#I just legit haven’t had time to write but a piece of my sanity leaves me each day I don’t write

[the-rad-pineapple]

See, I don’t choose to write fanfiction, it’s just when I don’t, I feel like I’m going to bite my own fingers off

[aikainkauna]

Sorry I haven’t been giffing/posting/reglobbing much lately, guys. It’s that behemoth of a fic swallowing up all my sitting-upright time (and a big chunk of my reclining time). Four chapters or so to go and I’m still spending about 7-11 hours every day combing the remaining text for typos (yes, some of us actually do care about our fics and don’t think it’s some dirty “trashy,” “guilty pleasure” of less value), so it’s a full-time job with overtime. So if I’m slow to respond to anything, it’s that. I’m sure that soon enough, the post-fic existential emptiness will be upon us and you’ll be seeing more gifs and tag yelling.

Although it’s just been so quiet among the nice people here and so loud among the idiots that I might just take several steps back from Tumblr in general, just for my mental health. There seems little point in making gifs nobody reblogs and saying anything when it’s drowned out by the types who give liberals a bad name (honestly, some of the shit people say on here would already have made me a Nazi were I a bloke, because apparently nothing is ever enough and I’ll always be Doing it Wrong anyway; you’re not making tolerance seem worthwhile, if you nevertheless beat the tolerant person up for wearing the wrong types of socks).

I’m still looking for that fandom old people’s home, so if you find it, that place where people are old enough to have some fucking perspective, do let me know.

This whole place is eerily reminiscent of an abusive relationship where you’re constantly having to tiptoe because you never know when the next explosion is going to come and where from, what sort of utterly random thing someone is going to call abusive now and beat you up for, even if you’ve been working hard not to upset them, have made deliberate choices to accommodate them because you know their wounds. It’s like Borderline Personality Disorder, but in the form of a website. (And yes, I know first-hand what BPD is like. Had the spouse, had the flatmate, had the fuckbuddies, had the friends.) And the worst thing about BPD is that it’s catching: being around a human minefield makes everyone jumpy, and then *their* jumpiness becomes tyrannical towards others (when the hurt person is just self-defending, they feel) and then the cycle continues. Everybody is paranoid and beating everybody up in the name of great justice, and undermining everyone else’s psyches to the point where they become human minefields themselves. And they don’t know how to stop that cycle, if they’re in denial about having a problem, because of course, if you hurt and lash out, you’re just defending yourself. (Being told you’re a shitty person for freaking out at a trigger is worse than being triggered. Good luck trying to crawl out of that into any semblance of health, if you feel you’re just an explosive piece of crap forever.)

And while I know I can help a bit by stepping outside of that and offering fic and pics and lols where people can forget about it all, I’m still in two minds about offering it in a direction where the recipient is never going to be happy anyway, and where the effort is (or seems) wasted as long as the receiving end isn’t doing any conscious healing/rebuilding itself to better appreciate healthier things. It does nothing. Why am I buying medicine for someone who abuses me for it and throws the bottle in my face? I’ve been there, trying to please people who were locked up in their traumas and paranoias, throwing all my love and effort and work at them to no avail because I thought I could help; I’m not keen on doing it again. Because now I’m old enough to know I’m wasting my time, as brutal and as “selfish” that sounds (how about calling it “self-preservation?” “Sanity?” “Kindness to oneself?” I know women are beaten out of daring to have that, for daring to even think their lives aren’t meant to be lived for other people, but fucking watch me go).

Just like partners and friends aren’t the same as professional help, fandom isn’t the ultimate cure for depression/trauma unless there’s an inner change in the ill person to better utilise it. I was that ill person and I had to go through a lot of therapy and growth to not become a 24/7 abusive bitch myself (I still have shitty hypersensitivities, but those are in-built–they’re bad enough). I changed the way I see fannish activities (I now really do see them as medicine), and only then could I enjoy them to the fullest and only then could I start writing really good fic, because it comes from a firm ground of faith in the inherent value of fic. It’s a really complicated thing to explain, the interrelationships of fandom, queer people and mental health (there should be a book on fandom/queerdom and mentalness–we are wonky in the head, sometimes fucking awfully so, and it’s *not* all due to persecution but genes).

But my gist is that there’s no point in endlessly remaining in a draining relationship with someone who doesn’t want to heal–Tumblr’s anxiety-mongering culture of self-hate, ahoy! One has to pick one’s “battles” and channel one’s energy somewhere where it’s actually going to bear fruit. Not on a site that says the phrase “I don’t discriminate by colour” is racist, or that a feminist, mixed-race royal princess “isn’t enough” or that a given sexual minority gets to rule it over everyone else. Not on a site full of kids who are too young/American to have known *real* homophobia and racism, and who don’t realise that for most people, in the real world, even not being racist or homophobic is a *choice.*

Which is why I miss that supportive community of other brainy, feminist and reasonable fans who actually had conversations so. Fucking. Much. Where are they? (DW is where the militant vegan lesbian sociopath SJWs went, and if you’re not keen on eternal frowny moral meta, ehhh.)

Where’s the actual fun? Where are the other fans who are old enough to have been through therapy and who have experienced real relationships and have known actual real “minority” people IRL, and who consequently have an open mind about things? Who can see that things really aren’t as black and white as they thought they were when they were in their teens? Where are the fans who know something about psychology and psychiatry? The ones who know how gendered socialisation works and just how deep it goes, and who aren’t fans of Tumblr essentialism and its blindness to gender-based toxins? The fans who actually understand and respect the intelligence of other fans, instead of kneejerk assumptions of ignorance and moral corruption? The fans who legit don’t think a Gen X writer who forgot to use–or simply didn’t know about the existence of–a new politically correct term, is as evil as Hitler (because ignorance=/=active, intentional oppression, Jesus!)? The fans who respect the labor that goes into fanfic and fanart and always leave comments or otherwise support fan creators, instead of thinking of writers as vending machines for something “dirty” they feel ashamed for reading?

Because I’m that kind of “old” fan and I’ll be there for you if you’re there for me.

I just need to know where the fuck you are!

[bookaddict24-7]

REVIEW: 16 Ways to Break a Heart by Lauren Strasnick

Release Date: July 25, 2017

Age Group: 16+

Genres: Romance, Contemporary

Rating: 1/5 Stars

Original review on Goodreads here. (To view points marked as “view spoiler” go to my original review on Goodreads)

Be warned: This is a rant review and IT IS LONG. I haven’t posted a full review on here in a long time, but it’s late and I wanted to share. There MIGHT be spoilers, I honestly didn’t care too much because this book is just UGH. Okay, happy reading!

I received a copy via Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review

This book is a disaster.

That's probably the best way to describe WTF I just read (okay, speed read because I couldn't, for my sanity, take my time to read the ridiculousness of this book). I even made notes because I was just so confused while reading this that I needed to keep my thoughts straight. 

Everything in this book was toxic. I literally asked myself multiple times why I was still reading this book because all of the characters were just so unnecessary and (view spoiler). I get that not all characters are made to be likable, but this isn't even about that. These were just characters who were just given so much leniency and they were just horrible characters. They weren't even the kind of characters you love to hate. I just can't with these characters. 

I will include snippets of the synopsis because I don't think anyone will ever really be ready for the disaster they will encounter when they read this book. 

Here's the first paragraph of the synopsis:

Natalie and Dan were electric from the moment they met. Witty banter and sizzling chemistry made falling in love easy—even inevitable. He was in awe of her subversive art and contagious zest for life; she was drawn to his good-guy charm and drive to succeed as a documentary filmmaker.

Yes, the start of the book is a letter from Natalie detailing their encounter and how there was immediate chemistry--but there's also an attempt in the first letter at alluding how Dan, the male protagonist, is a manipulative asshole that completely hid his true self when they first met. I will touch on that later in this review. What this paragraph doesn't allude to is how Dan's jealousy becomes a big issue with Natalie's "success", and how she basically thinks he's wasting his time with his documentary because he's spending so much time working on something that's important to him, instead of spending time with her. Because you know, someone else future dream? Fuck that, right? 

Second paragraph:

But that was before. Before hot tempers turned to blowout fights. Before a few little lies turned to broken trust. Before a hundred tiny slights broke them open and exposed the ugly truth of their relationship.

OKAY. Hot tempers. HA. Whoever created this synopsis failed to mention the mild physical and verbal abuse, the slut shaming, the manipulation, the triggering comments of wanting to "commit suicide" introduced as jokes. Shit is not funny. I find it really freaking troubling that this is such a huge part of the novel and its alluded to as "hot tempers" and "blowout fights". Also, "Tiny Slights" is like putting a kid's superhero bandaid on a bleeding gash. These two people were HORRIBLE together and look, if the synopsis explained it as more than just a little troubled relationship, then maybe I'd be writing a different review, but honestly, WTF.

Rest of synopsis: 

And now Natalie wants Dan to know just how much he broke her.

Over the course of one fateful day, Dan reads sixteen letters that Natalie has secretly, brilliantly hidden in places only he will find. And as he pieces together her version of their love story, he realizes that she has one final message for him. One that might just send his carefully constructed life tumbling down.

Okay, for starters, this was not a "LOVE STORY". This was a nightmare that was attempting to pass as a romance. 

This synopsis makes it seem like this book had a female character who was SO clever about her delivery of her revenge, which by the way was(view spoiler), but really it was her literally dropping off letters throughout his school and life. Honestly, I thought Natalie was fucking nuts and I'm sorry, I don't mean to be offensive or anything, but seriously fuck these characters. The last sentence of that synopsis says that she has a message that "might just send his carefully constructed life tumbling down." SURPRISE: She spent the whole fucking book ruining his life. She destroyed a guy that actually did sound legitimately good.

Look, Dan wasn't a saint by the end of everything. But one of the things that really, really screwed with my mind was how this girl was a legit nightmare. She was controlling, manipulative, and abusive and basically got Dan to put her as number one in his life despite of who and what he was giving up, yet when he starts to do other less than boyfriend-ly things on the side, suddenly he's the villain of the story. I might be wrong here, but it dangerously felt like the character of Natalie going through what she was describing as a horrible relationship because he wasn't who she thought he was was being validated for her actions because Dan almost (view spoiler). 

Dan had his shit, too. His jealousy about Natalie's life wasn't fair, and he also said and did questionable things, I just don't want Natalie's actions to be pushed aside because suddenly he's not a saint in our eyes anymore. Abuse and manipulation CAN NOT be justified just because the victim decides to do other shady stuff. One is not a lesser issue than the other. At the same time, I'm not defending Dan because he was also a massive asshole. 

One of my final points is going to be about the layout of this book. I get what was being done with the letters and the messages and such, but like it felt like it was trying too hard to be either Thirteen Reasons Why or Why We Broke Up. I haven't read the former (but watched the TV Show) and hated the latter. I just wanted to throw the similarities in there because it felt like Natalie's letters were just so over the top dramatic and just really really annoying. 

I'll leave this rant on the note that the ending is 10/10 dramatic and 10/10 unnecessary and just as messed up as this relationship. Also, wtf was up with that one final reveal? Like, not only was it cliche but we had absolutely NO LEAD UP TO IT. I wish I had a physical copy of this book so I could pull a Bradley Cooper.

I don't recommend this book for anyone, sorry. I don't normally say this, but I legitimately did not enjoy this at all and I was just so shocked that this was even a thing. 

Happy reading!