#Traditional cafés

[cuppa-and-a-view]

Come tae the Barrowland tonight

Come tae the Barrowland tonight

Swing yer maw, swing yer paw, swing yer granny up the wa

Come tae the Barrowland tonight!

Cuppa: an exquisite builder's tea with two sugars

View: the retro interior of Guido's Coronation Café on Gallowgate, Glasgow.

I don't go into the city as much as I used to, as I've changed jobs. It's nice to have a reason to come intae toon on a sunny evening, and this Friday I had the best of reasons.

The Barrowland Ballroom was just that, a popular dancing spot until it burned down in the 50s and was rebuilt in the swinging 60s. The perfect place to spend a night at the dancing, and maybe find a cute boy to walk you home. Now that ballroom dancing isn't so much the thing, the Barrowland has become a world famous music venue.

Warning: flashing lights

When they started this way, I knew which song they were going to lead with! If you want to hear the rest, here's the lockdown version (there's a studio version and an official video too, I just like that one!)

I am a huge fan of Tide Lines. The man above has the voice of a burly Gaelic angel. And this guy here is a wizard on a different set of pipes:

We even got a wee cover of another act that famously played here:

It was a wonderful night. Especially the moment that Robert Robertson forgot his own lyrics, while the crowd confidently went on singing. Maybe we should hold up prompt cards.

I'll leave you with a couple of Glasgow's famous murals, on the Barrowland itself, and on the Winged Ox pub at St. Luke's, another excellent music venue just along the street.

[emeryleewho]

Saw a fun little conversation on Threads but I don't have a Threads account, so I couldn't reply directly, but I sure can talk about it here!

I've been wanting to get into this for awhile, so here we go! First and foremost, I wanna say that "Emmaskies" here is really hitting the nail on the head despite having "no insider info". I don't want this post to be read as me shitting on trad pub editors or authors because that is fundamentally not what's happening.

Second, I want to say that this reply from Aaron Aceves is also spot on:

There are a lot of reviewers who think "I didn't enjoy this" means "no one edited this because if someone edited it, they would have made it something I like". As I talk about nonstop on this account, that is not a legitimate critique. However, as Aaron also mentions, rushed books are a thing that also happens.

As an author with 2 trad pub novels and 2 trad pub anthologies (all with HarperCollins, the 2nd largest trad publisher in the country), let me tell you that if you think books seem less edited lately, you are not making that up! It's true! Obviously, there are still a sizeable number of books that are being edited well, but something I was talking about before is that you can't really know that from picking it up. Unlike where you can generally tell an indie book will be poorly edited if the cover art is unprofessional or there are typoes all over the cover copy, trad is broken up into different departments, so even if editorial was too overworked to get a decent edit letter churned out, that doesn't mean marketing will be weak.

One person said that some publishers put more money into marketing than editorial and that's why this is happening, but I fundamentally disagree because many of these books that are getting rushed out are not getting a whole lot by way of marketing either! And I will say that I think most authors are afraid to admit if their book was rushed out or poorly edited because they don't want to sabotage their books, but guess what? I'm fucking shameless. Café Con Lychee was a rush job! That book was poorly edited! And it shows! Where Meet Cute Diary got 3 drafts from me and my beta readers, another 2 drafts with me and my agent, and then another 2 drafts with me and my editor, Café Con Lychee got a *single* concrete edit round with my editor after I turned in what was essentially a first draft. I had *three weeks* to rewrite the book before we went to copy edits. And the thing is, this wasn't my fault. I knew the book needed more work, but I wasn't allowed more time with it. My editor was so overworked, she was emailing me my edit letter at 1am. The publisher didn't care if the book was good, and then they were upset that its sales weren't as high at MCD's, but bffr. A book that doesn't live up to its potential is not going to sell at the same rate as one that does!

And this may sound like a fluke, but it's not. I'm not naming names because this is a deeply personal thing to share, but I have heard from *many* authors who were not happy with their second books. Not because they didn't love the story but because they felt so rushed either with their initial drafts or their edits that they didn't feel like it lived up to their potential. I also know of authors who demanded extra time because they knew their books weren't there yet only to face big backlash from their publisher or agent.

I literally cannot stress to you enough that publisher's *do not give a fuck* about how good their products are. If they can trick you into buying a poorly edited book with an AI cover that they undercut the author for, that is *better* than wasting time and money paying authors and editors to put together a quality product. And that's before we get into the blatant abuse that happens at these publishers and why there have been mass exoduses from Big 5 publishers lately.

There's also a problem where publishers do not value their experienced staff. They're laying off so many skilled, dedicated, long-term committed editors like their work never meant anything. And as someone who did freelance sensitivity reading for the Big 5, I can tell you that the way they treat freelancers is *also* abysmal. I was almost always given half the time I asked for and paid at less than *half* of my general going rate. Authors publishing out of their own pockets could afford my rate, but apparently multi-billion dollar corporations couldn't. Copy edits and proofreads are often handled by freelancers, meaning these are people who aren't familiar with the author's voice and often give feedback that doesn't account for that, plus they're not people who are gonna be as invested in the book, even before the bad payment and ridiculous timelines.

So, anyway, 1. go easy on authors and editors when you can. Most of us have 0 say in being in this position and authors who are in breech of their contract by refusing to turn in a book on time can face major legal and financial ramifications. 2. Know that this isn't in your head. If you disagree with the choices a book makes, that's probably just a disagreement, but if you feel like it had so much potential but just *didn't reach it*, that's likely because the author didn't have time to revise it or the editor didn't have time to give the sort of thorough edits it needed. 3. READ INDIE!!! Find the indie authors putting in the work the Big 5's won't do and support them! Stop counting on exploitative mega-corporations to do work they have no intention of doing.

Finally, to all my readers who read Café Con Lychee and loved it, thank you. I love y'all, and I appreciate y'all, and I really wish I'd been given the chance to give y'all the book you deserved. I hope I can make it up to you in 2025.

[pixelnoctis]

[blanchelune]

May art dump :)

[missterious-figure]

Some more Sweet Additions/Our Sweet Addition design doodles!

[hayzeydayzey]

café people watching

[diathadevil]

In my latest quest to introduce Princess Tutu to the local anime café I like to visit, I have spent about 2 or 3 hours working on this piece and pinning it to their art board. 👀

[aquamarineghost06]

Guess who finished this before going to university?

And a little bit of context: In a what if situation in which Mikey was left alone in the apocalypse, I think he would have access to his brother's ninpo. For his design most of the outfit is very simple, he doesn't have physical weapons. And something I wanted to add is Leo's scarf, and his brother's masks.

I'm not good at rambling, sorry if there is some grammar mistakes

[takaraphoenix]

Oh I am loathing this American-ification of everything.

I got an early appointment in the city tomorrow and I figured hey, why not treat myself to breakfast afterward. And since I hate walking into a place, seeing the menu and thinking "nope" and having to walk out again, I figured I'd look it up online first.

I've looked through the menus of ten cafés now and only found two that actually have... normal German breakfast.

Every other place has shit like avocado toast, "breakfast bowls" (stop putting all foods into one bowl I am biting you, meals belong on plates), American pancakes with maple syrup, bagels, porridge, hummus (for breakfast?!).

And look, I am not objecting to also including trendy American foods on your menu, but if these are the only options you offer and I can't find a single traditional German breakfast on your menu, then that is just... devastating, to me.

If you're a gimmick café that is specifically American cuisine, that would also be different, but a regular, German café needs to offer a regular, German breakfast.

It should absolutely include at the very-fucking-least the most basic German breakfast platter - bread rolls, hard-boiled egg, marmalade, butter, wurst and/or cheese, and the option to pay more for salmon or a croissant. That's the basic "I am going out to have breakfast at a café" menu. The one on every breakfast menu, for as long as I can remember going out for breakfast.

I can acknowledge that for reasons beyond my personal taste, people really love avocados. But if your menu includes three variations of avocado toast but not a single cheese or wurst option - and you are not an explicitly vegan place, like, there is bacon on this menu too - then something is just really, really fucked up here.

[bisquiibits]

My original character Chio, a cappuccino chinchilla. He runs a little café :3 Created with watercolors. > Please do not repost, recreate, trace, edit or use my art, thanks~ :3

[artydworld]

[polillamielera]

Strawberry Shortcake + Café Olé small redesign! 🍓🍰☕

[thebitchbehindtheslaughter]

I adore this little drawing so I don’t care if no one sees this one. Posting just ‘cuz I feel like it.

Now, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, otherwise and in between, put your hands together for the one, the only…

CHIBI WAITERTORE

[madfantom]

Happy Birthday!

@nicecarito

[tacosdefresa]

Que hago levantada a las 4 de la mañana

[thunderstorming]

i'd like to say an enormous thank you to everyone who's expressed their interest in and support for estelle over the last week!! her story will (hopefully) be coming to a corner of the internet near you sometime this summer...