estellamiraiauthor

[estellamiraiauthor]

Yes.

Sex ed class: Teacher described different ways of masturbating (not in like HUGE detail, just kinda like “some people use their fingers and some use toys) and went on and on about how normal it was and I LITERALLY COULD NOT UNDERSTAND why any of the things she was talking about would appeal to anyone.

I also briefly thought the idea of joining a convent sounded good (I was raised Catholic but knew at that point I didn’t believe it) just so no one would think I was a loser for not having a partner if it was my choice. (Not realizing that you could like… just choose to be single without joining a convent. Also not realizing I was demi yet and assumed I’d never find anyone.)

Bonus demi/bi awakening: I also didn’t really get what it meant to be gay or lesbian because I was just like, “I mean, I’m going to date guys instead of girls because that’s the way that’s not going to get me into trouble. But if society expected me to date girls I’d just… do that instead?”

Understanding aspec identities really helped me make a LOT of sense of how fish-out-of-water I felt in middle school and high school!

this is very much not the stuff I usually post but I just wanted to say that I partly found out I was asexual because when I was in middle-school our sex ed teacher told us we would grow up and have sexual relationships "whether we liked it or not" (horrible wording) and younger me took that as meaning I would be forced into it.

So I obsessively made up possible future excuses in my head to get out of sleeping with someone, and most of them revolved around joining a religion where I would be required to take a vow of chastity (I didn't know what I was talking about), so that I never had to be sexual with anyone (I was not religious and was also like 10 years old) uhhhh

anyways, I found out later that I could just not lol

I wonder if any other aces have had similar sorts of things happen??

[estellamiraiauthor]

i don't care how uncomfortable you are around cis men, queer cis men still need places to go, and sometimes, those spaces will be shared with yours. disabled and neurodivergent queer men and queer men of color especially need a place to go. the queer community isn't the "fuck cis men" community. that is the rad fem community. if you think cis men and people who read as cis men are inherently "too scary" or shouldn't be allowed in queer spaces, you joined the wrong community.

[estellamiraiauthor]

writers, stop apologizing for your genre. fantasy is valid. fanfiction is valid. your self-indulgent coffee shop au? also valid.

[estellamiraiauthor]

Leonid Pasternak  (Ukrainian, 1862–1945) - The Torments of Creative Work

[estellamiraiauthor]

love

[estellamiraiauthor]

write the story only you can write. someone out there needs to read it.

[estellamiraiauthor]

Abled gays celebrating marriage equality: well we sure do have nowhere to go from here when it comes to marriage rights. Gay rights!

Me, a disabled lesbian trying to get on ssi thinking about how I will not be able to marry my girlfriend if I do because I can't have more than $2000 to my name at a time and they count a spouse's income towards that: wow .. gay rights ...

[estellamiraiauthor]

[estellamiraiauthor]

not to derail the low income writer thing, but I’ve actually had this discussion before, many times, in smaller writing circles, with how so much of the current writing and publishing “climate” does not adhere nor even acknowledge how difficult writing (or any creative outlet tbh) can be for people to pursue - even as a hobby - when your energies are sapped into simply surviving, into struggling through life, working full-time, perhaps even balancing multiple jobs, or care-giving children, elderly or sick family, with little to show for it beyond the absolute minimum. how the current economic living crisis has been inevitably crushing creatives, and potential creatives, when there are so many limitations, not just financially, but in time and in energy

advice akin to “those who want to write will find the time” is insulting to those who are already running ragged just trying to get by, whether due to jobs, brain fog, illness or a combination of all the above and more. “get up earlier or stay up later” doesn’t take into consideration how much people are already sacrificing everywhere else. how out of touch a lot of it is, mostly offered by those who are already successful, or from those who have the luxury of time

most low income writers are self-publishing their work already prepared for a significant loss, after cover art, marketing budgets, editing etc, and so, some low income writers will never be able to justify self-publishing at all. and money aside, other avenues aren’t exactly easy either, patreon subscribers, for example, look for discord access, social media presence, weekly or bi-weekly updates, asking for more time and more energy from the author. simply the way readers engage now, expecting immediate sequels, long series, multiple books published a year, constant engagement, this entire set-up is making it almost impossible for low income writers to keep up, and it goes way beyond the monetary limitations. 

[estellamiraiauthor]

If any of y'all ever get the chance to see a beloved cult classic in the theater where it was filmed, I would highly recommend it! The crowd was so interactive and the setting so immersive that it felt like watching a live performance.

Also Paul Williams is such a doll and claimed he wanted to live another 20 years just to make sure we'd all be okay. Brb gotta go cry about that for a bit. He was so rambling and it was a delight.

[estellamiraiauthor]

Winslow

Here’s a tribute to one of my favourite movies “The Phantom of the Paradise”! It stars Jessica Harper, Paul Williams and the late William Finley. Its awesome. Everyone should see this movie and listen to its dated-but-fabulous soundtrack. 

[estellamiraiauthor]

OK, finally now coming back to this to more properly say THANK YOU! Thank you for giving my book a chance and for sharing your thoughts (especially because they were such nice ones!).

It was kind of weird because I was really thinking about those characters yesterday, calculating how old they’d be now and wondering how they’d be spending the holidays and thinking again about maybe writing a sequel or follow-up of some kind. And then I went to sleep and woke up to this beautiful review! It genuinely made my day, first thing in the morning. ❤️

I also want to say, I’m especially glad that it was able to reach a reader who doesn’t really read romance, because it really isn’t a romance novel. I have nothing against genre romance, but it honestly isn’t really my favorite genre either and this book was never meant to be a romance… it’s a love story, yes, but I am always so happy when it reaches people who don’t expect or want it to be a steamy, tropey bodice-ripper (OK, it’s kinda tropey. But not the others.) and just kinda lets it be itself?

I’m so glad you enjoyed it, dear reader, and thank you so much for sharing your thoughts!! ❤️

So last night I finished reading The Stars May Rise and Fall by Estella Mirai (@estellamiraiauthor) and I am still completely geeking out over it.

The synopsis is this:

Dreams don't always look the way you expect them to. Teru came to Tokyo with dreams of making it big in the glam-metal visual kei scene, but three years later, all he has to show for it is a head of hot pink hair and some skill with an eyeliner pencil. He may look the part, but he doesn't sound it, and tension among his bandmates has him worried about his future. When a mysterious business card offers help, he's willing to take it however it comes. Help comes in the form of Rei, a brilliant composer whose performing career was ended by an accident that left him scarred, injured, and in chronic pain. With Teru's voice and looks, and Rei's money and songwriting skills, both of their dreams seem about to come true - but a forbidden kiss and a late-night confession threaten to tear it all apart. Now Teru, who has spent most of his life denying his attraction to men, and Rei, who vowed long ago never to love again, must reconcile their feelings with their careers - and with their carefully constructed ideas of themselves. 

In my humble opinion, this description doesn't do the book justice. The writing is evocative, perfectly painting the images of the characters in one's head. Speaking of the characters, they are absolutely the heart and soul of this book. They are raw and achingly human, and feel like people you could run into on the street. They're each weird, flawed, dramatic and unique in their own ways, but never in a way that feels unnatural. Their relationships with each other drive this story, and I didn't want to stop reading about them. In fact, I didn't- I stayed up late into the night devouring this book.

All in all, this book is absolutely gorgeous and I highly recommend you give it a chance. Seriously, I don't even usually read or write romantic dramas, and yet I was sitting on my bed in the middle of the night, feeling my heartstrings get plucked and pulled like the musical instruments Teru and Rei so deftly play, telling myself I'll stop after this chapter. Okay, just a few more pages. There's not that many pages left, I can keep going...

[estellamiraiauthor]

Writing is such an amazing art form. You’re essentially sculpting a living, breathing universe full of sounds, sights, and feelings with only the tools of your imagination, 26 letters and a lot of patience to help you, and honestly, the fact that you’re able to do that is not only unbelievable, but also metal as fuck.

[estellamiraiauthor]

The Muppet Christmas Carol goes even harder when you realize this guy wrote all the songs

[estellamiraiauthor]

you have a fundamental misunderstanding of how math works

[estellamiraiauthor]

So last night I finished reading The Stars May Rise and Fall by Estella Mirai (@estellamiraiauthor) and I am still completely geeking out over it.

The synopsis is this:

Dreams don't always look the way you expect them to. Teru came to Tokyo with dreams of making it big in the glam-metal visual kei scene, but three years later, all he has to show for it is a head of hot pink hair and some skill with an eyeliner pencil. He may look the part, but he doesn't sound it, and tension among his bandmates has him worried about his future. When a mysterious business card offers help, he's willing to take it however it comes. Help comes in the form of Rei, a brilliant composer whose performing career was ended by an accident that left him scarred, injured, and in chronic pain. With Teru's voice and looks, and Rei's money and songwriting skills, both of their dreams seem about to come true - but a forbidden kiss and a late-night confession threaten to tear it all apart. Now Teru, who has spent most of his life denying his attraction to men, and Rei, who vowed long ago never to love again, must reconcile their feelings with their careers - and with their carefully constructed ideas of themselves. 

In my humble opinion, this description doesn't do the book justice. The writing is evocative, perfectly painting the images of the characters in one's head. Speaking of the characters, they are absolutely the heart and soul of this book. They are raw and achingly human, and feel like people you could run into on the street. They're each weird, flawed, dramatic and unique in their own ways, but never in a way that feels unnatural. Their relationships with each other drive this story, and I didn't want to stop reading about them. In fact, I didn't- I stayed up late into the night devouring this book.

All in all, this book is absolutely gorgeous and I highly recommend you give it a chance. Seriously, I don't even usually read or write romantic dramas, and yet I was sitting on my bed in the middle of the night, feeling my heartstrings get plucked and pulled like the musical instruments Teru and Rei so deftly play, telling myself I'll stop after this chapter. Okay, just a few more pages. There's not that many pages left, I can keep going...

[estellamiraiauthor]

How did you upload The Stars May Rise and Fall onto the Internet Archive?

Thank you for the ask! To be honest, it’s been awhile so I turned to Google for help… but this basically lines up with what I remember!