#and some great fiction writers critics etc

[hoyatype]

things that are gauche to brag about but cool to experience

[queen-paladin]

disclaimer: yes, I am complaining about cheating in media. Because, yes, writers have the freedom to create what they want but if the morality in creation is free for all forms of media, but no piece of art is exempt from criticism, and that includes criticism on personal moral grounds. I betcha if I said Harry Potter is good, actually, everyone on here would flood my blog telling me I am wrong because of the author's intense prejudice. That being said, I am criticizing cheating in fiction, If you don't like that, don't interact

So often lately I see period dramas where the husband cheats on the wife (ex. Poldark, The Essex Serpent, Queen Charlotte, The Great)...and not only do I despise the cheating trope with every fibre of my being to where I get panic attacks when I consume the media...but specifically with period dramas...

Do these writers not understand the greater implications of a husband cheating on a wife during these periods? More than just the humiliation and heartbreak in the case of a loving, good marriage just like it is today.

In the Western world, probably until certain laws were enacted in the 1900's, if a woman married a man, she was legally his property. She had no legal identity under him. She was financially dependent on him. Any wages she made would automatically go to her husband. Her children were also not legally her children- they belonged to the father. If the husband died, even if the wife was still alive, the children were legally considered orphans.

Women could only rarely gain a divorce from their husbands. In England in the mid-1800's specifically, if a wife divorced a husband she had to prove he had to not only cheat but also be physically abusive, incestuous, or commit bestiality. On the other hand, a husband could divorce a wife just for being unfaithful. Because, kids, there were sexual double standards.

Getting married was often the endgame for a lot of women during that time. Sometimes you couldn't make your own living enough- marriage was a way to secure your entire future financially, with more than enough money to get by. If you were a spinster and middle class, you could get by with a job. But if you are an upper-class lady, the one thing a lady does not do is get a job and work. So upper-class spinsters basically were dependent on their families to get by (ex. Anne Elliott in Persuasion faces this with her own toxic family). As strange as it sounded today, marriage gave them some freedom to go about since a husband could be persuaded sometimes more easily than a father and one had a different home, their servants, etc. A husband was your foundation entirely for being a part of society, and standing up as your own woman.

So if a husband cheated on a wife, that was a threat to take all of that away.

He could give a lot of money that could be used to support his wife and children to the mistress. He could completely abandon said wife for the mistress. And since the wife legally couldn't get a job as he still lived, she would be dependent on any money he would said- and that is IF he sent over any money.

He could take her to court and publicly humiliate her to get a divorce away from her (look up the separation of Charles and Kate Dickens, he would call her mentally ill and say her cooking was bad and that she was having more children than they could keep up with all while having an affair and divorcing her to be with the misteress). And even if the wife was the nicest, more proper, goodest, more rule-abiding never-keeping-a-toe-out-of-line lady in town...as a man, the law was default on his side (look up Caroline Norton's A Letter to the Queen which details exactly that, the poor woman had her earnings as a writer taken by her husband and was denied access to her children from said husband)

So yeah...even if there was "no love" between them (and anytime the wife is portrayed as too boring or too bitchy so He HaS tO cHeAt is brought up is...pretty victim blamey)

So yeah. Period drama writers, if you have the husband have an affair ...just consider the reality of these things and address them, maybe punish the husband for once (*gasp* men facing consequences for their actions?!?!!), and if not, just please find other options and other tropes and devices for once.

[thatscarletflycatcher]

One of the interesting excursus I must force myself not to explore right now XD is about Elaine Showalter's A Literature of their Own (1977), one of the most important/foundational works of feminist literary criticism in the English speaking world of its time. It is, in general broad strokes, a book that seeks to identify and characterize a tradition or traditions of the women's novel in Britain, as separate from that of men.

It's an interesting text in terms of the ways in which it identifies the strategies used in general Victorian culture to put down women's writers, the weaponization of Austen to put women writers "in their place" (cfr. that exchange of letters between Charlotte Brontë and G.H. Lewes that is used to this day to dunk on CB for disliking Austen's novels), the ways in which women themselves reinforced this (cfr. George Eliot's extreme reluctance to acknowledge genius in women that weren't herself) etc.* And in this way it accidentally illuminates A) how much of persistent criticism of Gaskell is just a continuation and rewarming of those same prejudices B) how much the establishment of the narrative of the great female novelist as a sort of Romantic genius/tortured artist -comically owing in no small degree to Gaskell's biography of Charlotte Brontë- made of Gaskell a safe scapegoat, and significantly drove readings of her as inferior and a failed artist.

Showalter uses as an example of certain insidious practices of certain male critics, a passage from J.M. Ludlow's review of Gaskell's Ruth (1853):

"Now, if we consider the novel to be the picture of human life in a pathetic, or as some might prefer the expression, in a sympathetic form, that is to say, addressed to human feeling, rather than to human taste, judgement, or reason, there seem nothing paradoxical in the view, that women are called to the mastery of this peculiar field of literature. We know, all of us, that if man is the head of humanity, woman is its heart; and as soon as education has rendered her ordinarily capable of expressing feeling in written words, why should we be surprised to find that her words come more home to us than those of me, where feeling is chiefly concerned?"

If you have seen me rant and complain these past few months about 20th century critics of Gaskell, you cannot fail to recognize here the same touchstones of discourse. The target has just been displaced from "all women are unintelligent and sentimental" to "all married women with children are unintelligent and sentimental".

Things get more interesting when Deirdre D'Albertis in Dissembling Fictions, one of the more cited books on Gaskell, takes Showalter to task (with Gilbert and Gubar, the authors of The Madwoman in the Attic) for more or less acritically subscribing to Virginia Woolf's conception of a woman's tradition of writing as both being evolutionary (meaning later works are better than earlier works) and pyramidal (in order for there to exist geniuses like Austen and Eliot, there must be lesser authors that provide the bases for those pinnacles of achievement). And, you know, passages like this from Showalter herself, at the very opening of the acknowledgements section of her book:

"In the Atlas of the English novel, women's territory is usually depicted as desert bounded by mountains on four sides: the Austen peaks, the Brontë cliffs, the Eliot range, and the Woolf hills. This book is an attempt to fill in the terrain between these literary landmarks and to construct a more reliable map from which to explore the achievements of English women novelists."

seem to entirely justify it.

This is, however, not yet the twist. D'Albertis' argument about how the tradition of feminist literary criticism has been extremely uncomfortable with Gaskell because of the ways in which she doesn't fit the molds of the Woman WriterTM is functionally placed in support of the main thesis of her work, which isn't that Gaskell is actually good. No. The thesis is that instead of being bad on accident, she's bad on purpose and a consummate liar. No, I'm not joking. The argument is that Gaskell's fiction is literary broken and the endings such failures because she's questioning genre and the uses of genre from masculine authors, but that she covers this protest with lies to protect her respectability.

While I cannot prove that this assertion of the self evident character of Gaskell's fiction as failure specially in closing is due to D'Albertis belonging to the Marxist critical tradition through Williams and Kettle -because both are referenced, but not extensively-, there's something very ironic to me in these layers of discourse in which the basic, unproven assumption (that Gaskell's fiction is actually not good) remains unquestioned, even when everything else is.

God forbid Elizabeth Gaskell writes anything.

*reasons why I cannot forgive Chesterton's The Victorian Age in Literature (1913). Chesterton is the kind of author that is prevented from becoming insufferably pedantic only because he's clever, well read and witty (much like Oscar Wilde), but when it comes to women writers this book is so insanely superficial and flippant he comes across as an unmitigated ass. The author of The Man Who Was Thursday (an excellent novel, btw) comparing Victorian women writers with headless chickens because of their unaustenian flights of fancy IS RICH.

[wearenemies]

i literally havent stopped thinking about ur peterick college professor AU all day.. its so good

giggles and blushes so sweet of you to say…. if you have any criticism at any point or any ideas of what to do with it i love how you write their dynamic and would be more than happy to sit my white ass down and listen 🫶

i've been thinking about the whole premise a little further and still am not sure whether or not they're going to straight up be married because i think patrick wearing a ring would be a good in for theorisation about his relationship status that would otherwise seem even more unnecessary, but i don't know if p2 marriage is an unrealistic and overly romantic stance to take, especially considering what went on in real life, so i'm still on the fence about that. i might just say they're engaged and leave it at that.... also unsure still whether our narrator would be a student or a coworker of theirs? i think the coworker situation better justifies this guy's interest in the lives of these guys because they'd want to make friends, and there are considerably more situations in which it would be appropriate for them to be interacting (after work drinks, etc. patrick could wear the stupid t shirt pete got him. beautiful world) but i worry that that'd betray to an immersion-breaking degree how little i know about the inner workings of american academia and employment at american universities and whatnot so. another glaring issue. i also realise that the whole keeping-the-narrator-in-the-dark thing might be much less realistic to achieve irl than i make it seem, so i’ll have to employ some serious lampshading + sitcom logic to make it work in a way that feels natural, but i figure that if you’re able to suspend your disbelief enough to imagine patrick pursuing higher education you can believe anything so peace and love.

on that note, the peterick history i’m imagining is that they would’ve been in the band but it never would’ve really gone anywhere because of patrick’s reluctance vocally, so they all (with the exception of andy: with how ridiculously skilled and prominent in the hardcore scene he was it'd be completely unreasonable to assume that he wouldn't have joined a band and made it pretty big at some point) ended up going back to school like their parents wanted. pete was vehemently against finishing his poli sci degree, and his parents decided to allow him to pursue something he actually wanted to do (that being literary analysis and creative writing) on the condition that he’d work as hard as he could and not touch narcotics or whatever, and it was a hard sell but after he graduated he decided that he’d rather be doing that than anything else, and since his parents had the funds to support him and running on mani mostofi’s logic that ‘if pete didn’t get famous, he would’ve ended up in jail’, they considered it a productive and wholesome use of his time, and pete just kind of stayed in academia. i imagine he’s very well known in literary circles because of his general charisma and bizarre angles on things, and i can see him having written several significant (and not to toot his horn too much but pretty great) journal pieces on the works of his favourite writers, and a wider fictional bibliography than just the single weird roman-a-clef that he has to his name in real life.

patrick’s a little more difficult to work with conceptually because he graduated from high school with significantly worse grades than pete in real life, doesn’t have weirdly famous relatives, and is generally not a hugely academically inclined person, so i might just have to gloss over explaining that (maybe he took some supplemental classes and took out a LOT of loans or whatever) but i imagine music theory being a subject of interest for him because of the technical and semi-scientific nature of it as a very trivia-minded (and ‘possibly autistic’. coughs) person who likes the factual nature of natural history. i can see him having work published in the yale-founded journal of music theory, and maybe focusing especially on music theory’s application in the fields of anthropology and cognitive sciences because of the aforementioned natural history interest. i see him and pete having drifted apart a little over the years (maybe they fucked for a while - potentially starting ‘05 - and had a messy ‘friendship breakup�� around 2009?) running into each other at an arts conference in like 2011/2012, ending up both working at the same place in around 2015, and finally getting together as a result of that connection, no unsubstantial degree of nudging from friends, and years of mutual tension.

there’s for sure a huge extent to which you’ll have to ignore how fundamentally the whole academia thing is probably not something they’d do, but i’m begging you guys to let me know if anything seems too egregiously out of character i’ve never written fic before i’m playing with my touys here 👍

[pseudowho]

Hi! i’m pretty new to tumblr and actually have met 0 people from it so i thought i’d ask you because you seem welcoming and i love your posts. how are you able to write fics without hating all of them? every time i try to write something i immediately reread it and find it to be the worst writing ever. any tips on improving?

Hello! I'm disgustingly welcoming and friendly. Well done for finding me.

please note: I'm really not an expert on what makes writing 'good'. Please don't consider me to be one

r.e. hating it, I very often hate my own writing. It does help that others don't seem to. Validation isn't everything, no, but it does go a long way. What goes further is, instead of looking at your writing and hating it, try to look at your writing with a critical eye. What do you dislike about it? Why? What are you trying to capture, and how is it best to create that?

You should figure out what kind of writer you are. Is this an exercise for you to feel soothed, or cheered? Is this an exercise to make others feel soothed or cheered? Both are equally valid, but they can change the direction your writing takes, leaning from how it makes you feel to how it makes the reader feel.

Equally, you can have both!

I'm very much a for the reader writer, and when I write something, it's with an unconscious lean towards making other people feel something. It ends up feeling methodical and calculated as opposed to personal. I like to garner the emotions I'm seeking from an audience. I find it satisfying as a writer.

Like I said, I've been asked this a lot, but I'm honestly not the person to ask. I've been writing for a year and didn't know I had any ability for it until it happened. I'll tell you some things that I think have contributed to my writing:

Read more, and good literature: try Shirley Jackson, Ursula leGuin, Ray Bradbury, Tasha Suri, Natasha Pulley, Jeff Vandermeer, Cormac McCarthy. This is going to sound arrogant and arsey, but I'll own it: most published smut has a lower literature quality than non-smut. Veer away into fiction. The writing quality will inspire you. You may already do this, but if not, give it a go.

I picture stories like movie scenes. Then I wrote the scene.

Often, what can be said loosely in 10 words, can be said tightly in three or four. There is a perfect word for a feeling, or situations, or vibe, or facial expression, etc. Seek them out.

Imitate-- find an author whose work is profoundly beautiful. Try to imitate their style. It's a great way to practice and discover your own style along the way.

Accept that your writing will improve the more and more you do it. If you keep writing, you'll look back on what you wrote a year before and it will make you cringe. This is normal, and healthy.

More than anything, keep going and trying. You'll never improve if you give up.

☝️ us talking writing, sharing a milkshake, idk

Love,

-- Haitch xxx

[honeyhotteoks]

First off: you're my absolute favorite fanfic author! The way you write the characters and their emotions and dialog is just beautiful! Into the Aurora and This Night Together inspired me to actually give my writing a fighting chance!!!

With that said...how did you start posting your work? I really want to, but I'm sooooooo nervous!! What if no likes it? What if everyone hates it? And is there a certain way to format the post? I'm fairly new to ✨️actually✨️ posting on tumblr and have no clue what I'm doing 😬

oh my gosh, thank you so much!! i’m so honored to know that i helped inspire you to write fic 😭

this is a great question!! i have lots of advice for you, check under the cut~

okay so as far as how i started posting, this is probably not the post helpful answer. i’ve actually been writing fanfic since i was probably like 14 for various fandoms, i used to post on ff.net then on ao3 and now here, and it’s just been years of publicly posting fandom works online. that being said…… at some point you will just want to rip the bandaid off and when you do, i have some advice

there are going to be people who don’t like what you write, it doesn’t matter what you write or how you write. you like my work and i have a lot of followers, but i’ve had people give pretty negative feedback about aurora, tnt, and some of my one-shots. or reviews that aren’t “mean” necessarily but are “constructive”…. however, i’m a big believer that in the world of fan fiction, unsolicited constructive criticism doesn’t belong in comments when the author is posting their hobby for free. all i’m saying is that it’s gonna happen at some point, but you have to remember that the people doing that aren’t writing fic, and i genuinely do not care about the critical opinions of someone who’s never put themselves out there creatively before.

something that hurt when i started posting was the lack of engagement, and i know this is something a lot of writers still struggle with, especially on tumblr. there are fics i have written that are like deeply dear to me and i’m really proud of but have so few notes compared to other fics and that used to really bum me out. what i’ve learned is this:

people actually aren’t perpetually online they just seem it, so if you post something once and never mention it again, people with busy lives are going to miss it

the time you post doesn’t have to matter… but if you’re trying to drum up engagement, then consider the time of day you’re posting. tumblr has good analytics to tell you blog engagement stats and stuff like that, i find that can help with knowing most of your followers are from XYZ time zone and they probably will not see something you post at 2 PM during the work/school day vs. 7 PM or something like that

try not to be sad if you get a majority of likes and not reblogs. i personally like tons of work that i intend to read later, i treat my likes like bookmarks, that doesn’t mean someone didn’t like your work enough to reblog it, it means they use their likes differently OR potentially they have a blog where they don’t feel comfortable reblogging fanfic, especially nsfw fic.

if you’re posting anywhere, know your tags. don’t post something with two hashtags and assume it’ll find its way. unfortunately it won’t, so make sure you tag everything appropriately so it lands in people’s suggested feeds

if you do all of that and then your fic gets some notes but not that many….. and you’re wondering….. why didn’t more people like it? well part of that might just be that it’s not showing up at the top of people’s feeds anymore. if you want to establish yourself in the writing space, engaging with readers is important. if you get a really nice review in a reblog, don’t be afraid to reblog it back. if you get a certain number of notes, don’t be afraid to reblog your own fic and say thank you for 100 notes etc., just to push it up on people’s feeds.

if you’re posting on AO3, just make sure that you’re filling out all the tags, warnings, pairings, etc. AO3 has been around a while and is a well oiled machine, and i know a ton of readers on there use the filters to find the exact niche of fic they want to read. i cannot tell you how many fics i pass by that don’t have tags, are missing a good description, etc.

okay now as far as formatting goes…… here are my thoughts after a lot of trial and error:

before you decide on anything formatting wise, just remember that readers engage with fic on tumblr in a variety of ways. some people are on desktop, some people are on your actual blog web address, and some people are just on mobile. before you teach yourself html coding for fancy lettering in ombré colors…… are your readers going to be able to see it in dark mode? if not, maybe don’t invest the time, because the first thing i do when i see a post like that is scroll because it’s taking me too long to know what’s going on

so yeah, are there rules to format? yes and no. content “yes”, visual “no” but people do follow a particular trend. what i like to do is keep it simple to avoid the formatting issues i mentioned above, but i also invested a little time in figuring out a “look” for my posts so when people are scrolling they might see my layout and know it’s me. details below->

1. a header image or header images, it’s the quickest way for people to get a vibe and it might capture an aesthetic. some authors have a header made for them as an author, some do a custom one per fic, but i typically just make an aesthetic black and white collage and go with that because it looks cool but i don’t have to learn photoshop to do it. go with what you know on this one

2. a title and a SHORT description, i think ‘untitled’ is tough…. people won’t read or remember your fic. no description means people are guessing and might not click, and too long means people might scroll. my rule of thumb is a couple sentences.

3. content tags, and this is VERY important — people need warnings or clarity on what the fic is about. most people skim the tags to find out if they want to read it over a description, especially when we’re talking very short form fic or smut. that’s why tags might be funny or informal, but it’s also really important to tag anything that might be triggering in a variety of ways. something i always make sure i include is every sex act or kink (i never know what triggers one person and not another), and anything related to: violence, abuse, self harm, mental health, physical injury, death, food/diet content, and body descriptors of reader. if you’re writing self insert and you’re describing the reader a particular way, that’s fine but you should disclose it. some of my fics are specifically written for ‘curvy’ reader in mind and its tagged that way vs. like …. ‘short/small/size-kink’ reader. Gender is also important here, i always tag fem!reader because i feel like that works, but i often see more trans inclusive terms like afab!reader etc., so it’s up to you! but we definitely want to be mindful of readers who could feel dysphoric if surprised by pronouns/body-parts/etc.

4. a clear identifier of the ships in the fic. i.e. put the ‘yunho x reader’ or ‘idol!yunho x fem!reader’ tag high up so people know who they’re reading

5. otherwise, i personally recommend keeping the top of the post short, putting in a cut, and then posting everything under the cut because a long post is just a lot to scroll through etc. i favor the small text for my fics headers and regular size text for the actual body of the fic just to keep it looking nice.

hopefully this helps! i’d be happy to talk through anything else too, i love getting into this stuff. my biggest recommendation would be to ask yourself what kind of work you want to post and invest some time in developing a style for your format etc. - even if it’s close to what other people are posting that’s okay! just keeping it consistent and looking good helps get readers to click, so search around and see what you like and then play with your posts in drafts before you do anything.

good luck!!!

[inklings-challenge]

Inklings Challenge 2023 FAQ

(Things that People Have Already Asked or Things I Imagine They Might Ask)

What is the Inklings Challenge?

The Inklings Challenge is an invitation for Christian science fiction and fantasy writers to create stories that fit the Christian worldview. The event runs from October 1st to October 21st, 2021. Participants are divided into three separate groups and challenged to write a story that fits the assigned topic.

Team Lewis

Portal Fantasy: Stories where someone from the real world explores a new world

Space Travel: Stories about traveling through space or exploring other planets

Team Tolkien

Secondary World Fantasy: Stories that takes place in an imaginary realm that’s completely separate from our world

Time Travel: Stories exploring travel through time

Team Chesterton

Intrusive Fantasy: Stories where the fantastical elements intrude into the real world

Adventure: Stories where characters (usually in our world) travel to exciting locations, face dangers, undertake a mission or quest, etc.

These teams will be assigned at random on October 1st, 2023. Writers are then encouraged to write a story before the deadline on October 21st.

Stories should also use at least one of seven provided Christian themes to inspire some element of their story. This year's themes all explore traditional acts of charity and mercy which Christians are called to do for others in need.

The seven themes writers may choose from are:

Feed the hungry

Give drink to the thirsty

Clothe the naked

Shelter the homeless

Visit the sick

Visit the imprisoned

Bury the dead

Finished stories can be posted to a tumblr blog. The post should also be tagged #inklingschallenge, and tagged with the name of your particular team: #team lewis, #team tolkien, or #team chesterton, so they can be shared on the main Inklings Challenge blog.

For organizational purposes, stories should also be tagged with:

The genre the story falls under: #genre: portal fantasy, #genre: space travel, #genre: secondary world, #genre: time travel, #genre: intrusive fantasy, #genre: adventure

Any themes that were used within the story: #theme: food, #theme: drink, #theme: clothing, #theme: shelter, #theme: visiting the sick, #theme: visiting the imprisoned, #theme: burial

The completion status of the story: #story: complete or #story: unfinished

How do I sign up for the Inklings Challenge?

Message this blog via ask box or private message before October 1st, 2023, and you'll be added to the list of participants.

What if I don’t finish by the deadline?

Post it anyway! In the original version of this challenge, Tolkien never finished his story! The idea is to create whatever you can, and we welcome unfinished stories. Show us what you’ve accomplished. If you like, you can also post the finished version at a later date, and I’ll make an effort to share it on the main blog.

What if I finish early?

Post it! I’ll share it to the main blog, and it’ll provide inspiration for other writers. If you’re feeling ambitious, create more stories within your assigned topics.

What if my story isn’t any good? Do I have to post?

No one’s judging this. This is a fun challenge, not a contest, and I hope that it will inspire people to push past that voice of criticism and just share whatever they come up with. If you really don’t want to post what you’ve created, no one’s going to force you to, but I hope you’ll join in the fun.

If you just plain don’t have enough to post–say, if the month gets away from you and you wind up with half a sentence–you’re always welcome to keep working on it and post something more substantial at a later date.

Can I use characters or settings from my other stories?

Absolutely! This can be a great way to expand your story world. As long as the story fits your assigned topic, you’re welcome to use any settings or characters you might have created for other works. However, it’d be nice if the story you write can stand alone, so readers can understand it without any knowledge of other works in the world.

What if I don’t like my team’s assigned topics?

I encourage everyone to at least try to come up with a story that fits one of their assigned topics. That’s the challenge portion of The Inklings Challenge–it’ll stretch your imagination and get you to work outside of your comfort zone. The categories are broad, and you should be able to come up with an angle that interests you.

However, if there’s a particular topic that calls to you in another team’s options, you can stretch the definitions to make it fit your own topic. What’s to say the portal in the portal fantasy can’t lead to a different time period? Explore a secondary world of elves in space if you want to. Be creative!

Does [a certain type of story] fit into this Inklings Challenge genre?

Writers are allowed to define the limits of the genre themselves, and can define it as narrowly or widely as they prefer.

I have never read anything by and/or don't like the author my team is named after. Do I have to write something in their style?

The team names have absolutely nothing to do with the style of stories we expect from the writers. They’re only named after the authors because:

The Inklings Challenge was inspired by a similar writing challenge between Tolkien and Lewis, who happen to have written genres that provide good categories for the challenge teams

Chesterton is another prominent Christian writer whose work dealt with fantastical themes that provided good categories for a third team (which allowed me to include the third major type of fantasy).

Naming the teams after the authors is much more fun than naming them Team A, B, and C or whatever.

That’s not to say that you can’t be inspired by the authors or their works if you like them, but please do not worry at all if you don’t.

Do I have to write an allegory or include religion?

You are welcome to write an allegory or to explicitly explore religion if you want to, but you’re certainly not required to. The goal is merely to write stories that fit within the Christian worldview, not to preach.

What if I can’t think of an idea?

Over the course of September, writing prompts will be posted to this blog for anyone who wants a little extra inspiration. The Inklings Challenge directory also has quite a few writing prompt posts from past challenges, most of which would still fit this year’s Challenge.

Do I have to put my story into a tumblr post?

If you prefer to post your story in another format–such as on another blogging site or on AO3–you are welcome to do so, but to submit the story for the Challenge, you’ll need to make a tumblr post that provides the link to the story and tag with all the required tags, so it can be archived on the main Challenge blog.

Do I have to post my story in a single post or can I post it in multiple parts?

You may post your story in as many parts as you desire. As long as they are all tagged appropriately and it’s clear which order they’re supposed to go in, I should be able to find them, reblog them to the Challenge website, and put them in the archive.

My friend doesn’t have a tumblr. Can they still participate in the Challenge?

This is a tumblr-centered Challenge, so for organizational purposes, the writers should have access to tumblr, so they can be notified of team assignments, post their stories, etc.

However, it would be possible for writers without a tumblr account to participate if these conditions are fulfilled:

The non-tumblr writer provides some name that I can use to list them on a Team and that can be used as an author name for their story.

The non-tumblr writer can check the Inklings Challenge blog and find out which team they are assigned to.

The non-tumblr writer has a friend who is on tumblr who can either post the story on their tumblr blog (with proper credit toward the writer) or create a post with the link to wherever the non-tumblr writer has posted the story.

It’s after October 1st and I just found out about the Challenge. Can I still participate?

This year, because of the extreme glitches in tumblr's notification system that puts me in danger of missing someone's message, I'm going to say that, yes, you can. People who sign up after the deadline will be randomly assigned to one of three teams in a way that balances the number of participants on each team.

Can I write fanfiction for the Challenge?

The Inklings Challenge is meant to provide new science fiction and fantasy stories from a Christian worldview, so this challenge is focused on original fiction.

Are there other ways to engage with the Inklings Challenge Community?

There are several ways to interact with the community!

On this blog, discussion posts, labeled "The Eagle and Child", will be posted roughly once a week that provide an opportunity for writers to discuss their story ideas and their writing progress.

@inklings-sprint, run by @allisonreader, provides several opportunities for writers to come together for writing and brainstorming sprints.

The Inklings Challenge Discord provides extra support for people who want to participate on that platform. The Discord is run by @secret--psalms--saturn, and @enjoliquej, so anyone who wants to participate should message one of them for the link.

Is there merchandise for the Inklings Challenge?

Every year, @ellakas creates beautiful stickers related to each of the three teams of the Inklings Challenge. The link to purchase this year's stickers is in this post.

[navybrat817]

Navy, do you have any tips for those of us new to writing smut/fan fiction in general? I’ve recently started and one of my beta readers have been really judgmental, and I can’t tell if it’s just them, or if it’s actually my writing…so I’ll take any advice for writing. 💕

Hi, nonnie. I'm sorry you're feeling judged by your beta reader. One of the things I've come to appreciate for anyone who has beta read for me is the balance between hyping me up and giving me constructive criticism. I value their feedback and it has helped me grow, but I've never once felt judged.

Typically when I have someone beta read for me, I provide the warnings in advance in case there are triggers and I ask for any help/feedback on grammar, flow, etc., which is important. Your beta needs to know what you want out of it. Is it the structure that you need help with? Do you simply need hype? Communication is key.

Is it the topic itself that has you feeling judged by this beta reader or your writing style? Is it judgement or constructive criticism? I only ask that because instinct for many of us is to get defensive or react emotionally before taking another look.

Are you able to find another beta reader through Tumblr or discord if you're no longer comfortable sharing with them? @needabeta may be an option.

As far as smut writing tips, I don't think I'm a great smut writer! I do try and stick with emotions and the tone of the characters. This ask here has some great tips if you want to take a look!

Sharing your writing is a vulnerable thing and I hope your beta reader understands that. Love and thanks! ❤️

[avelera]

On writing: crafting character knowledge vs. audience knowledge

One of the most wildly difficult things I think there is to do in writing is setting the parameters of character knowledge. IE, how to not have your audience think that your character behaved idiotically for the situation they're in.

This is closely tied to the problem a lot of amateur writers run into when they first start out and borrow heavily from their real life experiences.

For example, "Yes, after one misunderstanding, these two people parted and never spoke to each other again, but that's what really happened!" "Yes, this person survived falling out of an airplane because it happened in real life too!" And other things too, you get my drift, it crops up all the time in 101 Creative Writing classes when people protest that sure, it doesn't make sense in a story, but it really did happen and that's got to be enough that the reader should accept that it happened in fiction, right?

Wrong.

I mean, obviously that's wrong. Because unlike real life, fiction needs to make sense. Even fiction that seems absurdist on the surface follows strong internal rules if you know what to look for. And unlike real life, we're not presented the grand entropy of all possible facts, a writer who is doing their job will only present facts that are somehow relevant to the story. One reason for the enduring popularity of the mystery genre is that it's specially keyed to a promise with the reader that all the facts presented are relevant to the story, but that some might be red herrings, facts that are tossed out there as a facsimile of real-life entropy (ex. suspicious behavior in a town where a murder took place but which is not directly linked to the murder) but that too is in service of the story because one of the pleasures promised by the genre is that the clues could be assembled incorrectly if one isn't attentive enough.

This plays to the human need to organize our universe and our desire to live in a universe where everything makes sense and can be solved. It's another reason why mystery is a great genre for authors to get their start in, and many of the most popular stories have a mystery as their subgenre or as their entry point into the story (Riverdale, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Harry Potter particularly in books 1-3, are all examples of a "Whodunnit?" being used to introduce us to the larger world of the story). Because they demand that an author carefully control the flow of information and start from the point of view of knowing that the audience will be attentive to every detail in search of the answer to the mystery, so the author cannot be sloppy or lazy in what information they dole out, down to and including otherwise innocuous character descriptions or interactions that might otherwise be a place to use stock phrase or be brushed over in the interest of moving quickly.

Now, to get back to the larger point, controlling the flow of information to the reader is especially critical in mystery writing but it really is also critical in pretty much any fictional endeavor.

One reason I find it so infuriating that genre fiction is taught as a lesser genre in US academia is that genre fiction (sci-fi, fantasy, horror, etc) includes a heavy thread of worldbuilding as an expectation. That is, rebuilding the physics of the universe to say how things work in your world. Historical fiction is often viewed in literary circles as a sort of "lesser sin" genre fiction, which is laughable, because historical fiction relies just as much on worldbuilding as fantasy, and for similar reasons. Almost no historical fiction is 100% accurate to its time, it's all updated for the modern audience in some way, and the choice between what to present of historical accuracy and what to ignore lies at the heart of rebuilding the world to couch your story.

However, even fiction set in the current modern world that is not including any magical/genre fiction elements, should pay attention to worldbuilding and the inherent logic of this reality-adjacent world you're working in, because it's not actually the real, photorealistic world, and we the audience need to know where the divergence points are.

You know how some films are photorealistic but others that are still nominally set in the real world will sometimes use saturated colors to show that we shouldn't take some of the hijinks and coincidences too seriously? Yeah, like that. Because in the real world, it's possible but pretty rare to spill coffee on someone at a coffee shop and have that spiral into a love story where that moment of klutziness is the meet-cute with your soulmate. It's not impossible it's just unlikely in the grand entropy of the number of times we might spill coffee on someone, apologize, and never see them again. So, in film, you might wash the scene with a pink filter to show, "We're in rom-com land now, don't get too attached to the gray realities of photo realism." Or, if it's a detective thriller and the murderer is the one who just accidentally spilled coffee on the detective trying to catch them, in another unlikely coincidence, which triggers the detectives brain to realize later that they ran into the killer, we might wash the scene in gray to show a darker, edgier tone, but we are still departing from photorealism there.

But in my opinion the most difficult thing when controlling this sort of information is when you're in a mostly photorealistic world, you've controlled your flow of information, you've established the rules of your world, however, your character acts with information they know realistically, but since they lack omniscience, they act differently than the audience who has all the information does.

A classic case of this would be the, "Don't go in the basement!" impulse in horror movies. When it's done well, we're shown someone who is at home, minding their own business on a normal day, with no way of knowing that a murderer broke int their house earlier and is planning to kill them if our victim goes in the basement. Why would any normal person think that on a given day? So they go in the basement, and they get killed. The character very reasonably didn't know there was a killer down there or that they were in a horror story. They can't hear the soundtrack.

When done well, we the audience are terrified and frustrated but we know why they behaved this way reasonably speaking.

When it's not done well, we get the, "Everyone becomes an idiot the minute they're in a horror story" genre trope of people actively running from a murderer deciding to split up and then getting picked off one by one in increasingly stupid ways.

But this too loops back to, "But in the real world, why wouldn't I go check the circuit breaker in my basement if the lights went out? I wouldn't know there's a killer down there!"

And the fact is... I don't really know how to answer this one. Not every audience member is going to track back to all the information they've been shown that the character has and reasonably conclude that the character acted logically. There's a sort of confirmation bias in humans where when we're spoon-fed all the necessary information that someone else doesn't have, we assume despite evidence that we would have, in their place, magically figured out this information on our own or that somehow, magically, the person who has not been given this information somehow knows it. See: every fight between couples where the point of conflict is the other person not magically reading your mind to know what has upset you, because the world isn't a story, it's full of entropy, there's many potential causes for every effect, and one of the pleasures of fiction is the ability to read another person's thoughts by delving into their POV, something we can't do outside our own heads in the real world.

Really, the only solution is to get a second pair of eyes to ask, "What information do you need to know why the character acted this way?" Sometimes, it requires a bit of spoon-feeding, which many authors are averse to. Sometimes though, you do need to spoon-fed the audience because they're being thrown a lot of data points and unlike you, they don't know which ones are relevant. You can't know what other genres or stories they have in their head, or their own lived experience where what's obvious to you isn't obvious to them as a solution, or what the character should do next. Sometimes, you're just gonna lose. Sometimes you can put all sorts of work into making a character act intelligently and realistically and then they lose on their goal because of factors truly beyond their control, and the audience will think they're stupid because humans also have a success-bias, where the actions that lead to success are considered intelligent even if 99% of circumstance they wouldn't work (for example, buying a lottery ticket is 99.9999% time a dumb move, unless you're the person who wins, and then everyone else is stupid for not buying a lottery ticket. Human brains are bad at math).

Sometimes it's on the audience for not being attentive enough. But really, that's no excuse. As an author, you should do your utmost to craft the experience you want the reader to have. That might include ambiguity but even that should be deliberate. Controlling the flow of information is key to this and genuinely one of the hardest advanced level craft elements out there.

[let-us-cultivate-our-garden]

(。・・)_且 Spill the tea What is something about the TOH fandom you can’t stand?

This is mostly a Twitter thing but I've seen it a few times on Tumblr but I positively loathe when people bully and harass other fans for liking certain characters. We're in this weird moment in fandom where some folks think that if you like a villain character or even just a minor antagonist then that means that you either condone or derive enjoyment from their actions.

That's stupid.

You can't support the actions of a fictional character because they don't exist. You can also enjoy watching villain characters commit villainy, because that's what they're designed to do. It's entertainment. Also, villain characters almost universally get their comeuppance so you can enjoy when they meet their inevitable downfall. That's a normal part of consuming media; I can have a blast watching charismatic bank robbers do a heist in a movie but would call the police if I saw the real thing.

I dunno, it just seems like fandoms for kid's shows have this weird tendency to tie their morality with the type of media they consume, which is just unhealthy. Seems like just another excuse to bully people while feeling "morally" superior about it.

Another thing I can't stand that is applicable to all fandoms is shipping wars. I literally do not care what you ship. It's a stupid thing to argue over. I don't care if it's not canon, ocs and crossover ships are not cringe. Don't ask me what I ship because I don't go there.

Finally, another thing that I dislike is how everyone seemingly puts Dana Terrace on a pedestal. Look, I appreciate the show for what it's doing, the queer representation, the disability metaphors, the visibility of neurodivergent characters, those are all great. But the show is not without flaw and no, it's not all Disney's fault. You can and should be able to criticize the show and the writers for its shortcomings. Dana is a person and all people are imperfect. Nothing we create in this world will be without flaw and that's okay. If anything, when people point out the mistakes, missed opportunities, etc, it just means that the artist can see where their weaknesses are, address them, and produce even better content.

Thank you for the ask!

[aaronsrpgs]

DAWstruck

A Quick Look at Sci-Fi/Fantasy Publisher DAW and My Desire for Cheap Entertainment

If you've ever been to an American used bookstore, flea market, etc., you probably recognize the distinctively uniform yellow (or faded-to-brown) spines of the DAW books pictured above.

From Wikipedia: "DAW Books is an American science fiction and fantasy publisher, founded by Donald A. Wollheim, along with his wife, Elsie B. Wollheim, following his departure from Ace Books in 1971. The company claims to be 'the first publishing company ever devoted exclusively to science fiction and fantasy.'"

Wollheim was active in sci-fi publishing and fandom circles; he published the Ursula LeGuin's first two books at Ace, and as a youth, he was kicked out of the New York Science Fiction League club for getting a group of unpaid authors together to sue writer/publisher/organizer Hugo Gernsback after they weren't paid for published stories:

"It grieves us to announce that we have found the first disloyalty in our organization… These members we expelled on June 12th. Their names are Donald A. Wollheim, John B. Michel, and William S. Sykora—three active fans who just got themselves onto the wrong road."

I've worked in bookstores and libraries for decades, and my eyes always glossed over the shelves full of yellow spines. But I started to reconsider after listening to Sean at SFUltra talk about Electric Forest by Tanith Lee. (Once you're equally convinced, go back his Patreon, which is literally my favorite criticism on the internet.)

I started devouring Lee's work. In my opinion, she outstrips most of the "greats" of that era of sci-fi. Her prose is awesome, her plots are great fun, and she's prolific across science fiction and fantasy. Had I been sleeping on DAW Books? Were they all this good?!

They are not all that good.

DAW Books books run the gamut of sci-fi and fantasy, from alternate histories to barbarian tales to postmodern reactions to the post-war West. And taken as an overview of the sci-fi field at that time, they reflect the good (Tanith Lee) and the bad (libertarian cryto-fascism, coercive sex freaks, tired cliches).

So why am I writing about them? Because they represent a type of publisher that, as far as I know, doesn't really exist anymore. They published authors who'd never been published before, and they printed straight to paperback.

I have no idea if anyone was making a living being published by DAW, but I assume this was a foot in the door for lots of these authors. And the books were so cheap! The one I have on hand was $1.25 in 1976. Adjusted for inflation, that's $6.93.

And listen, I read difficult books. I read literary fiction and academic histories and complicated, confusing cross-genre works. But I also like to read trash! I think everyone deserves to read some trash. But I want that trash to be cheap and easily accessible.

And with modern publishers focusing on established authors and Next Big Things, it's hard to find trash! And when you do find it, it's often dressed up to look like a Next Big Thing and priced accordingly.

Please give me more cheap trash.

And god, look at those covers. Again, I don't know if any painters were making a living by selling work to DAW, but they were definitely putting in the work. You got classic Frazetta horniness, you got '70s psychedelia, you got "what if the Bible was weirder?" classicism.

I want to decorate my walls with these.

The nice part is that they're mostly shorter than 200 pages, and I've never spent more than $5 on one of these, and I can usually find them even cheaper. So next time you're at a library sale and you see a faded yellow DAW spine, take a closer look.

Just stay away from Gor.

(DAW is still in business today, as a subsidiary of Astra House Publishing. I would say they occupy the same spheres as Tor: popular, readable, and usually left-of-center science fiction and fantasy. Such as The Forever Sea, a sapphic ecological fantasy book about sailors on a sea of plants. They cost, unfortunately, more than $7.)

[kitkatopinions]

Hey KitKat I have a question and sorry if this is a weird question:

Is there anything wrong with liking certain rwby characters that are not as popular?

I like Neptune even with the small scenes he had in canon yet I have met fans that didn’t like my opinion because of the whole dance arc.

I understand he is not perfect but I think the part that really bother me is that when I try addressing their character flaws apparently I was the bad guy?

Why is their character immune to criticism when they have just as much flaws?

I don't think there's anything wrong with liking pretty much any character so long as the flaws the character has are acknowledged and (if included in writing) are actually written as flaws.

Neptune is a great example and I also happen to like him, so this is a great place to discuss it. XD Neptune in canon severely suffered from the RWBY writers' misogyny, as he was written as a giant douchebag partially to prop up Jaune's 'nice guy' thing, but since the writers were misogynists, Neptune's own cool guy dudebro 'womanizer' thing was treated as not a big problem and not a deal breaker to the other characters even when he made women visibly uncomfortable and kept flirting like with Team NDGO and with Ilia. And since he was a side character without a lot of screentime and like zero growth, that's kinda like sixty percent of his character at least and the rest of it is pretty thin. In canon, there isn't much to him. And it's important that no one defends or refuses to admit that Neptune in canon is a douchebag who doesn't respect women. But also... Neptune is a fictional person. he isn't real, 'condemning him for his actions' seems kind of ridiculous, and making him better or making him get better in fanfics or just liking the rest of his non-douchey character traits and his design and wanting to have fun with that shouldn't be treated as bad. It's the same with any RWBY character, even much worse ones who have done worse things morally speaking than making women uncomfortable, like Ironwood, Adam, Emerald, Mercury, Roman, Neo, Cinder, Salem, JACQUES SCHNEE even. Like, I hate Jacques with the power of a thousand burning suns, he's evil and trash and I would never redeem him or have a better version of him in my headcanons (even though I love and value redemption arcs, I also personally think having characters that don't get redeemed and instead demonstrate examples of how even though everyone can be redeemed, some people won't be redeemed is beneficial) but if somebody else did... So long as they aren't excusing or defending his actions, so what? I write fanfictions about redeemed Kylo Ren and redeemed Count Olaf, so I have no space to judge.

People have this weird tendency to treat fictional characters like they're real people, like they need to answer for their crimes, like they 'can't change,' and it's so strange to me. Fictional characters are whatever people want them to be, and they don't exist, so their crimes are all fictional, so... Why would they 'need to be punished?' XD Also, the same people who have this 'we should condemn fictional characters,' 'how dare you like this character when they did X bad thing,' 'writing anything except hate for this character is abuse apologism' people... They almost always like a villain themselves. XD Whether it's a villain in RWBY like Cinder, Salem, Tyrian, Watts, Hazel, Raven, etc, or whether it's a villain outside of RWBY like the Joker, Harley Quinn, Azula, Darth Vader, Sephiroth, Catra, Lotor, Maleficent, etcetera.

But yeah, in general, I think you should ignore those people. If you like Neptune, more power to you! If you want to write fics or headcanons or what have you about Neptune realizing that the way he acted was wrong, even more power to you! If you write things where Neptune was never a womanizer or misogynist to begin with, cool! If people get angry at you over something like writing a teenage boy to deconstruct his misogyny or making said teenage boy not that way in the first place, then they're probably not people you want to know. Hope this helps. :)

[goddevouringserpent]

some rambling thoughts about A Certain Videogame that is releasing soon (largely game-neutral and fandom-negative)

because. listen. there are a lot of things that I could criticise Dragon Age for. Inquisition was my biggest disappointment in gaming, even bigger than BG3 because with BG3 I was on the "I expected nothing and was still let down" mindset, whereas with DAI I was genuinely looking forward to it & felt like they did not deliver on any of the promises they made. there are a lot of things they have handled poorly. the ongoing plot about the elven gods is extremely unsatisfying & feels like a total cop-out and a loss of what made the world interesting in the first place.

but some people are approaching their criticism the wrong way IMO. because—alright I don't want to get into drama with anyone or bring drama to anyone so I won't be screenshotting OP's URL here, but this statement is just. outrageously ridiculous.

uh. no? it really is not that easy??? where are these texts coming from, pray tell? that shit doesn't sprout from the ground fully-formed. who's writing them? who's voicing them (unless we're meant to assume that you want all reactivity to be contained within codex entries)? even for interactive fiction games, where literally all you have is writing with no voice work or mocap work or whathaveyou involved, keeping track of these variables is extremely tough and time-consuming work. (source: I am writing one. unpublished as of yet, but I am writing it.) this is such a weirdly reductionist way of approaching the topic, especially in light of what we know has been going on at BW—they fired a large portion of the writers, including Mary fucking Kirby (which should be more concerning to us as players than a lack of reactivity, btw), there's clearly Issues going on there that encompass the whole company, there's a lack of funding or at least severe issues with how they're handling their funding, there's a lack of care for the people who have worked there for decades, etc etc.

is the lack of reactivity a problem? yeah I guess? maybe? but not for the reasons OP is saying, and it most definitely cannot be solved in the way OP is proposing. reactivity isn't a switch you turn on or off. and a reactivity like OP mentions would just make the world feel wide but shallow; things are acknowledged, but nothing comes out of them. there's a throwaway line of text, and that's that. because the alternative involves branching paths, cameos, different solutions to quests or different dialogue trees, etc etc, all of which is, again, a LOT of work, it's not something an intern can pull off in a day.

and like. alright. not to play devil's advocate here because I am, by and at large, hugely disenchanted with this franchise, and although I will be playing DATV (not that they'll be seeing a cent from me lol) just out of curiosity and sunk cost fallacy, I do not have high hopes for it. BUT.

Origins released in 2009. DA2 released in 2011. Inquisition—the latest entry in the franchise—released in 2014. that's a whole fucking decade in-between the third and fourth installments. and something that I think a lot of people online fail to understand is that the vast majority of gamers do not engage in fandom-type activities. we are a minority. a loud, outspoken minority, but a minority in the end. a LOT of people just play the game for what it is, then shelf it and don't think about it until the next one comes out (if it ever does). in this context I think that "making great use of the medium" would fall more along the lines of making sure there is proper reactivity within the game itself—meaning: let's NOT have another "human NPC humansplains Dalish history to my Dalish elf protag" moment—and not making callbacks to games from 10+ years ago, because. guys. we have to accept it. a LOT of the people who are gonna be playing this game won't have played DAO/DA2, or even DAI. a LOT of the people who are gonna be playing this game won't remember shit about the previous games. because a decade has passed. (if we're counting from DAI. otherwise we're looking at 15 years.)

especially when people start complaining about stuff like "what do you MEAN the choice of who we left in the Fade isn't relevant"—we were told that person's not coming back. like I could understand being upset at, IDK, your Inquisitor's romance choice (which btw does seem like their way of catering to the fandom part of the playerbase, but I digress) being more relevant than who is currently ruling Orlais, but if you're upset about the Fade thing you only have yourself to blame. we've known for years that character's Not Coming Back. the devs were very straightforward about that. ultimately it's not their fault if you've headcanoned your way around that statement. which like, don't get me wrong, I am all for headcanons, but when you have a headcanon you need to accept the fact that canon probably will contradict it eventually. your city now but also don't expect the devs to buy building permissions in your city, y'know?

but yeah. as I was saying. 10-15 years. most of the choices are gonna mean absolute jack shit to new (and a lot of returning!!) players, so at a certain point it makes sense that they had to make, like, a strategic choice of what to include and what to set aside. and of course it's a bummer for those of us who have been playing since DAO! I wanted mentions of my HOF, of Kieran, etc etc, there's a lot that makes me go "aww man". but also I think that people need to start acknowledging the fact that ultimately there are limits to what can and can't be done within the frame of one game that is being released, again, 10 years after the previous entry.

I mean tbh at this point I feel they'd be better served by having their next game be the first installment of a completely new franchise / IP. I can understand why they didn't make that choice. but it feels they'd be better off that way. having to deliver cameos and reactivity to Every Single Goddamn Choice Made In 3 Games The Oldest Of Which Is 15 Years Old is kind of a Sisyphean task that bogs the actual game down IMO

[mysticstarlightduck]

Author Ask Tag

Kindly tagged by @writernopal 💕

1. What is the main lesson of your story (e.g. kindness, diversity, anti-war), and why did you choose it?

The Last Wrath's main message, throughout many of the character arcs, is that one must not lose hope, even through the darkest times, and that to find that light in the dark, one has to take action, instead of waiting for a savior that may never come.

It also includes messages of acceptance and diversity (in the sense of the need for respect and tolerance for a harmonious society), learning from the past but not letting it define the future, and the need to take a stand for what you believe in. The value of freedom. Change, and its presence in all beings and things, is also an important theme.

TLW also shows how cruelty and injustice (of all kinds) can shape not only a world but the people within it.

On another note, The Last Wrath is also a story that criticizes how crooked people with enough power act like they are above others, and how prejudice can be one of the greatest evils a society can harbor. It criticizes oppression and corrupt systems, as well as criticizes against people who think they can take whatever they want because they can (be it in the more direct sense, like a conquest, or something more subtle but just as dangerous)

And it shows how there is still good even if it is hidden by the existence of great evil, and that the only way to find freedom, is to believe and accept yourself, and actively seek it - even if it may seem impossible at first, there is a brighter future ahead.

As for why I chose these themes, while most of them came naturally to the plot, it is also - in some ways - the story themes that I would've liked to read in the past and feel the message of a striving for a brighter future despite the odds, can be important to a lot of people out there too.

2. What did you use as inspiration for your worldbuilding (like real-life cultures, animals, famous media, websites, etc.)?

The Last Wrath takes a lot of inspiration from past civilizations that existed during the Ancient Times and Medieval Ages. I often find myself reading history books, researching historical articles, or even watching videos with random curiosities about the past, and all of those things eventually serve as a basis from which I built the fully fictional world that is the continent of Agrannor.

While my inspirations were varied the few ancient and medieval cultures that immediately come to mind when I think about some specific kingdoms/locations in Agrannor are: Ancient Romans, Ancient Greece, Vikings, the Mongols, Ancient Egypt, Celtic, Feudal Europe (especially England, France and Germany), Mediterranean, Ancient Middle East, Phoenicians, etc.

Mythology, lore, and folk/fairy tales are also great sources of inspiration for me, especially when it comes to the creation of magical beasts and creatures with a twist.

I also find myself inspired by watching different pieces of media, such as good movies or series, that take place in medieval fantasy settings. Something about it just gets me in the mood to write!

Listening to music, looking for aesthetics on Pinterest, daydreaming about my WIPs while listening to vibing songs - all of this helps get me inspired too!

3. What is your MC trying to achieve, and what are you, the writer, trying to achieve with them? Do you want to inspire others, teach forgiveness, and help readers grow as a person?

Well, aside from the overall goal of "prevent/stop the War of Prophecy from destroying the world" and "defeat the Secret Court and Emperor Aerich", I guess that all of my Main Characters are somehow looking for a missing piece of themselves (not in a literal sense lol, but in the metaphorical sense) and to finally find the place where they belong in the world, their "purpose" so to speak. Of course, each of the protagonists has unique goals and wants, but even those boil down to a variation of these.

As for what I am trying to achieve with them as a writer: I am trying to write a compelling story about unique individuals facing the odds, not because they want to, but because it is the right thing to do. I want to explore some aspects of the human condition through these characters, and how their harsh world shapes each individual in unique ways. How, at the end of the day, they're just people trying to do their best with what chance was given to them, even though they make mistakes and fail sometimes. I want to show how "courage is not the absence of fear, but taking action despite of it. " and that one doesn't have to be born a perfect hero to stand up for what is right or to protect those they love.

Do you want to inspire others, teach forgiveness, and help readers grow as a person? Yes, I do. At least I hope so, lol. But mostly, I want to inspire readers to question the world around them, and to consider looking at things through a different perspective rather than to become blindsided. I hope to show how you can choose your future and define your destiny, even if it is not an easy road for everyone. To embrace differences and let them help you - and the world around you - grow for the better. To consider that to try is the best thing anyone can do at any given moment, and that it is a thousand times better to try - even if there is a risk of failure - than to never try at all.

4. How many chapters is your story going to have?

While I have the story outlined and plotted, and know how it begins, develops, and ends, I don't know the exact amount of chapters it'll have. As many as it takes to write a well-rounded but concise story, I guess (:

5. Is it fanfiction or original content? Where do you plan to post it?

Original! I plan to publish The Last Wrath as an actual novel, one day, and I'm likely to indie publish when the time comes.

6. When and why did you start writing?

I started writing short stories when I was a little kid. I just loved creating stories, worlds, and characters, and creating wonderful things that only existed in my imagination! Sometime later I decided to try and write my first "book" on my dad's computer, which was already sort of medieval fantasy - which had always been my favorite genre, and still is. And this desire to write stayed with me ever since, and now, I actually write real novels and am able to bring the worlds in my imagination to my creations.

7. Do you have any words of engagement for fellow writers of Writeblr? What other writers on Tumblr do you follow?

Write the story you want to write, because it deserves to be out in the world, even if you currently doubt yourself, and only you - its author - can bring that story to fruition the way it was meant to be written, and know that you deserve to write whatever the heck you want. For yourself, to have fun doing it. Know that every word on a page, even if it is just a sucky first draft, is a step towards perfecting your craft, and that gentle practice and patience beats stubborn perfectionism (wanting things to come out perfect in the first try), any day.

Tagging (gently) @conkers-theficwriter, @digital-chance, @lyutenw, @exquisitecrow, @clairelsonao3, @cabbojage, @rickie-the-storyteller, @your-absent-father, @anoelleart, @jasperygrace

[greenpanda-djg]

Airplane/Binghe Mobei/Cucumber Parralell

Just ignore me OR add if you're like me and just love the parralells/ships and everything that is peoples headcannon that Airplane based LBH on himself and likes ice cold beautys like mobei and cucumber etc.

SO

How is LGH and SQQ the same as Airplane/cucumber?

Okay, so your a writer you pour your heart and soul into writing something you genuinly liked and then when you show that to the world you get attacked by criticism. As an artist/writer not everyone will like your work so the scene where LBH in the tea ceremony is happy then gets dunked on. SQQ could represent the haters/his anti fans that no matter how much LBH TRIES its NEVER good enough for your harshest critic. And JUST LIKE antis and weirdos online who trash on peoples works that they poured their heart and soul into is usually projection! That the antis online are probably miserable [or like SY who read PIDW but completely missed the tones and made a ton of assumptions which lead to his downfall in the world]

I'm not sure if its a headcannon or fact that sqq vitriol was based on most of Cucumbers animosity towards PIDW.

And most have noticed how Shang Qinghua always wears a pleasent smile, acts pitiful on purpose, takes advantage of others and looks down on them pretty much too faced but is suprisingly strong has some similarities to LBH. And his dynamic with Mobei-Jun someone who hites Shang QInghua [Which to demons is a sign of affection JUST like how SQQ hits Binghe with his fan its endearment like a wife slapping her husbands shoulder]

How Mobei-Jun is the damsel in distress JUST like Sqq and both need rescuing by their pitiful husbands! and also how Mobei-Jun is always annoyed at SQH but then gets pissy when Shang Qinghua tries to leave same as Shen Qingqiu who is hot and cold then cries when LBH leaves him in the mausoleom-

Okay I'm saying that its the same ship in different FONTS.

Also one last thing is how funny how Shen Yuan is a typical online weirdo who cares more for a fictional character version and has more empathy for this cute white lotus whose had a troubling life.

Meanwhile theres SQH who ALSO had an awful upbringing how his shixiongs literally shoved SQH in front of a freaken DEMON who was the great Mobei-Jun and expected a small disciple to take him on may as well have sacrificed him! How he had his own system and tried to help SY when he could and yet it was never good enough the weird anti parasocial dynamic where SY would rather care for SQH fictional counterpart than the real thing thats right in front of him since most people online hold fictional characters with more priority than real people

ps. YES SQQ does care for SQH he let him lay low in the bamboo house and fed him Binghes food just like his relationship with Binghe and Mobei SQQ is hot and cold he will literally slap you and say he hates you one moment then wifebeams gives you food the next and tuck you into bed I'm just saying he can be BOTH or his journey through the story is that SQQ follows scripts. He's a pretender and thinks its a story the characters and people in this world and just that fiction. So it would make sense that he has this distance with even SQH and by finally treating the world as real by taking LBH emotions seriously and that his words do have an impact and can HURT him shows that he also applies this behaviour to everyone around him including SQH.

Anything else you guys want to add feel free.

[autumn-oceanopromises]

Writing Like A Woman

I bought a book and I'm waiting for it to be delivered: "To Write Like A Woman: Essays in Feminism and Science Fiction", by Joanna Russ. I've never read her work before, seminal and powerful as it seems to be in relation to queer, intersectional, and feminist perspectives, and her work seems to be mostly out of print, as she was active (and alive) in the 60s to 90s.

I'll be quite honest - up until probably my mid-twenties, the title of that book alone would have put me off it completely. (There's a whole story and essay to be had there, the growing-up ways that a POC immigrant boy - man - seeks the media perception of white (=good, =great) masculinity and pretends to be the most masculine and milquetoast, which includes rejecting femininity in everything, in order to reject perceptions of weakness, which are mostly to do with how other boys see boys, within the masculine subculture. How virtue signaling is constant, even in the most private of spaces and to absolutely nobody but myself.)

But that's not the topic of this entry. This one's about writing like a woman: the female-expectation-derived plot points and structures that are rarely examined and re-combined by amateur male writers, why writing and exploring those structures are especially important in the low-agency world we are entering into or are already living in now, and how I want to but don't quite know where to start.

*Trigger warnings and disclaimers: I come at this from the perspective of someone whose publicly posted body of amateur writing is 50% poetry, 40% erotica/pornography, including some extremely dark content (though none of it is, of course, hosted on this blog), so appropriate trigger warnings apply when I discuss this, and 10% other things, including NANO novels, short stories, slash and romance fanfic, game design, worldbuilding lore, marketing copy, etc. I read predominantly amateur fantasy and science fiction, often fanfiction, and not professionally published literary fiction, horror, or romance, and am unaware of the trends within them. I am a cishet POC man living in a predominantly white country, and as such, may mention and perpetuate problematic perspectives. This is my personal opinion, written in 2023.* I've approached the work of Joanna Russ circuitously. I would like her guidance in the literary analysis of feminist fiction. I discovered her first by finding out about her essays and novels from r/menwritingwomen, a subreddit about pinpointing the ways that men write women - as a lampoon, as a satire, as a horror. I've looked at critical, if fond, examinations of her work, which is often the only things available for free on the Internet any longer - respected authors, mostly women, who point to her work as something that inspired and provoked them. I very, very much look forward to finding out what her work reads like. I very much look forward, if dread, examining and being deeply, viscerally horrified, at my thinking, my plot structures, and my internalized bigotry. I look forward to deliberately playing some really horrible shit straight, but with an undercurrent of horror. I look forward to writing things which are less horrifying. I very much look forward to writing like a woman, especially in science fiction and fantasy.

Writing like a woman without acerbic wit and superb guidance (at least according to all the critics), it turns out, in 2023 amateur writing spaces, even and especially under the current flood of "strong female characters", is incredibly fucking hard. Writing, plot and structure, is still mostly treated with the implication and context of masculine-derived plot and structures. The Hero's Journey is about men, after all, and it inseminates most things in modern media. In amateur genre fiction, which holds a lot of eyeballs, including isekai and litRPGs, there's very few non-male viewpoints; fantasy and science fiction as a setting abounds just about everywhere, but the rise and fall of the plot remains action, adventure, base-building, and shounen: everything stems from what society expects and pressures boys and men to do and desire: to conquer, to save, to explore, to investigate, to fight, to build and create, to happen to - to take, to seize, to plunder.

Some of the most popular tropes in this field are: overpowered protagonists, crushing and laying waste to things before them; time travel, cheat items and powers, systems to manipulate and game. The number of these stories are increasing, rapidly, and are a thriving ecosystem - the number of popular complete fucking jackasses maybe one or two morality pets is through the fucking roof.

I consume an absolute shit-ton of these. It was originally a guilty pleasure, but it's rapidly become less guilty, and more of blatant escapism and a solid portion of my day. I'm one of the target audience: I hate my job, but am reasonably good at it in some bits. I hate going to work, I hate being at work, and I hate the feeling of general helplessness and corporate bullshit, in myself, my team, and my customers, even while being very aware that I have probably some of the least corporate bullshit and helplessness that a person working in retail and in general is trading time for money, has. I have very much a lot of agency and I know I'm using it very poorly.

There is very little stopping me, in terms of amount of bureaucratic rules, except for the fact that the company is seriously overcharging people for a health-related product, mainly because the company is part of the fashion-industrial complex and a monolithic monopoly in the heart of unchecked capitalism. As a symptom of the general shittiness though, and unrelated to the corporate bullshit side of things, I especially hate entitled customers, who treat my team and me like shit for less and less amounts of money. Sure, you paid a "lot" of money for "the worst customer service in your whole life". We went out of our way to give you special treatment, including at least three free products and processes worth nearly 1.5 grand, something like four hours in consultation, and you in total spent $200 in a store where $800 is the average price, where you knew the average price walking in. I wish you genuinely shitty customer service for the rest of your miserable fucking life. That said, it's true that people in general just are making less money than the prices of living goods, and belts are squeezing tighter everywhere. If you can afford belts.

As people get less and less able to afford important shit, become less and less able to enact their own personal individualism and individual thoughts, and more and more ruled by whatever the higher-level narrative is - the news, the fashion companies, the social media trends, all of that shit - the more escapism rises, but also the more I believe that writing like a woman, like the challenges women faced in in the '60s to '90s is important. I would like to write "like a woman": I want to explore plot structures where the action happens in carving out agency under an unbearable and generally unbeatable social pressure - focusing more on the bureaucratic rather than the supernatural as in horror genre fiction, rather than the protagonist happening to the world. Figuring out the mystery where everyone and everything wants to kill or suppress you, girl (or boy, or other) meets house, and more structures that I just don't know yet, with and about things happening to the protagonist, the manic pixie dream boy archetypes, all that shebang and shemoves. I realize as I say this that it sounds incredibly stupid. The whole first half of the hero's journey is shit happening to the protagonist, the protagonist breaking out and developing agency, and arguably, a protagonist - especially in film - is almost always entirely reactionary.

But that focus on it? Where the pressure is right there, if unacknowledged or right out of the eyeline? Where specifically, the focus is the variation on and about carving out what little agency you can have in a world that specifically is trying to keep you down and quiet and in your little box and if you go too far they'll slap you down into place with horrific impersonal consequences, so walking the line and making peace with walking the line, is really, really important? Joanna Russ wrote a lot of this in science fiction, and many, many feminist writers have explored this in fantasy (in historical and epic), in mystery, in romance, in horror, in literary fiction, in erotica made by and for women. It exists in trans narratives, in queer narratives, in POC narratives, in narratives about poverty.

I don't know anyone who's cross-applied the same structures to the boxes for cishet middle-class men, even though we're rapidly entering a world where those boxes are getting more and more obvious and more and more crushing, because the middle-class is shrinking rapidly and high-level narratives, spin, trends, all that shit, are turning people on people. Radicalising via arousing extreme states of anger and fear, lust and gluttony and envy and greed. And, okay, there's a lot of fiction out there for cishet men already. It's just, that fiction for cishet men always runs with the same narratives that, frankly, causes this shit to happen IRL for everyone else.

I'll be honest: this whole entry is probably nothing new to people already reading and agreeing with the points of feminist literature. And cishet man discovers one of the good points of feminist literature, news at 11. But it matters to me.

And I don't know any mainstream literature or media, where specifically, the direction to make this situation and setup is about empowerment. Bioshock, maybe. But even that has caveats. Because a lot of works in these structures are tragic, specifically are about arousing extreme fear and anxiety and tension. Sometimes sexually arousing, sometimes sublimating it into an orgy of "justified" violence. Can I make this setup empowering and joyful and ecstatic and awe-inspiring and wonderful, with happy endings that don't result in breaking out of the physical box entirely or withdrawing into personal self-isolation, through whatever means? Because the pressure is overwhelming and there's a lot of it. And you can't change the world around you, you can't control it, but you can control yourself and your reaction to it - that's one of the most common therapy adages. And this is, very much, the same thing. I think it's really important, because the direction, very much, in high-level narratives and spin, especially in Western countries, is "give up when you're faced with this pressure". It's give in and join the complex. It's "escape into a fantasy world where shit is easy". It's escape into apathy. Apathy is the highest it's ever been, political or otherwise. Lack of social connection, lack of intimacy, lack of knowing and understanding and empathizing. It's rabble-rousing with undirected anger and fear directed against other people who are also angry and fearful.

And I think it's really worth disguising as a different take, so that some of the audience that's consuming media and fiction that would cause it IRL, instead starts looking at and exploring and varying takes on dealing with it instead. I don't know if there is much like this, in published fiction. though maybe there's a heap of it and I just have never found it. Therapy-heavy fiction and takes exist, but they come off really proselytizing.

Specifically though, on a personal level, I'm wondering, yet again, about the courtesan universe that I'm writing. All the fixed points in the timeline, everything I've written so far about it, I now realize is variations on this theme. But, having come at it from a male perspective, having written and consumed only ever male perspectives or male-reflected expectations and perspectives, it's always come off incredibly flat, somehow, with caricatures of characters. I've put in conflicts and things which are irrelevant and sometimes contradictory to the underlying message and exploration of theme for that universe, and it reads badly. My whole life, as well, has been about "breaking out of the box", while being incredibly aware that I keep putting myself back inside, or breaking out of the box and realizing I'm just in a bigger box; carving out agency while staying in the same box still feels like a failure to me.

I really want to explore this, though. I want to carve out my own agency, and be okay with it, living in the box that society dictates. I would like to explore, in writing, and hopefully share with other people, and inspire them to explore the same thing, their own takes on it. This is still, quintessentially, a very male perspective on a female-based structure, and I'm aware of that, so I would appreciate guidance. I really want to tell these stories, and explore these themes, writing like a woman.