#also love love love dark rise

[razberried]

Hi 🙀🙀🙀 how's ur summer been etc etc do u have book recs I've been bedrotting so bad

hey!!! my summer's been alright! not much has happened, saw a friend i havent seen in like 2 years and the like

books though,,,

i think youd like the poppy war by rf kuang, its a little hard to read but idk it seems like something youd like (especially at the end)

DARK RISE BY CS PACAT, i loved that book and the sequel

all for the game by nora sakavic (i will never stop recommending these i love them so much)

[cracklewink]

My Mane 6 Redesigns all together! I was going to post them separately but ended up finishing them all before I got around to it lol

[laurents-secret-diary]

oh damen we're really in it now.mp4

[lilithofpenandbook]

Something about Dumbledore being so hard on Snape

Dumbledore being scornful of Snape even when Snape was on his knees

Dumbledore emphasising that Snape made a mistake and must pay for it

Dumbledore who kept reminding Snape of his mistake even when he was grieving Lily

Dumbledore who didn't just let Snape change sides, he needed Snape to change his heart

Dumbledore who made the same mistakes as Snape and has been living in guilt ever since

Dumbledore who realised Snape was following in his footsteps

Dumbledore who may have started out thinking of Snape as cowardly or selfish but soon grew to trust him

Dumbledore who gave Snape half truths because if worst came to worst then Voldemort would have all the information right on his arm

Dumbledore who trusted Snape enough to not lie to him about the fact that he wasn't telling him everything even though he knew Snape resented it

Dumbledore who trusted Snape so much he knew that even if Snape resented him he would not betray him

Dumbledore who left everything he worked for in Snape's hands knowing it would be safe

Dumbledore who asked Snape to be the one to kill him, not just to save Draco's soul but for his own sake

Dumbledore who chose to die but only at the hands of someone he had grown to love

Dumbledore who once saw Snape as a desperate selfish boy that disgusted him

Dumbledore who made Snape his heir

Dumbledore who made Snape his.

[fixated-dark-king]

Sooo, I had the amazing experience of attending a panel C.S. Pacat was part of during the Sydney Writers’ Festival on 25th May 2024. The panel was called “Creating a Monster” (with two other YA authors).

And finally a week later (because adult-ing is hard), I had time to actually go through my notes and write up some of the fascccccinating things Pacat had to say about: monsterous heroes, and villains, and enemies-to-lovers deliciousness, and queer identity!

I didn’t want to forget some of the interesting things said in this panel and thought others might be interested in hearing about them too? Please indulge the splurge. :)

(Please note that all bold headers are just my thematic summary of each section for people to jump to, not the actual question asked.)

WHAT APPEALS ABOUT ‘THE MONSTROUS’ TO PACAT:

From a technical writing standpoint, the ‘Monstrous’ is appealing because a villain will often do an act and the hero reacts to that. It gives unconscious clues to the reader that when the villain turns up, something exciting is going to happen. In that sense, villainous characters have a special sort of ever-present attention given to them (possibly because human nature is to always keep one eye on the dangerous thing that could harm you).

On a personal level: A) When queer characters are awesome but also ‘Monstrous’, Pacat says it can feel really ‘electric’ and empowering to reclaim/allow yourself to embrace the monster role that you’ve been told you fit into by society. Like in Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles where queer people are allowed to be beautiful/glittering & powerful & witty & have existential conversations about good and evil while fitting under the Monstrous label. Like heck yeh, that’s cool. And B) as an author, you can feel a ‘minority pressure’ to have characters be Good all the time and be the perfect ambassador for that minority, but sometimes you just want to be a vampire and take over the world, you know?

THE EXISTENCE OF ‘PROTAGONIST-CENTRED MORALITY’ WITHIN THE DARK RISE BOOKS:

When pondering whether it is hard as a writer to convince readers that a Monstrous protagonist is a likeable character, Pacat pointed out that the funny thing is that the question ‘How am I going to make readers like this monster?’ never really ends up being an issue because people actually really like monsters! The thing you might not expect is that the struggle is actually: ‘How am I going to make these readers who are barracking for the protagonist feel that this ‘monster’ is actually monstrous?’

Pacat explained that when a protagonist is also a monster, it brings into play something called ‘Protagonist-Centric Morality’ -- where you bond with that protagonist and want the best for them etc, so much that it can obscure when the protagonist is actually doing something bad. Pacat mentioned that he has found the Protag-Centric Morality fairly striking in the case of the Dark Rise books because people have said to him things like: ‘The Dark King Did Nothing Wrong Ever In His Whole Life’ and Pacat questioned whether the moral centre of the story was landing somewhere different than intended. He was curious whether the other authors had experienced that with their ‘monstrous’ protagonists too.

IF A HERO IS ALSO MONSTROUS, HOW ON EARTH DO YOU DIFFERENTIATE THAT FROM THE VILLIAN? When pondering over the distinction between a Monstrous Hero and a Villain, Pacat shared some thoughts from his lived experience. He said the times when he has felt most threatened by the ‘Monstrous’ is when that person isn’t clearly identifiable to others around you; where there isn’t a shared understanding between everyone that ‘yes, that person is a monster’. Extending from that, the Truly Monstrous is when that person has some kind of control over you and control over the narrative as well; if the monster is the one telling the story but casting you as the monster. Essentially gaslighting via ‘narrative control’.

ENEMIES TO LOVERS TROPE:

This is Pacat’s absolute favourite romantic trope. And he elaborated that he doesn’t mean that in the sense of ‘these characters sort of don’t like each other’, but rather to the point where two characters really hate each other and for a very good reason. He likes when a path between two characters feels IMPOSSIBLE to overcome.

This trope was first explored in the Captive Prince trilogy and Pacat loved it so much he just had to use it again for the Dark Rise trilogy. The planning behind it for CaPri was brainstorming: ‘What is the worst thing I could think to use?’ (Answer: Killing a character’s brother, which lands the bereaved character into a set of hellish circumstances.) But that meant when Pacat decided to use it again for DR, he had to extend that to: ‘Now I need to think of something EVEN WORSE THAN THAT (CaPri)’ in order to separate the main characters. So Pacat had to spend ages thinking about what could be the absolute worst thing to use this time -- and he hopes that he came up with something that is ‘truly, truly way worse.’ Which essentially had everyone, including the moderator, laughing loudly in fear. XD

WILL KEMPEN: FOUND FAMILY & THE LONELINESS OF INAUTHENTICITY:

Pacat spent a lot of time trying to develop a really meaningful platonic friendship between Will and Violet. It meant a lot to see a friendship like that reflected on page for Pacat because some of the most important friendships of his life were across gender lines. The reception to Will and Violet has been so pleasantly surprising, so Pacat supposed he wasn’t the only one with a hunger for that kind of friendship within the romantasy genre.

Pacat also reflected on Will’s complex relationship with his Found Family -- that having the support of a Found Family can be so essential, but in Will’s case that lifeline is undermined by secrecy, turning that Found Family into a different kind of loneliness. Because the thing is: if something so immense happens to you that you feel you can’t talk about, or you feel some way about yourself but think you can’t share that with others, it means you can’t really be your authentic self. But if you’re not being you’re authentic self, who are your friends friends with? They can’t be friends with the true You; they can only be friends with a facade/with a performance. So as long as Will is scared to show his true self and remains hiding himself away from even his friends, he will be alone. It’s a hard step to take. (Note from me: so heavvvvy but poignant.)

NOT DR-RELATED, BUT PACAT’S FAV MONSTERS FROM POPULAR FICTION: Pacat was so excited to namedrop his favourite monsters from popular fiction, he volunteered to go first LOL. The answers: 'The Brat Prince' Lestat (Lestat has been on his mind a lot recently because the AMC TV portrayal captures Lestat so well & has completely rejuvenated Pacat’s 12 year-old love of vampires. Total mood); serial killers such as in the Ripley series; and simply: American Psycho.

Great panel, right? Now it’s Europe’s turn!

[gummi-ships]

Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance - The World That Never Was

[domokunrainbowkinz]

You’re wasting all your faith on me

[trinityprocessing]

I've read "Dark Heir"

Atleast the fucking horse loves him, right?

[kingsofakielosandvere]

MY FAVOURITE TYPE OF CHARACTER IS #INSUFFERABLE BLONDE BOY WITH VERY BIG PAST TRAUMAS AND ABUSES AND SOME HIMBO WHO FELL IN LOVE WITH HIM

[daboyau]

I got an idea when looking at this post by @tangledinink. I couldn’t rest until I’d jotted it down. The art possessed me like an evil spirit. warnings for body horror, vomiting, general fuckery. 💚

what probably happened directly before Leo found himself in this situation:

Leo: Fairies? No way those sparkly little assholes are real.

The fae who happened to be within earshot: and i took that personally.

Anyway, here we gooooo:

Leo opens his mouth to scream, but the sound won’t come out. He gags on the feeling of it catching inside his throat, and then again when the trapped scream begins to grow thorns. It scrapes its way up, and he claws desperately at his throat, trying to tear the feeling out, falling to his knees as he gags around the forced silence.

The threat of suffocation is enough to tear his attention, however briefly, away from the horror of what is happening to his shell. His body is changing itself on the urging of some other thing’s whims, and even though his nerves didn’t seem to get the memo that a dissolving shell (you know, the thing that most of his internal organs and, like, half of his bones need to stay inside his body?) should probably hurt a lot, he can still feel it.

He retches as the first flower falls from his lips. It hits the ground with a disgustingly wet sound, coated with bile and saliva. It shines wetly, rich orange hues standing out brightly against the black soil. The rest follow shortly after, a painful deluge of familiar colors, and he’s helpless to do anything but dig his fingers deep into the rich soil and try not to let the horrific impossibility of the situation drive him crazy. Tears flow freely, staining his cheeks before they fall to the ground below, greedily absorbed by the cursed earth of this place.

“Oh, dear,” a voice says, too close for him not to have noticed their presence. He tries to jerk back, but he can’t pull his fingers from the dirt. It hurts when he tries. A high pitched whine escapes his throat, but he’s too terrified to be embarrassed by that. The voice shushes him, soothes him, and warm fingers wrap tight around the back of his neck. They come to rest just above where the lip of his shell should be. He sobs at the way his back squirms as heat shoots down his spine and something begins to grow. The furred fingers drag like velvet against his scales as they squeeze, the sharp prick of claws threatening to break skin, and then release him just as suddenly. 

“So much sorrow and pain. And, oh, so many regrets,” the thing says as she circles him, humming a tune that makes his head pound in rhythm with his racing heart. His hands have sunk beneath the black soil, and it has begun licking greedily at his wrists as well. He can feel tendrils of something wet and cold winding themselves around his fingers, and he wants to scream again, but the bursts of bile-soaked colors decorating the ground keep him from opening his mouth. He can feel a petal still clinging to his bottom lip, and when the thing kneels before him, she reaches out to pluck it off, unbothered by the way he shrinks as far away from her touch as he can manage.

She slips it between her lips, and he catches a flash of a blackened tongue as it darts out to meet that single purple petal. Her teeth are sharp when she smiles at him. They hadn’t been sharp, when she’d first approached him in the Hidden City. Nothing about her had been.

In the dim lights of the underground world he and his brothers had only recently begun to explore, she had looked soft. He’d seen her approaching, and the first thought to flit through his head was, aw, bunny. A fluffy, rounded face. Big eyes, dark and deep as a still pond as they reflected the flickering neon of a sign in the shop window behind him. A pink nose had twitched when she’d smiled at him, sweet and kind, and asked him for his name. 

(What had he told her?)

Now, she would be unrecognizable, if not for the same strawberry patterned dress that drapes over her stretched out frame. He’d think to compare her to a hare now, but the hares he’d seen when watching Animal Planet with mikey had never looked like they would take delight in tearing his nails off one by one or plucking out his eyeballs. They had never made his vision swim or his body shake when he’d looked at them. Maybe she’s become more of a wolf.

The soil has reached his elbows. Those cool, slimy tendrils have circled his wrists like shackles. They’re squeezing tighter and tighter, and he feels his fingers throb and tingle as circulation is cut off. 

His mind flashes briefly to raph and how he used to tell them not to wear rubber bands on their wrists, convinced that their hands would fall right off if they got squeezed too tight. He wonders if the things that live beneath the dirt will steal what they’ve claimed, just like she’s stollen his shell. Another sound wants to bubble up his throat at the thought, and he lets it, because what use is a swordsman without his hands?

The hysterical giggles escape as big, iridescent bubbles. They glitter pink and blue and leave a bitter taste on his tongue. They only float a few feet into the air before they fall back to the ground, their attempt to flee the horror of this situation not getting too far at all. Soft green grass rises up from the dirt to catch them, but they do not pop. They rest, suspended on those tiny blades, for far longer than any bubble he’s ever blown before. He watches, transfixed, as his laughter is eventually swallowed by green. It begins to spread.

A hand cradles his chin, and his gaze jerks back to the thing that brought him here. She is watching him intently, eyes darting to take in every tiny change in his expression. She looks curious, in the same way that donnie does when he’s thinking about all the ways he can take something apart, and what he can do with those pieces to create something better. 

Her hand is soft where it touches him. She is gentle as she wipes a cloth across his mouth. It feels like water, soothing and cool, and he finds himself leaning into this tiny offer of comfort among the stomach churning violation of what is being done to him. His eyes flutter, and he distantly registers that the face she wears seems to swim before his eyes with each rapid blink, shifting back and forth between bunny and wolf and something other. She looks like she wants to devour him whole, no matter which face she wears.

From this close, he can see the way her eyes sparkle and dance when she smiles. He can’t help but think that maybe being swallowed whole wouldn’t be such a bad way to go, after all. 

The writhing shackles around his wrists tighten. 

She laughs, breathy and soft, and the sound is layered and beautiful like wind chimes. It conjures a hurricane inside his mind. Her cool breath gusts over his face. It smells like churned dirt and funeral flowers and pustulous rot. He doesn’t know if he wants to gag or breathe deeper. 

“Little blossom,” she croons, cupping both his cheeks, dragging their faces close. He doesn’t resist. She giggles, and she drags those soft hands and those sharp claws down his neck and over his shoulders, fingertips bumping against the disgustinghorriblewrongparasitetumor gathering of delicate buds that have sprouted up all across his back. She pinches one between the pads of her fingers, and he wants to screamcrybeghertostoppushherawaycutherdownandtearthemalloutbytheroots be good for her.

“Little blossom,” she says again, and those dark eyes catch his gaze and hold it as a heavy feeling settles against his skin, across his shoulders, around his neck, and he can’t look away no matter how desperately he tries. But he doesn’t want to try. Her smile stretches wider, wider, and for one brief flicker of a second he can see blood on her teeth as she asks, “Do you believe now?”

.

(Side note just for fun. The flowers that appear in this but aren’t actually described or named are:

Orange marigold, for grief and despair

Purple hyacinth, for sorrow and asking for forgiveness

Red cyclamen, for goodbye and resignation

Yellow zinnia, for missing a friend and remembrance

Bluebells, for gratitude and everlasting love 

[assasinationbycarscoveredinhamrs]

I love seeing artwork of Klavier having conflict with his appearence regarding how similar he is to his brother, Kristoph, and the fear he has about commiting his same mistakes (Shoutout to this art by @rentonotnerd).

I wish capcom would have the balls to explore this aspect of his character instead of keeping him in the basement capcom please...

(Continuing my rant in the tags)

[isasunbee]

I have deep complicated feelings about Devon

[mothpaww]

i just finished Dark Rise and I'm like

ASDFGHJKL INSANE

I WAS READY TO HATE JAMES BUT HE'S JUST???????

Also this

I know my ass will be destroyed once James realize WHO Will really is and I'm not ready

[clotpolesonly]

i just want y'all to know, if Cyprian has a million fans, i'm one of them. if Cyprian has one fan, then i'm that one. if Cyprian has no fans, that means i'm dead.

[starlight---starbrights]

Undertale yellow flowey embroidery

This took about 40 hours, give or take a few

[raeloganthesonic06fangirl]

Okay, but the lenticular cover for this old collector's edition of the Nolan Batman films is peak design, tho