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hms-chill · 4 years ago

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Hii! I see you've read RWRB (which means you obviously have impeccable taste) and was wondering if you could recommend any more LGBTQ+ books? Thank you!!

OH MY GOD I HAVE SO MANY!! It really depends on what genre you’re interested in and what you like; I’ll sort of try to break it down that way (and not just rec every gay book I’ve ever read lmao)

General fiction:

Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Saenz is about two Mexican boys growing up in El Paso in the late 1980s and the writing style is absolutely incredible. It was the first Gay Book(tm) I remember and I spent months of 2012-2013 trying to find a copy and it was 100% worth it.

Simon Vs. the Homo Sapien Agenda by Becky Albertalli. We know it, we love it, I wanted to include it anyway.

The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzie Lee is a historical fiction (leaning on fantasy) romp about a boy in the 18th century going on his grand tour with the best friend he’s in love with; the sequel stars his aro/ace sister. Bi lead, Black gay love interest, and a sequel about the importance of girl friendships.

I’m on page four of Gail Wilhelm’s Torchlight to Valhalla but I love the writing style and the fact that it’s a lesbian book from 1938 that apparently ends happily almost made me cry so there’s that.

anything by Virginia Woolf, but especially Orlando, which is a love letter to her girlfriend.

Soft Place to Fall by Ba Tortuga is a fun gay cowboy romance; it’s dumb and sappy and predictable and fantastic.

Sci-Fi / Fantasy

THIS IS WHERE I THRIVE this is my wheelhouse so sorry if I get carried away lol

anything by Sarah Gailey. Their Upright Women Wanted is about queer librarian spies in a futuristic wild west. The American Hippo series (River of Teeth and Taste of Marrow) is about queer hippo wranglers in an alternate 19th century. Magic for Liars is a murder mystery set in a magic school, perfect if you’re trying to ditch She Who Must Not Be Named but still want your fun magic school itch scratched.

Nottingham by Anna Burke is a lesbian retelling of Robin Hood; I’m still working through it but I’m pretty sure all the merry men are queer women and I couldn’t be happier about it.

Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas is absolutely fantastic; it’s got an entirely Latinx cast with a trans lead and a ghost love interest; 15/10 almost made me cry.

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo has that casual queer rep that I absolutely adore. Like yeah sometimes you need a book about Being Queer but sometimes you also need a heist where the badass gunslinger casually goes “oh yeah not just girls” and steals a tank, you know?

This is very I’m A Child Of The Late 90s/ Early 2000s but Tamora Pierce was huge for me growing up. She clearly stuffed as many queer characters into her world as publishers would let her, and recently she’s confirmed fan theories about even more queerness (ace/aro characters, trans readings, etc) in her work.

Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness was published in 1969 and treats gender as a fluid thing; I haven’t read it yet but it’s on my bedside table and I’m very excited to get to it.

Poetry

all of it straight people don’t get poems

Badger Clark was a gay cowboy poet; I love his stuff so much. “The Westerner” made me absolutely feral and “Others” gutted me.

Wilfred Owen is best known for his work about WWI, but “Maundy Thursday” and “How Do I Love Thee” are absolutely incredible.

Whitman wrote poems about being gay and was one of the more iconic queer voices of the 19th century, at least in literary circles.

Byron was an icon and also incredibly queer.

Sappho is the iconic one; Anne Carson’s translation of her work (If Not, Winter) is fantastic and the one I’d personally recommend.

Classics

If you’re down to read between the lines do I have some books for you

Stoker was gay (and wrote thirsty letters to Whitman), and no one can convince me that Dracula is a straight book. Arthur and Quincey were dating thank you for coming to my TEDx talk.

The Iliad is long and complex but also Achilles and Patroclus wanted their ashes mixed when they died (fellas...)

anything by Wilde but especially A Portrait of Dorian Gray.

Les Miserables has a character who “admired, loved, and venerated” another man, and who “took great care not to believe in anything” but said other man (fellas...). There’s also an entire page about how the lead has never felt any form of love other than familial (fellas... is it aro to spend a whole page talking about how you’ve never loved anyone).

I haven’t read Moby Dick but I know there’s like three pages about how much the narrator loves his crewmate (fellas...)

Nonfiction

A lot of people are scared of nonfic but I’m gonna let you in on a secret: you don’t have to read the whole book. Pick and choose chapters that interest you, put it down for a year, whatever. Nonfic’ll be there for you.

Portrait of a Marriage by Nigel Nicolson is a look into his parents’ open relationship and his mother’s relationship with Virginia Woolf; it’s a gorgeous exploration of the various ways that love and marriage can be flexible and it changed how I look at relationships.

A Queer History of the United States by Michael Bronski is a good intro to queer history.

We Are Everywhere by Matthew Riemer and Leighton Brown is a great look at the Stonewall Era and the time after especially, and it’s full of incredible pictures. They also run @/lgbt_history on insta and 10/10 for that.

Love and Resistance: Out of the Closet and Into the Stonewall Era by Jason Baumann is fantastic too; it’s got pictures and short descriptions of what’s happening in them. Maybe not a first place, but if you know the general scope of the queer rights movement it’s a fantastic thing (or if you don’t and you’re ready to google lmao).

My Dear Boy or anything else by Rictor Norton is incredible. My Dear Boy is a collection of gay love letters; he’s also got books on queer culture in 18th century London and queering the Gothic. You can find a lot of his stuff online here and My Dear Boy specifically here.

If you want more/ something more specific, don’t hesitate!! I work in a library and I’m always finding new gay stuff and I love it.

#i wrote this in two sittings because i had a lot of ideas lmao #and i'm sure i'll come up with more soon #but i love talking about gay lit and i have so many recs #so if you want something more specific let me know #not fic #ask and answer #hannah's recs

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starrlikesbooks · 4 years ago

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Let’s talk about upcoming books!

It’s hard to believe the year is nearly over, but it’s equally hard to believe that it’s somehow still 2020 ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Either way, the new year means at least one good thing- cool new books!

Click the read more for a little on each and why I’m excited! And have a great new year! 💓🎉

The Echo Wife by Sarah Gailey is Gailey’s third full-length novel, and their second Adult novel. It’s an SFF story about a woman whose husband is cheating on her… with a clone of herself… which he made by stealing her research. The layers of betrayal! Obviously her and the clone have to kill him, what other choice do they have? I’m super excited for another one of Gailey’s fun, complex characters and the concept alone sounds so, so cool.

The Valley and the Flood by Rebecca Mahoney I’ve already had the pleasure over reading and I am PUMPED to get other people to read it! This is a magical realism story about grief and baggage mixed with a southern (western?) gothic vibe with the town in the desert full of otherwordly “neighbors”. This is a beautiful story of PTSD and healing and as well as a lushly magic one.

The Mirror Season by Anna-Marie McLemore is another one I’ve already been lucky enough to get an advanced copy of. This is a magical realism story about the trauma of two characters’ unfortunately closely connected sexual assault. This one is heavy, and if you’re sensitive to stories involving rape and/or blackmail you may want to avoid it, but it’s well written and honestly an excellent story of healing and reflection.

Lycanthropy & Other Chronic Illnesses by Kristen O’Neal I…. have also already read! Sorry- I am just a very lucky reader of books! This is a really modern online friendship based story of a girl and her community of people with chronic illnesses, like the one that forced her to come back home from college. But it turns out her best friend’s chronic illness is a little… weird. I love the humor in this book, I love the characters, I love the representation of these illnesses and the online communities they form, and I honestly think that anyone who 1) like werewolves and 2) is still on tumblr will love this book.

Blade of Secrets by Tricia Levenseller combines three of my favorite things- bladesmiths, magical quests, and the author of The Shadows Between Us. A magical bladesmith takes a commission from someone far more dangerous than she knows, and winds up with an uber powerful sword able to steal secrets, on the run, and with some surprising friends. I can’t think of anything I don’t like from that, and I know I already love Levenseller’s characters, so!

Mister Impossible by Maggie Stiefvater has… that title, but is also the sequel to Call Down the Hawk, Stiefvater’s Ronan Lynch centric TRC spin off. CDTH was incredible and ended with a massive cliff hanger, so I’m chompin at the bit for this book. More magical dreams! More disembodied voices! More murder and art theft and Declan Lynch failing at pretending not to be weird af!

May the Best Man Win by ZR Ellor has the potential to make me cry right from the get go. This is a MLM trans lovers-to-enemies-to-friends-to-lovers story and my God I’m vibrating. Basically it’s a battle for prom king between exes who had a messy break up because one of them ended their relationship in order to come out & transition. The cover is so cute and I’m ready for this to be fluffy and fun.

One Last Stop by Casey McQuiston is McQuistion’s sophomore novel after Red, White & Royal Blue, so… obviously? This one is sapphic and involves falling for someone who is literally in the past. I trust McQuiston so much I’d need this book immediately even if the concept didn’t sound amazing, but I’m feeling blessed that it does!

Violet Ghosts by Leah Thomas is about being best friends with (and crushing on) a ghost while also coming out to yourself as trans. As an enby who likes ghost books- may I just say trans rights? This book also involved parental abuse, so beware if you find that distressing or triggering!

Blood Like Magic by Liselle Sambury not only has a stunning cover and a main character who looks like she means serious business, but it’s a dark urabn fantasy about witches. The main character fails her ritual to come into her magic, she’s forced to kill her true love or strip her whole blood line. Ah, I love difficult choices, gray morality, and magic, so I’m already in love with this.

The Box in the Woods by Maureen Johnson I’m astounded and super excited to know is going to exist at all. I loved the Truly, Devious trilogy, and while this isn’t exactly a part of that it is the same main character and it is still a mystery about an unsolved murder! Plus, I love summer camps, so a summer camp murder mystery makes me happy.

Gearbreakers by Zoe Hana Mikuta is a sappic enemies-to-lovers about two girls on opposite sides of a war fought by giant Windups. This is a cyberpunk book of spies and pilots and gay love, and it’s also the first in a series!

Any Way the Wind Blows by Rainbow Rowell is the third and (most likely) final book of the Simon Snow series and it’s gonna be GOOD. My only wish is for it to be about 500 pages longer because I want a full out door stopper of tying up loose ends.

The River Has Teeth by Erica Waters is the second book by the Ghost Wood Song author- which was on my most anticipated list for 2020 last year! That one was creepy and folky and queer, and this one looks to be the same. This one has a sister disappear and some strong magic to find out what happened to her, and if their mother was the one who did it.

Mark of the Wicked by Georgia Bowers is a dark fantasy about a girl who comes into her powers but has some different ideas about how she should be using them. I love morally gray or just plain dark main characters, so I’m ready to jump right on this one. This one also involves memory loss/blacking out and being framed, which always adds a cool mysterious layer!

Among Thieves by M.J. Kuhn involves queer, selfish thieves forced to band together. I have a soft spot for characters who are really flawed and don’t want to work together (especially if it leads into found family!) and this also has a slow burn sapphic relationship and a lot of possible betrayal in it, so I’ll probably go crazy from reading it.

Beyond the Ruby Veil #2 by Mara Fitzgerald doesn’t have a title yet but it does have a great plot to work off of. I loved the first book- which was creepy, had a completely awful, villainous main character, and full (I mean full) of murder- and it ended in a way that point to the sequel being just as good if not better. The first one had the quality of just watching the world burn, and I have a feeling this one’s going to be the same thing with maybe more flames. If you plan on picking up either of them, consider checking out the CWs, though!

Little Thieves by Margaret Owen got added to this immediately because Owen definitely gained my love and trust via The Merciful Crow duology, and I’m certain it’s going to be incredible solely because she’s a wonderful writer and her characters are a lot of fun- and speaking of characters, she’s already shared some drawings and info on them and they’re GREAT I cannot wait to meet them. This is a retelling of The Goose Girl story, from the maid’s POV!

Jade Fire Gold by June C.L. Tan was originally on my 2020 most anticipated but then 2020 happened so… yeah. But it is actually coming out in 2021, as long as the world doesn’t end again (fingers crossed). Inspired by East Asian mythology, this one is about a dangerous cult, a peasant cursed to steal souls, and an exiled prince!

The Heartbreak Bakery by A.R. Capetta is going to be one of those cute, fluffy, feel good reads, which I think we probably all need about now. I love Capetta’s work and their very queer characters, and I love the idea of a magical baker both breaking up and then getting couples back together. Also, the MC is agender- we love to see it.

The Second Coming by André-Naquian Wheeler follows a teen with a traumatic past falling for a boy who might be the second coming of Jesus Christ. Honestly, I’m a little nervous about this one- but also I almost wrote my own queer second coming story, so who am I to talk? I don’t know much more about this book, but I’m excited to see what it turns out like!

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loveisblindfanfictionbka · 4 years ago

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Love Is Blind: Chapter One

“Come on Robs, what could it hurt?”

Robyn looked over at her friend and frowned.

“Online Dating? Really? Do you know the kind of psychos on these sites?”

Leandra sighed, “Girl, ain’t nobody saying marry them but at least try it out. It’s been years since your divorce. Why are you still so gunshy?”

“Well maybe because my ex-husband ripped my heart out my chest.”

“Isn’t that a little dramatic? You and your ex-husband were both childish and lost. I still don’t think you should’ve gotten divorced either.”

“You and everyone else seems to have my failed marriage all figured out.”

“Look, forget about all of that, you need to get back out there, even if it’s just for a night of fun. It wouldn’t kill you.”

“You know what, just to shut you up, I’ll do it.”

“Good, I got your profile all set up, you just need to approve it and submit it.”

“How in the hell? This is the first time we’ve spoken about this.”

“Yea but this was just a minor technicality because I was gonna set you up anyway.”

“Ugh….get away from me.”

Leandra laughed as she slid her laptop over for Robyn to review the profile. After a few minutes, Robyn nodded her head in approval and pressed publish.

“So now what?”

“Now you wait to see if you get any hits or you just peruse others’ profiles too.”

Robyn was shaking her head before Leandra even finished her statement, “I am not perusing anything. I don’t even want to do this right now.”

“So let the men come to you, it is the natural order of things.”

“I’ma divorce you next.”

“You love me so whatever.”

Robyn laughed as she leaned her head on Leandra’s shoulder, “Le, do you really think this will help?”

“I think it’ll give you something to do while you try to get your life right again. I love you and I know you and I know that your divorce is something that you’re still trying to understand but your life doesn’t have to stop while you’re doing that. Things don’t have to be serious. You don’t have to fall in love with anybody but it wouldn’t hurt to get from behind these walls you’ve erected and live. You owe it to yourself, if nobody else.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Daddy, come on, the movie is starting”

Chris smiled as he rushed into the living room with a big bowl of popcorn. He sat next to his 3 year old daughter, Anesa, just as the classic Disney symbol flashed across the big screen.

“You know Princess, you could’ve just paused the tv. This is just a stream.”

“No because you were supposed to be faster anyway.”

Chris chuckled as he kissed her temple. He made the right decision becoming a foster dad two years ago. The little imp had done so much to replace the empty void in his life. He had suffered so much loss, being able to give that extra love to someone felt good. An image flashed in his head and he shook it. Years ago, he thought he had someone but that relationship crashed and burned. It surprised him that he even thought about her sometimes, all these years later.

Just as he started to become enamored with the Princess and The Frog, his phone rang. Anesa glanced over at him as he stepped out into the kitchen to answer it.

“Hello?”

“CB, what’s going on, Bro?”

“Marcus, how you doing?”

“I’m good. I’m moving back to the city so I just wanted to check in and see if we could meet up one of these days.”

“Of course, I’ll see if my sister can watch my daughter so just let me know when.”

“Daughter? A lot has happened, huh?”

“Too much.”

“How’s the wife?”

“Divorced years ago. I thought you knew.”

“I thought you were joking. You really went through with it?”

“We weren’t exactly seeing eye to eye.”

“But you were together for so long since middle school, right?”

“Officially since high school but you’d think that would’ve made our life together much easier, but nope.”

“Wow. We definitely got some catching up to do. Well, I’m back officially on Friday. We can meet at Roddy’s Bar.”

“Cool. 8 good for you?”

“Perfect, Bro. See you then.”

“Bet.”

They hung up and Chris went back to watching TV with Anesa.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Robyn fought as much as she could to not be curious about the stupid dating app but….that only worked for so long. As she scrolled, the frown in her face just got deeper and deeper. What the hell had the world become? These men were just- no. It was hard being single. She hadn’t been single in years. Scratch that, ever. She’d never been single. She wasn’t used to being alone and being married was supposed to prevent that. Her ex-husband had literally tore her heart in two and she still hadn’t recovered. How two people so in love could be so incompatible baffled her mind to this day? Of course, her people just thought they were too young and just gave up too quickly but what would they know? They didn’t live with them 24/7. Yes, they had awesome memories but all she could remember was how alone she felt when he was in the bed right next to her. How withdrawn he had gotten in the last two years of their marriage. How unsettled she felt. Like she never knew when he would finally explode from holding everything in. She felt like she walked on eggshells her whole marriage but him asking for a divorce shook her to her very core and she had never bounced back from it. She endured his brutal silence, his emotional hardness but yet he was the one who walked away. It just never made sense to her. Just as she was about to close the app, a direct message popped up.

Subject: Hello

Body: Hi, I was browsing your profile and you seemed really interesting. I was wondering if you would like to chat.

Robyn frowned a bit but she clicked on his photo to be directed to his profile. 42 years old. Divorced. One child. College Music Professor.

He seemed harmless. His photo was full length so his face wasn’t the clearest but he looked decent. Besides he’d probably say something weird and she’d never have to meet him in person so what’s the risk and Leandra had listed her under just her initials so it’s not like he’d know her real name anyway.

Re: Hello

Body: Hi, I would love to chat with you. My name’s Anna. Yours?

A few minutes passed before she got a reply

Re: Hello

Body: Christian but my friends and family call me Chris. It’s nice to meet you Anna.

A: Chris? That must be a common name, I know a few of those.

C: I can imagine. Don’t know too many Annas though. Not the typical name of this time

A: It’s a little old school but I like it. I see you’re a music professor

C: Yup. Decided to change career paths once I got divorced a few years ago. You’re a veterinarian?”

A: Yea, I own a clinic and a shelter in the city.

C: No children?”

A: No. Seems like my animals take up all my time.

C: Understandable. Animals can be like children.

A: Definitely. How old is your child?

C: She’s three.

A: That’s an awesome age

C: Very fun and energetic

A: My friends have children so I definitely imagine. Have you lived in the city long?

C: Just a few years. I was working at another college when the possibility of tenureship opened up at Columbia. Normally that can take years so I got lucky for the invite.

A: you work at Columbia University? That is awesome

C: I think the shock still hasn’t worn off. Kind of waiting for them to take it back at some point

A: Lol when I got the keys to my clinic, I felt the same way

C: Where’d you go to school?

A: Stanford for undergrad. University of California, Davis for veterinary school.

C: Pretty far from home, huh?

A:New York has always been the place for me. I always knew I’d end up here. You?

C: I’m from down south so that’s where my soft spot is. I did my undergrad and grad at Stanford though.

A: Wow talk about a small world. It is a large school so I’m not surprised we haven’t met unless we have.

C: Probably not, don’t remember many Annas there

A: True. How do you like being a professor?

C: It’s cooler than I thought it would be. My previous job had a little bit more excitement but after some personal issues then my divorce, I had had enough excitement to last a lifetime.

A: My divorce kind of knocked me off balance so I can understand wanting to start over

C: How long were you married?

A: Three years. You?

C: Same. Together?

A: Over ten years. You?

C: Same. Bad ending?

A: I really don’t know. It wasn’t the best situation but it wasn’t the worst. I think abrupt would be a better word. You?

C: I walked away. I wasn’t the best husband but I think we really outgrew each other.

A: That can happen. How old were you?

C: 35. You?

A: 34. A lot can change in over ten years

C: True. I don’t know if she knew that though

A: did you try to tell her?

C: Honestly no but that’s partly why I walked away. I wasn’t any good for her let alone for myself. I struggled a lot emotionally back then, I still do now sometimes. She didn’t need that weight in her life

A: Did she say that or did you make that decision for her?

C: Both.

A: Ah. I’m sorry

C: No need. She was better off without me anyway

A: you still think about her?

C: I try not to. It hurts. Failure sucks.

A: tell me about it. Have you seen her over the years?

C:No. We both moved away once we got divorced. Don’t really know where she went to be honest

A: Same. Some things are just better left alone, I guess

C: True.

A: You know Chris, this was fun. I was a little nervous about this online thing

C: Really? I’ve done it once or twice before. It’s not too bad if you take it for what it is

A: And that is?

C: Just a way to meet people. Doesn’t have to go further than a conversation unless you let it

A: That is very true.

C: If it’s agreeable to you. I’d love to talk to you again

A: I’d like that

C: Great. I guess, until next time

A: Have a good night

C: You as well

Robyn closed out of the app after reading Chris’s last message. They had a lot in common, a lot more than her ex-husband. She got a little nervous when he said his name was Chris but once he clarified that his full name was Christian, she could let out a breath. Her ex-husband’s name when shortened was Chris but his full name was Christopher. Christopher was a common name but she really didn't need that reminder of him too.

Chris dropped his phone onto his nightstand just as Anesa ran into his room. He laughed as she tried to climb onto his bed before leaning over to pick her up, “what’s the matter Love Bug?”

“Can I sleep in here with you?”

“Of course you can. Did something happen?”

“I had a bad dream.”

“Aww...I’m sorry, Love Bug. Come on, get under the covers.

Anesa climbed under the blankets as Chris turned off the lights. She cuddled onto his chest and Chris hugged her close, “Comfortable?”

“Yes. Goodnight Daddy.

“Goodnight Love Bug.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“So….how was it?” Leandra asked as her and Robyn sat down for breakfast.

“It was a nice conversation. He seemed like a decent guy.”

“What’s his name?”

“Christian but people call him Chris.”

“You really have a thing for Chris’s, huh?”

“Don’t say that. Chris is just a common name.”

“It is but what a coincidence.”

“Yea.”

“So what does he do?”

“He teaches music at Columbia.”

“Nice. Educated. Kids?”

“A daughter.”

“Marital status?”

“Divorced like me.”

“Guess you can share horror stories.”

Robyn chuckled, “my marriage was a failure but not a horror story. Stop it.”

“Have you spoken to Chris?’

“Not since the divorce was final. Why?”

:Leandra shrugged.

“Le, what happened?”

“Nothing. I thought I saw somebody who looked like him the other day, that’s all.”

“Where? Here? In New York?”

“Yea.”

“Please don’t tell me we moved to the same state.”

“Robs, I don’t know if it was him. I just caught his profile. It could’ve been any cute light skin guy. They are running around here galore.”

“That’s true.”

“So about your new Chris?”

“What about him?”

“What’s the next move?”

“We agreed to talk again but nothing more than that. I’m still stuck in limbo, I’m not trying to make something out of nothing.

“I guess. Are you gonna meet him?”

“Nah. Some things are just better left alone, you know.”

“Not even if you really start to like him.”

“Doesn’t matter. I’m swearing off serious relationships until I fix my broken heart and I have no idea how long that’s gonna take.”

“You still love him, don’t you?”

“I don’t know but I don’t want to.”

“You were together a long time.”

“Yea and he still left me so what does that mean?”

Leandra sighed, “I don’t know. “

“Chris, who are you messaging so much?” Jessica, his sister, asked as she started stirring a pot of beans.

“I met this woman online. We’ve been talking for a few weeks.”

“Online dating? You sure that’s safe?”

“I don’t plan on meeting her so it’s not a huge deal. Just a conversation.”

“Few weeks is a long time for it to just be a conversation. You like her?”

“She seems really nice.”

“Glad you’re opening your heart up somehow.”

“I’m not opening anything up. I went down that road and have no qualms about avoiding it.”

“You know you walked away from your marriage, Chris. I don’t understand your apprehension with moving on.”

“I didn't walk away to move on. I walked away to keep from hurting her. Two different things. I’m not fit to be in a relationship, let alone a marriage. My daughter is the only woman I’m concerned about right now.”

“Anesa can’t be your whole life.”

“Who says?”

“I wish Momma was here to talk some sense into you.”

“Don’t do that, Jess.”

“What? She was the only person you listened to. Did you ever tell your ex what happened with Momma?”

“No.”

“You never took her to meet her?”

“It’s not like she was around. Auntie C raised me.”

“So when you left every weekend to see Momma in the hospital your ex never asked why?”

“She asked. I never answered.”

“Chris.”

“I don’t want to talk about it. It wasn’t for her to know. She didn’t need that kind of weight on her, ok?”

“You never gave her a chance to really love you, Chris.”

“Well that doesn’t really matter. She moved away and about her life. I did the same. No harm, no foul.”

“I wouldn’t quite say no harm, no foul but whatever.”

“Why are you doing this?”

“I don't want you to hurt this new woman because you’re still in love with your past, Chris.”

“I’m not in love with anyone so there’s nothing to be worried about.”

“And that worries me even more.”

#loveisblindfanfiction #chrianna

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ahtohallan-calling · 5 years ago

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chapter 10 of it’s always ourselves we find is here!

1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9

[kristanna / m / modern au / coworkers & enemies to lovers ;) ]

Once again, he was woken up by a hand shaking his shoulder and Anna’s voice as she said, “Kris. Kristoff. Wake up, I need you.”

“Mmff...what?” he mumbled, rubbing at his eyes.

“Remember how yesterday you said you owed me a favor?”

“Uh-huh.”

Through bleary eyes, he watched as she bit her lip, her eyes nervous. “I need to call it in.”

That got him waking up. He pushed himself up on an elbow with a wide yawn. “Okay, I’m up. What do you need me to do?”

Her face melted into a fond smile. “Nothing. I just need to borrow one of your shirts.”

“What for?”

“To wear.”

He raised an eyebrow. “I don’t think that’s gonna fit you.”

“I’ll make it work. I have to. We’ve got that conference call with Harry today doing the dry run, remember? And I, um...I forgot my nice dress was bunched up in the bottom of my suitcase, and I just realized my shampoo leaked all over it, and--”

“Alright, alright, yeah, just grab one from the closet, no problem,” he said with another yawn. “But it’s really not gonna fit.”

A sigh of relief escaped her. “Thank you so much, seriously.”

“Don’t mention it.”

Quick as lightning, she leaned down to press a kiss to his cheek. “Go back to sleep, Kris, it’s not even half-past six.”

The only reply he could conjure up was a nod, hoping the room was still too dim for her to notice he was blushing. Mercifully, she only lingered long enough to squeeze his shoulder before darting towards the bathroom.

The next time he woke up, it was to the beep of his alarm at a quarter past seven. He sat up, swung his legs over the side, and stretched, his back cracking as he arched his arms over his head. Anna peered around the corner of the bathroom then, her hair falling in soft curls over her shoulder. “Morning, sleeping beauty,” she said cheerfully.

“Morning. How’s the shirt situation working out?”

“You tell me,” she said, a little shy, before stepping out so he could see her.

Fuck, he’d never been so glad to be wrong. The shirt didn’t fit the way it was supposed to; it hung loosely around her slender frame, the hem hitting a couple of inches above her knees and revealing the graceful line of her freckled legs. She’d pulled a cardigan on over it, hiding the way the seams had to be falling off her shoulders, and left the top buttons undone, showing off her collarbone and a delicate gold necklace that nestled there. Kristoff didn’t know a hell of a lot about fashion, but he did know that she looked like she’d walked right out of one of the giant posters he saw stuck up at the mall-- and that he’d be more than happy if she wore his clothes for the rest of her life.

“Is it that bad?” she asked timidly, and he realized he’d been gaping at her in silence for what was probably an embarrassingly long amount of time.

“Jesus, Anna,” he breathed, “you’re keeping that shirt, okay?”

Her cheeks colored at that, but when she crossed to stand in front of him, she was wearing a smile. “Will you help me roll the sleeves up? The shirt’s all bunched up under the cardigan, but I think if I roll them up and over and get the cuffs right it’ll look better.”

“Of course. Let me see.”

She lifted an arm, and he began carefully rolling up the sleeves the way she’d requested, feeling his mouth go dry as he saw how delicate her wrist was next to his broad hands. He wanted to linger there when he was done, trail his fingers over the pale, silky skin of her forearm and press a kiss to her palm, but instead moved to the other arm without even looking up.

“Thanks, Kris,” she said when he had finished, catching his hand in hers before he could pull away.

He gave her fingers a soft squeeze and glanced up at her with a lopsided grin. “Don’t say I never did anything for you.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it. This almost makes up for all the times you’ve stolen my post-its. Now hurry up and get ready before the line for the waffle maker gets long.”

“Knowing you, feistypants, you’ll just elbow your way past anyone who gets between you and something sweet.”

“And knowing you, you’ll just glare at anyone who takes too long at the coffee pot and they’ll melt away on the spot.”

“I glare at you all the time, and you’re still here,” he pointed out.

She grinned at him then, and something about it made his heart constrict. “Yeah,” she said warmly, “I am.”

---

“Excellent work, you guys,” Harry said with a grin. Behind him, Elsa gave them a thumbs-up and mouthed fuck yeah.

Kristoff set a hand surreptitiously on Anna’s lower back, like he’d been doing during the whole presentation, as if to steady himself. “Thanks, boss,” he said, his relief palpable.

“Any suggestions for how we can improve it?” Anna asked. “Do you think using Prezi slows it down too much? I can remake it in Keynote if you want, or I already have a backup PowerPoint.”

“No, I--”

“And are there enough pictures? I know people get overwhelmed with blocks of text, but for some of this the pictures felt extraneous, so I just thought--”

“Anna, no, it’s--”

“And did I talk too much? I know I tend to go on and on and--”

“Miss Delle,” Harry said firmly, and her mouth snapped shut. “I typed a short list of critiques. Once Elsa has a look over it and adds her own thoughts, I’ll email it to you. But it’s all very minor stuff, really. The important thing is that you two really know your stuff about the tech we’re using and our online sales and engagement strategies. Seriously, great work. We’ve got a conference call in a minute, though, so if you don’t mind--”

“Oh, of course! Thanks so much, Harry, really,” Anna said breathlessly. “See you Monday!”

She headed over to where the laptop was perched on a lectern, moving to click the red button and end the call. Before she did, though, she watched as on the other end, Harry turned to her sister and said, “Don’t know why the hell my brother’s always requesting we review their department, do you?”

For a moment she froze, hearing Kristoff suck in a breath behind her. Harry glanced over his shoulder then and said, “Oh, sorry guys, forgot to hang up.”

“I’ve got it!” Anna squeaked, ending the video call before he could say another word.

She turned on her heel and saw Kristoff hadn’t moved, his expression inscrutable. She crossed back towards him, but his eyes didn’t move from the now-black screen. “Fucking rat bastard, huh?” she asked softly, setting her fingertips lightly against his forearm.

He sighed and looked down at the floor, not meeting her eyes. “Yeah.”

She bit her lip, lingering for a moment to see if he said anything else, but his thoughts were clearly miles away. She slid her hand down then to give his fingers a brief squeeze before turning away to retrieve her laptop and settle back down at the table they’d been working at in the most out-of-the-way meeting room they could find.

Kristoff joined her after a moment, already slipping his reading glasses back on as he hunched over his laptop. “I gotta finish running these reports,” he said, not looking up, “then I’ll help you with whatever Harry said.”

“No worries,” Anna replied, tapping her fingers against the table as she waited for the email to come in.

Harry, despite being one of the baker’s dozen and one Westergaard brothers, was, all things considered, a more than decent boss. He never got too in the way of the work, was always willing to listen to new ideas, and-- most importantly, in Anna’s opinion-- kept Elsa, who worked as his executive assistant, from overworking herself like she always tended to do. When Anna had been hired on, he hadn’t known the two of them were related, but he’d grinned when he found out and said he was looking forward to having the pair of them around.

As far as Anna knew, he was higher up on the ladder than Hans in terms of who was likely to inherit the company when it was passed down to the next generation, and she was grateful for it. Hans saw everything from a sales perspective and didn’t bother to consider the people involved, and he was outright cruel to people when it suited him, whether it made sense or not. She couldn’t help but wonder why Kristoff in particular was--

A large hand settled over her still-tapping fingers, pressing them flat against the table, and she jumped in surprise. Her eyes flicked up to see Kristoff looking at her, half-amused and half-irritated.

“You’re gonna drive me insane if you keep doing that,” he teased, his voice light.

“Sorry,” she said sheepishly, “just got lost in thought.”

“S’alright,” he reassured her, sliding his thumb under her palm so he could squeeze her hand. “Is the email in yet?”

“Oh-- I wasn’t even looking!”

She returned the squeeze before pulling away to refresh her inbox. “Here it is-- yeah, Harry says....’switch slide four and six….bigger font for the headers...great job.’ And Elsa says ‘relax, both of you’.”

When she looked up, Kristoff looked stunned. “That’s it? Really?”

“I...yeah. Shit, maybe we work together better than we thought.”

They exchanged shy smiles, each of them unsure of what exactly to do next. The fixes would take less than five minutes; there was nothing left to do but present tomorrow. Well, Anna corrected herself, he probably has lots of emails still about IT problems, probably wants me to get out of his way--

“Do you...do you wanna take a break?” Kristoff asked suddenly, raising one hand to rub at the back of his neck. “Like...we’re at the beach, right?”

“Uh-huh,” Anna replied, trying to quell the tide of excitement in her chest that was going to overwhelm her if she wasn’t careful.

“And we’re the only department with something big like this, so everybody else has already been doing fun stuff, you know?”

“Definitely.”

“So...we could have a turn. For a little bit, anyway?”

She couldn’t fight her smile any longer. “So...what do you wanna do?”

He grinned. “Race you to the room and then down to the beach?”

Before he could say another word, she was on her feet and running for the door, her laughter trailing behind her.

#kristanna #my fics #iaowf

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xxmissak · 4 years ago

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Date Night

Miss Anna Jones was different to others her age. At 21, girls like her would have probably gone for a member of the latest boyband or a ripped model. But not Anna. After chatting online for months, Anna had scored a date with the man of her dreams - Basil Brush.

She had been obsessed with Basil since the age of 10 years old. And when she was 16, her feelings for him went beyond anything she could have expected. After school she would hide out in her room, lying in bed fantasising about her furry crush. She shivered with pleasure as she imagined what that tail would feel like against her skin. And then she came, intensely. Of course, it was never going to happen for real.

Or so she thought.

Basil and Miss Anna had been talking over Twitter for the past three months. Her heart would flutter wildly whenever she had a message from him. Especially when he asked her to meet him. Of course, Anna was a little skeptical at first - after all, wouldn’t you be? But, she thought, if this was the real thing, it was a chance she needed to take. She was surprised to find out that it was the real deal after all. They met up and had a nice bite to eat and had a few drinks and got on really well. Then, even more to Anna’s surprise, Basil invited her back to his flat afterwards,

Something could actually happen tonight. Anna thought she was going to have a heart attack. After all, she did get a little aroused whenever he said “Miss Anna”.

Her heart was pounding as he led her into the bedroom. Truth was, he was just as nervous as she was. With her long red hair and blue eyes, Miss Anna was quite beautiful. And besides., Basil had a fantasy he so wanted to make a reality tonight.

“Make yourself comfortable, Miss Anna,” he said.

Anna straightened herself out nervously and sat on the bed. “What do we do now?”

She decided not to wait for an answer. She slowly put her arms around him and kissed him softly. The fluffy softness of his tail felt as amazing as she’d imagined. It was a huge turn on for her. She couldn’t wait to make love to him.

But Basil had other ideas. “Miss Anna,” he said nervously. “There’s something I would like to talk to you about.” He struggled to get out of her arms. Anna sighed with annoyance as Basil opened his bedside drawer and took something out. At this point Anna didn’t know what it was. Basil took a deep breath. What should he say? Should he say anything at all? He decided against it. He would just show Anna what he wanted to do. He turned around to reveal to Anna a packet of balloons.

“I was thinking we could make things a little bit more… fun.”

Anna’s heart began to race again, but not for a good reason. “Oh, Basil, I don’t really like balloons,” she stammered.

“It’s OK,” Basil replied. “It was just an idea-”

Seeing how upset he was, Anna made a decision. She took the bag of balloons and took out a yellow one. It took her awhile before she finally had the courage to put it to her lips. Shaking, she blew slowly into it.

Basil took a deep breath. This was the closest he’d been to a beautiful girl blowing up balloons. He almost found it too much to handle.

“Are you OK, Miss Anna?” he asked.

“I think so, even though I’m a little scared.”

“Let me tell you a secret: I’m scared too.”

Anna’s eyes grew wide. She held the neck of the balloon shut trying to hold in all the air. “How does that work?”

“Fear and excitement, have a very fine line between them,” Basil explained.

Anna thought she understood a bit more now; after all, the anticipation was exciting her a little bit too. She continued to blow. By now the balloon was a nice pear shape.

“Oh, Miss Anna, you can stop if you want,” Basil said.

“I think I’ll have to,” Anna said breathlessly. “It looks like it’s going to…”

“Er, boom boom?” Basil giggled.

Anna smiled. “Yeah, well, at least I know where that comes from now,” She tied a knot in the end. “Is that to your liking?”

“Oh yes, Miss Anna,” Basil said, taking the balloon. “It’s so beautiful.”

Although Anna was still afraid of balloons, she did have to agree. She sat back on the bed and sighed. “Um… what do we do now?”

“Well, I usually pop them, but because you’re scared, we won’t be doing that today.”

Anna smiled. “That’s sweet. But what would you like us to do next?”

“Well…”

Before he could answer, Anna had an idea. She grabbed the balloon and started to rub it up and down his tail. It felt devine.

“What I would really like,” Basil said, “is to see you ride that balloon… so to speak.”

Anna hesitated. She wanted to make Basil happy, but she didn’t want to pop the balloon. After a few moments deliberating about what to do, she took the balloon and gently lowered herself onto it. She started rocking back and forth on the balloon. She could see that Basil was gettin more and more excited.

Anna got off of the balloon and lowered herself on top of him until he was inside her. It felt just as amazing as she had imagined all this time.

“What do you want me to do with this now?” she asked.

“Do you think you can pop it?” he said.

Again, Anna was hesitant. She closed her eyes tightly and dug her nails into the balloon.

*POP!*

With a loud bang the balloon exploded, louder than Anna was expecting, but Basil seemed to enjoy it, and it made him come. Anna came not long after. They collapsed on the bed in a heaving mess.

It was the best - and oddest - night of her life.

#basil brush #balloons #looner

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opaquestrategies · 5 years ago

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tagged by @7rc thanks!

10 quarantine songs:

1) this is a cheat, but just the whole first side of fleetwood mac’s 1979 album tusk (I keep listening to like all of tusk because it just fits the quarantine vibe so perfectly, but this stretch of it is esp. good and I listen to it a lot by itself because of the undeniable combo of “over & over” AND “think about me” AND “sara” and the two lindsey buckingham songs are also pretty good but really just along for the ride)

2) “everywhere” - fleetwood mac (we have been on not one but several 48 hour fleetwood mac lockdowns and I guess I didn’t notice it but maybe I think christine mcvie is their best songwriter? hard to say because all three of them are good, but maybe i think that.)

3) “martin” - car seat headrest

4) “life during wartime” - talking heads

5) “MGMT - Kids But It’s September By Earth, Wind & Fire” - william maranchi (this shouldn’t work and most of this guy’s mashups are a lot more cursed but this is just aural dopamine)

6) “i steal pets” - rachel bloom

7) “the steps” - haim

8) “celebrity skin” - hole

9) “don’t be a lawyer” - crazy ex girlfriend ost

10) “angel” - fleetwood mac (again, tusk; again, underrated)

Are you staying home from work/school? yes, we are doing both remotely. I work on campus, but fortunately my department’s website direly needs updates so I’m still getting hours and easily able to do it from home.

If you’re staying home, who is with you? I have one roommate who’s stuck around but he lives at the other end of the hall and was already pretty sparse (although he finally got a replacement key the second week of quarantine) so usually he just shows up at 10 or 11am, showers and bumps around for an hour or two, and then leaves and I don’t see him again until 10 am or 11am the next day. so I’m basically by myself.

Who would be your ideal quarantine mate? my family or my friends anna and madeline.

Are you a homebody? yeah although I’d just spent the last year learning to be much less of a homebody, so it’s kind of a bummer to be shoved back here again when I was doing so well at getting out.

An event you were looking forward to that got canceled? I was going to present the first part of my undergrad thesis at a really niche conference in my field that I was helping to put on, but that’s moved back to the fall! I was also really excited about sitting in on a class on simone de beauvoir this summer, and that’s technically still happening but it’ll all be online and it’ll be different and lesser because of that.

What movies have you watched recently? double feature of portrait of a lady on fire (stunning) and lady macbeth (intriguing but flawed) last saturday night. a week earlier, I started with a trio of comfort food classics (frances ha, stop making sense, the hudsucker proxy) before watching stuff I’d been thinking about seeing in the back of my mind, but had never gotten around to: alien (would have been better as a short film; its reputation ruins all the best twists), true grit (solid mid-tier coens), hard eight (a nice lowkey character study), the witch (superbly crafted but I like it when a film, you know, has a point and this one fools you into thinking it does and then...doesn’t), married to the mob (a lot of fun, but something about it always felt just a little off which made it harder for me to get into), hot rod (popstar is the superior lonely island film by far), and an unintentional pairing of two films themed around “step siblings with a complex relationship that’s complicated even further when their parents don’t stay together”: mistress america and step brothers. I watched as many movies that first week of quarantine as I had the whole rest of this year before, but most of the first time watches were honestly only okay? idk if that says more about them or the emotional state I watched them in.

What shows are you watching? I have been so blessed that my apartment installed a big tv in the common room during those miserable renovations last year and that two of my friends had given me their netflix, hulu, and prime-with-an-hbo-subscription passwords. also cursed, because in the mood quarantine puts you in, all you can do for much of the day is watch tv and this setup really enables that. during the past three weeks, we’ve started and finished barry, derry girls, fleabag, and crazy ex girlfriend. derry girls was my favorite.

What music are you listening to? so after previously only knowing the four big songs from rumors, I’ve spent a good deal of quarantine getting really into fleetwood mac. they’re mellow and cheesy and comfortable in way that’s very appealing right now, but there’s also this nice undercurrent of mysticism, weirdness, and interpersonal tension to their songs that prevents them from descending into soft rock gloop. tried getting more into the cure, but they’re a little too dour for right now. bruce springsteen, carly rae jepsen, and haim are also heavily factoring in.

What are you reading? since quarantine started I’ve finished taylor jenkins reid’s daisy jones and the six (this is responsible for all the fleetwood mac if you’re keeping score) and toni morrison’s the bluest eye, which I read for a class that’s basically just my favorite philosophy professor doing a book club. I’m in the middle of reading italo calvino’s if on a winter’s night a traveler, albert camus’ the stranger, daniel lavery’s something that may shock and discredit you, and gradually working my way through ted chiang’s short story collection story of your life and others.

What are you doing for self-care? taking a lot of long hot showers, avoiding getting things done (works short term; causes less self-care long term), going on a hike in the local canyon foothills, doing a remote existentialist literature reading group with some friends.

tagging: @animesemplemcpherson, @aahsoka, @theraisincouncil, @curtailedwhale, @teddy-stonehill and also you if you’re interested in filling this out.

#that's quarantine babey!!!!!#sorry to go so granular but waxing on about popular culture is one of my truest joys

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let-it-raines · 6 years ago

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Betting on the Bullseye (18/?)

Summary: Emma Swan loses a bet that means she has to ask her celebrity crush to be her date to her office’s annual fundraising gala. Killian Jones is that celebrity crush. She expects all kinds of humiliation and for her dignity to be completely lost. What she doesn’t expect is for him to say yes.

Rating: Mature

A/N: I wrote this chapter awhile ago, and I was so proud of the movie title I made up…I checked Netflix the other day, and they have the same movie. So, you know, either I saw the movie without realizing it, or Netflix has some explaining to do…I kid, I kid :D Thank you guys for continuously being the best!

AO3: Beginning | Current

Tag list: @nikkiemms @resident-of-storybrooke @wellhellotragic @bmbbcs4evr @onceuponaprincessworld @jennjenn615 @mayquita @captainsjedi @teamhook @skyewardolicitycloisdelena91 @artistic-writer @branlovesouat @dreadpirateemma @kmomof4 @ekr032-blog-blog @galaxyzxstark @lifeinahole27 @andiirivera @ultimiflos @hollyethecurious @thejollyroger-writer @superchocovian @cs-forlife @qualitycoffeethings @jonirobinson64 @notoriouscs

When he got the call in the middle of August, he felt actual butterflies in his stomach. He’s always hated that turn of phrase, but oftentimes, it’s the only phrase he thinks can actually describe what it’s like to be so damn nervous that he feels as if something seriously wrong is going on in his body. He could feel it in his stomach and in his throat. Hell, he could feel it in his fingers some days.

He was excited.

He was terrified.

It happens sometimes. He wishes it happened more often, but honestly, he wonders if it keeps the excitement for what he does alive to get to read through scripts to find the rare gem that actually speaks to him instead of liking everything that passes over his desk. This one, though, the more he reads it, the more he thinks about it, the more he gets inside of Michael’s head…the more he wants it.

Which is probably why he’s about to throw up as Robin drives him over to meet with the producers and the casting directors. He’s not even really auditioning, just talking to them, but it feels like he’s doing his first audition all over again. It had been for an extra with one line in Grey’s Anatomy, and he felt as if he was attempting to prove himself to be Tom Hanks or something.

It was ridiculous.

He didn’t even get that role. It was one line. He’s pretty sure he was supposed to be ordering coffee or something.

His phone buzzes in his lap, and Emma’s name pops up, instantly calming him down for a moment.

Emma: Go kick ass today, KJ! I love you!

Emma: I also love your ass, but that is totally unrelated to what I’m supposed to be telling you right now.

Killian: I love you too! I’ll try to kick arse with my good arse just for you!

Emma: That’s all I ask.

He does kick arse if he says so himself, the meeting going far better than expected. They want him. He knew that they wanted him, but they actually, seriously want him. He’s still got to do negotiations, to work out a few details and to screen test with potential costars, but he’s got the role if he wants it. It’s all early in the preproduction stages, but damn is he excited.

“You look like Roland after I let him eat more than one donut,” Robin laughs as they drive away from the lot and make their way to go get lunch. “You excited?”

“Obviously, mate.” He pulls out his phone and texts Emma about everything, knowing that she’s at work right now and can’t really talk. He really wants to tell her anyways. “And nothing compares to your son on a sugar high. Absolutely nothing. It’s like he’s been possessed.”

“He has been. By sugar.” Robin pulls off of main road and down into one of the business districts. “You want to go in somewhere or do take out?”

“We can do take out. Just pick something out Roland will like since we’ve got to pick him up from school.”

“He’s not going to be hungry.” “He is if we have any kind of junk food, and I feel like we deserve junk food.” “Because we’ve worked so hard today?”

“Exactly.”

Sure enough, when they pull up to pick-up at Roland’s elementary school, the boy climbs in the backseat, buckles himself in, and then immediately asks for some of the fries Killian is eating.

Like clockwork.

-/-

He swears that every Labor Day weekend his corner of Santa Monica gains at least half a million tourists. He’s sure that’s a bit excessive, but it’s only Thursday and people are absolutely everywhere. It’s to the point that he’s in the grocery store trying to stock up for the weekend, and he can’t turn anywhere without running into a cart with someone stocking up on beer and any kind of junk food he can imagine. He can’t really say much, not when he’s doing the same thing, but he absolutely cannot wait to get his things, check out, and get home before he has to drive to the airport to pick Emma up for the weekend.

He should have just ordered online and had his stuff delivered, but he wasn’t exactly sure what he wanted when he thought about it the other day after he and Emma had talked.

Emma’s had a hell of a few weeks at work, has pretty much wanted to pull her hair out nearly every day, and even though he saw her two weeks ago before he had to come back to California to meet with the producers for this movie (he wishes they’d give it a temporary name other than Project 783 because he’s a bit tired of calling it that), she was too stressed for either of them to really enjoy it. It’s been a long summer. A good one but incredibly long.

He’s pretty sure there’s several songs about long hot summers, and that’s pretty much been his entire summer. With a lot of airports and Uber rides and living out of his overnight bag.

But Emma’s coming in today, is already on her plane, and is staying through Monday. They’ve got his premiere for Highland Waters tomorrow night, a day to themselves on Saturday, and then they’re spending Sunday out on the Jolly with his family, Anna and Kris included. He’s pretty sure Anna has texted him at least five times a day double checking that Emma is definitely going to be here this weekend. Despite how much time Emma has spent with Elsa, she keeps missing Anna.

Anna is not okay with it in the slightest. Sometimes he thinks she’s been his sister-in-law for his entire life instead of five years with the way she treats him. She’s refreshing, and he’s completely sure that she and Emma need to meet on soft ground for when Anna inevitably tackles her.

Yeah, she’s definitely going to tackle Emma.

After he finally checks out and loads his groceries in the car, he drives home a little faster than he should and quickly puts everything away. He’ll have to tidy it all up later, but he needs to go ahead and make his way to LAX because he already knows that traffic will be awful. It nearly always it, and this weekend is going to make it worse.

Sure enough, he’s late to show up, but he hasn’t gotten a text from Emma letting him know that she’s landed, so he parks in hourly parking and makes his way inside, taking the long route to avoid the photographers that stake out at the exit nearest to the parking lot. He doesn’t see her anywhere, but considering it’s at least thirty times more insane than the grocery store in this small corner of the airport, he doesn’t exactly expect to right away.

Killian: Have you landed?

Emma: Yeah, but we’re taxiing right now.

Emma: My legs are so stiff, and the man next to me has talked for this entire flight.

Emma: Ah, shit. He just asked if I’d get dinner with him.

Emma: Why are people so weird?

Killian: What did you say?

Emma: Obviously I said yes.

Killian: Bring me some takeout from wherever you go.

He keeps texting back and forth with her until the texts stop and he’s left simply standing there watching and just waiting for her to show up somewhere.

“Hi, hi, hi,” Emma sighs as she jogs up to him at the airport, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and holding onto him as he tugs her closer, the bill of her baseball cap rubbing into his cheek with the sudden embrace. “How long have you been waiting here? It took forever taxiing after we landed, and then I had to pee, which I pretty much refuse to do on the plane which was hard because I had coffee…and yeah. Sorry for being late.”

“I absolutely do not mind,” he promises, quickly brushing his lips over hers as many times as he can before things turn inappropriate in a very public place. “Even if you were obviously going out to dinner with that man. I’ve just been watching people get black suitcase after black suitcase mixed up with other people’s very similar suitcases.”

“Sounds like quality entertainment.” “Right? Your flight’s luggage is coming out on this belt in front of me, so yours should be here soon. I’m surprised you didn’t do carry-on.”

She shrugs, pulling back from him and tightening the plaid shirts that’s wrapped around her waist. “Too much stuff. I wasn’t exactly sure what to wear tomorrow, and Ruby convinced me to bring…a lot. I figured you could help. Plus, my foundation went over the TSA limit for liquids weirdly enough, which I found out at security. That was a fun time.” “Sounds like you’ve had quite the adventure, Swan.” “I have. Look, there’s my suitcase. Let’s go.”

Emma practically jogs off to get her luggage, and he wonders just how much coffee she’s already consumed this morning. It’s got to be quite a bit, and he knows that she’s definitely going to crash in the middle of this afternoon. But it doesn’t matter. She’s here. She’s here, and he’s absolutely convinced that they’re going to have a wonderful Labor Day weekend with all of the plans that they’ve been making.

He hasn’t been this excited for a weekend in a long time.

-/-

“I like this,” he croons as he walks up to Emma at the counter in his bathroom that he’s come to think of as her counter. All of her stuff is there, the things she leaves behind both on accident and on purpose, including the damn toothbrush she ordered replacements heads for and had them sent here instead of to her home. He’d already signed up for the refurbishment ones, but he didn’t let her knows that when she texted him about the delivery. So now he has an entire dentist’s office worth of toothbrushes.

“Thank you.” She finishes putting her earring in and then turns around. “If I move from side to side, the fringe shakes.” She demonstrates for him, twisting and turning so that the white fringe on her dress moves with her, and he’s about as fascinated with it as he is with the smile on Emma’s face. It’s almost like she’s living some kind of childhood moment she never got right now, and all he can think is how happy he is that she’s happy. And how much he wants to spend the rest of his life with her.

He’s known it for awhile even if they’re not there yet, but he’s there. And he’s perfectly happy to go at Emma’s pace. He knows that she’s it for him. All this summer, the months of flying back and forth, of getting brief moments of time together and even more talking on the phone, it’s been difficult, but it’s kind of reaffirmed things for him on what he wants out of life. Emma’s not the first woman he’s been in love with, she’s not even the second or the third, but she’s it in every big sense of such a small word. He somehow…somehow he just knows it with every fiber in his being.

God, he loves her. More than anything.

“See?” Emma laughs, looking up at him as the fringe stops moving, resting back in place and framing her body. “I bought this dress forever ago and have never worn it. It looks okay for the premiere, right?”

“You look stunning, my love,” he promises, taking her hands and kissing her knuckles so he won’t mess up her makeup. His lips move along the skin of her hands until he’s kissing her wrist, right on the small black dot. “And this is perfect.”

“Thanks. You look nice too. Very handsome but,” she reaches up and runs her hands through his hair a little bit, “your hair is too flat. You gotta add a little life to it.”

“How embarrassing will it be for me to admit that I usually have someone do my hair for things like this?”

“Only a little,” she laughs, continuing to mess with his hair, which feels far too good than it has any right to feel. “Why didn’t you for tonight?”

“Smaller event. I’m not even wearing a tie or anything.”

Emma rolls her eyes before turning around and picking up her lipstick and reapplying the red, her tongue poking out the slightest bit. “You are obviously in shambles.”

“Thank you for your never ending support.” He can see her wink in the mirror. “Always.”

The show sends him a driver, which he really didn’t understand for something like tonight when it’s simply a miniseries premier and not a movie, but he’s not going to complain about not having to worry about how much he’s had to drink when thinking about them getting home. So he thanks Steve, before helping Emma into the back of the car, her dress seemingly always in movement, and loading in himself.

Robin’s waiting for him when they pull up to the hotel where they’re hosting this thing tonight, and Steve drops them off at the front entrance where he can see Isabelle getting out of her car as well. Apparently, the producers are trying to schmooze them one last time.

“You ready, darling?” he asks Emma, taking her hand in his, lacing their fingers together as Robin walks them through the front doors. “Yep,” she says quietly, her eyes darting around the room that’s bursting with people. “This is kind of weird.” “Aye, I know. It’s pretty unconventional.” “A pipe burst down at the theater where they were going to do this,” Robin explains, “and they’re having to redo all of the upholstery. And this was a good last-minute option even if things are a little unconventional for it being a show.”

“That’s shitty luck.”

“It is, but this is a nicer place if I’m honest.” They walk into one of the ballrooms, and there’s a wall set up for them to take pictures by, a group of photographers and journalists already taking pictures and interviewing some of his costars. “Jones, you know what to do here. Take your picture alone, then some with Isabelle, and then you’ve got one interview at the end. Emma, you can stay with me if you want to.”

He looks over to Emma, and she nods her head, smiling at him even if her eyes are blown a little wide. “You going to be okay, darling?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” She squeezes his hand before releasing it. “Go do your thing, KJ.”

So he does, standing and taking pictures, alternating between smiling and staring at the cameras with an emotionless look. This, to him, has always been one of the most awkward parts of his job. It’s not the interviews. It’s standing alone and having people take pictures of him. So he’s eternally thankful for when Isabelle finishes hers and comes to stand next to him, wrapping her arm around his waist and smiling.

“You’ve got these crazy eyes going on right now, Jones,” she laughs, all the while her pose never fades. “I’d try straightening those out.”

“It’s the damn flashes and the way it’s far too dark in here.”

“You’re supposed to be a professional,” she teases. “Get it together.”

“I would, but your shoes are just so bright that I’ve been blinded.”

She hits his back – hard – and he laughs while they continue to move across the small carpet until they separate to do their own interviews. She’s one of his favorite costars, someone who he actually likes to talk to outside of work, and even though they’ve been finished filming for months, he knows he’s going to miss her when she flies back home to New Zealand instead of staying here.

When he’s finished talking, having gone through Ezra’s entire backstory once again as well as explaining just how excited he is for the miniseries to begin, he makes his way through the doors, figuring that’s where he’s supposed to go. It’s definitely different than he’s used to, not at all familiar, so he waits inside the impromptu theater that he’s just stumbled into until Robin and Emma also come through the doors with smiles on both of their faces. Good.

“You want to get something to drink, KJ?” Emma asks, coming up to him and poking her fingers at his chest. “Because I know for a fact that you hate watching yourself on screen, and I feel like you are going to need a couple glasses of rum for that.” “Are you trying to get me drunk?”

“No,” she promises, wrapping her arms around his neck while he rests his on her hips, feeling the soft material of her dress under his fingertips, “I am not. I’m just trying to make life more bearable for all of us before you whine and moan all about your performance in the show.”

“She’s right, mate,” Robin laughs. “You’re going to give us all hell this entire time.” “See?” she nudges, running her fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck and pleasantly scratching his skin. “You need something to drink. Plus, I think there may be food.”

“Swan, I would never dare bring you somewhere without food. I’m not a madman with a death wish.”

“That’s a good plan for you.”

After they get their drinks and Emma finds herself some food (“They have mini cheeseburgers, KJ. I knew your job wasn’t worthless.”), they settle themselves down into their seats while people continue to move around them. Isabelle comes to sit next to Emma, and they absolutely hit it off. It’s wonderful, even if most of it is them teasing him, but Emma’s just got this smile on her face, her eyes lighting up with joy…and it’s all he wants. He wants her to be happy, and if it means him suffering through being made fun of and having to watch himself on screen, it’s completely and totally worth it.

Plus, there are other scenes that he’s not in, and those are okay to watch. Those are brilliant to watch because it’s a bloody brilliant show. Emma gasps in all the right places, laughing at all of the totally inappropriate places when he’s doing something like sword fighting, and she spends the entire time whispering a live commentary in his ear that has his stomach rolling while he stifles his laughter in her hair and in her shoulder as he runs his lips across her bare shoulders every time he gets a chance. She smells like her hairspray, her perfume, and a little bit of rum on her breath. He enjoys the spice of it.

He enjoys her.

“That was brilliant,” Emma sighs when it’s over while the room claps. “Is there any way you can get me the entire thing, like, right now? I kind of want to know what happens next without you giving me spoilers.”

“I don’t think I have that power.”

She groans, stretching out her legs in the seat while her head falls back. “What good are you?”

“I thought we already established that the sliders you consumed earlier were what I was good for.” “That’s what your job is useful for. You, on the other hand, need to be worth something.”

“I’ll just have to think on that, love.”

He’s not sure if he ever comes up with something he can be good for since he can’t get Emma the entire season on Highland Waters, but he does get her some more food and a refill on her drink as everyone settles around the bar, chatter and laughter filling the room while music plays on the speakers overhead. He’s not exactly sure who all is here, most of the faces unrecognizable to him, so he assumes they’re executives instead of the crew he was so familiar with while filming. He would recognize the crew.

“So tell me,” Isabelle sighs as she comes up to he and Emma in the lounge by the bar, the wine in her glass sloshing around, “how in the world does Killian Jones get someone who is such a catch like Emma here?”

“I ask myself the same thing every day,” Emma teases, settling herself down on his thigh while he wraps his free arm around her waist, the other hand holding his glass.

“You have literally known her for three hours, Isabelle.”

“Yes, but in those three hours, she has informed me that you organize your fridge and pantry as well as everything else in your house like you’re in some kind of organization club.” “I am not embarrassed by the fact that I’m organized. Emma should be embarrassed by how much of a slob she is.” “Hey,” Emma laughs, adjusting herself in his lap while she slaps his hand over her stomach, “I am not a slob. I’m not a slob,” she repeats to Isabelle, “and really, the weirdest thing about Killian is definitely that he eats his salad without combining ingredients. Like, if there are strawberries in there, he eats all of them before moving onto the lettuce.” “That’s not weird.” “That’s really weird, Jones. I can guarantee it’s not the weirdest thing about you, but it’s pretty weird.” Someone calls out her name, and Isabelle looks away, practically tripping over her own heels even as she stands still. “I’ve got to go, but I’m going to come back and find you guys later.” “So she’s drunk, right? She can’t actually that clumsy all of the time, and if she is, that was incredible acting in that first episode.”

“She’s definitely a bit intoxicated,” he chuckles, tilting his head to the side and brushing his lips across her jaw and down her neck while she moves and gives him more access to her skin, little moans escaping her lips. Bless her. “I think we may be too, but we’re sitting down.”

“Because we’re, ah,” she gasps when he bites down on her skin, and it sends a shiver down to the base of his spine, “intellectuals.”

“Big word there.”

“You really are drunk if you think that’s a big word.”

He hums, leaning back in the chair and yanking her back with him so that she giggles, the sound high and lilting even with all of the sounds in the room. “I think we should go home, Swan,” he growls into her ear as his finger start moving over her stomach, wishing the damn fringe wasn’t in the way. He loved it at the beginning of the night, loved the way it made Emma feel, loved the way it hugged her curves, but he’d really rather she not be wearing it right now.

“I think that sounds like a plan, Stan.”

They load back into the car and get a ride home from Steve. He can’t say he’s ever made out with a girl in the backseat of a car, not since he was a teenager and Liam would have lost his mind had he and Hannah Kirpatrick been in the house, but now as a thirty-three-year-old man, he does just that. She tastes like the spice of the rum they’ve both been drinking, maybe a bit like the chocolate she ate right before they left, grabbing it on the way out the door, and it’s intoxicating as always as her lips move against his over and over again.

They’re probably scarring poor Steve, but he honestly doesn’t care when there’s a white fringe dress on the floor of his living room.

-/-

“Okay, so remind me that I am not twenty-two anymore the next time we decide to go out and drink so much,” Emma groans when she wakes up the next morning, her voice far too loud for how much pain he’s in.

“You’re talking far too loudly.”

“Oh my God, so are you.”

He chuckles, even as his head pounds, and wraps his arms further around his pillow, burying his face in the softness while he tries to will everything away. “You are nearly five years younger than me, so you’re much closer to twenty-two and not feeling dead from drinking too much.”

“You have a bigger body mass. Harder to get drunk.”

He kicks out on the other side of his bed until he finds flesh with his foot. He’s honestly not sure what part of Emma’s body he’s kicking, but he doesn’t care. “Rude,” he mumbles into his pillow, turning a bit and opening one eye just so he can see her stretched out as well, her hair covering her face from his view. “You’re not supposed to comment on a man’s body mass.”

“You’re taller than me and weigh more. Your body mass is bigger. It’s not an insult.” He kicks at her again until she yelps. “I hate you so much.”

“You don’t.” “I do.” “Will you still hate me if I go make us some hangover food?”

“Pancakes with chocolate chips and whipped cream would be acceptable. And coffee. And bacon. It has to be cooked in the oven and not the microwave though.”

“Bloody hell,” he grumbles, rolling over in bed and letting his eyes adjust to the light, “how are you being so specific about what you want?” “I am a specific type of person.”

“Okay,” he sighs, slowly getting up from bed and letting his eyes adjust to light, “I will go make us all of that food, but I’m also going to make you eat some fruit, yeah?”

“Fine, Mary Margaret. I will eat all of my food groups.” “Don’t tease Mary Margaret when she’s got a good point. Besides, you eat salads all the damn time.” “Not when I’m miserably hungover and not picking everything out like you do.”

He’s miserable pretty much the entire time that he’s making breakfast, the medicine he took and coffee he’s drinking helping a small bit. Emma eventually joins him, her hair wrapped up in a towel on the top of her head while she’s changed into the sleep shorts she likes and one of his older t-shirts that she must have gotten out of one of the drawers in his closet. Misery loves company, so as he and Emma grumble and groan all while waiting for their food to be cooked, it’s not quite as miserable as it was.

Or maybe it is. He did drink a hell of a lot of rum yesterday.

But eventually he feels less like death and more like a human being. The food helps, even if he does have a lingering headache, but honestly the fact that they hoard themselves away in his bedroom with his curtains closed to block out the sun and do nothing but hide out under the covers while the rest of the country likely has a nice Labor Day Saturday helps the most. Plus, Emma grabbed bags of chips out of his pantry and brought them upstairs with her so they really don’t have to leave his room at all.

Except to go get water. Neither of them thought about water when they both really need it.

“I’m proud of you, you know,” Emma speaks out of nowhere, making him turn his head to face her. She’s got a bag of salt and vinegar chips in her lap, something he already knows makes her tongue break out because his does the same, not that she cares about that, and if he were to shake out his comforter, he knows there’d be crumbs everywhere.

“For what, sweetheart?”

She shrugs, the bit of sunlight that’s peeking through the window casting across her face and hitting the green of her eyes, making them shine even more brightly than usual. “For your premiere yesterday, for getting the role for that movie that doesn’t have a name yet. I totally think it should be called After Life, though. People will think it has supernatural stuff in it when it doesn’t. It’ll just be about what happens after life is over for someone you love.”

He laughs, scooting up on the mattress and inching closer to her, nearly sitting up himself. “I’ll have to tell the producers that. Get you a paycheck for the name and everything.”

“Always looking out for me.” “Undoubtedly.”

“But I’m also just…” she sighs, her entire body heaving with the movement, and it’s what gets him to sit up against the headboard with her. “I’m proud of you for who you are, for getting this life for yourself, for not letting your past define you any more than it has to.” “Emma, what’s all this about?”

“Nothing,” she promises, putting the chips on the table next to her while he watches her features, watches to see if there’s anything she’s not telling him. “I don’t know why, but I was thinking about the Sorellino’s, about how I was late because of work, and how at the end of the night you told me how proud you were of me. That meant so much to me, probably more than I can ever tell you, but I also realized that I never told you how proud I am of you for the life that you’ve built.”

Emotion lodges itself in his throat, as do the words he wants to say in response. He remembers that night. How could he not? He remembers telling Emma how proud he was of her, remembers the way her eyes lit up and her lips trembled a bit, and he also remembers her telling him that his mum would be proud of him if she were here to see him. And while he doesn’t think what he does is changing the world, he’s glad that he does what he loves. Emma telling him that his mum would be proud of him, well, that was just the same if not better than anything else she could have said.

It doesn’t change the fact that he can feel his entire body heat all the while thinking about Emma and how she thinks him to be a man who she’s proud of, a man who she wants to be with despite all of his shortcomings and failures.

“Thank you, my love.” He leans over and brushes his lips over hers, tasting the chips she’s been eating.

“You taste like onions,” she groans, her entire demeanor lightening instantly so that he laughs against her lips.

“You taste like vinegar, so you really can’t complain.”

“Lucky for you, I do have a fancy toothbrush compared to your regular, manual one.”

“You and that damned toothbrush, Swan.”

She winks, reaching over and grabbing the big of chips before popping a large on in her mouth. “You’re really going to appreciate it when I eat this entire family-sized bag of chips all by myself in the next hour.”

“Those were for you and Anna for tomorrow. She’s going to kill you before she even meets you.”

“Don’t be so salty, KJ.” Emma pops another chip into her mouth while he groans, scrunching up his face. “Totally worth using the word salty for the look on your face right now.”

#betting on the bullseye #captain swan #cs fanfic #cs ff #cs fic

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mr-hoebot · 5 years ago

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Watch the Stars - Chapter One

Pairing || Ben Hardy!Roger Taylor x OC

Note || Uhm. So. I’m really fuckin apprehensive about posting this. I have never dabbled in RPF before because it’s so...controversial and I totally get why. In this case, I’m really not writing about the real people involved here, but the biography that was based off of them? Which is still about real people. I was basically inspired by the movie if that makes sense, and I’m writing entirely in the context of the movie. This is 100% fictionalized and not meant to offend anyone. Julie-Anna is just a character who popped into my head.

So anyways. I don’t encourage involving any actual real-life people in fiction written online, and all that. I just figured that the BohRap fandom seemed like a pretty nice place. So I thought I’d give it a shot and see if you guys will like, accept me into your fold or whatever.

Summary || After playing a show on Halloween night in New Orleans, Queen’s drummer takes off on his own and is solicited by a very unusual woman who is definitely going to drive him crazy.

Content || Past parental abuse, drinking, drugs, sexual assault (not romanticized in any form), smut.

It’s late. Julie-Anna Ackerton doesn’t know what time it is, she just knows that it’s late because the sky has been dark for a while now. She checks it every now and then for the aliens. There’s nothing.

Maybe next time.

In a tiny gas station restroom a few hours earlier, she sprayed on perfume that smells like artificial candy apples, tried and failed not to smudge her eyeliner, and pulled a ratty faux fur coat on over her dress. Now she’s standing out on the middle of the road, heels in hand. They started hurting her feet after some time and she’s not getting any clients tonight anyways.

New Orleans is even buzzier than usual tonight, and it’s not just because of Halloween. There was a concert on at the Municipal Theater and she can feel the ground shaking, hear the cheers of the crowd, feel the wild excitement of people pouring out of the venue, chattering to each other about how amazing it had been.

Julie realizes just then that she can add it to the list of things she’s never done. Never been to a concert. The list just keeps growing longer.

1. Never been really kissed for real for real for real.

2. Never had a beautiful dress like a princess, just like in the movies.

3. I can’t give you the whole list. It would go on forever!

Well, Julie might not have a beautiful princess dress, but she has a silky negligee coming apart at the seams. She shifts her coat off her shoulders and starts walking, pausing by a car with a few men inside.

“Any of you gentlemen looking for a good time?” It doesn’t sound at all like her, but it’s what she’s supposed to say. Still, it never comes out as sultry as it’s meant to. She always sounds too eager and soft.

“I’m spoken for, honey.” The man in the front puffs on a cigarette. “Get lost.”

Concerts are usually a good night for business, but this one is proving to be a bust.

“Are you looking for a good time?”

“Would you like some company tonight?”

“I’m feeling lonely. Could I hitch a ride?”

None of it matters. All the chatter in the world hasn’t gotten her anyone, and Julie is getting desperate. Slowly, she’s drifted away from the bright lights of the main streets and fallen into the shadows behind Halloween costumes and concert memorabilia.

Julie steps out of an alley and keeps walking, keeping her eyes out for any parked cars that might contain possible clients. She scans the area and sees several people drive by, a few drunken stragglers stumbling home with their arms around each other, a woman shouting at her boyfriend.

And a car parked right up on the curb.

Julie fluffs up her hair and tries to saunter forward, imagining herself looking very beautiful and irresistible. Isn’t that what she needs?

The car window is rolled up, so she taps on it a few times to get the driver’s attention. When it rolls down to reveal a blonde man with red eyes, smoking a cigarette, she feels her heart skip a few beats.

Wow wow wow! This isn’t for the list of things I’ve never done. But wow!

“Can I help you?” the man asks. He looks exhausted. Bad news.

“Um.” Julie opens her mouth, then shuts it, suddenly finding herself forgetting her lines. “Oh! Yes. I remember. Are you looking for some company tonight?”

He rolls his eyes. “I don’t need to pay for company.”

“Oh,” she replies dejectedly, “Oh. Yeah. I guess not.”

Before she can say anything else, the man is rolling the window up. The car still doesn’t move though, and just as she starts to walk away, she’s hit with the realization that she needs a ride back home. She hitched one into town with a trucker driving in for the night, but he’s long gone now.

Julie spins around on her heel and stumbles back over to the car to tap on the window again. When the man rolls the window down, he looks irritated. “What?”

“Let’s trade.”

“Trade what?”

“Could you take me home? Please? I’ll make it worth your while. Do you know what worth your while means? I’ve learned it’s very persuasive.”

He stares at her in confusion, “Are you serious? I’m not having sex with you to give you a ride home.”

Julie swallows the lump in her throat that’s started to form. Tonight hasn’t brought her anything but bad luck and she’s going to need to pay rent soon. “Please? Oh, it won’t take long. I would walk but I get lost a lot, especially in the dark. Once I got lost and walked into a small pond. I stood there very confused because I didn’t know why my feet and legs were wet. And then I said, ‘Oh Julie-Anna Ackerton, you walked into a pond! That’s why your feet and legs are wet!’ Then I looked for frogs, but I didn’t find any. But I know my address. It’s-“

“Okay, okay!” The man puts his hand up. “Get in. I guess I need to drive somewhere anyway.”

She claps her hands excitedly. “Thank you! Thank you so much! You’re very nice! Very, very, very nice. Very, very-“

“Please just get in.” He actually looks like he might smile. “Julie-Anna Ackerton, huh?”

“That’s right,” Julie says cheerfully, opening the door to the other side and getting in. The car smells like cigarette smoke, so she rolls the window down. “Do you like my name?”

“Sure I do. It’s a nice name.” He starts to drive but extends one hand to shake hers. “I’m Roger.” “It’s real nice to meet you,” Julie shakes his hand excitedly and slips her coat off of her shoulders. “Why’re you just sitting in your car?”

He shrugs. “It’s not mine. I rented it. I needed to drive, clear my head. It was kind of a wild night.”

“Did you go to the concert? I saw lots of people going. I’ve never been to one before, but I think it would probably be magic and beautiful. I really like music. Did you have fun?”

Roger looks over at her, surprised. “Well, yeah. I mean, kind of.”

“You kind of had fun?”

“No, I mean-I kind of went to the concert. I mean, I played it. I’m the drummer for the band.”

Julie gasped, her inner voice telling her to calm down, even thought it was just so, so hard. “How neat! I wish I could be a drummer. Or a singer. Or a movie star. Or a goddess. I just want to be a beautiful beauty queen. Do you think I could be a beauty queen?”

“Oh yeah. Definitely. Why aren’t you one?”

Julie sighs sadly. “I don’t have a beautiful dress or a special talent, and you need those, I guess. But if I close my eyes really tight and try to dream, I can imagine that I’m Miss America, y’ know? And it’s so beautiful. I look like a superstar.” She emphasizes the last word with all the reverence and adoration of someone talking about a religious icon.

“I’m gonna be a superstar one day,” she tells him.

Roger laughs and turns a corner, “I don’t doubt it.”

“Are you going to be a star too?”

He shrugs. “I don’t know. I feel like I already am, but I guess that could be me getting ahead of myself. Fifteen minutes of fame and all that. I’m just trying to enjoy it while it lasts.” He falters a bit, looking unsure.

“Aren’t you?” Julie asks.

“Aren’t I what?”

“Enjoying it.”

“Oh. Well, sure. I am. I just…I don’t know. I was kind of stressed out tonight. I don’t think I played as well as I could have. I got in a fight with our guitarist. Things were loud and we were drinking…” he shuts his eyes for a moment before focusing again on the road and sighing, “I guess I just needed some time to myself. So. Rented a car and here I am with you. Which was not part of my plan by the way.”

“Sorry,” Julie says cheerfully, “But maybe I can make you feel better. I can tell you a joke.”

“You don’t have to-“

“What’s red and moves up and down?” Without waiting for an answer, she hurriedly says, “A tomato in an elevator.”

Roger snorts, “You’ve got to be joking.”

“I am. It was a joke.”

“No, I mean-nevermind. That was really funny, Julie-Anna.” It comes out with obvious sarcasm.

“Oh, you can just call me Julie,” she says, “Everyone does except for Dad, and he doesn’t really like me that much.”

“I’m sorry. Speaking of, where did you say you lived again?”

Julie-Anna lists out the address, the same old place on the edge of town that she’s been for ages. The same place she always will be, until she’s a famous beauty queen.

#watchthestarsmhb #roger taylor fic #roger taylor x oc #queen fanfiction #bohemian rhapsody fanfiction #roger taylor #ben hardy

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punkpoemprose · 6 years ago

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December 3rd- Charmed

Universe: Modern Witch AU

Rating: T (Teen & Up- Kristoff cops a feel)

Length: Words 2164

Previous engagements with this universe here and here aren’t needed to enjoy this fic but are here if you enjoy it or want additional context!

Snow fell to the sidewalk outside of the Arendelle Sister’s Herb and Crystal Shop and through the glass storefront people could be seen rushing along with packages and shopping bags from the variety of small shops that made up the small business sector of the city, or as Anna liked to joke, hipster central. The hustle and bustle outside seemed like it was determined not to enter the shop for the last half hour of its operation for the season. It was a both welcome and bothersome respite from how it had been just shortly before.

Anna sighed as she stirred together a variety of herbs in the mortar and pestle before her. A flick of her wand and it would be doing itself and she could be doing something else, but when it came down to it she had nothing else to do and she couldn’t very well pull her wand out in the front of the shop where anyone could see. She thought that maybe that was why she’d been feeling so drained, it is having been weeks since she’d done something even slightly magical.

She angrily crushed and crunched the contents and lamented the fact that her inability to perform even a single spell or brew anything stronger than a cup of coffee wasn’t ending anytime soon. It was like it was when she was thirteen and her abilities first manifested, her parents, both of old bloodlines, but neither exhibiting any talent had chosen to prevent either of their daughters from performing magic, even the accidental.

“Conceal, don’t feel,” she muttered under her breathe before bashing stone into stone with so much force the energy radiated back up her arm and she was surprised that she hadn’t broken anything.

Elsa had always been better at keeping her powers under wraps. She was the responsible one and certainly the more talented one of the two. Spells that took Anna months to master took Elsa a few hours, and while Anna had never resented her sister for her aptitude, she was slightly jealous that Elsa had better control and never seemed to be as twitchy as Anna was when she couldn’t practice her craft.

Anna didn’t know why she’d agreed to spend the Holidays away from home. When she and Elsa were home together Anna could cast as many spells as she wanted, even if they were wholly unnecessary, but she lived for the moments where she could flick her wand and turn the Christmas lights on or when she could say a few words, expend a little energy and have dinner fix itself. Even the smallest tasks, when spell work was involved, pleased Anna greatly. Magic in the afternoons was her solace year round, and the Holiday season had been one of the few times in any given year that her parents had allowed her to practice at all.

This year however she’d barely done anything even slightly magical since Black Friday. It felt like bucking tradition, but she hadn’t had the time or energy to even pick up her wand when she came home from work most nights let alone cast a spell or brew up a potion. Some online article about the “Best 20 Bespoke Gifts that Won’t Break the Bank” had gone viral and with it and the top seated idea of individualized blended teas and expertly crafted custom perfumes had meant that from the beginning to the end of each day Anna, as the more approachable sister, had been working with customers while Elsa took care of stock and ran the register.

She heard the bell above the door tingle and it took all her strength not to tell whosoever had just entered the shop to beat it using a few choice words.

“I think it’s dead, you don’t have to keep hitting it.”

She smiled and looked towards the source of the voice, glad she hadn’t hollered on reflex.

Kristoff Bjorgman was forever teasing her, and justifiably so given the fact that he had expert knowledge of just how clumsy she could be.

When he crossed the room and pressed his cold nose into the crook of her neck she jumped, and he laughed in return, wrapping his arms around her tightly.

He was cold, she could feel the iciness of his skin and she felt annoyance toward her sister. He was half frozen to death because Elsa had asked him to brave the cold to pick up an order of dried wintergreen berries from the nearby docks and being the pragmatist that he was he’d decided to take the ten-minute walk both ways through the snow with the crate on a dolly instead of his truck to pick them up.

It was only a half mile to the small warehouse on the water that provided their shop with much of their stock and in the summer, Anna was known to take the walk herself. However, in the bitter cold of the city’s winter, particularly with the wind off the water, she couldn’t be paid enough to endure it. It didn’t help that she loathed the cold more than anything being a Summer and Autumn child through and through.

“So what are you making?” he asked as if he couldn’t notice the way he was stealing her heat.

Anna glanced to the contents of the vessel and flushed when she saw it was entirely powdered into a fine dust. She hadn’t been paying much attention to her work and had becoming a bit overzealous in her pounding and grinding in her annoyance. It was hardly the first time it happened and it was unlikely to be the last.

“It was going to be tea for your sister. You mentioned she liked peppermint and because she’s got all those exams coming in the spring I thought a mint blend might be nice… you know, soothing and mint helps promote information retention and…” she shook her head and sighed, “Well I’ll just have to try again tomorrow before we head up to your parents place.”

“Honestly she’d probably find a use for it as is, but if it makes you feel better to remake it I wouldn’t mind staying here after hours.”

She noted the way his tone deepened toward the end of the statement, his tone clearly implying that with Elsa already having left for the evening, he was incredibly interested in staying in the space with her. She almost made a comment about him having dipped into her stash of love potion but was stopped when he slipped his hands up the front of her shirt, resting his hands on the bare skin of her waist.

‘Kristoff!” she squealed, “Your hands are freezing!”

He chuckled at that and pulled them back out from the fabric, looking at her sheepishly as she stalked away from him and toward the door of the shop.

Anna flipped the sign in the window from Open to Close and twisted the deadbolt on the door before beckoning her boyfriend to follow her to the back of the shop which he did gladly and without the need of any verbal prompting.

She had a brilliant idea. He was behind her as she went into the back and picked up her satchel to rifle through its contents. He was going to take a while to warm up, even if she used… extreme and certainly not safe for work measures to heat him up, and given her recent laments about spending several more days away from home and unable to practice she figured that a warming spell was in order.

He watched as she tugged her journal from the bag and while he knew what it meant in a sense, he never quite knew what she was planning when it came to digging out a rune or spell or potion recipe. He was decidedly not magical in any way and as far as he knew his family wasn’t either. The only reason he knew about Anna’s abilities at all was because she had accidentally dosed him with a love potion the October before and he’d had the good fortune to fall in love with her under its influence to the point where once it had worn off completely he felt no different about her. The way he loved Anna was soft then, understated but powerful, and it had only grown stronger since. He was under her spell, but it wasn’t at all intentional. He was just in love with her, which was why he’d trust her not to kill him enough that he had no intentions to dissuade her from whatever it was she was searching for.

Anna flipped to a page she’d written down a few years prior, studied it for a moment, then turned to Kristoff and reached her hands out towards him. She’d always liked wandless magic best, so she was especially excited to cast the spell she’d remembered. She had a much faster way to shake the cold from him.

“Not that I’m going to say no in either case, nor am I going to ask you what it is that you’re about to do specifically, but is this something you know how to do or am I an experiment?”

She grinned at that. While he was her favorite and only guinea pig, she knew what she was doing, at least sort of.

“I promise this is an easy one. I do it all of the time!” she said omitting the fact she hadn’t attempted it on a person before but used it frequently to warm cooled coffee.

When she extended her hands to him again, he stepped close to her and relaxed when her hands went to his half-frozen ears.

He heard her whisper something, but with her covering his ears he couldn’t quite make out what it was that she had said. It didn’t particularly matter, as he was treated to the beautiful view of her concentrating. She was always cute when she was focused. She got a little crinkle in her nose and a twinkle in her eye. He could feel the warmth of her palms stealing the cold away from his ears, then his cheeks, his fingers and finally his toes. He supposed he should have known that it was what she was up to given how much she loathed the cold.

She went from focused to broadly smiling in less than a minute, looking at him with pride when he returned her grin.

“When we get to my folks’ place tomorrow you should do that again when I come back from finding a tree.”

Anna flushed, “I… Kristoff…”

He smiled and tucked his hands back up her shirt, noticing the blush already present on her cheeks and deciding to make it deeper.

“I’ll probably come back an ice cube, but how’s the song go?” he thought for a moment before slipping his hands up below the band of her bra.

“I’ve got my love to keep me warm” he sang softly, his lips near her ear.

Anna was melting under his touch, as she always did, but she had a feeling that the rush of euphoria she had after warming him was owing both to the way he’d smiled at her and to the relief she felt at finally letting go of a little of the pent-up energy she’d barely expended in over a month. It made her a little dizzy, heating him up took more energy than warming her coffee, but it had felt good to do. She supposed that if she had used her wand to focus her energy, she’d have used a bit less, but it didn’t matter, she’d been so pent up that the release had felt amazing.

“I can’t do it when I’m at your parent’s house,” she said, finding the words as he was busying himself with playing with the band of her sports bra, gently brushing his fingers against her skin as he did so.

“Why not?” he asked, “I keep it a secret for your sake baby, but no one will notice, and I know how you get if you can’t use at least a little magic. Even if they could figure it out, my family is so crazy about you already that they’d just accept it. Your secret would be safe with them too.”

She sighed and smiled at the thought, “You honestly wouldn’t care if they knew you were dating a witch?”

“I couldn’t care less, because I’m not dating ‘a witch’ I’m dating you and you’re pretty great.”

She giggled when he got tired of fiddling with the fabric and his hands slipped up to cup her breasts gently.

“These are pretty great.”

That got her really laughing and before she knew it he was kissing her and her legs were wrapped around his hips with his hands once again on her waist. She liked working late when he was there to keep her entertained.

#kristanna advent 2018 #kristanna #frozen #Modern Witch AU #Witch! Anna #I promise you guys there's smut coming soon #But these first few have just been flirting with the idea #I'm saving it up for a good one

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evotter · 6 years ago

Note

jan, march, sept + one of your choice, love. have a great day, u icon

thank u kyra i adore u

january: what was the first fic you posted this year?

the first fic i posted this year TECHNICALLY was the epilogue of a different path. the first standalone was chewbacca (aka my introduction to the jily world once again and i have such a soft spot for it)

march: do you listen to music whilst writing?

yes! pretty much always; if it’s not music, it’s a TV show.

september: share a comment or review which still warms your heart?

quite literally anything you’ve left on any of my fics BUT there are a few that i hold dear to my heart. i’ll post them under the cut cause they are LONG :’)

ancient: the first fic you ever posted online?

hahahaaaaaaa. it was my own version of rick riordan’s the son of neptune before the actual book was published. it was on ff.net, and the first chapter got 7 reviews, and i felt so good about myself after that lmfao. who knew i’d still be writing 8 years later?

ask me questions!

OKAY so i have 3 top favorites:

from a different path:

okay so i had seen this in someone else’s bookmarks the other day, thought it was an interesting concept—especially since i too love slytherin!percy and strongly subscribe to ofswordsandpens’ headcanons about it—but didn’t give it another thought until i was listening to a video about the cursed child and went: wait, there’s a percabeth hogwarts au that i saw somewhere. and immediately i hunted this down and i’m just in awe? i tore through it. belatedly, i realized that i made a mistake: i didn’t write down my thoughts as i was reading, which is definitely a disservice to you. however, here are a generalized list of things that i loved.

first of all, with hogwarts au’s, there are three main aspects that i look for: plot, characterization, and quality of writing. normally, fics of this size lack one or more of these key factors, but i was astonished to find that the plot is tremendously tight and intriguing (my lip bled from biting it so much because i’ve been stressed to the max), you write these characters with such distinct voices i can easily picture them saying everything—except, of course, now in a little british accent—and your writing flows so well, it feels almost like i’m reading an actual harry potter book, just with percy and co. you also do a masterful job of weaving together aspects of the pjo universe with the established canon of hp.

and there are so many specific things that i love. primarily, the way you write the relationships in this story; not just concerning percabeth (though i will get to that in a minute), but also with each of the interactions between all of the characters. i applaud you for how you handled luke/annabeth and rachel/percy, and the friendship among them all is just incredibly well done. i especially love how well you wrote connor and zoë and just, a lot of characters that i don’t often think about when i think of pjo. grover and percy’s friendship especially is heartbreaking, i just. he’s so protective because he loves his friends and holy fuck i also love how you wrote grover in this. but i just adored how you wrote annabeth/percy—the love between them, both platonic in its early stages and the romantic all throughout, was doubly apparent. i ached when they kissed each other’s cheeks, and i inwardly cheered when she kissed him in the locker room. there was just such a natural progression, to me, of their relationship. and man did i dig it. i’m excited (and maybe a little scared) to see where you take their relationship in the future.

boy, this is getting long. sorry. but some more just little quick things: loved the b99 reference, with both of their competitive natures playing out in a similar way to jake and amy’s. i kind of want to go back and see if i can find any other references that i missed because i was just too engaged in the story to catch them. also, zoë’s death killed me all over again, thanks for that. i like how you’re working the kronos plot in, and i can’t wait to see how the Final Battle plays out. what else? oh! professor hestia? beautiful. eventual maybe professor percy? outstanding. percy kissing the top of annabeth’s head? breathtaking. rachel being a quidditch commentator? earth shattering. (truly i cackled when i saw that.) mrs. o’leary being a cat? incredible. how you incorporated percy’s water powers? stunning.

ooh, this exchange was beautiful and had me cackling it was so in-character:

“None of us are dying.” Connor clarifies. “Not you, not me, not Annie, not the rest of us.”

“I might have to dispute that.” Annabeth says, from Percy’s other side. “Call me ‘Annie’ one more time, Stoll, and I’ll kill you myself.”

Connor only grins at her. “Sorry, love. No more ‘Annie’. Can I call you Beth?”

“No.”

“Anna?”

“No.”

okay, so i just finished chapter nine and i am blown away. sorry for how long this comment was, but a fic of this magnitude truly warrants it. i can’t wait to see what happens next.

i leave you with just two words: “holy shit.”

from a different path:

god, oh my god, am i the only dumb bitch who didn’t get what the prophecy was??

anyway, i stumbled on this fic last year, patiently waiting for its completion, and now that i’ve rediscovered it, i’m so glad i finished it all in one go! i couldn’t imagine the tension of waiting for the next chapter, especially since the tension is so well-crafted!! i hardly noticed the tonal shift even as the story got darker and darker as it led up to the war, and in that way i was reminded of how extremely similar it felt to reading the hp books for the first time! you nailed percy very well i might say, and the awkward-yet-caring relationship he has with his dad. i daresay you gave connor and zoe more characterization than rick riordan himself, and the percabeth you wrote is perfect to the nth degree. i appreciate that you didnt bother with all the love triangle and unrequited feelings nonsense as well.

but i have to say, even as i cried at sally and paul’s wedding, or at dionysus’ quiet mourning for castor, what really struck with me most was the way you handled silena. for that, i have no words. that was a job extremely well done. thank you so much for blessing us with this fic.

from chewbacca (a comment from u!):

A girl in a bright yellow hooded raincoat stumbles into the cafe on one of the slowest nights James has ever seen. Her coat is dripping all over the floor he’d just cleaned (but it’s fine) and when he leans over the counter he sees that her boots match the coat.

First of all!!! Thats the best opening line in the world and nobody can convince me otherwise. I want to become a publisher just so that if you ever write a book, I’d be able to publish it. ( like omg, what an honor??? )

She looks like sunshine, standing there with the amount of yellow in her wardrobe. Briefly, James wonders if that’s her favorite color. It’s got to be.

Im going to quote this whole fic but I really love these lines? Like, you have this distinct style of writiting that I aim to acheive and you’re literally such a rolemodel!!! These are my favorite kind of fics to read. Funny story but I was going through a ‘no thanks Jily’ mood ( a horror, i know !! ) but your fics are just,,,,exceptions? You could write about trash and I’d love it and ask for you to sign me up.

“Say it again, but convincingly this time.”

ooof this dialogue??? let me breathe

This is the longest he’s stood still since he started working. It’s actually a miracle.

and the funniest person award goes to YOU. also, the most talented and cutest but thats neither here nor there.

james taking care of fleamont, switching off the lights gives me just a nice and realistic vibe? its so simple but i love how you added it.

honestly at this point, ive been sucked again by the fanfic. it feels less like a fic and more like a masterpiece that belongs in a museum but anyway.

“James is supposed to be helping.

James is on his phone.”

ugh i love ur mind. im rereading and its so nice and lovely. even if its like 1am and im exhausted, this fic is sustaining me.

“Do it off the clock, would you?”

PEAK HUMOR

have i mentioned how much i love that scene with euphemia? she seems like such a lovely mom. i love ur euphemia the most. and ahh, both of them just rushing to the hospital ? another 100% good scene.

“Euphemia smiles too, but looks at Fleamont rather than at her son. “Yes,” she says. “It really does.””

fic? or shakspeare? HMMM

A girl in a bright yellow hooded raincoat stumbles into the cafe on one of the slowest nights James has ever seen // “Get fucked.”

the fic!! has made a circle!!! i love how it begins and ends along the same lines. I really want to know how??? are you so talented im in love.

i just really love this fic, okay? i love how james is just the kindest, lily is allowed to have feelings, its just so soft and warm. and it makes someone feel loved, want love anyway.

the dynamic between the characters are just so real and great and im astounded, in short.

your sirius is everything. so many fics potray him as a dick??? which is first of all #rude and also, not at all true. you made me love these characters even more so i sincerely hope you never stop writing.

you’re such a beautiful writer and the way you string words together is just poetic and gorgeous and all the other good adjectives you can think of. i read your spiderman x reader too and i was a goner for you. EVERYTHING YOU WRITE IS SO GOOD. i read it so long ago but i can vividly remember peter whipping the mask off and she just going wtf stop on the window ledge. what im trying to say is that you leave this lasting impression on people that make them remember random scenes and words / prose long after they’ve read it which is a remarkable feat, i believe.

and im so sorry im not on tumblr rn bc i cannot keep recing this fic but i have told my friends about your writing and they loved it too. you’ve got like a million fans. when i do get back from my hiatus, im going to keep recing your fics and people will cry because their universe will shift thanks to the newfound joy of your presence in their life.

lastly, im more of a dog person and that, more than anything, should tell you how much i love this fic. i love u. and basee on your writing, i want to hug you, be your best friend and make you cookies bc again

WOW

#thelaziestgeek #answers #friends!#<3

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darkspellmaster · 7 years ago

Text

E3 2018 Microsoft’s Press Conference thoughts

Then we got Microsoft…

Whoa…On the one hand I was impressed with the number of games, on the other hand…most were games that were coming to other systems and, while I liked the rapid fire way of doing things, I really felt that they should have given time for a few of these so we knew who was making them. The few presenters that we got did a fairly good job of handling the situation.

Regarding the games I was kind of surprised by the choices there, although some have me thinking we’re going to see more online game set ups for these.

Halo Infinite to me seemed rather large for a traditional Halo game, and, while the trailer looks amazing, I have to wonder if this, like Anthem, and Fallout 76 is going to be an online game. Although we’re told that Master Chief is involved, so it’s up in the air if this will be a GAAS game, or a large open world First Person Shooter. Although, given the situation with Fallout 76 and the turn a lot of game companies are doing to have their own, I wouldn’t be surprised if this was one.

Ori and the Will of the Whips looked amazing to see and I was really happy to see it. The fact that we see it growing the story from the beginning. It just looks really pretty and strong for a platformer. Not much to say other then Pretty. Something about the Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, while looking really interesting, has me less interested in it, but given it’s From Soft, I wouldn’t be surprised to see this turn out to be very Dark Souls like. I was interested in exactly why he’s not dying. Of course it’s From Soft so I’m not not expecting some really dark themes in this game about death and the main being a living dead creature possessed by the death gods for some reason or another. Though the monsters in this look really unpleasant. Probably will end up with Ghost of Tsushima over this one, but I know From Soft fans will be getting this.

Todd Howard came out and talked up Fallout 76, which later got revealed to be an online game, so any interest I had over the idea of this game being something that won’t have weirdos being jerks, got thrown out the window. The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit was okay. LiS wasn’t my cup of tea given the whole thing with the endings and that you couldn’t help everyone involved and the prequel never really amazed me either, so this one is low on my radar. Though the animations look a lot smoother than in the first game. Of course we had a Crackdown 3, no surprise there and not much to add on that.

Metro Exodus is intriguing given the location and story it’s telling. I’m going to take a wait and see set on this one as the original stories that the Metro series is based on is really interesting to me from a writing perspective.

The big one was Kingdom Hearts 3, and the surprise twist at the end with Aqua. Although I don’t totally buy that this is Aqua. One thing that got to me was the missing sound effects, and some of the voices, particularly Elsa’s as I don’t know if that’s Idina Menzel or not voicing her, but that is Kristian Bell and Josh Gad voicing Anna and Olaf. One thing of surprise is the fact that Xbox got to premier this over Sony or Square Enix themselves at E3 this year. Also we got the song now that will be the theme of this, and we got to see Lee and Kairie watching the sun, which makes me think that they may play a part in this…at least I hope they do.

Racing game Forza Horizon 4 looks really nice again. Not really surprised by this, and while I would love to play a driving simulation game, really not in the mood to be dealing with a racing game for me.

Now onto something that has me unnerved. Okay so I’m not against the idea of a studio being acquired by a publisher/Manufacture. The issue for me though is that Microsoft is not one that plays fair with their games, and tends to dictate things to the creative teams, less so than EA on it’s own Triple A games, but more so than EA does on it’s idies. What does this mean? Well given that they now have what Sony has with it’s World Wide studios deal, probably, with the Initiative, I really am worried that more games will have to follow a set look or style for Microsoft if they’re under their blanket. That’s not even the fact that they’ve acquired, Undead Labs, Playground Games, Ninja Theory, and Compulsion Games.

On the one hand, it’s good for the studios because hey that’s money for them. On the other hand the pull back from creativity and only having it on one system, especially for smaller studios, and particularly Microsoft, it can become a problem over time if those games don’t sell well on that system. Games like NT build that won’t be an issue since a good number of them are more action oriented hack and slash, or dramatic types. But studios like Compulsion which is making We Happy Few this could be a bit bad as Microsoft can be notorious for shuttering companies that don’t produce enough in sales, similar to EA but not as badly. Certain games would, I think, work better on the PS and Switch as both systems tend to have higher numbers, but also both would be good to push a higher number of sales. My main worry with this is that that studios like NT, for example, just got off a strong game after the crash that was DmC, and the issues that came out of that…and let’s be honest Capcom through them under the bus. Given the issues also with recent game, mind it was a well made story, and the bugs either having this deal will help them…or force them to reconsider what they’re doing there. Let’s hope it’s not the later for these companies because we don’t need more shuddered studios.

The Division 2 looks interesting, but it also seems to be an online game. My main issue so far is the story for two big things. 1. The idea that the small pox can be transmitted via dollars seems really weird, and 2, and more importantly, the fall down of the whole system. Unless the state of Virginia and Maryland were blocked off and that area quarantined, the whole thing with the lawlessness doesn’t hold water. You have the CDC, that’s out of Washington DC, that would be on that case like a bad case of the hives, and that’s not to mention you also have Camp David and other locations that the President and congress can go to run things and get things under control. Thirdly, when you have a crisis of this nature, as we’ve seen, people tend to try to help one another. So I have a hard time believing that people would become this lawless and insane. Unless this is some underground militant group it’s hard to see this story holding water. At least it looks better than the first game.

Laura’s back in Shadow of the Tomb Raider, and…I have mix feelings. While style wise the game looks very lovely, the colors of the jungle stand out and the story seems to have an interesting idea going on. The game play…is…uninspired. I get that the whole idea is to make Laura out to be badass, but come on, can we please try to show more of the puzzles and less of the killing of random baddies? Also another end of the world story? Really? Come on Crystal Dynamics; give me something more inspired in your overall story telling than that. Please.

Session…pretty much Skate 4. Nice designs but I don’t do well on these games and they’re not normally a game I would play…so not much to say on this.

Devil May Cry 5, on the other hand I have a lot to say about. Let’s start with….holy crap! How did they keep this under wraps! Seriously, I’m kind of surprised the DMC community didn’t dig this out while it was being made. So Capcom may finally be paying attention to what players have been requesting. As for the Trailer, I will say this much, I was at first thinking Nero was DmC Dante, with the haircut. However, fans did get some clues given that Ruben, Johnny and Daniel were tweeting clues that something was going down. So Nero’s over all look, again mixed feelings, I like that the shorter hair gives him his own look outside of Dante’s longer hair look, and makes him stand out more, and the story about the missing arm is going to be something different. Certainly, they’re trying to keep both sides happy giving a slightly darker edge to him, but there’s still the wise cracks going on, which is nice. Nero wasn’t the one that gives a lot of jokes. I will say I should have known it was him given Red Queen.

Nico, I’m pretty sure she’s going to be related to Nina, Dante’s arm’s dealer. Though the connections will have to come in time, but I really like her and I hope she sticks around. Dante’s sudden appearance was a pleasure, and…well he’s riding what looks like a devils arm, so I’m not sure when this story is coming from…though he apparently was missing so, probably after 2. What I want to know is if that’s Vergil as the third character on the cover image. Please let it be Vergil…Please Capcom!

Cuphead DLC: Yay we get to play as Ms. Chalice! That is all!

Jump Force is weird. Okay so I realize that this is going to be a Weekly Shonen Jump game with characters from all sorts of series (and how the hell do you fight Light given his attack would probably an instant kill, given the book and all that) and that the story is going to be all sorts of Camp. While I’m really excited, I’m also worried that it’s going to be something that only Weekly fans will like and people will be annoyed that various characters won’t be in there. For example, are we going to include a JoJo character? Will you have older characters from Japan that fans may not know about, or are we sticking only with American based characters? Like, yes we have Goku, and I’m sure we’ll have My Hero characters in there and Bleach, but are they going to put in Claymore? Kenshin? Allen Walker? The Leads from Claymore? New characters from the newer series that just recently came out? How do they determine who comes in…and more importantly, if Gintama is in there…do I get to break the fourth wall with him? Also can I play as L since you have freaking Light in there? Is L or Near the head of the good guy side? Are we getting female lead characters too, like the ladies of Claymore? I’m just worried this is going to be another Jump Brawl with the same characters as before.

No comment on Dying Light 2 other then, oh look Troy in another game.

BattleToads surprised me though, and I have to wonder if it’s going to be on all systems since the characters were on Nintendo when they first came out. I would think that Switch would get this too given the fact that it’s clearly going to be more of a platform game.

Just Cause 4, alright…so we’re going to Venez…I mean an unknown country in South America. I mean…it’s another Just Cause game. Not much to add here. Nice Trailer?

Gears of War came out with something funny with the Pop version, which I think could be fun to play for people like myself who couldn’t care less about the original Gears series. I will say this much It’s nice to see so many colors in 5’s trailer. This is a departure from what Gears 1 was like and seeing the characters have become far more mature and more like dad’s to our new female lead. Gears of Dad? Actually I kind of like this trend that games are taking with the idea of the insane killer male lead becoming a more mature father figure for the younger character. It shows not only how the company has grown, it also shows how gamers have grown in general. I mean a lot of the Gears fans are now, in some cases, parents of their own and they could understand that worry that the team has for their youngest member and the parental fear that they’re going to face. It’s a nice change. In addition, Gears Tactics could be a useful deal for those who abandon C&C given the mobile game.

So we have a new Xbox being worked on…Grand….Okay….Does that mean another new freaking OS Microsoft? Am I going to have to do a new one of those? Also where’s your Holo thing? Have you abandoned that?

Nier Automata getting on Xbox. I’m expecting them to be also working on an edition for the Switch as well. This really isn’t surprising at all. I was actually waiting to see that release because I have a friend who refused to buy a PS4 to play it even though he loves the game’s director and creator.

Several Collections and Expansions were announced including the whole thing of Sea of Thieves, a New MMORPG –which I can’t remember the name of, Halo –Master Chief Collection (running that thing down to the ground aren’t we MS).

Tunic looks cute, but I have to wonder if it will sell well on this system or work better on the PC for them.

As for We Happy Few…what the hell happened there? This game has changed, dramatically. From what I can remember it was supposed to be more Bioshock like, but now we have a very trippy sort of dramatic story going on. I couldn’t really tell how you play because the trailer didn’t seem to indicate if it was a “hit the crazy people” or more a Tell Tale like story driven adventure game. I’m really confused as to what the whole mystery is or who we are. Are we the guy in the trailer, the woman, or someone else? How did this happen? Who’s behind this? The latter questions are fine to have, but the trailer leaves a lot of confusion as to what this game really is, and it’s kind of disappointing for someone who was hoping for more of a Bioshock experience. On the other hand the game goes boast some lovely visuals, so I’ll give them that.

Then there’s Tales of Vesperia, which is an updated version of the game, and is coming to all systems so I guess Microsoft paid to get the trailer. I’m going to be playing it on the Switch when it comes to that.

Lastly CD Project Red’s Cyberpunk 2077. I don’t really know what to say about it. While it boasts a great deal of visually arresting art, I’m not feeling it. Maybe it’s because when I hear Cyberpunk I’m looking for something different and we’re seeing a sort of Mix of Blade Runner here, and I wish people would knock that off. I get that a lot of people have connections to that series, and love it, but maybe I was hoping for something ala System Shock or maybe something along the lines of Watchdogs –but how it was supposed to be played with you using your phone to act as a trapping device vs. actively shooting and driving around Chicago. Visually it looks nice, but honestly, the world of Good and Evil looks more interesting to me. I hope that Cyberpunk 2077 does well, but I’ll probably watch someone play it rather than me struggle with it. Over all I thought they did a good job, honestly other then Ubisoft, I thought they did the best physically presenting things. So probably a solid B+ from me.

#microsoft #xbox one #microsoft e3 #e3 2018 #Halo #cyberpunk 2077 #tales series #we happy few #sea of theives #jump force #gears of war 5 #battletoads #the division #devil may cry 5 #kingdom hearts 3 #shadow of the tomb raider #cuphead #ms. chalice

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wbwest · 8 years ago

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New Post has been published on WilliamBruceWest.com

New Post has been published on http://www.williambrucewest.com/2017/04/21/west-week-ever-pop-culture-review-42117/

West Week Ever: Pop Culture In Review - 4/21/17

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Star Wars Celebration (I can’t say that without thinking of Dave Chappelle’s Rick James yelling “It’s a celebration, bitches!”) happened in Florida last weekend, and we got our first teaser trailer for Star Wars: The Last Jedi. Folks seemed to like it alright. I’ve never claimed to be the biggest Star Wars fan, but nothing about this really gave me a Force Boner or anything. That’s probably because Rogue One left such a bad taste in my mouth. Anyway, I’m sure I’ll see it, but it’s not really on my radar.

In other movie “news”, we got the track listing for Awesome Mix Vol 2 from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2., which comes out today. Is it just me, or is it weird that Mama Quill gave Peter mixtapes of all the songs that played while she was banging dudes in Camaros? Come on – she was totally that chick! Anyway, there are no real surprises here, as it seems to be in-line thematically with the first volume. Personally, I’m ecstatic that “Come A Little Bit Closer” will be introduced to a new generation, as I’m a huge fan of Jay and the Americans (check out “Cara Mia” if you’ve never heard it).

This rumor came out a few weeks ago, but it kinda floated under my radar: apparently Warner Bros wants to release 4 Batman-centered films in 2019 to commemorate the 80th anniversary of Detective Comics. This slate would include Nightwing, Gotham City Sirens, the Joss Whedon Batgirl, and the oft-delayed The Batman. Nice idea, but there’s no way this happens. DC just doesn’t have its shit together enough to pull this off. Marvel could do it, but they would’ve been planning it since 2012. It’s already 2017 and they expect to crank out 4 movies in 2 years? Shit ain’t happening.

Bring on the teen angst train, as we’ve got two more comic-based series just dripping with it! First up is Cloak and Dagger on Freeform, which looks like the Freeformiest show that ever Freeformed. It’ll be right at home between the show about the deaf girl and the show about the foster kids. I’ve never been a huge Cloak and Dagger fan, but the series follows teen runaways Tandy Bowen and Tyrone Johnson, who were kidnapped and injected with an experimental drug. The drug left Tandy (Dagger) with “light daggers”, while Tyrone (Cloak) has a mystical cloak that transports people and things to a dark dimension. Oh, and there’s that sweet, sweet interracial love/Jungle Fever aspect to things. Based on the trailer, it’s gonna focus more on the love thing than the power thing, which is understandable since powers are expensive on a weekly TV budget. I haven’t heard if this is actually considered part of the MCU, but it’s nice to see the Roxxon sign at the end, so there are clear ties to the universe itself.

The angst doesn’t end there, though, kids! We also got a trailer for Syfy’s Krypton series (which has since been yanked down) – ya know, the one that nobody asked for. It’s hard for me to get excited about Krypton when very little about that planet has ever seemed appealing. It’s most recently been painted as a cold, stoic, science-based society. And since they don’t have our sun, it means they’re powerless. Here’s what I don’t get about the trailer: the show takes place approximately 200 years prior to Man of Steel (I guess making it the first series to be an official part of the DCEU), but the monologue is of Kal El’s grandfather leaving a message for him. Um, how does he KNOW his grandson’s name is Kal El if he hasn’t been born yet? Anyway, it’s about Grandpa El, who happens to be a sexy, CW-ish twenty something, trying to restore honor to the disgraced House of El. The effects look nice (AKA expensive), but nothing about this show makes me want to see it.

There’s some laughter coming from a different comic-based series, however, in the form of Freeform’s New Warriors. I mentioned it a few weeks ago, but it’s been confirmed that Kevin Biegel of Enlisted/Cougar Town will be the showrunner, and we got a confirmation of the roster. Led by Squirrel Girl (who has never been a New Warrior in the comics, but I won’t harp on that), the team is comprised of Speedball, Night Thrasher, Microbe, Mister Immortal, and Debrii. I’m familiar with career Warriors Speedball and Night Thrasher, but I don’t know anything about the others. Considering Mr. Immortal and Squirrel Girl are Great Lakes Avengers characters, this is something of a hybrid team.

I’m the furthest thing from a foodie, but I love a good dairy-based gimmick drink, and this week featured TWO of them! First up, I’d read online that Burger King had been testing a Froot Loops Shake at certain East Coast locations, with plans to roll it out nationally today. Well, I traveled around until I found one that had it early (well, I didn’t travel too far – it was down the street from my apartment), as I had to see what the fuss was all about. I had heard it described as made from vanilla soft serve, with Froot Loops pieces, topped off with a sweet, syrupy drizzle. Sounds exotic, right? WRONG. Whoever thought of this probably got a bonus for the idea, but it lacks in the execution. It’s basically a vanilla shake with edible confetti in it. From Loops don’t really have a strong fruity flavor to them, so it’s not like it’s rubbing off into the soft serve. And when you do get some Froot Loop chunks through the straw, they just taste like flavorless corn cereal. I didn’t taste any kind of drizzle, and I kept waiting for the WOW to kick in. It never did. I drank this so that you don’t have to and, trust me, you really don’t have to.

Next up was the Starbucks Unicorn Frappuccino. I hadn’t even heard of the thing until Wednesday morning, when everyone and their mom was talking about it. Looking at it, I was reminded of the Birthday Cake Frappuccino that comes out in March (I remember this because it was out at the time Evie was born). I LIVED on those things for the two weeks or so that they were in stores, so I was expecting this to be more of the same. I wasn’t sure what flavor this one was supposed to be, but there were certainly visual similarities. Anyway, after dinner Wednesday night, I snuck off to the corner Starbucks to try it out. You’ve heard of a Butterface, right? Well, this is a Buttertaste. It looks cool and everything, but the taste…THE TASTE! Its marketing emphasizes that it magically changes flavors while you drink it, but I could never really nail down what those flavors were supposed to be. There was a pervasive muskiness to it, making me feel like I’d basically sucked off a real unicorn. Of course, that would be silly – everyone knows you’ve got to buy a unicorn dinner before it lets you do that! Then, near the end, the muskiness gives way to a hyper berry taste, reminiscent of the Blue Raspberry that candy scientists seemed to have discovered in 1992. At no point in the drink was it what I would call “enjoyable”, and even the whipped cream on top was disappointing. As far as I’m concerned, this drink can fuck off back to Narnia where it came from.

Things You Might Have Missed This Week

Bill O’Reilly was fired from Fox News following sexual harassment allegations. See, if he’d told Billy Bush he only grabbed ‘em by the pussy, he’d be President by now!

Nintendo officially ended production on the NES Classic, followed by rumors that an SNES Classic is coming later this year

Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck were announced as the directors for Captain Marvel. I’ve never seen anything they’ve done (Half Nelson, episodes of Billions, and The Affair), so I’ve got no real opinion right now

Speaking of Marvel films, Black Panther wrapped production this week, as Hollywood braces for the return of every living Black actor

Will Smith is in talks to take on the classic Robin Williams role of The Genie in Guy Ritchie’s live action Aladdin adaptation. Obviously, Jaden Smith will probably get the role of Aladdin.

Stranger Things co-star Shannon Purser came out as bisexual on Twitter. Well, she’s bisexual in real life. She just used Twitter to announce it.

Director James Gunn announced that Guardians of the Galaxy 3 would be the final iteration of this lineup of the team

Black-ish was sold into off-network syndication, launching in Fall 2018

Jane The Virgin’s Gina Rodriguez will voice Carmen Sandiego in a new animated series coming to Netflix

Steve Harvey will host a revival of Showtime At the Apollo for Fox

Fate of the Furious debuted to $532 million internationally, beating the record-setting $529 million earned by Star Wars: The Force Awakens

With its original pilot rejected by Fox a few years ago, Joe Hill’s comic Locke & Key will have a new pilot filmed for Hulu

The X-Files has been renewed for a 10-episode 11th season. I couldn’t even make it through the last 6-episode batch they gave us, so I think this is a pass for me.

For the past 6 seasons, I have pretty much hate-watched HBO’s Girls. I hated Lena Dunham’s dumpy, Play-Doh body which was constantly on nude display. I hated all of her character Hannah’s “problems”. I hated her boyfriend Adam. I had convinced myself that I was really just watching, hoping that the characters would eventually be hit by a truck or something. Then, this season came along. Even through all my hate, I had to admit that this was a pretty strong season. From Hannah’s odd interaction with a bestselling author to Marnie finally realizing she sucks at life, there were some great episodes of television to be found in this season of the show. I was also forced to admit things about myself.

First off, I always knew I liked Shoshana because she had enough sense to know that she deserved better than the friends with which she’d found herself. And I definitely missed her once she decided to finally distance herself from them. I also realized there was much more to the Ray character and, while they didn’t exactly put a bow on it, I’m glad they led us to believe that he had found a happy ending. Even a character as originally unlikable as Elijah had some strong development this season, and he was truly missed in the finale, even though this chapter of his story had come to a close. As I already admitted in my Get Out review, I had to come to terms with my crush on Allison Williams and, by extension, Marnie Michaels. Yeah, she sucked at life, but she seemed like the one out of the four who had Tony Starked her way into that situation; she was the cause of her own problems. Once she began to realize that, the character held more promise. And I realized I hated Jessa because she reminded me too much of girls I’d hooked up with in college: damaged, tattooed, pseudo-junkies who are lucky to still be alive. And I guess Hannah reminded me of girls I’d hooked up with post college. Yeah, I hated a lot about Girls because, I guess, I hated a lot about myself.

This Sunday saw the series finale of the show, and I wasn’t quite sure I was ready for it. After a season that had given us a pregnant Hannah, but also showcased the dissolution of the group’s friendship, I didn’t really know how they could “end” the story. I was further distraught when I read an article last week saying that Jessa and Shosh’s final appearances had been in the penultimate episode that had just aired. While I would miss them in the final half hour, I had to admit that their chapters had also come to a close.

When we get to the finale, there’s a five-month time jump, where Marnie and Hannah are living in a remote house upstate, raising Hannah’s baby, Grover. Yes, that’s what she named him. Anyway, it was 30 minutes about what it means to be happy, but also what it means to be an adult and a parent. I like to think that Hannah finally grew up once she realized that Grover wasn’t another problem that she could simply run away from. The entire episode, she’s freaking out because Grover won’t breastfeed, but in the final seconds he finally takes to her breast. The look on her face is a mix of relief and maturity. It was then that I realized the show had to end at that point, as Hannah was no longer a girl. The entire series had been about millennial drama, as they skirted adulthood, but those times were over. The title Girls no longer applied to Hannah because she was now a Woman, with all the responsibilities that entailed. I used to worry about Hannah, and I sure as Hell worried about Grover when we learned she was pregnant. After Sunday’s finale, though, I think they’re gonna be OK. It was a finale that I had to give some thought to, but it didn’t leave me unfulfilled like Don Draper creating a Coke jingle only to end up hocking tax prep software six months later. For this reason, Girls had the West Week Ever.

#Batman #Comics #DC #Indie #Marvel #Movies #Music #Politics #Race #Relationships #Star Wars #Syndication #Television #Video Games #West Week Ever

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topicprinter · 5 years ago

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Few people get to experience product management at large, successful tech companies and decide to share their expertise and outlook with others who want to get started in the field. One of them is my good friend Anna Buldakova, a seasoned product manager.Anna sat down with Scott Eblen, Director of Product Management at Twitter, to discuss if technical background is a requirement for Product Managers, what is the difference between Google and small startups, and how to create a good vision and strategy.About skills for Product ManagersWhen you were in the university, were you focused on your studies or also trying to find entrepreneurship opportunities?I played in a jazz ensemble and in a marching band; I conducted a pit orchestra for a musical comedy that was written by the students. Those were all great experiences and opportunities that are hard to pursue post-university. I see a ton of new-grad candidates who already have a startup under their belt but I’d really encourage people to experiment with what would be hard to do later in life: play sports, do theater. You’re going to have a chance to work later, starting two years earlier with a company isn’t something you necessarily should be doing.What were your favorite subjects in the university?I studied Computer Science at Princeton but what I really liked is that it was a liberal arts curriculum, not just engineering, math, and science courses. I was required to take a diverse set of classes. The one I really loved was Art 101. I distinctly remember the exam question where we were asked to compare a modern painting by Piet Mondrian to a Bernini sculpture in St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. It was all about finding analogies and connections, and in some way product managers are doing the same by saying “we are the Uber of x” or “the eBay of y”.Which part of your education you think was the most beneficial for you, creative one or the technical one?I really value the creative part, I wouldn’t trade it for anything. Technology has changed so much since I graduated and it will continue to evolve, but creative & soft skills are enduring. At that time computer science was required for a lot of the roles so I’m glad I did that because it got me into product management. Thankfully, now a lot of companies don’t make it a hard requirement which is a good expansion of the pool of applicants that we can appeal to.Do you think product managers not having a technical background is a good trend?I would say having a technical background is a good thing; but not having a computer science degree isn’t a bad thing. With a product manager, I want to find someone who can debate in a healthy fashion with engineers, and I think they can acquire those skills by doing some development themselves, by having worked with engineers in different capacities. Having done specific coursework doesn’t always qualify them to do that.Makes sense. I hear more and more from senior people that technical education is not a requirement anymore.One of the reasons is that you realize that product isn’t the hard part; people are the hard part. With the diversity of backgrounds, you’re more likely to find people who can bring unique and creative solutions to those problems.Finding ways to motivate and inspire people or align groups of people to solve problems has nothing to do with computer science. One of the most important things for aligning people is a narrative: having a clear and compelling story that people can rally around. If you can tell a story that people can then tell to their friends, family, coworkers, then it makes them excited, they feel like they can convey why they are doing what they are doing.How do you develop such a skill as storytelling?I think it’s really important to read fiction and non-fiction on a regular basis because it’s a good opportunity to understand new mindsets and spend some time on thinking how to tell a story.Empathy is another essential skill for a product manager. You can only do so much user research or data analysis, but you simply can’t understand what that person was thinking when they were using your product. Reading fiction can give you a glimpse into other perspectives and doing things in a different way that you haven’t considered.One more thing to say here. I often hear product managers asking “what book should I read”. There are a couple of really standard books like Ben Horowitz’s “Hard things about hard things”, which give you a very narrow perspective on what you should do. Reading non standard books is the only way to get ahead. It allows you to find other solutions that your peers don’t see. To find your next book to read you should talk to people, especially outside of technology, ask what they found interesting or thought-provoking. And then just get recommendations and look for new things to try.What was the most inspiring book that you read last year?One really interesting one from the product perspective was Ron Chernow’s biography of Alexander Hamilton where Lin-Manuel Miranda got his inspiration for the famous musical. It was a really interesting insight into first principles thinking as the founding fathers were trying to craft the government, and there were few resources to suggest how it should be structured. If you don’t have Wikipedia to consult with or two dozen peers you can call on the phone, what are the approaches to build something that will last?I also enjoyed the book called “How to do nothing” by Jenny Odell, a Stanford professor and an artist; she talks a lot about some negative aspects of the attention economy.About the difference between being a PM at a large company vs startupWhat was your first job?After university my first job was at Microsoft, it was called “a Program Manager” which is essentially a Product Manager. I spent two and a half years there, and during this entire time there was only one launch. Anyway, you learn a lot of good processes at a big company: seeing how to do annual planning, triage bugs and features, work with different stakeholders — it gives you a really great foundation for subsequent roles.After Microsoft, I joined a startup called Library House, and it was a great contrast. At Microsoft I never saw a sale firsthand, while at Library House I was involved in pitches. Being in the room when a sales manager was closing a deal, seeing what the buyer’s concerns were and how to overcome them was really useful for my career.Do you think that Product Managers should have an understanding of the sales process, especially if they work in b2b?An understanding of disciplines outside the product is incredibly valuable. When people get more senior in their careers, they have more interactions with other functions so your understanding of marketing, PR and, of course, engineering will make you a more effective product manager. Imagine that you are in a startup, and a CEO needs to make resource allocations across product and other disciplines. If you can’t argue the pros and cons of other disciplines’ requests, your work is at a disadvantage.Thinking about your experience in startups vs. Google and Microsoft, what is the key difference in terms of PM responsibilities?In big companies the function and the process are well defined. I’ve seen opportunities to tweak both of those but there’s a little more constraint in terms of what you do, whereas in startups you just need to do whatever it takes to make the business successful. When I was a Head of Product at Nutmeg, an online investment platform in the UK, there was a week in a year when we had a ton of sales coming through, and everyone from developers to our CEO and our founder were actually on the phone supporting customers. It obviously would never happen at Google or Twitter.How can a startup compete with a large company in terms of talent?I think it’s really about spending time with the job candidates, understanding their motivations and seeing if you can match them. It’s not worth shoehorning a candidate in if they’re not a fit for the business. The other thing is mission. This is actually something I saw in Twitter when I first joined. There were a lot of acquisition rumors, the stock was way down but the mission that Jack Dorsey articulated and the notion of building a platform that could really connect people helped to still attract and retain great candidates.About transitioning to a Director roleHow did you start transitioning into more senior roles?One of my first managers at Google said: “Always make sure that you’re feeling a little bit uncomfortable as you move, it means that you’re challenging and pushing yourself”. When I talked to Nutmeg about the Chief Product Officer role, there were a lot of things that were uncomfortable, there were disciplines that I hadn’t managed before but embracing and just going with that was a big step forward. When I came to Twitter, this experience helped me feel much more confident.You were an individual contributor at Google, how did you persuade Nutmeg that you will be good at managing people?At Google I had a lot of different managers, and I’d seen things that worked really well and things that didn’t, and I tried to write up my thoughts about that on a regular basis. So when Nutmeg reached out to me, I was able to articulate ideas about the good and the bad in organizations, organizational design and process.And how did you find this opportunity, or did it find you?I was headhunted into that role. I think it’s helpful to have conversations with recruiters occasionally. They give you a pulse of what’s out there and a sense of “Am I doing what’s best for me?”. As a people manager, your reaction might be “no, I don’t want my people talking to other companies” but it is useful as it reminds your employees what is good about their current role. And if they really want things that your company can’t offer, you ultimately want to help them find a role that is a better match.What was the most difficult for you in this transition?One of the biggest challenges I had was working with other disciplines. When we sat down with the CFO or the Head of Marketing, these were the disciplines that I hadn’t had much firsthand experience with. Trying to figure out how to both explain and sell our product team’s efforts to these disciplines and understand how they were interacting with each other was not so straightforward. We had people who worked in old-school banks for 20 or 30 years, their mindset was quite different, so I had to spend a lot of time with them to understand how they think about business, product and my discipline. It was difficult but also critically important. For example, when the budget decision comes up about “do we spend a million pounds on a TV campaign, or hire more researchers or designers”, it’s not just about my role, it’s about how those things work together and what’s best for the business overall.When you transition to a more senior role, sometimes you might feel under water. How did you deal with it?Process. People often think of it as some sort of bureaucracy but it can be incredibly beneficial if done well. One thing that I distinctly recall is that I initially overfocused on making product decisions as opposed to setting up and enabling the team to make product decisions of a certain quality. I thought a lot more about this at Twitter. One way to make a team really effective is to be very clear about what metric they are trying to move and what are the guardrails or certain principles that you care about, and then give the team the autonomy to achieve those goals within the guardrails that you set up. And, of course, this should all align with the product vision.How does vision relate to the strategy?Strategy has two pieces: one is how your business is going to evolve — what you’re doing, how you’re doing it. The second one is the understanding of what’s changing in the world. The clearest example is Nokia in 2007: if you were just focusing on your phones and how you’re going to change them, but you weren’t thinking about how the iPhones were changing the market, that obviously made a huge difference in the strategy. A part of our strategy at Nutmeg was thinking how payments were changing, how banks were changing, how attitudes towards cash or talking openly about money were changing. Those were really important things that we needed to think about when we were setting the strategy. An interesting exercise is to look back 3 to 5 years in your industry and ask “who were the competitors, what were the trends that everyone was talking about back then”. And then try to extrapolate some of that forwards because it gives you a little bit of perspective about what that time frame was like and what were some of the differences over that time frame.How do you align your team on the strategy and the vision, how do you make sure that everyone feels heard?Roadmaps are bread and butter for product managers to align the team. Have two or three key problems that the team is working on, and focus on the narrative of solving that problem. At Nutmeg our goal was to sell confidence in financial choices, instead of selling investment products. So there was a “confidence” work stream in the roadmap that covered, for example, transparency about what was happening with the investments.To make the vision more understandable and concrete at Nutmeg, we created a deck of vignettes which were single screenshots accompanied by some narrative about customer feelings and outcomes. This was compelling and memorable but avoided unnecessary detail which would have been time consuming and distracting from the overall message.To the second part of the question, if you are listening to everyone, they are more likely to buy into your vision and strategy. Twitter started doing a lot more of silent meetings where we’ll start with a document, spend the first 10–15 minutes reading it, and everyone will leave a bunch of comments. You will see specific places where people left comments and then follow up with specific conversations. This allows for much more equitable discussions.What if you hear everyone but as a leader don’t agree with what people are saying?That’s tough. I think at some point it’s important to let the team make decisions and have some autonomy. If you always step in to override, I don’t think you set that team up for success. It also depends on how bad you think the mistake is. If it’s two slightly different approaches or two relatively small features, give the team the chance to try. Maybe you’re wrong, maybe they’re wrong but it can be a learning experience for everyone. Obviously if the team is doing something that you believe would imperil the business then it’s your responsibility to step in, but it’s important to have some self-awareness and ask yourself: “Am I doing this every single time or is this once a year occasion where I’m stepping in to alter the course of things”. If you do step in, to the earlier point about goals and guardrails approach, you should think if there is a different guardrail or a different target that could have helped us avoid this problem.To your point about self-awareness and reflection, how do you find the next opportunities for professional growth?Speaking is a great opportunity provided that you’re actually taking the time to think and write some new ideas for these talks. It’s a chance to get feedback from a large crowd of peers, and it also exposes you to other perspectives because usually after you speak, people will come up and ask you questions. Writing is similar, I wish I did more of that. Twitter is a nice micro opportunity: there’s a ton of product leaders, and just engaging in a conversation gives you some exposure and feedback. Finally finding opportunities to meet and talk to other product managers is helpful as well.

#/r/startups #reddit

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limejuicer1862 · 5 years ago

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Wombwell Rainbow Interviews

I am honoured and privileged that the following writers local, national and international have agreed to be interviewed by me. I gave the writers two options: an emailed list of questions or a more fluid interview via messenger.

The usual ground is covered about motivation, daily routines and work ethic, but some surprises too. Some of these poets you may know, others may be new to you. I hope you enjoy the experience as much as I do.

rob mclennan

Born in Ottawa, Canada’s glorious capital city, rob mclennan currently lives in Ottawa, where he is home full-time with the two wee girls he shares with Christine McNair. The author of more than thirty trade books of poetry, fiction and non-fiction, he won the John Newlove Poetry Award in 2010, the Council for the Arts in Ottawa Mid-Career Award in 2014, and was longlisted for the CBC Poetry Prize in 2012 and 2017. In March, 2016, he was inducted into the VERSe Ottawa Hall of Honour. His most recent poetry titles include A halt, which is empty (Mansfield Press, 2019) and Life sentence, (Spuyten Duyvil, 2019). An editor and publisher, he runs above/ground press, seventeen seconds: a journal of poetry and poetics (ottawater.com/seventeenseconds), Touch the Donkey (touchthedonkey.blogspot.com) and the Ottawa poetry pdf annual ottawater (ottawater.com). He is “Interviews Editor” at Queen Mob’s Teahouse, editor of my (small press) writing day, and an editor/managing editor of many gendered mothers. He spent the 2007-8 academic year in Edmonton as writer-in-residence at the University of Alberta, and regularly posts reviews, essays, interviews and other notices at robmclennan.blogspot.com. He has a million links to books, chapbooks, interviews and other activity at his author page: robmclennanauthor.blogspot.com

The Interview

What inspired you to write poetry?

That’s a good question. I’m not entirely sure, and it’s a question I was asked by another not that long ago. I think poetry found me, and the finding, during my early high school years, solidified some of the thinking I’d already been attempting. Writing simply made sense.

It helped that I had a good social group around me during that period, many of whom were also experimenting with the beginnings of writing. We even started a small publication that our English teacher put together for us, and I contributed poems, postcard fictions and a couple of drawings.

Once my twenties began, it was the birth of my first child that really made me realize I should either pay attention to “this writing thing” properly, or simply not bother. She was born two months before I turned twenty-one, and I was soon running a home daycare full-time so I could stay home with her (taking in two other children five days a week, ten hours a day). I was writing in a coffee shop three nights a week during that period, from 7pm to midnight.

Who introduced you to poetry?

During my mid-teen years, my girlfriend (the eventual mother of my first child) was a big reader, and she introduced me to many things, including poetry and fiction, predominantly Canadian literature of the period—Leonard Cohen, Margaret Atwood, Margaret Lawrence, George Bowering, John Newlove, Alice Munro, Michael Ondaatje, Elizabeth Smart, etcetera. Through another high school peer, I became introduced to the work of Richard Brautigan, who remains my preferred American writer. I have a soft spot for him and his work I refuse to relinquish.

How aware were you of the dominating presence of older poets?

“Dominating” seems an odd word. Anyone who publishes, especially for an extended period, is going to overshadow anyone younger who hasn’t yet published. Also: I’ve known a great many ‘older poets’ who have been remarkably generous with emerging writers, many of whom might not have managed to get to where they needed to gain traction with their own work without that kind of mentoring. I, myself, spent my teens and twenties encouraged by a great number of well-established writers, including Henry Beissel, Gary Geddes, Ken Norris, Judith Fitzgerald, John Newlove, George Bowering, Bruce Whiteman, Robert Hogg, Diana Brebner, John Barton, Mark Frutkin, Barry McKinnon, Elizabeth Hay and others.

I was aware of other writers only abstractly during my teen years, with few examples. Gary Geddes and Henry Beissel lived close, and I became aware of them through high school workshops. Ralph Connor was very much on my radar, as he’d written extensively on and around my geographic area, but he existed as a historical figure, not as a contemporary one (he sold a million copies of his books in 1900, being Canada’s earliest, if not first, best-selling fiction writer). It was only once I moved from the farm to the city at nineteen that I began moving through bookstores and libraries and multiple reading series, and getting a slow sense of what was happening with writing.

By the time I was twenty-three (1993), I’d started reviewing poetry titles, which quickly emerged into what has become a lengthy engagement with reviewing poetry, fiction and non-fiction books, journals and chapbooks. I started with a column in our local weekly paper in 1994, but by the end of the decade that had fizzed out, which eventually shifted my attention online, and my blog, which began sometime in 2003. For many years, as reader, writer, editor, reading series organizer and publisher, I’ve made it my business to be aware of as much as I possibly, humanly, can.

What is your daily writing routine?

Before the birth of our wee girls (who are now three and five and a half), I was writing daily from the time I woke until late afternoon, and even kept “office hours” at a donut shop from 1994 to 2000, before shifting over to a coffee shop (once my donut shop closed) where I sat daily for fourteen further years. Once the (more recent) wee children plus our house, I moved from writing almost exclusively in public spaces to sitting at my desk in a home office. These days, I’m either with the children, or I’m at my desk. There aren’t many opportunities for much else.

I’m currently writing around their summer program schedule—three mornings a week from 9am to 12:30pm—before I collect them from the church down the street for further adventures. There are times they are willing to play quietly, whether downstairs or in the living room, which allows me some further time at my desk, but I try to be careful with that. Once September hits, our big one begins grade one, and the wee one most likely returns to her three mornings plus two full (school) days a week, which will allow me some further attention. Perhaps that might even open the possibility that I return to that “big novel” I keep promising myself I’m still working on.

What motivates you to write?

This would seem an odd question to pose to a dairy farmer: what motivates you to milk the cows? Or to a welder: what motivates you to weld? So I offer: this is what I do. I start projects to make sense of things, and to explore particular subjects, thoughts and shapes. I finish projects because I am project-oriented (and am often eager to get to whatever might come next). Perhaps it comes from being the son of a self-directed dairy farmer, but I see what I do very much as existing in a working-class ethic. I get up, I work. I keep working. Very “Alice Munro” in my Scottish-Protestant ethic.

What is your work ethic?

My work ethic is the muscle I utilize to create and complete work. It is something I struggled to establish during my twenties, and has sustained much of my writing since.

How do the writers you read when you were young influence you today?

George Bowering was a great jumping-off point for my reading and research. He remained my favourite Canadian poet for two decades or more. He is often underacknowledged in CanLit for his wide range, and enormous amount, of editorial work and critical writing. He did, it was said, more critical work on those around him than any other writer of his generation. Through him, I discovered the work of a great deal of writers, from established to emerging, from mainstream to experimental, from Canadian to international. If one thought inevitably leads to another, so, too, my reading and thinking, and Bowering, singularly, increased my awareness exponentially.

And there are multiple books and authors I continue to return to, for rejuvenation, or solace. I’m rereading Jack Spicer these days, for example. Before that, I was digging through, yet again, Rosmarie Waldrop and Norma Cole.

Who of today’s writers do you admire the most and why?

There are many! And too many to list here. But I am always excited to see new works by Lydia Davis, Lorrie Moore, Rosmarie Waldrop, George Bowering, Stuart Ross, Gil McElroy, Jason Christie, Brecken Hancock, Julie Carr, Pattie McCarthy, Erín Moure, Jack Davis, Monty Reid, Stephen Brockwell, Pearl Pirie, Amanda Earl, Stephen Collis, Sarah Manguso, Cole Swensen, Megan Kaminski, Anna Gurton-Wachter, Hailey Higdon, Shazia Hafiz Ramji, Jordan Abel, derek beaulieu, Sarah Mangold, Sandra Ridley, Hoa Nguyen, Jessica Smith, etcetera. There are so many writers doing amazing things! And there are new things to learn and relearn from every one of them. I want to experience it all. I like seeing what I haven’t before, which can often be difficult. I want to see work that challenges the way I think of writing, and thinking.

Why do you write, as opposed to doing anything else?

This is something I know I can do, and do very well. I also really enjoy it.

It makes sense to me when I tell myself that I write. I am a writer.

What would you say to someone who asked you “How do you become a writer?”

Write as much as possible. Read as much as possible. Be fearless. Employ the long game.

Be open. Engage with others attempting the same. Edit later. Don’t be afraid to fail.

Keep going. Repeat as necessary.

Tell me about the writing projects you have on at the moment.

Since January I’ve been working on a poetry manuscript titled “book of magazine verse,” which plays off Jack Spicer’s title, writing poems that aim themselves toward specific journals and presses. In hindsight, I’m realizing just how little such pointed compositions are acknowledged, and I’m enjoying seeing where the poems end up taking me. If one attempts a couple of poems for Fence magazine, for example, they are going to sound very different than, say, poems that one might send to Grain magazine, so why not play with that structure? So much contemporary literary production would be lost without the little magazine and the small and smaller presses.

I’ve also been poking at a handful of short stories, attempting to get a sense of where a new manuscript might take me, especially since completing a further manuscript of short stories last year. I don’t just want new stories to sound like an extension of what that prior book was doing. I want to see if I can do something different with the tone, and the structure. I’m still feeling it out. I’m also working on a follow-up manuscript of postcard stories, furthering a line begun with the publication of my debut collection of short short stories, The Uncertainty Principle: stories, (Ottawa ON: Chaudiere Books, 2014). I step into that manuscript every so often, but am not in any particular hurry, there.

There are numerous other projects in various states of incompleteness, which I would like to focus on, but I might have to wait until the fall before I can consider any of that. I mean, I’ve a post-mother creative non-fiction manuscript, “The Last Good Year,” that could use reworking. I’m half-through a poetry manuscript, “snow day,” currently made up of two longer prose poems (I haven’t yet decided on what the potential third section might look like). I’ve multiple unpublished manuscripts of literary essays that could use some attention, and re-shaping, for potential publication.

There is so much more that needs to be done.

Wombwell Rainbow Interviews: rob mclennan Wombwell Rainbow Interviews I am honoured and privileged that the following writers local, national and international have agreed to be interviewed by me.

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