#and the (lovely) prose got in the way

[itsladykit]

Realized the other day (while listening to a podcast about a book) that writing beautifully isn't really my aim. I don't aim to be quotable. I don't aim for beautiful prose.

I want to be functional. I want the words to disappear so thoroughly that my readers can see and hear my characters. As a writer, I want to be nearly invisible.

And you know what? That realization gave me some peace and cured some of my feelings of inadequacy.

[da-janela-lateral]

At this point I don't think Teruki's parents are exceptionally horrible individuals (long-term psychological consequences still happen in cases in which the abuse isn't considered particularly severe + everyone is capable of harm, even "good" people), but they weren't the best, without a doubt.

Okay, they got too busy with their jobs and had to move overseas to progress on their career. External circunstances. Things that happen. They left their son behind, but that could always be justified by hectic schedules of ever-moving businesspeople. How else could he have a stable routine to focus on his future? They're just busy. Teruki hasn't seen them in long but that's not their fault, right?

They cared for Teruki, didn't they? His parents made sure that there was someone home to watch him whenever they were far away. It was inevitable that there would be times he would be with himself, though. But that's not bad! It only became a problem once those strange espers tried to take hold of him on the street. And even then, they were so weak he could barely give them the title of a psychic. It wasn't an issue that it happened more and more and there was no one to intervene. Or that Teruki had to torture descriptions of "Claw organization" and "brainwashed soldiers" out of these grownups to know what they wanted with him. His parents couldn't know. Why should they know? Better put: what could they do?

What could a normal person do against someone with psychic powers?

It was Teruki's choice to live by himself. He could manage it all. Contrary to the other kids, he was an independent and responsible young man who could be trusted with a house and money. Such a great boy. His parents were so proud to have someone as competent as him as a son, one which wouldn't mean hard work for them. One who always had the best grades and was the soccer team's best player and was the best student on the town's best middle school.

Of course they would suddenly allow Teruki to live on his own. Any parent with a child like him would, wouldn't they? Anyone on their right mind and who knew the slightlest about him would be sure he could do it.

And even if this "Claw" organization scared him a bit and he felt a bit lonely at times, it wasn't an issue. Issue would mean it was an obstacle - which it wasn't, as Teruki did perfectly on his own. His parents believed on so. That's why he had his own apartment at 12 on the first place. Teruki was so wonderful at this. It wasn't horrible if they didn't answer his calls, because they were so busy and he wasn't a little kid who depends on his mommy. None of this was their fault. He shouldn't bother them or himself over this.

Because they cared, right? On the end, it was only a pile of tragic circunstances and coincidences no normal person could act against. It was part of life as someone special like him. He couldn't expect that his parents could change any of this, and this made his loneliness the best possible choice. It was obvious that they would support such a decision.

What would a normal person do against someone with psychic powers?

[seajestic]

Recently read hell take us, heaven can wait by KivaEmber. Am now obsessed with the idea of Demi-Fiend Akechi Goro. Sometimes all you gotta do to solve your daddy issues is to just nearly die and then get turned into a half demon in the most traumatizing way possible.

If you wanna read it, link is below the read more

[aroaessidhe]

2024 reads / storygraph

Where The River Meets The Soul

cosy-ish fantasy, romance

follows a herbalist who decides to find a magical bloom with healing properties which has become rare in recent years, after her sister is diagnosed with a terminal illness

she travels to the city, and along with a friend and an heiress, discovers that reuniting two reincarnated ancient soulmates will restore the bloom

but when she encounters corruption and betrayal, and finds herself getting feelings for one of the soulmates, things get more complicated

ace MC, genderfluid LI

[gen-is-gone]

hrgh every time I think I've come close to forgiving lance fucking parkin I skim the gallifrey chronicles. and then I remember the Horrors.

[necromancy-savant]

In undergrad I took a Shakespeare class with the head of the department and he mentioned in class that he had a first folio facsimile in his office and we could come see it any time if we wanted, so the first time I was there to discuss a paper it took everything in me not to blurt out "ravioli ravioli give me the folioli"

[akkivee]

examples of Jakurai hsbing foot in mouth syndrome?? 😂 /pos

exhibit a!!!!!! in rhyme anima➕, he was tasked to be a good host in that bb/mtr/bat episode and showed off that jakurai charm to the point she was speechless!!!!! and not in a good way lmao!!!!

and it can be directly compared to hitoya’s rizz that we see in the next scene, where he also provided consultation services as his attraction point, but not only did he provide good advice, he also poured and mixed her drink for her like whew!!! 😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨

if the canonicity of rhyme anima bothers you, you also have that scene of the same vibe during kuujaku posse’s drama track (the second one is what my brain tells me lol) where ramuda gets hypmic’s og high functioning disaster gay to pick up women and not only does he fail, he makes her run away from him lmao

exhibit b!!!!!! he got a hot date with hitoya in the block party tracks!!!!! they totally sounded like bfs who didn’t want to hang up the phone on each other until jakurai fumbled it lmao

exhibit c!!!!!! the most damaging!!!!! who knows what would have happened if jakurai, out of all the things he could have questioned ramuda about in the scene leading to their break up, chose not to pick at ramuda’s ‘realness’ as a being!!!!! but he did!!!! even tho ramuda, caught in the lie, looked to be willing to bare something of himself to jakurai who is on the record of wanting to see the real him btw!!!!!

i hope this is sufficient evidence of jakurai inability to talk to people without fcking it up in some way lmao thanks for coming to my ted talk LOL

[raiiny-bay]

there isn’t a single universe in which dhes graduates from college…

[elvenmoans]

read a gay orc romance trilogy (the orc prince by Lionel Hart) and find it funny and sweet how the orc guy turns down sex the first time bc they don't know each other well enough yet (arranged marriage), then just before the series climax (hah) the orc guy nuts in the MC and then immediately starts crying just love when big scary guys subvert expectations and cry during sex bc they love their partner so much

[madamescarlette]

nothing like staying up aggressively late to finish a book that you don't realize till halfway through is kind of infuriating and wrong and yet you have to see the end so you can close the lid on the fury vs. the healing joy of going off to read a book and then reading it all in one sitting because it was glorious and exactly suited to what you needed to read at that moment!

[faedotexe]

So I'm building a tiny mix between a flip & write game and an incremental game, but it's actually interactive fiction written in ink?

And also you build your own adversary and I'm just kind of writing them with a vague "aren't they super hot? Why are they hot?" energy

But playing the game and winning means brutally killing your adversary through metaphorical game actions so there's that

[six-improbable-things]

I forgot to post anything about this, but I did the scene where I had to read some of my writing to the dnd party (twice!) and they were SO nice about it. I couldn't stop smiling. (which was kind of a weird disconnect since the scenes were super dark, lmao.) But augh, I'm so glad they were nice to meeee. My poor boy Rook is Going Through It right now, and things are about to get worse.

Next session we also might get to do our first version of ship combat using the rules I made which is kind of wild. I'm very nervous, but I feel like after this last session and sharing stuff I wrote with them (out loud!!!) I can handle it. Probably.

[aquynh]

im now 50% through fsp and its like well, when i had the novel pitched to me initially i was expecting something kind of more serious than what i got….but idk what i expected when i already dont like entertainment industry focused plotlines

[lesbiansaaviik]

Can I be beautifully honest with you guys? I hate 91 Whiskey and So Says the Sword

[shebsart]

Im sick with flu so naturally I picked up my newly bought copy of Howl's Moving Castle which includes DWJ interviews in the back.

And im in love with the way she tells these stories feels like a part of her books.

And my favorite:

The magic in the mundane :)

edit: I'm copying the ID by @princess-of-purple-prose below, thank you!

[ID: Excerpts of printed text which read:

I suppose there's also a biographical element in that Sophie is the eldest of three sisters, and so am I. The idea for Sophie grew out of the time I discovered I had a very severe milk allergy. I almost lost the use of my legs and had to walk with the aid of a stick. I was moderately young, but because of this I suddenly became old.

I had to wait until I knew what Wizard Howl was like. I began to discover Howl about the time when one of my sons took to spending several hours in the bathroom every morning and I got really, really, really annoyed with him.

Where were you when you wrote it? I wrote the book the way I write everything, stretched out on the big sofa in my sitting room, in everyone's way. This often annoys my husband rather a lot.

which made me burst out laughing. I laughed and laughed at the seven league boot, and when I came to the bit where Sophie accidentally makes Howl's suit twenty times too big for him, I laughed so much that I fell off the sofa. My husband was really irritated by this time. He snapped, "You can't be making yourself laugh!" And I gasped, "But I am, I am!" and rolled about on the floor.

Are any of your relatives or friends included in the book? Yes, well the thing that started me off writing the book was a friend of mine who never does her laundry. She has it around the place in huge bags for often as much as a year. When she does tip it all out and try to wash it, she discovers all sorts of clothes that she has forgotten she had.

Which is your favourite part of the book and why? I like the book all over, but I suppose if I had to choose a bit, I'd choose the place where Howl gets a cold. It so happened that when I was writing this bit, my husband caught a bad cold. He is the world's most histrionic cold catcher. He moans, he coughs, he piles on the pathos, he makes strange noises, he blows his nose exactly like a bassoon in a tunnel, he demands bacon sandwiches at all hours, and he is liable to appear (usually wrapped in someone else's dressing gown) at any time, announcing that he is dying of neglect and boredom. So all I had to do was write it down. End ID]

[stupidphototricks]

One of my favorite Discworld tropes is normal (ish) prose written in the style of religious texts, because I don't know*. Definitely I love it when writing mixes it up a bit, yay for not sticking to the usual sentence/paragraph structure all the time. I remember being gobsmacked as a kid when I read, I think, one of the Hitchhiker's books and there was a chapter that consisted of a single word, like whoa, you can do that??

Anyway, there's way too much pseudo-biblespeak in Small Gods to make a comprehensive list, but here are some of my favorites:

Yea, the Great God Om spake again unto Brutha, the Chosen One: "Psst!" -- Terry Pratchett, Small Gods

Once more the Great God Om spake unto Brutha, the Chosen One: "Are you deaf, boy?" -- Terry Pratchett, Small Gods

He cursed a melon unto the eighth generation, but nothing happened. He tried a plague of boils. The melon just sat there, ripening slightly. -- Terry Pratchett, Small Gods

"This is good lettuce. And it's me saying it. You don't get lettuce up in the hills. A bit of plantain, a thorn bush or two. Let there be another leaf." Brutha pulled one off the nearest plant. And lo, he thought, there was another leaf. -- Terry Pratchett, Small Gods

He had smitten good and hard in his time. Now he could just about walk through water and feed the One. -- Terry Pratchett, Small Gods

VIII. It's Got A Good Ring To It. Hurry Up, I've Got Some Smiting To Do. -- Terry Pratchett, Small Gods

XV. I Could Destroy You Utterly. "Yes. I am entirely in your power." XVI. I Could Crush You Like An Egg! "Yes." Om paused. Then he said: XVII. You Can't Use Weakness As A Weapon. "It's the only one I've got." -- Terry Pratchett, Small Gods

VI. This Is Religion, Boy! Not Comparison Bloody Shopping! You Shall Not Subject Your God To Market Forces! -- Terry Pratchett, Small Gods

*Mainly, of course, because it's funny. It's funny up to and including the point where you start thinking about how, in reality, pretty much all religious books probably came about kind of like this, recorded by random people who maybe didn't have the entire context, and included irrelevant bits, and took the whole thing way too seriously.

And then they're passed down through the ages and people make an entire way of life out of them, how can you not laugh.