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Joe Flaherty and John Candy - Monster Chiller Horror Theatre: Dr. Tongue's 3D House of Cats (SCTV, 1978)

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A half-moon shimmers on the dark water of the canal like shot silk. Jyn slips through the small water gate into the palace gardens and hurries down the overgrown pergola, keeping her hood up and staying to the deepest shadows. Nothing else moves but fallen leaves rattling over the flagstones. Still, her heart is racing and she can’t take a deep breath until she ducks into the sprawling royal wing. With her back pressed to the wall, she scans the corridor—dark and deserted. 

A giddy smile pulls at the corners of her mouth. She can’t believe she got away with it.

This week’s word is…

✨ LEAVES ✨

Find the word in any WIP and share the sentence containing it. Reply, reblog, stick it in the tags, tag us in a new post, or keep it private. All fandoms, all ships, all writers welcome.

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If it doesn’t impact the rest of the story, you didn’t raise the stakes

              I recently went back to a chapter at the midpoint of my novel and changed a huge detail of it because I thought it didn’t raise the stakes enough as it was. Because of this change, I had to go through every single scene and chapter beyond that point and edit it to fit in and make sense. It was annoying, but that’s how I knew I achieved what I wanted to.

              Raised stakes change everything about a story.

              If your characters can continue on as they were, then you didn’t really raise the stakes at all. This heightened pressure or danger has to be heightened enough that their lives as they know them are different now.

              Consider this: at the midpoint, you introduce a mutated form of a monster your characters have been facing that’s more deadly and intelligent than its predecessor. It’s a super scary scene, but after that, your characters go back to their safe house to talk over how best to kill it.

              Suddenly, this new monster doesn’t feel as much of a threat. It’s just another element of the same threat they’ve already been facing.

              To properly use this element as a way to raise the stakes, it should take away something the characters rely on—safety, allies, powers, etc. Something they can’t get back, and don’t get back for the rest of the story. They now have to adapt to new circumstances, and things will never be as easy for them again.

              So maybe instead, they flee to their safe house only to discover that it’s no longer safe—the monster is smart enough to get through their hidden entrance and corner them. Now they’re stuck out in the open, taking turns keeping watch and slowly deteriorating to sleeplessness and stress.

              That’s a delicious steak.

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Crossing North Dakota in the dark

Taken August 2024

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Ruined Country: Old Battlefield, Vimy, near La Folie Wood, 1918 — by Paul Nash.

More of Nash’s moving depictions of the destroyed and broken landscapes of the First and Second World War here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/the-war-art-of-paul-nash-1917-1944 #ArmisticeDay #RemembranceDay2022 #RemembranceDay

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Romance novels: This story ends in marriage.

Arranged marriage trope: what if….the story STARTS with marriage?

Me:

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A fantastically chiseled and gilt Rapier,

OaL: 45.5 in/115.6 cm

Blade Length: 39.5 in/100.3 cm

Width: 6.5 in/16.5 cm

Depth: 3.4 in/8.6 cm

Weight: 2.1 lbs/935.5 g

Spain, ca. 1590, housed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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I will draw this moment again in digital, because I really love it ( ´ ∀ ` )

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Jyn Appreciation Week Day 3 ➬ Favorite Relationship

SAW GERRERA & JYN ERSO

“I was a child,” she said. “Saw Gerrera saved my life. He raised me. But I've no idea where he is. I haven't seen him in years.” “A girl who—genetics notwithstanding—had clearly inherited Saw Gerrera's burning rage and icy competence. The need in her eyes frightened Cassian.”

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If nothing else, as a historian every time I get scared at the state of the world I have to remind myself that "uninteresting times" is a myth.

The world has always been in the throes of chaos and violence and fear, just in different ways and to different degrees. The anxieties of the past are no less real than our own, and we can learn from them. Normality and peace are fleeting, but we can always strive to increase those moments. We have to keep hoping and working for a better future. It's all we have. We may not succeed, but if we don't try, what are we living for?

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Porch of the Monserrate Palace, Sintra, Portugal

Palácio de Monserrate is a palatial villa located near Sintra, the traditional summer resort of the Portuguese court in the foothills overlooking the Atlantic Ocean north of the capital, Lisbon.

Designed by English architects James Thomas Knowles (father and son) and built in 1858, in neo-Gothic style.

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Bridget Riley (British, 1931), Gaillard 2, 1989. Oil on linen, 164 x 227.5 cm.

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hello hello again my dear! your RCSS hree again just dropping by to say: i have a rough outline for your gifts and should be starting it this week! also, i hope you're having a wonderful, cozy November sunday and enjoying your extra hour! see ya next week! <333

Thank you, lovely person! It rained here all day so I took the excuse to do very little except snuggle up in a blanket and read 💙

You're way ahead of me on your RCSS - I'm impressed! I hope you enjoy working on it and are able to get into that wonderful zone where things just flow... Have a great week yourself!

(FYI, I'll be out of town for a couple of days so I might not see messages right away.)

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Compliment them. That person you think has their shit together and wouldn't need it or want to hear it. They do. They absolutely do. Their shit is dispersed. I promise you. It is a shambles.

I've had someone tell me to my face that they would compliment me, but for the fact that I already know this or that about myself. Huh???? No. Sorry.

No I don't. In my weaker moments I become an ungrateful mud monkey that has never once internalized a compliment

I adore being told you like me or something I've done. It sustains me, and in my weaker moments when I forget that life is good and happy, you might catch me before I fall.

You ever had someone catch you like that? You can do it too. The ones that catch you have been you in that moment before and know they will be again.

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Which is your favourite?

I’ve redrawn my stack of Austen books to get the image quality high enough to be a shirt/tote!

Shop

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reblog game rb with ur lowest kudos fic in the tags and say something nice about it/something about it you enjoyed writing/favorite line/etc.