner’s kit. We decide to keep the tools as a spare (Ghorza will carry them). Then there’s this exchange.

Ghorza: “Is Megs gonna take the poisoner’s kit?” Megs: “Uh, NO? Why would you think I would want that?” G: “Um, sorry, I just - you pick locks and stuff-” M: “That doesn’t mean I KILL PEOPLE! … I mean, I do, but like, it’s not one of my favorite pastimes or anything! I don’t go looking for new fancy ways of killing people! Arrow does just fine.” G: “Yeah. Sorry. I shouldn’t have assumed.” M: “Tell you what. Bake me something good, and we’ll call it even.” G: “Deal”. Megs raises her hand. Imp: “Ok, Ghorza goes in for a- wait was Megs going for a fist bump or a handshake? (Handshake.) Okay, Ghorza goes in for a fist bump, but then switches to-” “Megs also switches.” They sorta give up. (beat) Brianne: “So if noone else wants it, I’ll take the poisoner’s kit!”

We tie up the unconscious spy and mull over the new revelations.

End session.

[nightmareonfilmstreet]

Revisiting The Bizarre Nightmare of THE BLACK CAT

New Post has been published on https://nofspodcast.com/revisiting-bizarre-nightmare-black-cat/

Revisiting The Bizarre Nightmare of THE BLACK CAT

Universal’s The Black Cat (1934) is a strange creature. The film bears zero resemblance with the Edgar Allen Poe story from which it takes its name. Instead it’s one of the most disturbing, bizarre, and unique horror films of the classic horror era. The superstition tinged animal of the title plays a very small, but thematically significant role in the film. But the uncanny, haunted atmosphere of The Black Cat still makes it a perfect film to revisit for the upcoming occasion of Friday the 13th.

The Black Cat, while less famous than Universal Studio’s other horror films, was a fundamental release for the studio. It was their highest grossing film of 1934, and the first to unite their two biggest stars, Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi. The combination of these horror icons was so successful, they went on to star in seven more films together. But in the opinion of many horror fans, the original film to join Karloff and Lugosi would stand out among them all as the best.

The film received mixed reviews upon its release. Like today, critics of the 1930’s didn’t put much stock in horror. But modern reevaluations hold The Black Cat in much higher esteem. It is considered a horror classic and currently holds an 87% Fresh score on Rotten Tomatoes.

  Honeymoon Gone Wrong

Dr. Vitus Werdegast (Bela Lugosi) meets Peter (David Manners) and Joan Allison (Julie Bishop) after a mix-up forces them to share a train compartment,

The Black Cat opens with American newlyweds on honeymoon in Hungary. Peter (David Manners) and Joan Allison (Julie Bishop) are a good humored but average couple, making their alternative honeymoon destination a somewhat baffling choice. The film, which is often snarkily self-aware, later has Peter crack “Next time, I’m going to Niagara Falls.” But Peter is an author of thrillers by trade, so perhaps he’s looking for inspiration? If so, he gets more than he’s bargained for.

A mixup on their train forces the Allisons to share a compartment with Dr. Vitus Werdegast (Bela Lugosi), a Hungarian psychiatrist. Over the course of their travels together, Werdegast reveals he is a veteran of WWI and survivor of an infamous Siberian prison camp, where he spent 15 years. He tells them he is travelling to visit an old friend

The three share a car from the train station. During the rainy ride, the driver entertains his passengers with gory tales of the WWI battle wherein Russia took nearby Fort Marmorus. The driver describes the carnage cheerfully, more like a tour guide pointing out pretty sites than describing a tragedy that would’ve been relatively recent history in the 30’s.

The storm proves too much for driving, and the car crashes, killing the driver and injuring Joan. Werdegast takes the couple to the home of Hjalmar Poelzig (Boris Karloff), Austrian architect and the “old friend” that Werdegast was going to visit. Beneath the modern Art Deco home are the bowels of the fallen fort.

  Ghosts of the Past

Hjalmar Poelzig (Boris Karloff) surveys his collection of dead women…while petting a black cat.

Werdegast treats Joan’s injuries and drugs her to help her sleep. Soon after, he sees a black cat approach and panics, throwing a knife that kills the animal (offscreen). As a cat lover, this moment never fails to shock me, but Poelzig and Peter seem only mildly perturbed. Poelzig explains that Werdegast suffers from an extreme case of Ailurophobia. The doctor refers to the superstitions surrounding the animal as the embodiment of evil as partly responsible for his fear.

When Werdegast finally finds himself alone with Poelzig, he confronts his former comrade, accusing him of betraying the fort to the Russians during the war — dooming him to prison and thousands more to death. Werdegast further accuses Poelzig of stealing his wife from him during his imprisonment. He tells Poelzig that his revenge on him will not be immediate.

Later, Poelzig explores the passages beneath his house, which houses the preserved corpses of women displayed in glass cases, including Werdegast’s wife. Before long, Poelzig’s true nature — a murderous Satanist — is revealed. He plans to keep the Allisons prisoner and offer Joan as a sacrifice in a black mass.

Werdegast attempts to save the Allisons, all the while waiting for the perfect moment to exact his grisly revenge.

  The Living Dead

Dr. Vitus Werdegast (Bela Lugosi) confronts Hjalmar Poelzig (Boris Karloff), seeking revenge.

The Black Cat is an unsettling and unique film among its fellow 30s era Universal horror releases. It’s not a monster movie, and it’s plot doesn’t resemble its literary source material in the slightest. The terrors of the story are entirely human. Supernatural elements are merely suggested and never confirmed to be authentic factors in the events.

As a result, The Black Cat is an eerie, disorienting film with surprisingly deep psychological themes. It examines the nature of evil in a way that continues to feel relevant today.

The most immediate source of evil in The Black Cat is war. The two WWI veterans at the center of the plot are made monsters only by the real life horrors they witnessed and were forced to partake in. The specter of WWI haunts the entire film. Poelzig’s house, which becomes a terrifying trap, is not the typical crumbling manor of gothic horror. Rather, it is a starkly modern, art deco mansion. Much more Frank Lloyd Wright than Castle Dracula. It’s unexpectedly bright, clean appearance adds to the uneasiness of the horror that takes place there.

Modern and very much of the 30s, the house is built on top of the remains of the fort that witnessed the horrors of WWI. It prompts the viewer to consider how the decades immediately following the war attempted to bury its scars in style and modernity. The metaphor is subtle but clear, and effective.

As characters, Poelzig and Werdegast serve to further explore themes of the effects of war. Both do horrifying things. Poelzig is entirely detestable, Werdegast is depicted much more sympathetically. But while he tries to help the Allisons  and cares deeply about his daughter and late wife, he is by no means a redeemed character. He tries to protect the Allisons while still using them as tools in his “game of death” with Poelzig. And when he does exact his revenge on Poelzig, it is famously sadistic and disturbing.

Poelzig himself alludes to this when he confronts Werdegast for his hypocrisy in attacking him in seeking revenge;

“You say your soul was killed and that you have been dead all these years. And what of me? Did we not both die here in Marmorus fifteen years ago? Are we any the less victims of the war than those whose bodies were torn asunder? Are we not both the living dead?”

Indeed, the film forces us to face ghosts of our own making. Not supernatural, but people who have become broken, shells of humanity as a result of violence and war. This is a theme that feels just as relevant today as it did in the 1930s.

  Undying Evil

The titular Black Cat reappears after it’s apparent death.

Another theme at play the The Black Cat  is unending cycles of evil. When Werdegast kills the cat in the beginning of the film, he cites ancient tomes that describe a black cat as the embodiment of evil. Poelzig reminds him;

“The Black Cat does not die. Those same books, if I’m not mistaken, teach that the Black Cat is deathless. Deathless as Evil.”

For cat lovers such as myself, anything describing a black cat as evil is laughable and honestly offensive. But if you consider it as a representation of the undying nature of human evil, rather than an animal,  it’s very effective. Sure enough, the titular cat appears again, very much alive, throughout the film.

Like the evils of the world  at the center of the film, the cat will never die. It will always return to create more living ghosts like Poelzig and Werdegast.

The themes of the The Black Cat  are unexpectedly deep and timely. But aside from this, the plot is still incredibly strange. So how does this unusual outing for Universal Horror hold up today?

  Horror of the Bizarre

The living dead descend into the remains of the past.

There’s no doubt the story of The Black Cat  is far from airtight. It has plot holes, developments that come out of nowhere, and bizarre character motivations. But it’s not too ridiculous to be interesting, enjoyable, compelling — and very creepy. In fact, the bizarre nature of the film is what makes its horror stand out and continue to work today.

The film is full of creepy imagery. The preserved corpses that appear to levitate in glass are haunting, as is the notorious climatic scene in which a character is skinned alive. That scene is done with the gore off-screen, shown in shadow rather than full on. But the suggestion is horrifying enough.

The set design, lighting and cinematography of the film is masterful and surprising. It evokes a uniquely chilling atmosphere that manages to keep you interested — and creeped out — even in the films quieter moments.

The other major draw of the film is to see Karloff and Lugosi face off in their first onscreen collaboration. The horror greats are in top form, and it’s fascinating to see them play characters that aren’t supernatural creatures, but merely twisted, broken men.

I wouldn’t say the film is particularly scary. Truly scary horror was being made during the 30s and 40s, but in my opinion at least, it wasn’t coming from Universal. Universal Horror always dealt more with mood and theme than scares.

But in the realm of mood and theme, The Black Cat delivers. It is genuinely creepy, disorienting in its strangeness, and shockingly disturbing. This, along with it’s brilliant cinematography, creative design, and noteworthy turns from two horror greats, make The Black Cat a must see horror classic and the perfect choice for a Friday the 13th movie night.