#Fayet writes

[fayet]

Writer's Tears

So I haven't written anything in about a year or two or more and suddenly inspiration for the weirdest shit of all times crashed into me and now I'm 123k balls deep in it and wtf. I have to edit all of this now. I have to post this at one point.

And have I mentioned it's THE WEIRDEST SHIT OF ALL TIME and I generally write weird shit but this takes the cake. Where did this come from. Why am I doing this. What. I have lost my mind.

[yaggy031910]

It‘s Davout time!

Happy 253th birthday, dear iron marshal! ☺️🇫🇷🥖✨

Louis-Nicolas Davout is known for the devotion and love he had for his wife, Aimée Davout (born Louise-Aimée-Julie Leclerc), so I was interested about their correspondence. To cut a long story short, I started reading their letters (specifically the ones around the Russian campaign because I also wondered how Davout had dealt with this mess of a campaign).

Let‘s say it was simply heartwarming and I was melting away most of the time so how about I share one of my favourite little moments? Shall we? :D Davout‘s desire to have a second son and how he throws all of it away as long as Aimée‘s health is fine:

Ce 12 décembre Je profite, ma chère Aimée, de l‘estafette pour te rassurer sur la santé de ton Louis; elle est, malgré la rigueur de la saison, très bonne. Tu trouveras mon écriture tremblée. Je te jure par toi que la seule raison en est au froid qu‘il faut, et que je sens d‘autant plus que je t‘écris en plein air pour ne pas masquer cette estafette. Desessart part demain pour Paris, il va bien. Beaupré, malgré son âge, s‘en tire assez bien. Beaumont et les deux Fayet ne sont que fatigués. J‘envoie mille baisers à mon excellente Aimée, qui est peut-être, - à l‘heure où je lui écris, - dans les douleurs: puisse mon Aimée me donner un second fils! Cependant, si c‘est und filled, elle sera bien accueillie. J‘envoie mille caresses à l‘enfant chéri qui es Louis et à nos deux petites. Assure ta bonne mère de ma tendresse. Tout à toi. L.

German translation: Der 12. Dezember Ich profitiere, meine liebe Aimée, von dem Kurier, um dich über die Gesundheit deines Louis zu beruhigen; sie ist trotz der Strenge der Jahreszeit sehr gut. Du wirst meine Handschrift zitternd finden. Ich schwöre dir, dass der einzige Grund dafür die Kälte ist und ich fühle mich dementsprechend mehr dazu, dir im Freien zu schreiben, um den Kurier nicht zu verpassen. Desessart bricht morgen auf für Paris, ihm geht es gut. Beaupré hält sich trotz seines Alters gut. Beaumont und die zwei/beiden Fayets sind nur müde. Ich schicke 1000 Küsse an meine exzellente Aimée, die vielleicht in der Stunde, wo ich ihr schreibe, in Schmerzen ist: Möge meine Aimée mir einen zweiten Sohn geben! Jedoch, wenn es ein Mädchen ist, wird sie auch willkommen sein. Ich schicke 1000 Streicheleinheiten an die lieben Kinder, die Louis und unsere zwei Kleinen sind. Versichere deine Mutter meiner innigen Liebe. Alles an dich. L.

English translation: The 12th of December I benefit, my dear Aimée, from the courier/messenger to reassure you about the health of your Louis; she is very good despite the harshness of the season. You will find my handwriting shaking. I swear to you the only reason for that is the cold and I feel more like writing in the fresh air to not miss out the courier/messenger. Desessart leaves for Paris tomorrow, he is fine. Beaupré, despite his age, is going well. Beaumont and both Fayets are just tired. I send a thousand kisses to my excellent Aimée, who is perhaps in pain in the hour I write her: May my Aimée give me a second son! However, if it’s a girl, she is going to be welcomed. I send a thousand caresses to the dear children, who are Louis and our two little ones. Assure your mother about my tenderness. All for you. L.

Just like Napoleon, Davout had a desire to sire sons and - as far as I am concerned - it‘s clear that his enthusiasm for the possibility of having another son is strong. We might say it’s even stronger than for the possibility of having another daughter although he wrote that a daughter would be welcomed. Now, let’s read the next letter he wrote to his wife where he threw all of that away, shall we? :D

Gumbinnen, ce 17 décembre Je suis bien tourmenté, ma chère Aimée, du long silence auquel les ciconstances m’ont forcé et de toutes les inquiétudes qu’il t’aura données, à toi si ingénieuse à te tourmenter sans motifs. L’état où tu te trouvais, à la veille de faire tes couches, ajoute à mes tourments: jamais je n’ai plus éprouvé le besoin de recevoir de tes nouvelles, et j’ignore quand j’aurai ce bonheur, malgré les estafettes qui arrivent régulièrement; mais le comte Daru, sous le couvert de qui tes lettres me parvenaient, étant parti pour Koenisgsberg, me prive absolument de tes nouvelles. […] Ta santé, dans ce moment, est tout ce qui occasionne mes inquiétudes; lorsque je serai rassuré sur ce point, je désirerai connaître de tes couches: fille ou garçon, l’enfant sera le bienvenu si la santé de mon Aimée est telle que je la souhaite. […]

German translation: Gumbinnen, der 17. Dezember Ich bin sehr gequält, meine liebe Aimée, von dem langen Schweigen, zu dem mich die Umstände gezwungen haben und von den ganzen Sorgen, die es dir bereitet hat, so geistreich von dir, dich ohne Anlass so zu quälen. Der Zustand, in dem du dich am Vorabend mit der Geburt befandest, fügt mir Plagen zu: Nie habe ich mehr den Bedarf verspürt, deine Neuigkeiten zu erhalten und ich weiss nicht, wann ich diese Freude haben werde, trotz der Kurier, die regelmässig eintreffen; aber der Graf Daru, unter dessen Deckmantel deine Briefe mich erreichten, hat mich, nach Königsberg aufbrechend, von deinen Neuigkeiten beraubt. […] Deine Gesundheit ist in dem Moment alles, was mir Sorgen bereitet; wenn ich darüber beruhigt bin, wünsche ich mir, über das Wochenbett zu erfahren: Mädchen oder Junge, das Kind wird willkommen sein, wenn die Gesundheit von meiner Aimée so ist, wie ich es wünsche. […]

English translation: Gumbinnen, the 17th of December I am quite troubled, my dear Aimée, of the long silence to which my circumstances forced me to and of all the worries it caused you, so ingenious of you, to torment yourself without reason. The state you were in on the eve with the birth caused me torment: Never have I felt more the desire to receive your news and I don‘t know when I am going to have the happiness despite the couriers who regularly arrive; but the count Daru, under whose cover your letters came to me, having left for Koenisgsberg, deprives me absolutely of your news. […] In the moment, your health is everything what causes me concern; when I am reassured, I desire to find out about your postpartum period: girl or boy, the child will be welcomed if the health of my Aimée is how I wish. […]

MY HEAAAAART, GAHWD, THEY ARE ADORABLE.

[thoughtlessarse]

Algerian authorities declared President Abdulmadjid Tebboune the overwhelming winner of Saturday’s election on Sunday (8 September), but a rival candidate alleged irregularities in the count and fewer than half of registered voters cast ballots. Official preliminary results gave Tebboune 95% of the vote, enough to avoid a second round run-off, with Abdelaali Hassani Cherif getting 3% and Youcef Aouchiche 2%. Turnout was 48%. -Tebboune, backed by the military, was facing only nominal opposition from Hassani Cherif, a moderate Islamist, and Aouchiche, a moderate secularist, both running with the blessing of Algeria’s powerful establishment. Hassani Cherif’s campaign said polling station officials had been pressured to inflate results and alleged failures to deliver vote-sorting records to candidates’ representatives, as well as instances of proxy group voting. “This is a farce,” said Hassani Cherif’s spokesperson Ahmed Sadok, adding that the candidate had won far more votes than had been announced, citing the campaign’s own tallies from regions. Reuters could not immediately verify those tallies or reach Tebboune’s or Aouchiche’s campaign for comment. However, electoral commission head Mohammed Charfi said when announcing the results that the body had worked to ensure transparency and fair competition among all candidates. Late on Sunday, three presidential candidates, including Tebboune and Cherif, issued a joint statement in which they objected to the provisional results announced by the electoral commission. “We inform public opinion of the ambiguity, contradiction, vagueness and conflicting numbers recorded with the announcement of the provisional results of the presidential elections,” the joint statement said. Tebboune’s re-election means Algeria will likely keep on with a governing programme that has resumed lavish social spending based on increased energy revenues after he came into office in 2019 following a period of lower oil prices. He has promised to raise unemployment benefits, pensions and public housing programmes, all of which he increased during his first term as president. “As long as Tebboune continues to raise wages and pensions and maintain subsidies he will be the best in my eyes,” said Ali, a cafe customer in the Ouled Fayet district of Algiers, asking not to write his family name.

continue reading

[cara-tine]

Inspirational Indie Author Interview: Ricardo Fayet. Reedsy Cofounder Helps Gather Indie Publishing Ecosystem

My ALLi author guest this episode is Ricardo Fayet, a cofounder of Reedsy, a marketplace connecting authors to editors, cover designers, book marketers, translators, and other professionals. Also, full disclosure, I am also a developmental editor for Reedsy. As for Ricardo, when he's not coming up with new and expanded services for Reedsy, he's writing books on an important part of the publishing ecosystem: marketing.

ALLi's Inspirational Indie Author Podcast stream is sponsored by Kobo Writing Life, a global, independent ebook and audiobook publishing platform that empowers authors with a quick and easy publishing process and unique promotional opportunities. To reach a wide readership, create your account today! Thank you, Kobo, for your support of this podcast.

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Inspirational Indie Author Interview: Ricardo Fayet

On the Inspirational Indie Authors podcast, @howard_lovy features @RicardoFayet. @ReedsyHQ cofounder helps gather an indie publishing ecosystem. Click To Tweet

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               Inspirational Indie Author Interview: Ricardo Fayet. About the Author

Ricardo Fayet is one of the four founders of Reedsy, a marketplace connecting authors to the world’s top publishing talent—from editors to cover designers, book marketers, or literary translators. He’s the author of How to Market a Book: Overperform in a Crowded Market and Amazon Ads for Authors: Unlock Your Full Advertising Potential, and a regular presenter at several prestigious writers’ conferences: NINC, 20Booksto50k, and The Self Publishing Show Live, among others.

About the Host

Howard Lovy has been a journalist for more than 35 years, and now amplifies the voices of independent author-publishers and works with authors as a developmental editor. Find Howard at howardlovy.com, LinkedIn and Twitter.

If you’re a published indie author who would like to be interviewed by Howard for the Inspirational Indie Authors podcast, you need to be a member of the Alliance of Independent Authors.

Then contact Howard, including your membership number, explaining why you’re an inspirational indie author and what inspires you.

If you haven’t already, we invite you to join our organization.

Read the Transcripts — Inspirational Indie Author Interview: Ricardo Fayet

Howard Lovy: My guest this episode is Ricardo Fayette, co-founder of Reedsy, a marketplace connecting authors to editors, cover designers, book marketers, translators, and other professionals. As for Ricardo, when he's not coming up with new and expanded services for Reedsy, he's writing books on an important part of the publishing ecosystem: marketing. I'll let Ricardo Fayet tell his story.

Ricardo Fayet: Hi everyone, I'm Ricardo Fayet. I'm one of the four founders of Reedsy. If you don't know what Reedsy is, we're mostly known for our marketplace, where you can come in as an author and find editors, proofreaders, cover designers, marketers, translators, ghost-writers, pretty much anyone you'd ever need to hire throughout your writing career.

We've been going on for around nine years now. It's been a while. In the process, I've managed to write a couple of books myself, one on how to market a book and another one on Amazon ads. So, very much non-fiction in that, indie authors among, yeah, among a few other things.

I think reading has always been a part of my life. So, I grew up first in Spain and then moved to France early on. So, I spent most of my childhood in France, education as well.

Howard Lovy: For Ricardo, Reedsy was an idea he and his partners had before he even finished college.

Ricardo Fayet: Yeah, I studied mostly business management. So, I did, I think it's called a master's of science and management, or something like that, in in a university in Paris, and I actually started Reedsy before I finished the masters. So, there were a couple of years there where I had to juggle both. So yeah, that's why I always say that I don't really have much of a background prior to Reedsy, because we got into it right after university.

Howard Lovy: The idea for Reedsy came after Ricardo and his partners began reading books on their devices. They figured there must be a support system for authors in this new world. When he found out there wasn't, Ricardo and his partners created one.

Ricardo Fayet: I've always come to this more from a reader's perspective than a writing one. The genesis of Reedsy is, a friend of mine, Emmanuel, had this idea after traveling to Canada, I think, and discovering the first Kindle devices and started learning about e-reading. He basically asked himself, what impact does it have on the author side, right?

Because he was getting his first Kindle from across the pond. I was at the time reading on my on my phone when eBooks just started and we found it super convenient, but we were thinking, okay, what does this mean for authors? Does it open new doors? We started learning about self-publishing. That's how we got a little bit into the industry.

Howard Lovy: And Ricardo says, he got into the industry just at the right time.

Ricardo Fayet: It's a fascinating industry and we're very lucky to be in a creative industry. That was quite important for us, and it's what made the idea of Reedsy so appealing. First because of the industry and second, because it solved an actual problem in the industry, which was a lot of authors were starting to self-publish their work and they didn't really know where to get the professionals that they would otherwise get through traditional publishing houses.

At the same time, there were a lot of editors, designers, copy editors, proofreaders, et cetera, typesetters, who used to work within the traditional publishing houses who started going freelance, either because they were made redundant or to have more flexibility.

So, there were these two trends that we came across, and manifested the idea for Reedsy quite nicely. So, we got into it one, because we really enjoyed the industry, and second because the idea seemed like a really promising one.

Howard Lovy: And to help launch the promising idea, Ricardo turned to the indie author community.

Ricardo Fayet: No, that definitely was a building process. I think we, obviously, we weren't very well known in the industry. So even before we started Reedsy we started going to events, to the London Book Fair. I met Orna, I met Joanna Penn. I was there at the, I think it was 2014 London Book Fair, when there was this booth with a few of the American best-selling indie authors at the time. So, Hugh Howey, Bella Andre, Barbara Freethy, et cetera.

So, it was a really exciting time, and at the same time that we started learning about the industry and about self-publishing in general and the community, we also started getting known there. But I think it was hard at the beginning because, when you offer services as a company, which is essentially what we started with, editing and design, immediately a lot of people will associate you with vanity presses that have come before. The Author Solutions etc, because that's where most companies were doing services before. That's who they were.

So, we had to make it very clear that we had a completely different model, completely different philosophy, and completely different ethics, and that took a little bit of time, but I think building that reputation and maintaining that reputation for a place that really has authors best interests at heart, yeah that's been really vital in the long run.

Howard Lovy: Part of the Reedsy service involves conflict resolution and mediation if there's a problem between author and a Reedsy professional.

Ricardo Fayet: Yeah, it's hard, as you say to make both parties happy. So, we aim for reaching a fair decision. I think the idea was that we're one of the few places who really vets the professionals who we display on the marketplace. If you're an editor or designer and you apply to join Reedy, generally, you've got a 5% chance of being accepted.

We only accept people who worked on a certain number of books, ideally, who have some traditional publishing experience. If not, people who worked on books that have done well, that are well reviewed, that have sold well, et cetera. So, we're very strict in terms of the people we accept on the marketplace, and so we wanted to provide some sort of insurance.

If you are a Reedsy professional, that has to mean more than just, here's your editor and you guys work together. No, we want to provide some sort of safety net of, if something goes wrong with the collaboration, whether it's the editor's fault or the author's fault, or no one's fault, we can step in and mediate. So, that's always something that we wanted to offer.

Thankfully, we only have to do it very rarely, in around 1% of collaborations, and when it happens most of the time, I'd say it's fairly simple, one party recognizes, maybe, I don't know, if the professional has had a delay of a month in offering the deliverables, we can all agree on a small partial refund because of that.

If there's real contention, most of the time it's going to be on the quality of the work, when the author questions the quality of, I don't know, the edits, or the design work, or the marketing work that they received. Then we'll actually look at the whole collaborations, the request, the offer that was sent, the messages, and the deliverables, and evaluate whether it's up to our standards, basically.

If it's something that we cannot do ourselves, then we'll bring in a third-party person to do it. So, if the contention has to do with the quality of the edits, for example, then we'll ask a third-party editor from our marketplace to review the work, sometimes several, to give us the feedback and based on that feedback we'll reach a decision. So, that's how we do it right now. We're always trying to improve the processes, but for now it's very much case by case every time.

Howard Lovy: Of course, once your book is out there, the biggest challenge is bringing it to your audience. So, one service that reads the offers is becoming more and more popular: marketing.

Ricardo Fayet: Yeah, we started with editing and design, and then we added publicity that we still have in the marketplace. Then we added marketing, and I think that there's a lot more marketing requests and collaborations happening now than publicity. Publicity is like very niche, and it only makes sense for a very small subset of authors.

Marketing, however, has become very popular on the marketplace. We don't have a ton of marketers, because there just aren't that many great marketers out there who are still open to working with authors one-on-one. Most of the really good marketers are going to launch their courses, or they're going to try to find some scalable ways to offer their services to authors whereas Reedsy is very much one-on-one work. But we have a few on there.

We added literary translators a couple years ago, and that's taken off quite well as well. I know ALLi's been insisting a lot on European markets and how they've been growing, especially since the pandemic. We've seen a lot of translations on our marketplace into German, French, into Italian, into Spanish. So, that's been really good to see.

We've got ghost-writing as well. That's a separate beast because there the clients aren't necessarily always authors, they're more, sometimes, celebrities or people who have this story that they don't want to write themselves.

We aim to be opening to narrators in the near future as well. So, if you're a narrator and you're listening to this, feel free to reach out to us and we'll add you to our list.

Howard Lovy: Inspired by Reedsy authors, Ricardo became an author himself, focusing on marketing.

Ricardo Fayet: I think since the very beginning, working with authors was very inspiring, and you always toy with the idea of writing a book yourself one day. I was mostly thinking about fiction, because that's all I read almost. But as the years went by and I kept going to conferences and authors asked me, so what do you write, and I said, nothing; I was getting tired of that nothing answer.

So, I thought I should really write a book. We have a lot of resources around marketing, but marketing is a very complex topic, and we're basically telling authors, here are some blog posts or hire a professional, and not everyone has the funds to be able to hire a professional to do a full marketing plan for their release.

So, I thought, okay, we can create one free book where we put all our marketing knowledge in there, and so I set out to write that, and I never wrote anything because I kept procrastinating it.

So, I started a weekly newsletter instead, like a free weekly newsletter with marketing tips, and what that allowed me basically is to write this book one chapter a week while sending those newsletters.

So, every newsletter was on a specific topic, and then I had probably 80-90 newsletters that I had to rearrange, and in most cases completely rewrite to finally put this book together, but it allowed me to not have to start from scratch, which was really helpful for that first book, I think.

Howard Lovy: There are so many marketing methods available, but Ricardo recommends finding just two that work for you.

Ricardo Fayet: Finding those strategies that work for you is relatively simple. It's through testing. So, you have to test in a very systematic way. You test one or two strategies at a time, but you really put the time and the energy into testing them correctly.

What I see a lot of authors do is spend a week on Facebook ads without taking any prior course or anything else, just going to the Facebook ads interface or they boost a post, give it a week, it doesn't work, and then they conclude that Facebook ads don't work for their books, and that's their conclusion forever.

The method they follow of testing one channel is correct, but the way of testing it is completely wrong, because you've got to really put the time and the energy to properly test that Facebook advertising channel, take a free course about it or read a book, give it a proper month, logging in every day, tweaking your ads, et cetera.

After that, you can actually take a conclusion on whether they're helping your books or not. So, that's for the testing part.

But then the first half of the book focuses on the essentials that you need to have before you test any channel, because a lot of times we think of marketing as, how do I drive eyeballs to my book, and whenever Authors ask me about that, I look at their book pages and they're generally not ready to get eyeballs sent to their pages.

90% of marketing work, in my opinion, should go into coming up with a perfect cover, the perfect blurb, securing those reviews, and getting those retailer pages as neat as possible with all the correct metadata underneath.

If you really do that, then everything else becomes so much easier that you really won't have to struggle that much to bring eyeballs to it.

Howard Lovy: And Reedsy is expanding, focusing on teaching authors how to write a novel.

Ricardo Fayet: I think over the summer, we're launching a novel writing course, a paid one, called How to Write a Novel.

Not a very imaginative title, but it tells the story. Taught by Tom Bromley who's an author, editor, a ghost-writer, who's taught a number of courses at Faber and other places before in the UK, and we've spent a lot of time and energy on producing that course. So, we're really excited to launch it over the summer, and I think a lot of the authors who come to Reedsy, who come to our blog, who view our webinars, who take our free courses, they haven't written a book yet. There's a lot of people who are still at that aspiration stage, and so the idea of the course is to help them write a novel in three months, that's the whole purpose of the course.

After that, it's people who can then use Reedsy to find an editor or a designer, or publish a book, but it's adding another offering in there that I think will have a lot of synergies with the marketplace, with the writing tool, and with everything else in the Reedsy ecosystem.

Howard Lovy: Ricardo also recommends authors use a free writing tool from Reedsy.

Ricardo Fayet: Another area we're focusing on a lot is our writing tools. So, a lot of people are not aware in the first place that we have a free writing tool called the Reedsy Book Editor with recently added plotting resources to it, outlining resources, where you can create notes, different characters, locations, settings, things like that, and you can write your whole book in there. It's absolutely free. You can set goals. Say, okay, I want to write 10,000 words by the end of the week, and it's going to tell you how many words you need to write every day, send you a little notification.

So, if you don't hit your goals, et cetera, that's got a little bit of gamification in there to keep you accountable, and then once you finish a book, you can export it for free to a print-ready PDF or to an EPUB that you can then go on and publish on any distributor.

So, if you haven't invested in Vellum or Atticus yet for the formatting, you should definitely check it out. Or if you're just looking for a new distraction-free writing tool that's free, check it out as well and see if it's for you.

Howard Lovy: As for the future, well, everybody is talking about the role AI will soon play in the writing, editing, and publishing process. For now, Ricardo says, he's not worried about the competition.

Ricardo Fayet: No, it definitely is something that we're taking into account, and I think everyone should take it into account and see how it could affect their future.

Right now, I think we're still a fair way away from where AI could ever replace an editor, especially on the developmental editing side of things.

There's software that have been using AI for several years now to try to come up with some automated tools to do some of the developmental editing. May that change in the future? Absolutely, but I still think that those tools may end up being used more by the editors than the authors themselves.

Just like Photoshop is still used by colour designers rather than authors themselves, and the same thing goes for design. I see a lot of people thinking, I can just use AI now to generate my covers, but actually most of the design work on the cover, maybe not most but a good 50% of it, is in the typography and the placement of the type, and the incorporation of image and type together, and one very simple way you can tell a professional cover from a less than professional one, is just by the type, how it's placed. Some covers have amazing illustrations, but just very terrible type on them.

So yeah, you can use AI for a lot of things, and I think it provides new opportunities, maybe for authors who are on a budget to get their books out there, in at least a better shape than they would have been able to otherwise. But I think we're still very far from it being able to rival professionals, or the level of professionals that you find on Reedsy in the fields of editing, design, translation, marketing, et cetera.

Read more here https://bookmarketingandbookpromotiontools.blogspot.com/2023/06/amazon-kdp-categories-also-see-bottom.html

[ruffboijuliaburnsides]

🌍 and 💡 for the ask meme!

🌍 What is your dream AU? 

Hmmmmm... I’m trying to think, ‘cause most of my most-desired AUs have been written! I think the dream AU i most want to write (let’s go with that) is my Renfri-and-Jaskier-are-siblings AU, because it also ends with Renfri being y’know. Alive. I don’t know what plot I would have beyond the backstory to it, but I really want to write it one day.  When I’m done with...

/eyes WIPs...

...well.

I’m very sorry to anyone waiting on bgsa or ayhwa updates, i swear I’m working on them.

💡 Tell me a headcanon (and who you wish would write it)?

Hm, well, I headcanon Jaskier as... honestly actually being pretty depressed, dealing with stretches where he’s not able to be as bright and optimistic and creative as Geralt usually sees him.  Winters are especially bad.  So like...

I think I’d want a story about Jaskier dealing with his usual issues over his first winter in Kaer Morhen, while also trying not to let on to the witchers - especially Geralt - that he’s feeling that way, totally forgetting they can smell it on him and they’re just like “...do we talk to him about it? Is it our fault?” and just... having him explain eventually, and Geralt (and the other wolves) reassuring him that they’re not going to be upset with him if he’s not always able to be the person he forces himself to be out in the rest of the world.  IDK if it would just be this or if there would be plot too, but I’d prefer at least equal focus on the emotional stuff.

Just for tone and the sort of writing and approach they take, I think my top 2 choices for who I wish would write something like that would be @fayet or @jackironsides.  I think @bomberqueen17 could also do a really awesome take on it but she’s basically already including that in Meet Death Sitting, just not the focus usually.

[fayet]

Great, now I do want to actually do this campy Vampire story translation.

camp is the purest form of art actually this isnt an ironic post

[eskelchopchop]

First Sentences Meme

Took me a little while to get around to this, but it looks like fun! Thanks for the tag, @ghostinthelibrarywrites and @queenmevesknickers!

List the first lines of your last 20 stories (if you have less than 20, just list them all). See if there are any patterns. Choose your favorite opening line. Then tag 10 of your favorite authors!

In chronological order from oldest fic to current WIPs:

1. The rope is weathered, fraying in places from too many nights on the saddle. -The One with the Rope

2. Eskel is chopping firewood when she calls. -After Tedd Deireádh

3. “That wish of yours,” Yennefer whispers. “I heard what you wished for.” -she gathers you

4. Kaer Morhen. Mountains like geriatric dragons’ teeth, winters like an ice giant’s ass, marshes full of foglets, forests full of wolves, and caves full of children’s bones. -A Standing Agreement

5. Every night, Javier goes into the nursery and tries to think of bedtime stories. -"Ghost Stories" (original fic)

6. Three years since they got the place, and Eskel still can’t get over the sight of Geralt’s hair in the sunlight. -The Color of the Wheat Fields

7. Eskel hears Geralt first. -With Regards from Master Darkheart

8. Every morning that he wakes up to her, he thinks he's still dreaming. -where the grapevines grow

9. "They interviewed the werewolf's wife on the Today Show." -unnamed & unfinished original fic

10. ���Yen,” Geralt says, “might be time to slow down.” -veritas

11. Call me Dandelion. -A Happy Ending, If You Can Bear It

12. Geralt hears the cry about a mile off, a high-pitched yelp like an animal in pain. -Yearlings

13. When yet another knock sounds at the manor’s door, Dak nearly pulls out their beard in frustration. -Bread, Salt, and Wine

14. Lady Dassene Chorbenne examined her bust in the fitting room mirror for the fourth time. -When We Killed Monsters

15. YOUNG YENNEFER “Tirlich-tirlich, call my love to me.” -golem magic

16. “Must you move like that?” -A Splinter in Time

17. Eskel knew he hadn’t dressed his Friday night best, especially for New York. -seeeecret Eskel Big Bang modern AU fic

18. After the first shock, dying feels like the morning of a bad hangover: a slow re-assembly of sense as you figure out where you are, how you got here, and how to make the headache stop. -seeeecret Fisstech exchange fic

Patterns. Hm. I see most of these sentences trying to set up a character focus and a setting from the beginning: here's a character, here's where they are / their situation. A lot of my stories begin with the entrance of a character or at the beginning of an important conversation, not so much in the middle of action or a conversation. Also, my Yenralt fics are much more likely to start with dialogue for some reason.

Favorite one? Uhhhh I dunno. Possibly Wheat Fields for the instant feels, possibly the original fic that opens with the werewolf one-liner because that one line stuck in my brain so deeply, I had to write a story for it.

Erf, I can't remember who's gone already. Extending a possibly redundant invitation to @stillmadaboutpetra, @fayet, @octinary, @witchertrashbag, @lohrendrell, and anyone else who wants to take a motorcycle tour of their story beginnings!

[saeculorum-art]

You're the author for Hibernating With Ghosts?? OMG I LOVE that fic SO MUCH!!!! It's so melancholic but really hopeful in the end and i enjoyed every minute of reading it!! AND IT DEALS WITH MONSTERS,,, I LOVE FICS WHERE THE MAIN VILLAIN IS A MONSTER,, i think monsters are so under-utilized in witcher fics in general.. especially in a series where the main character is a professional monster slayer xD

ASDFDASDFGFDF NOOOO you have the wrong person. @fayet is the author, direct your praises to him!! I merely drew some fanart but I didn’t write the fic... ought to make that clearer in my posts.

[elyccscorner]

Chapters: 15/16 Fandom: Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types Rating: Mature Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia & Other(s), Eskel & Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia Characters: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Jaskier | Dandelion, Eskel (The Witcher), Vesemir (The Witcher), Lambert (The Witcher), Coën (The Witcher), Various Characters, Roach (The Witcher) Additional Tags: Kaer Morhen, Canon-Typical Violence, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Friendship/Love, Fluff and Humor, Family Dynamics, Canon-typical bathing, Various monsters - Freeform, Crack and Angst, Animal Traits, Blood and Injury, Drinking, cursing, Sweet Melitele be with us, Slow Burn, long chapters, World Building Galore, Blood and Gore, Violence, Mystery, And a little bit of Horror, let's make #TeamEskel a thing, #TeamEskel Summary:

Getting stuck in Kaedwen in winter had never been on Jaskier's plan. It's cold, they don't appreciate his music and nobody likes their national beverage anyway. The only redeeming thing Kaedwen has is Kaer Morhen, so Jaskier does what any reasonable bard would do in this situation: he decides to charm his way into Kaer Morhen to hibernate with Geralt and the other witchers. If nothing it will be an experience no human has ever had, fuel for songs and poems for years to come, while finally teaching him a thing or two about witchers he's just dying to know.

Curiosity tended to kill the cat, but Jasker had always seen himself as more of a bird anyway.

--

I’m tearing up a little bit because this is the last chapter of a truly amazing fanfiction. The language and writing style is amazing, the characterisation is unbelievably good - and the whole story!! READ IT!! NOW!! I’m serious, it’s awesome!!

[nanowrimo]

5 Common Mistakes First-Time Novelists Make

Every year, we’re lucky to have great sponsors for our nonprofit events. Today, our sponsor Reedsy has put together a list of the most common mistakes for rookie novelists (Want more advice from Reedsy? Check out their webcast on writing and submitting query letters!):

Writing a novel for the first time is probably one of the most daunting creative experiences in existence. Indeed, many first-time novelists have no idea how to approach it! This often means they go in blind—and end up making mistakes that seriously hinder their writing process, their novel, and their overall confidence as a writer.

And while learning from your own mistakes is a great way to cement those lessons, we can all agree that it’s not very efficient. So if you're about to start writing a novel for the first time, here’s a quick catalog of five common mistakes that first-time novelists make, as well as how to evade them.

1. Starting without a clear purpose

A staggering number of first-timers go into the novel-writing process with no greater mission other than to, well, write a novel. It’s a noble quest, to be sure—but without any other purpose in mind for your work, you’re not going to get very far.

To avoid this fate, have a prolonged brainstorm/deep thinking sesh before you begin to draft. The question you ultimately need to answer is: what kind of story am I trying to write? Not just in terms of genre and plot, but what you want the reader to take away from your novel.

This might be an outright lesson about society, as in a book like The Handmaid’s Tale. Or it might be an impression of a time/place/feeling, as in Elif Batuman’s 2017 novel The Idiot. Perhaps you want to represent a group or experience you feel is underrepresented in literature. Your novel’s purpose could be just about anything, as long as you feel strongly about it.

But whatever it is, pre-draft is the time to get ahold of it—not halfway through your novel, in a frantic attempt to conjure meaning out of thin air.

2. Being unrealistically ambitious

While you should definitely have goals (like purpose) as you write, you don’t want to be too ambitious—i.e. if you’ve never written a novel before, you can’t go into it thinking you’re about to write the next Gone Girl. Unfortunately, many first-timers do exactly that!

Little do they know that being overly ambitious with your first novel is a one-way ticket to Writer’s Blockville, which is walking distance from Giving-Up Town. So don’t make your writing goals too lofty, lest you become too discouraged to actually meet them.

Instead, try this: make a list of 3 realistic and concrete goals to work toward as you draft, and tell yourself to disregard everything else for the time being. A reasonable set of ambitions for a first-time novelist might be:

Write X number of words in X days (say, 50k words in 30 days, if you’re feeling up to it).

Construct a relatively straightforward plot. 

Focus on one aspect of your fiction writing that you know needs improvement—characterization, pacing, dialogue, etc.

Keeping solid goals like these in mind will prevent you from burning out. Just remember, the most important part of writing a first novel is just to get it down on the page. As long as you’re still writing, you’re doing something right.

3. Trying too hard to be “literary”

Even seasoned writers often fall into the trap of trying too hard to sound “literary,”—like F. Scott Fitzgerald, Virginia Woolf, Zadie Smith, or any number of renowned writers. Of course, it’s great to have role models, but not if you end up sounding unnaturally ornate and formal in an attempt to emulate other novelists.

The best way combat this “over-literary” effect is to carefully monitor your prose. Be honest with yourself: if you’ve written something just to sound fancy, not because it actually contributes to the story, cut it out. When in doubt, ask someone else to test-read your work and tell you if anything comes across as pretentious or unnatural.

It’s also good to consciously stay away from other literary works during the writing process, just in case of accidental osmosis. Or if you must read (we all know it’s a hard thing to give up), try picking up novels that are nothing like yours. For example, if you’re writing a slow-burn romance, you should be able to enjoy a fast-paced thriller without worrying about the style bleeding into yours.

4. Editing right after finishing

Countless successful writers and editors constantly remark on the importance of waiting to edit one’s manuscript. Yet after completing their first draft, many people dive right into the self-editing process without so much as a day’s buffer!

The result is a highly subjective—and therefore largely ineffective—editing process. You’re stubbornly attached to certain passages and subplots, and you’re so exhausted from writing the first draft that you resist the idea of revising. Basically, editing too soon after finishing your novel means you can’t get much of anything done.

Luckily, there’s an easy way around this problem: waiting a few days, weeks, or even months before returning to your first draft. While you may be eager to start sending your novel out to agents or other readers, trust us that waiting is the best thing you can do at this juncture.

This doesn’t mean, of course, that you can’t do anything else productive during the interim. You might research professional editors, or even start working on another project if you have the energy! The important thing is to clear your mind of that first novel, so that when you do finally go back to it, you’ll have fresh eyes with which to conduct a much better, deeper self-edit.

5. Never writing anything else

One of the worst mistakes writers make is letting their first novel also be their last. Yes, some people write novels just to see if they can, or to get a story out of their system, and they’re satisfied to leave it at that. But many more people just don’t think it’s worth the effort—especially if their first novel didn’t turn out as amazing as they thought it would (see tip #2).

Allow us to dissuade you of that notion. No one’s denying that writing a novel is hard work—but the work is worth it, as long as you don’t give up. The more you practice and the more novels you write, the better your craft will become. To paraphrase Ira Glass, your skill will eventually catch up with your taste; you just have to push a bit to get there.

So don’t stop writing after your first book, otherwise you’ll never know what you’re truly capable of creating. Learn from your own mistakes, as well as the ones we’ve outlined here, and keep moving forward—to your second, third, fourth novels and beyond.

Ricardo Fayet is a co-founder of Reedsy, an online marketplace connecting authors with industry’s best editors, designers and book marketers.

[fayet]

The thing that you have written- is it original work or some sort of fanfiction?

It's some sort of fanfiction, but the more bizarre variety: I read a fanfic I liked in a fandom I'm not in or know anything about, it triggered what we used to call a plot bunny in the good ol' days (I'm an old fucker) and I essentially AU-ed the fanfic. At this point in time it's probably 1% content from the original thing, 20% from the fanfiction I read and 79% world-building. So, yeah, it's deriative work, but with various sources and a dash of crazy. (And yes, I am in contact with the author of the cool fanfic and will send them the whole novel-lenght thing for clearance before throwing it on Ao3).

This is as original work as it gets for me, to be honest.

[sylviahubbard]

What to do at a writing conference via Ricardo Fayet #Reedsy #motownwriters

What to do at a writing conference via Ricardo Fayet #Reedsy #motownwriters

In this edition of the Reedsy marketing newsletter, we’re going to take an even closer look at — you guessed it — writing conferences. More specifically: how to make the most of them when attending.If you’re wondering which conferences (if any!) you should consider attending in the first place, it means you didn’t read my last newsletter! If that’s the case, you can find it here.Note:…

[ao3feed-snape]

The Howler

read it on AO3 at https://ift.tt/39ihDnK

by Fayet

In which Albus Dumbledore receives a Howler, needs a place to hide for a little bit and learns a few things about how Slytherins celebrate christmas.

Listen, I know. It's a christmas ficlet. It's a bit cheerful, it's a bit sad, it's not canon compliant and I love to write Albus&Severus-friendship things at the moment, so here is one. You can read this if it's not christmas anymore or will be soon again. It would even work in summer, maybe. It's mostly sappy and a bit angsty, so it fits all seasons!

Works as standalone, don't mind that it's part of a series.

Words: 6795, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English

Series: Part 4 of Those Who Favour Fire

Fandoms: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling

Rating: Not Rated

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: Gen

Characters: Severus Snape, Albus Dumbledore, A Howler, Plus Slytherin students, OCs

Relationships: Albus Dumbledore & Severus Snape

Additional Tags: Dialogue Heavy, au-ish, Not Canon Compliant, Involves Christmas, violence mentioned, One Shot, Old Friends, So much talking, and nobody is happy, but somehow they are, I've given up on canon, Mentor/Protégé, a bit angsty, because that's how I write

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/39ihDnK

[ruffboijuliaburnsides]

🥰 for the Witcher of course

A/N: Milos was created I believe by Fayet on AO3 who writes Hibernating With Ghosts which you should all read.

[surrounded by love]

Vesemir was the first person to love Geralt, he thinks. He doesn’t remember if his mother loved him, and he has significant doubts about whether she did or not, since she left him to be raised as a witcher.

But Vesemir was gentle with him, gave him a name of his own, took him back to Kaer Morhen with admonitions that it would be a hard life but that his brothers would always look after him.  He didn’t understand the “if he survived” part until later, when he was a bit older, but it was true nonetheless. There was a fair amount of bickering and bullying among the younger boys who hadn’t gone through the trials yet, but if it came down to it they always had each other’s backs, just sometimes they weren’t nice about it.

Vesemir taught him to hold a sword, to fight with a sword, to keep moving even when he wanted to fall over. Vesemir, he learned years after the fact, had pushed back against the choice to put Geralt through a second round of the Trial of the Grasses, said that they needed a witcher who came through the first round in such (relatively) good shape. And it was Vesemir who was the kindest to him and the most protective of him, in his own rough and hard way, after he emerged from the second round different and strange and uncertain. And he’s never stopped.

Eskel loved Geralt immediately.  They were of an age, though Geralt had been in Kaer Morhen longer when Vesemir brought Eskel to the youngest boys’ dormitories, but Eskel had been bigger. Just a little taller, just a little stronger. 

“I’ll protect you,” the boy declared with complete childlike confidence, taking Geralt’s hand and jutting his chin out as if daring anyone to argue, and Geralt said, “Ok,” and let it happen.

When there were bullies or injuries or sickness, Eskel was always right there. When they came through the Trial of the Grasses (the first time, for Geralt), Eskel was worse off but still managed to crawl his way to Geralt’s cot and squeeze onto the tiny thing with him, holding him even as he trembled nearly out of his skin from the pain and the fear. 

(Geral never tells Eskel how much that moment meant to him, even if he wasn’t so badly off. He never tells Eskel how much any of the things he’s done over the years mean to him. Eskel doesn’t need him to.)

And after the siege that destroyed their brothers and their home, Geralt came back to find Eskel had arrived much quicker than he had, that he and Vesemir had already dealt with the bodies and the worst of the bloodstains. And even hollow-eyed and grieving, the first thing Eskel does is walk to Geralt, pull him into the tightest hug of their lives, and ask if Geralt is okay.  If that’s not love, Geralt has never experienced it, but he’s pretty sure it is.

Lambert loves Geralt in the same way he hates Geralt: loudly, intensely, and jealously. Their relationship is fraught, always. When Lambert is twelve, he begs Geralt to take him away onto the Path, promises he’ll earn his keep, and in the first big city he can go his own way.  Geralt declines, and Lambert’s hatred crystalizes in that moment, from idolization to jealousy.

But other times, as he gets older, especially after the siege, Lambert also provides comfort. He’ll needle Geralt to the point of lashing out, and at Vesemir’s command to “take it outside!” they’ll get their swords and spar for an hour, sometimes more, and when the fight eventually ends, even though it almost always ends with Geralt’s sword at Lambert’s throat, Geralt feels better and Lambert looks satisfied and relieved.

It’s almost as if Lambert doesn’t know how to care for someone without hating them a bit too. Geralt tries not to think about it, because Lambert deserves to be able to pour out that love he carries inside himself without having to lace it with hatred and violence.

Coën  loves Geralt, in the way you love a cousin you were never close to. The Gryphon isn’t a regular winter resident in Kaer Morhen, exactly, but then neither is Geralt. 

Coën  teaches him moves that his school perfected, that don’t naturally mesh with the way the wolves were trained to fight, and talks at length about Milos and how he learned it. 

Milos was a smallish, blond-curled Wolf who was killed in the siege. By all accounts, from Vesemir and Eskel, it looked as though he’d died doing his best to protect the littlest of children. He’d travelled with Coën (inasmuch as witchers travelled with each other, which was to say mostly meeting up every few weeks in a previously determined location) for over a decade.  They would never let Coën go with that sort of connection.  They knew it was there.

And Coën is always a little worried about them all. He may not love them the way he loved Milos, but he doesn’t want what happened to Milos to happen to them.  

Jaskier loves Geralt.

Sometimes facts are just facts, and a best friend will always love you.

Jaskier loves Geralt steady and true until Geralt can’t stand it anymore and breaks his heart and pushes him away.

(And even still, that broken shattered heart keeps loving him, even when he doesn’t remotely deserve it.)

Yennefer loves Geralt, though not always the way either of them want her to. The draw is the djinn, they realize eventually, but the feelings are her own. It’s complicated in the end - she doesn’t want to be kept or bound, and he doesn’t want to be left behind, and yet somehow both of them have managed to entangle the other in the things they want least.

“We could’ve been a great love story,” she says one evening, years down the line, sitting at the fireplace in Kaer Morhen’s library after dinner. “Something your bard would’ve been fit to burst about writing.”

“Hmm,” Geralt says, and falls silent. It’s a long time before he says, “I don’t think that was what we’re meant for,” just before Eskel and Jaskier come in bearing alcohol and glasses, Lambert carrying a tray of bread and cheese.  It doesn’t leave Yen any space to argue, or agree, or say anything. 

Geralt’s not sure he can handle hearing too much about exactly what kind of love she feels for him. Not just yet. He can’t quite handle the thought of Jaskier writing a song - well, another song - about them, especially after the heartbroken bitterness of the others.

Ciri loves Geralt with all the joy and power and carelessness a traumatized child could hope to love.

She is fire and passion and anger and bitterness and kindness, and it’s all Geralt can do to open himself to accepting all her emotions and trying his best to give back even half as good as he gets.

He doesn’t.  But he tries. He’s her father, and he will always try.

Jaskier loves everyone. It’s not clear at first, how much he loves. Geralt sees him with Ciri, combing her hair and holding her after nightmares and singing silly songs and pretty songs and songs that he clearly wrote about Geralt but with more subtle imagery than Geralt’s used to from him. He’s always known Jaskier was talented, even if he didn’t enjoy the fruits of his labor, but this is something else entirely, a story that is clearly about Geralt, the most honest songs he’s heard about himself from the bard’s lips, but without ever once mentioning wolves or witchers. He doesn’t know why he hasn’t heard these songs, or why they exist. He’s afraid to ask. Ciri seems to already know them well.

Geralt sees Jaskier with his brothers, even with Coën, and feels like he might burn from the warmth in his chest. The lazy ease with which Jaskier interacts with them. It’s not that he’s not nervous, he clearly wants to make a good impression, but Jaskier is warm and open and most importantly not afraid of any of them.

He is never afraid, and it terrifies Geralt more than anything he can think of, and makes him improbably proud to have been the bard’s first witcher.  His brothers love Jaskier right back, in their ways, Eskel with cheerful-yet-terrifying facts about monsters and witchers and the dark places of the world, Lambert with insults and very restrained physical harassment, Coën with solemn offers of helping him train to be a better swordsman than he is, so he can protect himself out in the world.

He sees Jaskier with Yennefer, their previous animosity softened somewhat. They still snipe at each other, pulling at the threads of each others’ insecurities and fears, but if they go too far, they back off, which they never did the first times they met. Geralt sees Jaskier say something saucy (judging by his expression) to Yen one day, and expects Yen to retaliate or slap him, but instead Yen laughs - bright and loud enough that even as far away as he is, Geralt can hear her - and kisses Jaskier’s cheek. He doesn’t know what they’ve built, but he’s glad it’s there, holding them up if he can’t be there.

Vesemir is an enigma in some ways, but Jaskier manages at least to get into his affections, judging by the strict tone he takes with Jaskier while he watches him train with Eskel or Coën, or the firm way he steers the exhausted bard to the dinner table, or the baths, or his own room. It makes Ciri laugh, and Jaskier always sighs when this happens, just following along with a teasing (but somehow also respectful), “Yes, Papa Vesemir.”

And then...

And then.

Jaskier loves Geralt. 

It doesn’t make sense. And after some time away, Geralt can process and internalize that it was never meant to be solely platonic. That Jaskier was willing to take whatever love he could get, but that the love he gave was more than that. It overflowed to everyone in Geralt’s life, spilling over and over and over, doing its best to fill everyone up, and somehow Jaskier manages to do this without coming out of it drained and exhausted and unable to love.

He kisses Geralt one day, after singing Ciri to sleep.

“I can’t handle this anymore,” he admits, and Geralt doesn’t know what he means. He tries to say it, pained and uncertain and terrified that Jaskier’s leaving, but Jaskier watches his face and the strange openness of his expressions, and he smiles.

“You can’t either, can you?” he asks softly, and Geralt lets himself whimper, just a tiny bit. “Well,” Jaskier says, a spark of heat and delight in his voice as he presses against Geralt’s body. “We’ll just have to fix that, won’t we?”

Every important person in Geralt’s life loves him, and when it matters they all love each other as well. And while he doesn’t know how to process or handle this fact, he knows that he never in a million years would give it up for anything short of saving their lives.

And all the people around him continue to love him.

[stillmadaboutpetra]

JOYVEMBER - Let’s cast a personal Quen and bring about some spirited protection.

Doing this with @fayet​ and @eskelchopchop​ as we’ve all been a bit dark and with the oncoming winter and coming off of spook/whumptober, it would be nice to nudge-nudge ourselves into a better mood.

For anyone who wants to participate, I came up with a rough prompt list of happy things - take a peak if you want. Tag me in anything you write or art! <3

Good food/drink Feeling safe/cared for Love language Good kush “Stopping to smell the roses” Good sensory experience Random acts of kindness Feeling safe Festivals Animal cuddles Decorating Revisiting favorite books(or other thing?) A really good nap Gift giving/receiving Cuddles in General/puppy piles “Home” Arts & Crafts Dancing, Cavorting, General Frollicking Pranks Unrestrained Summer Fun & Fuckery Holiday vibes of your choosing Pleasant and Unapologetic Clownish Buffoonery Giggling during Intimacy Found Family “He followed me home on his own can we keep him” Amiable Hunter/Gathering (berry picking, fungi finding, collecting pebbles, etc) 10/10 Orgasm Celebrating Your Friends Accomplishments/Your Own Trying a New Skill /Exploring New Thing It’s the Little Things / Life is made of many small moments

[eskelchopchop]

tagged by @mondfuchs! :D

rules: it’s time to love yourselves! choose your 5 (ish) favorite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2020. tag as many writers/artists/etc. as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works!

Uh yeeee yay For full effect, imagine me as that red-faced kid giving his presentation at the front of the classroom, talking too fast, avoiding all eye contact, and sitting down immediately before the necessary Q&A portion

5. A Standing Agreement - The one that started it all. Last Winter Break, I did nothing but replay The Witcher 3 and by the end of the gaming binge, I had the initial idea for this fic. It was the first urge I’d had to write fanfic since my Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver days, about... uh, fifteen years ago? I wrote six chapters, realized my plot structure was fatally flawed, put the fic away for five months, came back and rewrote it from top to bottom with a different focus & plot arc. It’s only 44k words, a modest length by the standard of fanfic long reads, but I’ve spent more time working on this fic than anything else that I’ve ever written. 

4.  The Color of the Wheat Fields - I found out about stillmadaboutpetra’s birthday the day before. They deserve gifts and nice things, so I wrote & edited this giftfic in a feverish last-minute fugue state. It was supposed to be a happy fic-- instead, it made them cry. Still feel bad about that. This fic is the reason I get misty-eyed whenever I see @calyxestra’s redheaded Geralt. 

3. Yearlings - Secret Santa gift fic for mondfuchs! I was aiming for a different style with this one-- sparer prose, a lot less inner monologue. I cut 2k words off the first draft, about 25% of the fic. Mondfuchs wanted a subtle fic about the unconditional trust & love that Geralt and Eskel share, so I set out to show the moment that Geskel became what they are-- that transition from bright-eyed kiddos goofing around in Kaer Morhen to the seasoned, jaded professionals who carry each other’s histories with a profound understanding beyond words. I think the fic works. Grateful to mondfuchs for the prompt & inspiration!

2. A Splinter in Time - My personal monster. This is me being my own psychopomp, marching down to the underworld and wrestling with the demons there. The fic’s not done yet; my first writing goal of the new year is to finish it. It may also be too harsh / brutal for anyone to really read, but that’s okay-- excavating that tar down in the deep is already changing me-- stories with happy endings are becoming possible again. Cheaper than therapy, if not easier.

1. After Tedd Deireádh - Artists can get kind of woo-woo about the nature of creativity and where their ideas come from. I get 100% woo-woo with this story. The first chapter poured out from who knows where, and Yen & Eskel did what they did against my own plans for the fic. It would have benefited from some editing after the fact, but oh well-- I love it in all its messy rawness. I needed a story like this. Thanks, invisible merciful muse or whatever, for donating one. 

uhhh yeah sooo I’mma tentatively tag @fayet and @stillmadaboutpetra and @lohrendrell (who tagged me in another post-- consider this a cheerful wave back! :D) and @laurelnose and @inber and @limerental, who can feel free to decline, and anyone else who wants to play because what the hell life is short and 2020 is awful and lets celebrate the good things that managed to crawl out of its toxic cesspit