#but I'm pretty sure that the author got published

[dduane]

i cant belive that you of all people are at risk of homelessness >:(

homelessness isnt a problem that should exist in general, but you, specifically, should have like a million dollars from the star trek novels alone

(chuckle) Wouldn't that be lovely! (And it's kind of you to be thinking that way.)

But alas, that's not how it works.

When you're working in/for other licensed universes—which is always on a work-for-hire basis—the only really significant payment(s) you're likely to see will happen when you've turned in a given book and it's been formally accepted. And even then, the payment's rarely going to be higher than low-to-mid five figures... which (after your literary agent gets their cut, and after your taxes on the income get paid) won't take you very far even in a single year, let alone the years that follow.

If you're very lucky in your publisher, or have a very good agent—which I do—you may even manage to get some royalties on such a novel. But they'll be at the low end of the scale—maybe 2-3% of the cover price. (Bearing in mind that even for original novels in one's own universe, an author rarely gets more than 8-10% of a given book's cover price in royalties.) And when the book goes out of print, the royalties stop.

So just because the owner of the IP makes a lot of money off it, doesn't mean that any significant amount of it necessarily trickles down to the writer. (sigh) Nor does the fact that a book is good, or the writer is good, or both, make any significant difference in this branch of mathematics. Eventually, pretty much inevitably, sooner or later sales of a book drop off and the publisher lets it go out of print.

(shrug) It's not like I didn't know this was eventually going to happen when I wrote my Star Trek work. I did that because I loved Trek (and still do), and I was sure I could write a better Trek novel than anyone else had up until that point. (And maybe that was even true. Who knows.) To have done the work was the thing that primarily mattered.

But let this be a reminder to folks that only a low percentage of writers make enough from their writing alone to live on: and that something like 90% of writers at times live at or near the poverty line and sometimes slip below it. ...And for all of us, even for strong writers who seem moderately successful and have other income streams, bare patches happen: times when publishers don't pay (for example, I still haven't been paid anything for Disney/Marvel's reissue of my Spider-Man books), times when you can't work, or times when accident or illness or other unexpected circumstance eats the cash you've stashed away to serve as a cushion.

This is not a safe lifestyle. With talent and luck and endless slogging away at/over the writing mechanism of your choice, and with the support of your readers (whom I'm very much thinking of at the moment!—and thanks again to the Ebooks Direct customers and Ko-Fi friends who just now saved our butts), it can be survived. Which, from day to day, @petermorwood and I do our best to keep on doing.

...In any case: people who even at this end of time can say things about my work such as you did at the top of this, make me feel like about a million dollars. 🙂 (And since today I have both an upper respiratory infection and laryngitis, that's quite a trick!) ...So thanks.

ETA: for those curious, to deal with local physical issues I am now making this chicken soup, which—whether or not it has any actual therapeutic benefit—is still going to be very nice. ...It annoys the shit out of me that I have to leave out the onions and garlic, which would quickly trigger my IBS and subject me to an entirely different level of pain; but such is life. We've got all the other ingredients on hand sans the fresh turmeric, and if there's one thing this soup's short on, it's chilies. Which around here, believe me, is a deficiency that Peter's well positioned to remedy. :)

[angelfishe]

#𝐀𝐃𝐌𝐈𝐑𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍

Vil schoinet x reader

Before you were teleported into NRC, you were a writer as well a popular illustrator. You decide to upload one of your most Popular works at twisted wonderland about a love story with a villain. Eventually it blew up in the media, changing the standard of how the media view villains. As well changing his life view forever.

( this is so rush, I'm so sorry )

You never have expected to be teleported into a world of magic it seems to be fictional but it's real, sadly you didn't get any abilities but on the bright side you don't have any deadlines to worry about I'm pretty much sure your coworkers are dealing with your story publishing.

Recently you got bored and decided to re write one of your most popular works and publish it into the media of this world, believing it wouldn't change anything.

The next few days your work has taken over the world, it gotten very popular due to having a unique setting and plot.

One thing you realize about this world is that they glorilize the heroine over the villain which is something you're not surprised because this is literally Disney. Why would they choose the innocent petite character when they could have the dark strong and hot villain. But still back in your world many would still simp for the villains in Disney.

It has taken the world by storm changing people how they view villains, finally finding the dark mysterious character attractive instead of the pure and innocent character stealing the spotlight from them.

Meanwhile vil realizes that his magicam account has been getting more likes than ever and saying that he looks like the male lead in your manhwa, I mean you were inspired to change their appearance to look exactly like vil because I mean look at him.

Vil decided to check the manhwa and insteadly falls inlove, on how they make the villain into the male lead as well a reasonable and loveable character, everyone is in love with him.

What part that makes him fall In love is because of how he finally sees the character staying till the end of the show getting the happily ever after they finally craved.

Soon many stories start the villain as its shining star pops out in a few weeks even though there are many short animations about the series, vil got the entire film study club to be involved and recreate one of his favorite scenes in the series.

It changed his whole world even the entire world on their views towards the villains, he wants to meet the author the bad part is he's unable to know because the author/ you is anonymous always keeping their private life close towards them never showing it towards the public.

But you may have left a slip up at that point you as being the author, during lunch you were looking panels on one of the scenes in the newest episode in the manhwa and epel was sitting right beside you surprisingly he was allowed due to vil being in a good mood.

Epel look over your shoulder and ask what you were doing while believing it was a normal question saying about how you were looking at panels for your manhwa, epel look at it and instantly recognize the character well because vil wouldn't stop rambling about it.

And in cue rook decided to drop by and also have a look at the panel he immediately looked at epel with a confused on what to do meanwhile you were still minding your business unaware of what's happening in both of the pomifiore students.

One day epel told you to come to pomifiore because he said he's housewarden wants to meet you. And low and behold vil is waiting sitting across a couch with teas and sweets on the table.

When you took a seat at the couch across from him he asked as If you were the author towards the popular manhwa and you confirmed it believing it's nothing special.

Vil ask why would you prefer the villain over the hero and you gave your reason was due to them being overshadowed, as well misunderstood as being a character. As a writer your job is to fully understand a person's character even tho they commit questionable things. You have to understand a person to write them perfectly.

And he was stunt and then he sends you a smile and says he needs your help about your manhwa as well saying both of you are gonna get along.

[petermorwood]

A day or so ago, @dduane reblogged a long post - a Canadian magazine article from 1966 - about the Americanisation of Winnie the Pooh.

It's an Impressive Tirade in which the writer (Sheila H. Kieran) says what she thinks about letting Walt Disney have a free hand with a foreign Children's Classic.

There's mention of the previous Adaptation Endeavour, "Mary Poppins" (1964) but it's very brief, perhaps with an eye to limited column space - or maybe because All Was Said Already in a previous review.

There is, however, rather a lot about the English characters being given American accents, and about the inclusion of a new character, an American gopher (which, the article suggests, looked vague enough to the Kieran children - its target audience - that it might as well have been a mole or a beaver).

*****

And that reminded me of another bit of American Animalisation done by Disney, in the 1949 short "The Wind and the Willows" - though in this instance it's visual since the voices are, for the most part, suitably British.

They include Basil Rathbone as narrator, and a horse who sounds like George Formby. In some scenes the horse actually looks like Formby, so this voice may not be entirely accidental.

Badger, however, sounds like a Scotsman - the worst kind of stage Scotsman at that - rather than how I used to "hear" him as a C. Aubrey Smith-voiced crusty retired colonel.

That, however, is just personal preference.

However, Disney's Badger is not a proper British (more correctly, European) badger, Meles meles. Here's one, which though not the most amiable of beasts in reality, still manages to look fairly affable ("I say, old chap, whatever are you looking at?")

Instead he's a North American badger, Taxidea taxus, which not only has a less affable expression ("Hey, bud, you. Yeah, you. You lookin' at me? You lookin' at ME?") but, more important, different stripes.

Here's Disney's version alongside mine. The correction took about five minutes of pixel-tweaking.

Disney's animators could have got it right from the outset just as easily, because I'm pretty sure the reference library which provided costume info for Rat's tweed Norfolk jacket and britches included picture-books of natural history.

Come to that, any "The Wind in the Willows" after the unillustrated first edition would have been enough, and there must have been at least one copy lying around for story adaptation and scene-description purposes.

The first illustrated edition came out in the UK in 1931, and its artist was, at author Kenneth Graham's request, the very same E.H. Shepard who had illustrated the Pooh books just a few years previously...

...while this Arthur Rackham colour plate is from an edition published in 1940 in New York.

So those books wouldn't have been impossible for Disney to get.

The problem, however, is that if a word ("badger", for instance) is well known to mean one thing here, it may be Too Much Trouble to find out if the same word means something else there, with the result that finding out can sometimes come as rather a surprise.

Check the UK / US meaning of "suspenders" to see what I mean... ;->

[kimmryokoo]

Late Night - logan howlet

author: kim ryoko

ao3

masterlist

summary: logan was supposed to go to a mission that would only last 3 days. unfortunately, it took longer then expected. your birthday went by quicly and you were already sleeping when logan returned. you both really missed each other and you let a kiss turn into something bigger...

word count: 3k

warnings: figeting, smut, filthy, reader has no appetite, slight possibility of death (doesn't happend), teasing, sub reader, little fluff at the end

author's note: english isn't my first language so i'm sorry for ay grammar mistakes, feel free to correct me. i'm so sorry it took me this long to publish something. i've been really busy lately. my birthday was on december 13th (the same as taylor swift🤭), so i wrote this as a sort of birthday present.

It's been days since you last saw Logan. He was out on a mission with Scott and Jean, and they left exactly 7.5 days ago when it was supposed to only last 3 days. You missed Logan very much, and tomorrow was your birthday so you were rooting for Logan and the rest of the team to arrive the night before or in the morning of the day.

It was already 11pm the day before your birthday and you were still waiting for your friends and lover to arrive while sitting in a bench on the jet garage and you then heard the big and thick metal doors sliding to open and the sound of wheels caught your attention.

“You're still here? It's getting late. You should head to bed and get a good night's sleep. Big day tomorrow.” Charles said.

“I'm just waiting for them to arrive.” you spoke with a tone filled with exhaustion, worry, hope and love, all at the same time.

“Unfortunately, I don't think they'll come back today.”

“What makes you say that, professor?”

“If they were to return, Jean would've reached to me and reported everything that happened while they were out on the mission, but she hasn't yet.” Charles argued and got a bit closer to you, now sitting next to you and putting an understanding hand on your back.

“I really wanted to spend tomorrow with them.” you said in a sad voice.

“I know. But the only thing you can do right now is go to sleep and get energized for when they do come back.” he stated in his always calm tone.

“You're right. Thank you, professor.” and before you got up to leave the room, you gave a loose hug to the older man that has supported you through so many things.

It was now the next day, 6:30 a.m. and your alarm went on with his job of waking you up. His loud rings easily made their way to your ears and woke you up with a symphony that reminded you a lot of screaming babies. To end your suffering, you quickly moved your hand to turn off the alarm.

You sat up and stared at the place where your feet were hidden under the blanket. You then looked to your side and saw the cold, empty bed you wished was filled by Logan.

You sighed and got up to prepare yourself a bath to give you enough fuel to go through the day.

After you got out of the shower and put on some clothes, you packed everything you needed for the day and when you were packing the notebook where you plan your classes, you saw something written on the page the notebook was opened, and it looked like Logan’s lettering.

‘ Hey. So, I'm pretty sure this mission ain't gonna take 3 days like those dip heads are saying, so I'm writing a note for your birthday, so you can at least hear from me that day.I know that the day you're reading this is your birthday day, because I can see the date of the classes you planned in here. First of all, happy birthday, and I want you to know that I love you. A lot. And you're honestly the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I also want you to know that if I'm not there for your birthday, I'm dying of how much I miss you. I really hope you have a great day and that I get to see you or at least talk to you today. Love ya.

-Lo ’

Wow. Even when he's away, he somehow manages to make your day better.

You read the note and felt your heart swell with love for that man.

You finished packing everything and stepped outside the room and only a few steps later you were attacked by someone who came running towards you from your back and back-hugged you.

“Happy Birthday!” you heard the person whom you then knew was Ororo from her voice.

You turned to your friend and she immediately hugged you properly. Your smile grew wider from all the care your friend was giving you.

“Thank you, Ororo.”

“I got you a present! But I’m only going to give it to you at the end of the day.” the white haired woman said while breaking the hug and holding both your hands to continue touching you somehow.

“Then why would you tell me now?! You’re going to make me anxious all day!” you said in a pout tone but with a smile on your lips as you squeezed your friend’s hands harder.

“I know you have classes to teach, and so have I so I’m not going to take your precious time.” she grinned and kissed my cheek “Have a great day and happy birthday again!” She continued and started walking towards the direction she came from whilst waving a small ‘good-bye’ to which you responded with the same gesture and a kind and grateful smile.

You quickly arrived at your class and from that moment forward, that day was filled with people saying ‘Happy Birthday’ to you and many ‘Happy birthday’ songs.

At the end of all your classes, you decided to head back to the jet garage to wait for the team, since they haven’t arrived yet. While you were sitting on the same bench as the day before, you heard the same sound as you’ve heard the day before - heavy metal doors sliding open and metal wheels going your direction.

“What a Déjà vu, huh?” you said playfully to Charles, who chuckled softly at your statement.

“I would also say so myself. I presume you're here doing the same thing as you were yesterday?”

“Yeah.” you said looking down. The truth was that your day had been amazing, but it still felt a bit empty without Logan.

“Have you had dinner yet? It’s almost 8 p.m. .”

“No, I came here right after my classes finished. I’m just so worried. They should’ve been back by now. What if something bad happened? What if they…?”

“I’m sure it hasn’t. Have a little more faith in them. Go eat something and then I’ll let you come back here, but you have to promise me you’ll go to sleep at least by 11 p.m.”

“Fine.” you responded with a tone of defeat and got up to walk to the kitchen.

You tried your best to eat a normal sized meal, but you were too worried to eat anything. You stared at your plate with a small amount of mach-and-cheese and stirred it for about 30 minutes. It took you a long time to eat all of your food, but eventually you finished and cleaned the mess you made.

You left the kitchen and saw the rest of the mansion in complete darkness. You know your way around, and your heart was telling you to go back downstairs and wait for Logan a little longer but you also knew that whether you wanted to or not, you'd make noise that would probably wake someone up and that would make you feel bad. You glance back at the clock on the kitchen wall and see it’s almost 10 p.m. and consider going straight to bed and not risking waking up any student that might make your day 10 times worse tomorrow. You end up going to your room, since you’re also pretty tired from your day.

Once you closed your bedroom door, you started doing your night routine and only a few moments after you lay on your bed, you fell asleep.

You later woke up to what sounded like a door opening and closing. And then another door opened and closed.

You looked around the room and found nothing wrong. It must've been in your dream, so you went back to sleep.

You woke up again, but this time with an arm wrapping around your waist and you supported your weight on your elbow and turned slightly just to see Logan’s exhausted face looking at you with apologizing eyes from his pillow.

“Logan!” you said happily and hugged the man tightly while burying your face in his neck.

“Hey, sweetheart. Happy birthday.”

“Thank you!” you said and pulled a bit back to look at Logan’s face.

You leaned forward to lightly press your lips against his. That soft kiss was deepened when his hand grabbed the the back of your neck and pulled you to him. He was quick to change you positions so that he was on top. One of Logan’s hands supported his weight on the mattress near your face while the other one roamed free through your body squeezing your skin. You felt Logan’s tongue against your lips and didn't hesitate to let it in.

“You have no idea how much I missed ya.” Logan said in between kisses with a rough and starved tone that made you moan against his mouth.

In response to your sound, you felt his hips pressuring against yours while his free hand wrapped your legs around his waist. You could feel how hard he was beneath his pants and you never wanted something so bad like you did in that moment.

Logan’s mouth didn't restrain only your mouth. It also traveled to your neck and collarbones and you then smelled the scent of his shampoo. That's why you heard 2 doors opening and closing. One of them was your bedroom door and the other one was the bathroom's. It made sense now.

All that sense was rapidly taken away from you when you felt his bulge starting to move against your clothed pussy.

“Ahh… Logan…” you moaned “Please…” you finished.

“What, darlin’? Tell me. Tell me what you want and I'll give it to you, birthday girl.”

“I… I want you…”

“Where?” he asked “Here?” he said, faking innocence while rubbing stripes on top of your shorts.

“Y-yes…” you said with flushed cheeks.

“Well then. Imma have to take this off.” He said and sat up on his knees to smoothly rip your shorts out of you to find out you weren't wearing any underwear.

“Oh fuck, princess. You'll be the death of me. I've been gone for over a week and come back to you all wet like this? Do you know how hard it is to control myself when all I could smell was this neddy pussy since you saw me?” he asked. His face gets closer with each word. Almost close enough to kiss you.

“Then don't.” you said breathless and softly. You then leaned a bit forward to lick his lips and made them open just a small bit.

You saw the way his eyes darkened in pure lust and you felt it in the way he kissed you - with so much passion and need.

Logan only broke the kiss to sit back up on his knees to rip your shirt off, letting your chest free.

“Why’d you rip all my clothes off?” you asked with your breath taken from the way he took your nipples in his mouth which made you back ark for more.

“My present.” he stated in a low tone.

“But it’s my birthday…” you answered with your eyes closed and a moan escaping your lips when you were done talking.

“Your birthday, my present.”

Logan continued to play with you for a few minutes when you felt a knot on your stomach.

“Lo, I’m close…”

With that, Logan stopped paying attention to your breasts and took his hand to your core, rubbing circles on your clit with his thumb and slowly inserting his index and middle finger on your clenching hole.

You almost screamed out of pleasure when you felt Logan’s fingers moving inside you and scissoring you open to prepare you. You soon came undone under the felling of the friction of his long, thick and calloused hands inside your pussy.

Logan pulled back his body, taking his fingers out of your hole and putting them in his mouth for a brief second, sucking them.

“The sweetest fuckin’ thing I’ve ever tasted.” he uttered.

He then proceeded to put those same fingers inside your mouth, this time.

“Suck.” he demanded, and when you did as he ordered, he continued “Atta girl.”

With his free hand, he pulled down his pants and his cock immediately sprung free, slapping against his abs, with veins popping out and precum leaking from the tip. Logan then slowly stroked his length to lubricate it while you watched with saliva dripping from the corners of your mouth and your core getting wetter with every passing second, even though you just cummed.

Logan grabbed his cock by the base and aligned it with your hole, pushing bit by bit, inch by inch, until you were a moan and whimper mess. Once he bottomed you out, you moaned into his digits.

“Such a pretty little fuckin’ slut” he said as his gaze stared intensely to where your bodies met, watching you clench around him in an oh so delicious way.

Logan pulled back his hips to immediately rock them back into yours, making the thrilling sound of his skin slapping against yours fill your ears and your brain. Logan’s pace started slow - always careful not to hurt you - but you could tell it was different then usual. He was rougher than normal, eating you out with more urgency.

“You have no idea how good it feels to be inside this pussy again.” he groaned at the end of the sentence.

Logan’s pace sped up as he started to seek for the pleasure of his high that he had felt coming since he began fucking you. Logan knew that after so many days of only cumming with his hand while thinking of in his tend don't even compare to the feel of being inside you and that once he felt it again, he wouldn’t be able to hold on for long.

Logan took a moment to stop thinking about anything and look at you. Really look at you. The way your hair was messy because of the pillow, the way your forehead was sweating more than usual from thee over-stimulation, the way your eyes rolled to the back of your head every time he pounded inside you, the way your cheeks where flustered and got more red every time he praised you, the way your beautiful lips where glossy and red from all the sucking and that pretty string of saliva dripping in your cheek, the way your neck was marked from his hard work, the way your tits bounced up and down rhythmically with the times he fucked himself into you and the hickeys and red spots here and there, the way your clit was swollen and over-sensitive, the way your pussy wrapped around his cock so perfectly and clenched around him making him feel like he was in heaven, the way your sweet noises filled the room and you the way you called his name like it was a prayer. Fuck… Logan couldn’t take it anymore.

He grabbed your legs and put them on his shoulders, giving him better access to your g-spot and bending even further to kiss you. The kiss was rugged but held all the feelings he felt when he was alone in his cold sleeping bag in the inside of his tent while listening to Scott and Jean doing what he would kill to be doing with you.

“Lo… I-I’m coming again…”

“That’s it. Come for me princess.”

And, you did as you were told.

As soon as he felt you coming apart on his cock, he couldn’t resist it anymore and filled you up.

“Good girl. Always doing as you’re told.” he said in a teasing and low voice in which you only responded with another moan.

Logan helped you ride both your highs and you both soon came completely. He then let himself fall to your side, burying his head into the crook of your neck.

“Thank you for the present.” you said with a smile on your face as you lifted up your hand to play with his hair.

Logan chuckled and asked “You think this is your present? I told you it was mine. My fucking present for putting up with Scott and Jean for so long without leaving them there and coming back here to your arms.”

You laughed.

“I wouldn’t have minded that.”

“Noted. I’ll be sure to do it next time.” he joked and you felt his smile against your neck and you laughed again.

“Where’s my present, then?”

“Such an impatient girl.” he said as he pushed himself up, kissed you and grabbed a small box from his nightstand, all without coming out of you.

“Here you go, birthday girl.” He said and kissed your forehead.

You looked at the box and kissed Logan as a thank you. You opened the box and saw dog tags with your info on it and a picture of you and Logan.

“Well this, this is actually for me.” he said as he took your dog tags and with his other hand, he took his own off his neck and gave it to you.

“This is the one that’s actually for you. You know, I really missed you when I was out on the mission, and I know you miss me too when I’m gone so I thought this was a good way for me to always have a piece of you and you always have a piece of me. I also know how much you like that picture, so-” You interrupted him by kissing him.

“Thank you. I love it!” you said and he looked at you like you were an angel. His angel. “I love you, Logan.”

“Love you too, sweetheart.”

You cupped Logan’s cheeks and kissed him.

Both of you cuddled for the rest of the night and were finally able to fall asleep next to each other after so many nights apart. You were able to be next to each other, to feel the other's warmth.

That was the best night’s sleep both of you have had last week.

Hope you liked it!

xoxo, kim ryoko

[rafesbabyg1rl]

The Watcher ~ Part One

Part Two, Part Three,

Summary: Rafe Cameron x Reader, Stalker!Rafe x Pogue!Reader Reader's parents work late on Friday nights, which she spends alone. Except Reader hasn't been alone in a long time, not that she knows of at least. Rafe has watched you for years, he's very good at it. He has no plans of formally meeting you, as he's satisfied with the current arrangement. He likes it better when Reader doesn't know he's watching. But his idea of staying an anonymous stalker is ruined when reader catches him in her bedroom one Friday night. Rafe has to figure out how to fix his mistake before he loses the only thing that makes his life worth living.

Warnings: Rafe stalks reader...that's literally the entire plot. He's pretty pervy in this, I guess. Masturbation (Rafe) in front of unconscious reader, strong/vulgar language, somnophilia (I guess?), death threat(?). If I missed anything from this part that I should include in the warnings, please let me know!

Word Count: 5.9k

Author Note: My sneak peek got a few likes, so thank you if you liked it, y'all are the reason I'm finally posting this part! I'm not sure how I feel about this fic so far, I definitely have a habit of overly critiquing my own work and never being fully satisfied with it, but I'm trying to get over that. I don't have plans for this fic, it's just going in whatever direction I can think of as I write, so if you have any suggestions, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASEEE let me know, I'll write pretty much anything. This is my first work published on tumblr and the first thing I've written in years, so I hope it's at least readable, and maybe even a little enjoyable. If just one person enjoys this, then my mission is accomplished. Thank you, I hope you enjoy! And do NOT be shy to share feedback or give suggestions/requests. Again, thank you!

For those of you that DID read the sneak peek, a large portion of this part was included in the sneak peek, but I highly suggest reading it over in it's entirety. This draft has undergone several additional rounds of editing and I believe it is better than the version I published as a sneak peek.

CREDITS: The foundation of this fic was heavily inspired by/ based off of one of @faiszt 's bots on character ai. So, if you like this and you like character ai, I greatly suggest that you check out the bot!

One thing about humans is that we always want what we can’t have, especially when everyone else wants that same thing. It’s just something all humans do; but what happens when you already have more than you need and everything you could ever want? Well, almost everything. Rafe Cameron has more money than he could spend in his own lifetime, he can practically buy anything he wants. Except one thing, you.

At first he just thought you were pretty, but the more he saw you out in public the more and more he liked you. The way you’d talk or laugh when you were out with your friends…god, he could tell just how sweet you are. Too delicate for him to touch, like the wings of a butterfly or the petals of a flower. This is when he went from wanting you to needing you. 

See, another thing about humans is that we admire things. And, admiration can easily turn into obsession. Everyone has been obsessed with something or someone at some point in life, it’s normal. Obsessions will come and go, like a cycle. You get obsessed with something, you get over it, and you let it go until a new obsession marks the beginning of the new cycle. But things are a bit different for Rafe, he has never gotten over anything like, ever. Not once has Rafe Cameron ever let anything in his life go. When Rafe wants something, when he needs something, he will do whatever it takes to get it. And oh, how he needs you.

Rafe’s fascination, his obsession with you has been going on for years. He won’t ever admit it, but his perfectly curated collection of your personal items in his closet proves just how bad he’s been obsessing over you. The first thing he had ever stolen from you was your drink, you had been at the same party and you left your red solo cup about three-quarters full. Nobody noticed anything when he casually picked up the cup and finished the rest of your beer, purposely lining his lips with where yours had touched the cup, which was perfectly marked by the lipstick you had been wearing. After you’d leave a restaurant, he’d take the straws from your drinks. Rafe eventually worked himself up to breaking into your house and stealing your things when nobody was home. And Rafe made sure to explore every single inch of your room. All of your favorite panties? Gone. He’d take everything, your shirts, bras, whatever he liked really. You had noticed things kept disappearing from your room, but you’d just think you misplaced it–whatever it may be, or left it in a bag somewhere. Rafe had a good system. He knows exactly how much and how often he can take from you. 

Rafe knows he’s sick. He knows that it’s wrong to watch you from outside your bedroom window, that it’s wrong to follow you around in public, to purposely bump into you so you have to mutter a ‘sorry’ as you move around him. He just really, really needs you. And in Rafe’s twisted, dark, mess of a mind he believes this is the best way–the only way. He couldn’t treat you like every other girl, no, you were special. You were his and you just didn’t know it yet. Starting early on in his life, Rafe has always been neglected, always pushed into the shadow of his younger sister, Sarah. He’s been told he ruins everything, that everything he touches turns to ash. And you’re way too perfect to ruin. So, he follows you around like a creep, lurking from a distance. Of course you didn't know he’s been following you everywhere…he liked it better that way.

Rafe knew the line had already been crossed. Hell, the line had been crossed a long fucking time ago. He doesn’t care anymore, he needs you. Heaven is smelling like you; and not because you had left your scent on him, but because he had bought the same perfume as you. He needed to know what you smell like, how sweet you are…how sweet you taste. Heaven is watching your chest rise and fall as you sleep peacefully in your bed. Heaven is you.

What Rafe has been doing to you for years could be defined as worship. Rafe was worshiping you. He’s your good boy; your loyal man and he was going to take care of you; protect you, even if you don’t know it yet. You’re what he lives for; you’re all that keeps him going, the only thing he cares about. 

Since he’s been watching you for years, of course he knew your schedule. Of course he knew that on Fridays your parents work late at the local bar & grill that they own. This means you slept in your house by yourself practically every Friday night. So every Friday night, Rafe would sneak in through the back door that you always forget to lock. He just wants to check on you, he wants to see his pretty girl sleeping beautifully, he wants to know that his baby is okay. This is not a crime, it’s not a crime to care; he’s not insane, he’s just in love–if you could even call it that. How can it be wrong to protect what’s his? Oh, and god forbid anyone ever get in the way of his stalking routine, if anyone were to take you away from the inevitable path of meeting him…oh, the things he would do; whatever it takes.

One unforgettable Friday night, you fall asleep on your couch watching a rerun of one of your favorite shows. You enjoy being alone. If only you knew you haven’t been alone for a very long time. You’re woken up by sudden, loud noises coming from your bedroom, but you think maybe it’s just the cat, or maybe you didn’t shut your window. You get up from the couch and in several slow, cautious steps you tiptoe over to your room. When you enter your doorway, you’re immediately greeted by the sight of a tall and broad man standing in the center of your bedroom holding the last shirt you wore to his nose, breathing in your scent. The sight of all this makes you immediately freeze and stand motionless in your bedroom doorway, staring at him blankly. 

Rafe doesn’t startle when he realizes you’ve caught him red-handed. Instead, quite the opposite actually. He’s actually a bit amused, relieved even; if you hadn’t caught him just now, he never would’ve been able to work up the nerve to finally talk to you. He didn’t want to have to be creepy about things between you two, but he couldn’t talk to you like a normal person. It’d be too unpredictable, too unknown. Meeting you like this…he has all of the control. 

“There you are,” he grinned. “How beautiful…” The strangely offputting man gloated in your fear and it was obvious.

You take a step back from where you had been frozen. He takes a step forward. This cannot be happening, you think. Your brows furrow in hopelessness and defeat. Again, you freeze where you are standing, even more afraid to move now. 

You feel like you’ve seen the man before, which you have, plenty of times; but he was careful to never have too big of an interaction, so that you couldn’t recognize his face. You have no clue that you’ve been and always will be his.

 “W-wha…who are you? W-why are you in my house?” You try to keep your voice as strong as possible, but the way your words shake with trepidation betrays you. 

The man takes a quick step forward, slowing to a stop and putting his hands up in mock surrender as you jump back. “Woah, woah, hey…calm down, alright?”, he chuckles when he sees the utter horror and complete fright in your eyes. His tone switches into one of a little more seriousness, “I'm not here to hurt you, you don't need to be so scared...”.  If you didn’t feel like your only choice was to look him in the eyes, you might even believe him. But, you had no other option but to witness the animalistic spark in his eyes that lit up with each word he spoke. With each step he took, you took one further back—your heart dropped into your stomach at the sight of his cocky, twisted smile and the way he looked at you…like you’re a zebra grazing in your natural habitat and he’s the lion waiting to pounce and attack you in your own home. 

“I just wanted to see you," he leaned up against your dresser, taking in the look on your face. His face almost instantly drops the predatory look and adopts one of mock concern, almost convincing enough to hide his amusement. “Hey, it's okay, baby, it’s okay…”

“Please,” you beg. “If you leave I won’t call the cops. I won’t tell.”

Rafe cocks his head and lets out a slow breath, as if he’s disappointed in your reaction; you aren’t supposed to want him to leave. “Hey, hey…I’m not gonna hurt you. Just listen to me…you don’t wanna have to call the cops at three in the morning,” he elaborated. He’s trying to be as convincing as he can because he cannot screw this up. Even so, he still can’t help his smile that only grows at the sight of your terrified face. He shakes the smirk off, adopting a serious expression once more. “Especially when the cops won't be able to do a damn thing.” 

He continues to step closer to you with each word. He stops once his figure is looming over you, looking at you like a lion about to pounce on its prey. “You should really be more careful, sweetheart, leaving the back door open like that at this time of night, when you’re all alone…you never know who might be out there.” His voice is cold as he warns you about the dangers of the world; the dangers of himself. 

“Who are you?” You repeated. The man looks so familiar but you just couldn’t quite place his face anywhere. You just need to know what he wants; who he is. 

“That’s not important right now baby…we’re focused on you, yeah?” The man’s eyes widen, taking in every detail of your face; the only other times he’s seen you this close is when he watches you sleep. 

You could feel his breath on your face as he spoke. The look in his eyes tells you to take another step back, but when your back collides with the wall you jump; there’s nowhere left for you to go and that was exactly how he wanted it. He wanted you like this alone, afraid, and cornered. He loved your fear. The man stares at you with a predatory look although aside from the darkness and lust in his eyes, you can see something else, but…what is it?  

“W-what do you want?” You ask, keeping as calm as you can. Even though with every passing second the air gets thinner and thinner. Your stomach is in knots and your throat starts to close up. Not to mention the stinging tears in your eyes, threatening to fall at any given moment.

“Me?” he cocked an eyebrow, his eyes shamelessly roaming your body as he blew out a huff. “I just wanna have a little chat, that's all...” The unknown man takes another step towards you, invading your personal space, his tall frame towering over you as his bottom lip finds a home between his teeth. Rafe reaches up and tucks a strand of your hair behind your ear. “No need to be so scared, baby...”

“T-talk about what?” You have no idea what this man who you don’t know, could possibly want to talk about with you. Why is he acting like he knows you when you’re sure you’ve never even seen him before? Why is he…admiring you? No, that couldn’t be right. The mystery man is so confusing, all his twists and turns giving you whiplash. 

“Ah, you see...” he responds, pausing to place his other hand on the wall behind you, almost trapping you in. You feel his hot breath against the sensitive skin of your face, burning you like hot steam. His breath was slow and steady. He was completely calm. He liked this. He gave you a genuine smirk, bringing his face closer to your ear. “It’s more of a proposition really…”

“What is it…?” You ask. Not out of curiosity because honestly, you’re too afraid to know. But because you figure things might, just might go better for you if you play along. He stayed silent for a moment—enjoying the look in your eyes and your erratic breathing.

“All this fear…all this trembling...” he trails off as he brings his hand up to your chin, his thumb slowly tracing the outline of your lower lip. “It's nice to finally meet you...” He chuckles and leans in so that his lips nearly touch your ear. “Will you stop shaking like that if I tell you what I want?” His thumb moves from your bottom lip and he tucks a piece of your hair behind your ear; he doesn’t want anything getting in the way of his view of your pretty face.“Hmmm?” he challenged. “Or will you still be shaking like a scared little puppy?”

“I-I don’t…” You stutter, not being able to speak or even think clearly with the way he’s glaring at you. 

“Shhhh… ” he tutted, bringing his other hand from the wall to your lower back and drawing you even closer to him—until your body was almost flush against his, his touch surprisingly warm. “You're not answering my question,” he whispers your name as he runs his fingers through your hair, it’s softer than he’d imagined. 

“Please just…” The tears were no longer threatening as they began to fall down your cheeks. “Please…” Hearing this man who you do not know, say your name, was probably the most frightening thing to happen to you yet. 

“Shhh, stop that...” he calmly commanded when he saw the tears falling from your pretty eyes. Rafe's voice was soft but stern—he hated seeing you so distressed. His hand moved from your lower back to your chin, making you look up at him. “Hey it’s okay…it’s okay baby, no need for tears. I just wanna talk to you is all." You almost believe him for a moment with how sincere the glint in his eyes appeared. But you’ve picked up on his manipulative expressions. 

“My parents will be home soon…” You vaguely remember your parents mentioning something about something and blah blah blah…they’re closing early tonight. You really hope it’s true and isn’t just a figment of your imagination; something your mind is making up so you don’t completely give up. 

A cocky smile returned to his face as he let a small huff of amusement slip past his lips. He knew your parents were working late, just like every other Friday night. "Bullshit,” he chuckled. His hand moved back to your lower back, holding you against him. “It’s just you and me, pretty girl.” He grabs your waist and within the next second, you’re on your bed and he’s hovering over you. You can feel his hot breath in your ear, you can smell him, feel the excessive heat radiating from his body. He speaks quietly now, more serious than he’s been this entire time, “Don’t ever fuckin’ lie to me again. Got it?”

His words provoke a small whimper from you. How long has he been watching you? What’s he gonna do? What does he want to talk about? Your mind is filled with questions you’re too afraid to ask. “I-I’m not lying.” He leans down, his lips almost touching yours. Rafe’s eyes are looking straight into yours, admiring the complete and utter fear your eyes possess. He doesn’t want you to be scared of him. But fuck, does he love it.

“Oh yeah?” He mumbles as he presses his face into your hair, taking in your scent. He can’t believe he’s finally this close to you. He didn’t think it’d ever happen, and if you didn’t catch him tonight, it probably wouldn’t have. It’s meant to be, he thinks. “What did I tell you about lying, hm baby? I know you’re fuckin’ lyin’ to me, so you wanna try that again?”

Before your brain could muster up some bullshit response, the sound of the front door unlocking echoes through the hall and into your bedroom. Rafe holds his breath and puts his hand over your mouth, causing your eyes to widen as he leans to the side to glance down the hallway at the front door. “Shh…”, he whispers. You weren’t lying. Your parents came home from work early and they’re about to turn the doorknob and come inside the house. Rafe looks at you, the look in his eyes beyond unsettling. “Tell the cops…tell anyone, and I’ll come back and fuckin’ kill you, okay? This is our secret. Don’t make me come back and hurt you babe, I really, really don’t wanna have to do that, alright?” 

He has to be bluffing, right? But, when you look up to meet his gaze, you can tell; you can tell he meant every single syllable that he spoke. It’s not like the cops would believe you if you said you had a stalker anyways, you’re a pogue. And cops never believe a pogue. Rafe doesn’t need a response from you, the fear in your eyes tells him all he needs to know.

 Just before you hear the front door open, Rafe smirks at you. “We’re gonna have so much fun together baby.” Reluctantly, the disturbed man leans back and takes his hands away from you. Without another word, he walks over to your bedroom window and pushes it open. Before ducking to climb out, the large man looks back at you. Your breath hitches even further if that’s even possible.

 “Goodnight puppy.” The outline of his smug grin is visible even in the darkness of your room. Just as you hear the quiet voices of your parents enter your house, the dark figure turns and exits your window. When the man is outside you sit up and rush over to shut and lock the window behind him. 

With caution, Rafe watches as your mother comes to peek her head in your bedroom. She only lingers in your doorway long enough to see your dark shape laying in bed. Covered in blankets, you pretend to sleep, knowing that you wouldn’t be able to hold a casual conversation with your mother at the moment. And the last thing you want to do is raise any alarm. Not while he’s out there–whoever he is. Hot, salty tears fall from your eyes, wetting the soft skin of your cheeks. When she shuts the door, you let out a shaky breath, finally being able to breathe.But, you keep your eyes sealed shut. At least then you can’t see if the man is still watching you from outside your window. You lie awake for hours, how are you meant to go back to sleep after whatever the hell just happened? All you can do now is wait. Is he coming back? When will he come back? Who is he? Why does he want you? There’s a million different questions and worst scenarios circling around in your head. So, you just wait, it’s all you can do. 

As you wait, the hours turn into days, days turning into a week as the next Friday approaches you; you spend your time worrying about having to be home alone again. There still had been no sign of him since your encounter last week, but you decide to stay the night at a friend’s house, not wanting to take the risk. The second Friday after you came face-to-face with your stalker, you get a friend to spend the night with you. And now, after four weeks of waiting there’s still no sign of the deranged man. Although, if you had no knowledge of him stalking you for years he clearly is good at staying hidden. As the fourth Friday approaches, you think over your options. You can go to a friend’s house or have a friend stay over, as you’ve been doing. But, you’re tired of waiting for something to happen. You’re sick of not feeling safe in your own home and of having to look over your shoulder at all times. You used to love being alone, and now it’s been weeks since you’ve spent any time to yourself. You’ve had enough. This Friday you’re not hiding, you’re done being a coward. You will not allow this creep to keep taking away everything you love; you won’t allow yourself to waste any more time worrying about that psycho. So, you stay at home by yourself. He’s not gonna show, right? He was just bluffing or on drugs or something, that’s what you convince yourself.

You pull back the fluffy comforter on your bed and climb in. You pull the covers up and completely over yourself, you used to do this as a little girl when you’d have a nightmare or you’re scared of the thunder or the monster in your closet. If the blanket could protect you when you were little it should work now…right? Well, maybe it’d still work if you had a nightmare, but logically, what is it gonna do against your stalker? But no matter how much you force yourself to believe that he’s not coming back, you still find yourself praying. You’ve never been very religious, but recently you pray to whoever will listen. 

You had bought some sleeping pills from the store a few days after you discovered your secret stalker. They helped you sleep, since your brain hasn’t once stopped thinking about him since the whole fiasco. Reaching over, you pull out the drawer of your nightstand. You grab the bottle of pills, you swallow a couple dry and set the rest on your nightstand. The pills start to kick in quite sooner than usual, must be because you took double the amount…you’re gonna need them to fall asleep tonight. Your first night alone in weeks. In just a few short minutes, you’re out cold, buried underneath an absurd amount of pillows and blankets.

Rafe spent the past few weeks feeling overwrought after what he did. He feels wrong–a feeling he’s not used to experiencing. But it’s because he knows he’s ruined any chance he might’ve had with you. Before you caught him in your bedroom, he had a chance that you could meet him regularly and think he was just a normal guy. But now, all hopes of you ever thinking he’s ‘normal’ have been abandoned. He actually feels shame and…regret for his actions? He’s been seeing less and less of you, and it’s making him angry, so fucking angry. Your schedule has been relatively the same for the past years and now you’re switching it up? You’re hiding from him; running from him just like everyone else in his life. Maybe the things his family has been saying about him for most of his life is true; maybe everything he touches does turn to ash. God, why does he ruin everything? 

You are the one thing, the only thing that Rafe did not want to ruin. You’re the one thing in his life that’s too perfect to ruin…too innocent. But, the damage has been done. He doesn't have many options left. He could leave you alone, but then he’d be weak for not sticking to his word and he can’t have you thinking he’s weak and that you have the power. He could go back, but then what would he do? There was absolutely no way in hell you’d seriously talk to him, and he didn’t want to force himself onto you. He really wanted you to need him back, you have to want it. But everything you do or say now will be out of fear, it’ll be you trying to stay alive. He wanted you to be desperate for him, not desperate to get rid of him. Either way, you’re never gonna forgive him; you’ll always hate him now. Since you’ll feel the same no matter what he does now, he decides that he just needs to see you, he needs to talk to you again. It’s been far too long since he’s been close to you. He can’t take another goddamn second without seeing his reason to live.

He hurries over to your house, parking an entire block away as usual. He makes sure no eyes are on him as he sneaks around to your backyard. Rafe tries peeking through the curtains that block your window to see if you were in bed or not, but he can’t get a good view. He needs to know if you’re home. He needs to see you. 

Rafe sneaks around to the side of your house, checking all windows and doors in the process, but he has no such luck. But he doesn’t give up yet, he’ll get in, he’ll find a way. He tries the side door that leads into your garage. He lets out a giant breath of relief when the door clicks open. Once he’s inside the garage, he takes a quick glance around to analyze his surroundings and burn every inch of your house into his memory. When he finally enters your house, he takes his time to look around. Obviously Rafe knew you were a pogue–he knew everything about you, but you never really looked or acted like one. However, the inside of your home puts your life on display, making it very clear you’re a pogue. 

You sleep soundly, only being interrupted by the occasional dream; completely unaware that your stalker is making his way down the hall and into your bedroom. Rafe opens the door quietly. Your room is dark like the rest of your house, but the moonlight shining through your thin curtains provides just enough light that he can see the outline of your sleeping body. Now that your presence has been confirmed, he feels like he can finally breathe and he lets out a breath he didn’t even know he was holding. 

Before he became totally obsessed with you and he’d see you occasionally in public, you used to just make him horny. He’d catch a glimpse of your smile or hear the softness in the way you spoke, or the innocence in your sweet laugh and his dick would be hard within seconds. And when his obsession grew and he’d watch you more frequently, sex with other girls started not doing anything for him. He needed you…he needs you. When he actually started paying attention to the way you spoke, the way you acted, he fell in love–what he thinks is love anyways. Rafe realized you’re the sweetest, most pure person he’s ever known. He didn’t think people like you really existed. His discovery led him to watch you more closely, he started taking more risks just because he needed to find your flaw. There’s no way you’re actually this perfect, it has to be an act. Now, after years of watching you he can confidently say that you really are just that perfect. Rafe needs you for more than just getting off now, he needs your comfort, he needs the kindness that radiates off of you. Which is why he’s always trying to find a way to get closer to you, he needs to absorb your sweetness. But hes really done it now; he’s fucked up big time. You hate him.

He hadn’t realized that the hate he brought upon you would tint the kindness that radiates for your being. He has to get you to let go of the hate he’s caused you, he needs you to be yourself again. He just doesn't know how, if it’s even possible.

 As you sleep soundly, his large frame towers over you as he stares down at you through the darkness. You look so peaceful, so innocent. It physically pains him to know that he’s taken away parts of your innocence. All he can do is stare at you as he mentally curses himself. He can’t wake you up and ruin your small moment of peace. It’s better if you don’t know he’s there. 

Your stalker slowly raises his hand and uses his thumb and pointer finger to pull your blanket down to your knees. Even with the blankets pulled down most of your body was hidden from him. Almost everything is left to the imagination in the loose, patterned pj pants and the oversized, long sleeve shirt that you’re wearing. He can only see a small portion of your lower stomach due to your shirt slightly riding up. And that small bit of skin is enough to trigger his memories of you. Because of course he’s seen you countless times; he’s got your body memorized.

He’s practically panting as he takes in the sight of you, imagining that you’re unclothed beneath him; his memory is sharp enough to almost see it. His cock grows to press against his jeans and his eyes trail up to your beautiful face. The ache in his needy cock starts to become unbearable. Your name slips past his lips in the form of a mumble when he starts to palm himself through his newly tightened jeans. 

Okay, Rafe has definitely jerked off to the thought of you, your smell…everything about you makes him lose whatever control he ever even had to begin with. Something he hasn’t gotten to do yet is jerk off with you right in front of him as a live viewing source, fresh for his eyes. He’s gonna be able to cross that off the bucket list soon enough; he can’t wait any longer. His hand stops its ministrations over his jeans as his head turns and he moves over to your closet, grabbing a pair of delicate, worn panties from the top of your laundry hamper. He brings the treasure up to his nose to smell you. God, he could cream his fucking pants right now. He quietly walks back over to you, taking a look at the pill bottle on your nightstand. He picks it up with his free hand, eyes quickly scanning over the label. He smirks as he sets it back down. Rafe turns his head to look back at you. His smirk grows even wider as he leans back, cocking his head as he observes you. Yeah, you’re definitely gonna be out for a while.

With his pants and boxers around his ankles, he stands over you. Your panties between his hand and his cock as his fist slowly pumps up and down his length. His other hand meticulously pulls your shirt up to reveal your chest.

“Fuckkk…” he whispers under his breath as his bottom lip is held captive between his teeth. Your perfect tits are spilling out of your bra as you lie asleep on your back. He lightly fiddles with the ends of your hair as his hand pumps over his dick repeatedly and without rhythm. He takes his time, Rafe never likes to rush this. Especially not with you.

Your subconscious mind reacts to his light touch and sounds, pulling you into a wet dream; seeing as a main side effect of the medication you took was vivid dreams. You’ve also been unusually horny lately, probably because you’d been too afraid to touch yourself when you thought you were being watched twenty-four/seven. His fingers trail up your stomach and into the valley of your breasts with feather light touch.

You stir a bit, not because you felt him, but because the dream you’ve been thrown into by your subconscious is starting to get your body all worked up. You’ve been extra horny recently and keep having sex dreams since you haven’t been able to touch yourself the past few weeks, having a stalker and all. As he leans down to lightly kiss the skin in between your boobs, a moan slips past his lips, vibrating off of your skin and interrupting the mostly silent room. The only other sound that can be heard in the quiet room is that caused by Rafe’s hand quickly moving up and down his cock; the friction caused by the soft fabric of your panties generates a quiet noise. Pre-cum leaks from his slit and seeps into the fabric of your recently worn panties. He leans back down to create a hickey on your chest and hopes that you won’t wake up from the sudden feeling, although if you did that might be even better. Shaking the selfish thought out of his head, he sucks strongly at the smooth skin between your beautiful tits. He pulls his mouth off with a pop! Leaning back to see the mark he left, he smirks knowing you’ll see it too eventually. The already rhythmless movements of his hand gets even more erratic the closer he gets to reaching his orgasm. 

The man standing above you runs his hand back down your chest and abdomen as you sleep. Completely unaware of what's happening to your physical body right now, you begin to get all wrapped up in your dream. You only ever get sex dreams when you’re so overly horny, which you’ve been the past few weeks. That combined with the sleeping medication you took, made this particular dream feel different; it felt so…real. The only dream-like part about it was that you couldn’t see the man's face for whatever reason. 

While you’re in a deep sleep, you involuntarily let out a needy whine as your active mind plays games with you. When Rafe hears you he thinks he imagined it, until he hears you do it again. He wonders if you could feel him, except he’s not even touching you right now. Realizing that's clearly not the reason, he furrows his brows in confusion. He pulls the duvet cover completely off of you to reveal the way you keep periodically squirming as your body searches for the same feeling your mind is experiencing; and the way your toes tighten up and curl as you’re tricked into thinking you feel pleasure. 

He can’t take it, not when you look like this. The man hovering over your unconscious figure lets out a lewd moan that corrupts the silence as hot strings of his cum spurt out of the pink, glistening tip of his cock and onto the pair of your panties that he's got clenched in his fist, immediately soaking into the fabric. Surprisingly, when he gets through his orgasm, he adoringly covers you back up with your blankets and leaves your house, locking the door he entered through to be sure you were safe. He got enough to satisfy him for now as he works on a plan to change the way you think of him.  He’ll be back for more of you soon enough. He has to fix this; the biggest mistake he’s ever made and the only regret he’ll ever carry. 

To be continued...

Thank you for reading! I hope this was enjoyable and not a waste of time. I spent a lot of time on this part, especially with the editing since I never really feel done with anything. If you have literally ANY feedback, questions, or suggestions, PLEASE feel free to let me know! I don't really have any solid plans for this fic so if you have any ideas I just might include them, there's not much I won't write!

I'd like to thank @faiszt for inspiring me to write this fic!

[thedaddycomplex]

How did you begin your success journey as a writer? I feel as though there are so many paths and the pressure to find the right path is so overwhelming.

Oh, "success journey" sounds so nice, much better than "a series of major calamities and general dip-shittery" that actually got me here.

First, let me say you are absolutely right that there are many paths. And please don't feel pressure to find the "right" one. There's no correct or perfect path, only the one that gets you there. And it'll likely be a total surprise once you arrive to learn that you were on a path at all. I sure a shit was.

OK, I'll give you my whole story, not just the beginning. Because I feel like it was a bunch of beginnings in a row. So hold tight, I can get long-winded about this stuff...

I began my professional post-college career as a journalist, where I honed my writing voice. Honing your voice is a huge component for any writer, I believe. But, you can do that just by writing and writing more, any way and anywhere you can—blog, diary, bathroom stalls, wherever. But, journalism and I didn't get along and soon found I had angered any newspaper editor that might hire me.

I did some odd gigs here and there (communications manager, copywriter, reality TV writer), but nothing I could call a career. Not long after our twins were born, I started this very Tumblr account and started chronicling my repeated cartoonish failures as a stay-at-home father.

I found a supportive community here—another big component for any writer—and I started to get attention outside of Tumblr. A fellow parenting Tumblr liked my writing and put me in touch with her friend, who is an awesome agent. So, then I had an agent, but nothing to sell. I felt stupid. I had a tool and no materials to build anything.

About a year later, at what felt like my lowest point ever, I wrote a snarky shit-post lampooning all of the various parenting crazes and techniques. It went viral (strangely, pretty much everywhere but Tumblr). A book deal soon followed.

That first book became a bestseller. And my relationship with that publisher grew into more book deals. And I parlayed my new career as an author into an even newer career as a screenwriter.

It all was... no. It all is so fucking weird.

None of it would have happened if I hadn't honed my writing voice at a job that wouldn't last long. None of that would have happened if I could've afforded to join a more "professional" blogging platform (Tumblr is free and I was poor). And I never would have landed an agent if I hadn't met the wonderful parenting community here. And I wouldn't have written a post that changed my life if I didn't vent some ol' fashioned pettiness and anger with my writing.

So, yeah, maybe it is a success journey. To me it's just a series of major calamities and general dip-shittery.

But, it's the path that got me here. And I'm fine with that.

So, don't worry, @dulxetwrites. You'll find your own path. Just keep writing, keep making and taking opportunities. It'll seem random, chaotic, sometimes tragic, always weird.

That's all OK. Because all journeys would be boring without a little calamity.

[avoliot]

Querying

I got an ask on querying, which I answered privately as it had personal details in it, but thought the info might be useful more widely. As I didn't officially query I have crowdsourced some tips from my agented friends who did (ed: the group chat would like me to say i have 'consulted the sages') so here is the collected wisdom, which I have sorted into categories.

Please note that this is largely based on querying US agents.

Before you start:

Prepare yourself emotionally for rejection. if at all possible, write another book. Really common not to get rep for your first novel and really common for the book you got signed for not to sell. Honestly a lot of the confusion around querying is like, this is not about getting a good mark in writing a book. This is starting a career.

Don't jump the gun - make sure you've polished your book as much as possible yourself, sought feedback from beta readers and critique partners etc.

Finding agents:

Use manuscript wishlist, query tracker etc to build a list of agents, research their sales history in your genre.

If you can: spring for a publishers marketplace membership for at least a month (it's $25 and you can cancel any time). That way you can see who is selling comparative titles and whether they are selling to reputable publishers.

Don't query anyone you're not actually prepared to sign with. No agent is better than a bad agent.

Query letter:

Make sure you actually understand your genre, are reading recent releases, and know where your book would sit on the shelf, the number of people trying to query 200k game of thrones clones and getting nowhere because the industry moved on from there two decades ago is shockingly high.

Have a really solid idea of what the marketable hook for the book is. Which doesn't have to be what you personally like about it or what makes it good.

Use resources to both read a lot of query letters and, if you like, get yours critiqued. QueryShark archives are free and incredibly helpful. r/pubtips is, despite being reddit, a pretty good place to get specific feedback on your query

Pubtips also has wiki resources on query letter structure, vetting agents etc.

More details:

Even if you've got a series ready to go, you'll probably get further querying it as a standalone with series potential, 'this is the first in a seven part series and I love my characters so much and blahblah' isn't as appealing as you'd think.

Don't editorialise and praise your own manuscript, let people decide for themselves whether it's sensitive/gripping/lyrical.

This is a business letter, you don't need to be SUPER formal, but also be polite and professional and don't get overly familiar.

Referring to other authors the agent reps and how you see your work fitting in with that list also can be effective, but on the whole, personalisation is only necessary if there's something you really want to say to that particular agent. "I'm querying you with my fantasy book because you rep fantasy" can just be left out.

Don't comp the absolute no. 1 bestseller in your genre, comping Sanderson for your fantasy book (or, even worse, Tolkein) will make you look wildly out of touch.

Misc:

be prepared to wait a billion years for a response, it is a shitshow right now

also if you don't know anyone in publishing that's normal but if ur serious about writing professionally please god make friends with some writers at the same career stage. not a query tip but truly essential for ur sanity

[veliseraptor]

April Reading Recap

Now with Storygraph generated visuals!

Finished out my Wheel of Time reread last month with Towers of Midnight and A Memory of Light; I still have all the same frustrations with both and with Brandon Sanderson's books more generally but A Memory of Light did make me cry (again) so...I have to give it credit there, if for nothing else. The other 11 books I read, not including the Black Widow trade paperback collections that I reread (mostly because I felt lazy about it):

The Haunting of Room 904 by Erika Wurth. This book confused me - as in, I wasn't totally sure what was going on or why. The plot was happening but I wasn't really following the chain of causality most of the time. I'm still going to read Erika Wurth's other book, because I didn't find the experience of reading itself to be unenjoyable, and maybe it was just me, but...damn, I felt like I was struggling to piece this book's disparate pieces together and figure out what it was saying.

A Rome of One's Own: The Forgotten Women of the Roman Empire by Emma Southon. I don't know that I could adequately explain why I picked this one up when I was mildly irritated by A Fatal Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, except that I guess gender-related studies of the Roman Republic/Empire are catnip to me in a similar way that mythological retellings are (I often don't like them, I read them anyway). I was once again mildly irritated by the chatty, conversational tone of this book, which is really a me problem and not an it problem but I did find it personally grating. The scholarship underlying the text might be strong but the text itself feels like it undermines the scholarship. Or maybe I'm just a snob.

The Merciful Crow by Margaret Owen. I almost never read YA for a few different reasons, but this one was recommended by a friend so I gave it a go. And it was pretty good! But still did feel very YA to me in a lot of ways. I don't know if I'll pick up the sequel. I might, because it was a very quick read and I found some of the worldbuilding interesting, but I didn't really connect to most of the characters and found the plot fairly predictable.

Metal From Heaven by August Clarke. I've seen this book recommended widely so I had high hopes for it, and I wasn't...disappointed? Exactly? But I don't think it really worked for me. Possibly some of that is that first person narration is something that is really hit-or-miss for me, but honestly I think more of it comes down to the fact that - and I feel like I keep saying this - it ended up feeling like the delivery mechanism for a manifesto rather than a narrative. Which wasn't inevitable, I don't think! There were interesting things going on here, potentially! Though I think they were underexploited in terms of the, I don't know, moral thorniness that was kind of brushed off by the "our thieves are good and moral" thing. Reminded me a little of what happened with the Lords of Fortune in Veilguard, honestly.

I don't know. Maybe if I can come out of a book feeling like I can confidently say what an author's political stance is on a specific issue, I'm just not going to like it. And now I'm talking myself into feeling like maybe I was disappointed after all.

America for Americans: A History of Xenophobia in the United States by Erika Lee. I've had Erika Lee's other book (on Asian-American history in the United States) on my shelf for a while but got to this one first largely because. You know. I definitely learned about a few new chapters of ignominy in US history that I wasn't previously aware of; I was already in agreement with the main thesis of this book (that xenophobia is a core and recurring piece of United States culture) so that wasn't a revelation to me or anything. This was published pre-2020 but the paperback included a postlude on racism against Asians and Asian-Americans around the outbreak of COVID.

A Short History of Queer Women by Kirsty Loehr. Speaking of books with a chatty, conversational tone that turns me off! This was supposed to be a fun little interlude, took me a few hours to read, I thought I would enjoy it. It annoyed me. It did, however, provide me with a citation of a more sober history of lesbian women that I probably will enjoy more.

The Icepick Surgeon: Murder, Fraud, Sabotage, Piracy, and Other Dastardly Deeds Perpetuated in the Name of Science by Sam Kean. This one was...fine. It was fun, it was interesting, it was trying a little too hard to have a moral message and not just enjoy the narrative ride of people doing wild (and often terrible) things in the name of science. I was also sort of irritated by the author's constant footnotes basically saying "go check out my podcast for more on this!" but maybe that is unfair of me.

Birds of Prey: Murder & Mystery by Gail Simone, Ed Benes, et. al. I don't remember exactly what inspired me to go back and reread this run (because I have read it before), but something did. The art has not aged well; the writing is still quite good. I am, if anyone was wondering, still bitter about DC "fixing" Babs and effectively deaging her.

A Culture of Conspiracy: Apocalyptic Visions in Contemporary America by Michael Barkun. I pulled a quote from this one that was very oof to read in our year 2025. It was originally published in 2003; there's a second edition from 2013 with additional material that I'm trying to acquire, but even that is going to be miserably out of date as far as the current state of conspiracy thought in the United States. I'm glad I read it, though; the most potent thing I took out of it was probably the way the author discussed the shift from conspiracies that are either religious or secular in origin to what he called "improvisational," meaning that they are omnivorous and borrow from multiple, unrelated strains of thought/ideology. I also just finished another book about conspiratorial thinking in the US and found myself comparing it unfavorably to this one, despite the other one being newer.

The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett. I love mysteries though I sometimes forget how much. I love second-world fantasy (obviously). I also really love Robert Jackson Bennett's work and pretty much have across the board (though I haven't finished the series beginning with Foundryside). This is clearly riffing on Sherlock Holmes but secondary world, but it worked for me and I'm excited to read the sequel.

The Voyage Home by Pat Barker. I read The Women of Troy a while back and don't really remember it, but The Silence of the Girls by the same author remains one of my all-time standouts of Iliad retellings and myth retellings in general so when I saw this one, and read that it was going to cover some Oresteia ground, I tossed it on to-read list fast. I liked this one better than I remember enjoying the second one - I don't think one needs to read either of the others to read this, though there are connections between them. I think what made this book work for me in a way that myth retellings often (generally) don't was the fact that it felt much less like it was self-consciously Retelling a Myth with a point to make than it was taking an existing story and working within it to tell a different story. It felt much more about the characters than about the myth, if that makes sense. I think telling a solid third+ of the novel from an outside point-of-view - not one of the core myth characters - was also a good choice, here.

---

Anyway - I have about 8 books out from the public library right now, so those are taking priority, followed by the two books I have borrowed from a friend. It's about half/half fiction/nonfiction, mostly horror, so I'm going to try to alternate. Right now I am reading Hungerstone by Kat Dunn, which I am excited about; also upcoming is The Museum of Other People and The Reformatory.

also continuing to reread a bunch more comics, apparently.

[meirimerens]

Do you have recommendations on reading sth more experimental? 👀

fair warning a lot of the experimental shit i've read i've read in art school context so i have no idea if the classmates who made it published it somewhere + it is kinda hard to recommend experimental shit by virtue of it being experimental so i'm going to rec stuff that i consider like. "mainstream" experimental as in yeah an author wrote this. also the "actually unconventional" bar is pretty low starting from the stuff i was moaning about so well also ☝ love pushing upon people books i've read + i know for a fact i've pushed them before lollll so

mainstream as it goes: House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski. like you know?

unconventional in essence through shape. it is one book of ergodic literature and if you dig into ergodic literature you will find unconventionality that's kinda Its Thing. i understand by standards for "unconventional prose/pacing" get pretty high once you've put your eyes on this but like. i got more conventional in shape that still are unconventional in prose of pacing.

still mainstream-ish? if you're French? she was an author well-known and important in her time and place (she's still alive it's just that she was important as an author of the literary feminist wave in the 60s & 70s), Anankè by Hélène Cixous. i've read it in french and have no idea how it fares in english (or translated otherwise) but if you want unconventional pacing and prose you're getting unconventional pacing and prose. it is full to the brim with homonyms (hence why idk how it fares in english), of subject-to-attribute uncouplings (a verb conjugated for "I", a subject as "she"), words straight up made the fuck up through homonymy (like "téléfaune", from téléphone and faune [faun/satyr]). some sentences are 2 full pages long, reading them feels like trying to ride out an engine startle. it has no plot, it is about an internal trip, a self-actualization from girl to woman, or from chaperoned woman to free woman. you don't read this for plot, you read this to feel like you've traveled with your head through the open window, and for the imagery, god the imagery i find so very great. unlikely associations, quite sensorial. it's a short book but i've needed multiple tries to get through it because, as i've said, the long sentences feel like trying to hold onto a hand-cranked engine start. the pacing feels cyclical, like an endless stop and start, expressing the internal conflict. you have to hold onto it.

mainstream-ish again if you're french, Le Corps Lesbien [The Lesbian Body] by Monique Wittig. it's one of those where if you're not on that crazy shit you're gonna get yucked, it is endlessly violent in grotesque ways that make you horribly aware of all the anatomical details of your body. it alternates horrible and grotesque neverending violence with horrible and grotesque neverending tenderness (& sometimes neverending tenderness in/through grotesque violence or vice-versa). another one of those where the english translation cannot truly do it justice because french has "elles [female plural they]" and "ils [male plural they]" and wittig goes out of her way to never use ils [french has "masculine as default" grammatical gender]. in the french text, "je" (subject "I") is cleaved in twain: "j/e". In english, they've just italicized it; i think they'd have done well to use something like the polish ł to figure it. anyways barely a plot either. cyclical destruction in grotesque ways that both are anatomical impossible and yet horrifyingly anatomically-anchored. re:the violence in this i'm sure if you've read like. "extreme horror" novels by whichever male author of the month it is you probably won't flinch but i've read this after a long streak of nonfiction & poetry.

i think a bit less mainstream because i've been told about it in art school lol after i had partaken in a collective performance and my stuff had for base a poem about a roadkill that neverendingly dies then is reborn only to die again anyways Jaguar Harmonics by Anne Waldman. closer to poems than literature-in-prose (even if it is in prose instead of rhyme) it is about/from the yagé (ayahuasca) ritual by waldman, poet & buddhist & activist who brings in the text a lot of subjects and themes (the anthropocene, colonization, environmental and feminist concerns,...). it is poetry, so technicallyyyyyyy unconventional by nature as far as literature goes, + spoken poetry at that, i know for a fact there is a bandcamp where you can listen to the poems spoken/sung.

what else. since i'm on the topic of poetry check out Guillaume Apollinaire's Calligrammes i guess

you'll hate me for bringing it up again + it's poetry also againnnn LOL but The Oresteia as transladaptated by Tony Harrison. i find it's great english it uses words that brother i've never seen used. and i loooooove a made-up compound word the people know this about me. let's liven this shit up let's make words up!

French has l'Oulipo ("Ouvroir de littérature potentielle", "opener of potential literature") with representatives such as Raymond Queneau who made a book of poems that looks like this

OH AND HE MADE "EXERCISES DE STYLE" which i quite like also (99 times the same story written with different stylistic/literary constraints)

[xclowniex]

Okay I need peoples opinions in this.

There is a tik tok creator and author who has a series on tik tok they're trying to turn into a book called Cafae Latte.

It is this very queer and diverse series. All characters are played by one woman, the creator who is white.

She has 2 jewish characters, both are dragons who shape shifted into humans. One wears a magen david and the other is orthodox and wears a tichel. The creator wears them when portraying the respective characters

Now I have an issue with this for a few reasons which all fall under the big glaring thing of, they didn't consult any jews or do any research past the surface!

First issue of business is the tichel. I do find it incredibly disrespectful for a non jew to wear a tichel when you're portraying a Jewish character and you can't even get tzniut correctly. It wasn't until they finally got a tichel, that they learnt thay they needed to cover their collar bone and elbows. Especially when you also don't call it a tichel and just call it a "jewish head covering". If you're trying to make a Jewish character who keeps tzniut, these are basic things you should know if you did any research!

Second order of business, the magen david. I do find this disrespectful as it's not really for non jews to wear???? Like it's not like you commit this great atrocity by wearing it. But considering their poor rep with the character above, I doubt they know anything meaning behind it and why its important to jews. Plus it's pretty much literally just used to signify that the character is Jewish and that's it.

Thirdly order of business, idk how else to start this besides, they unjewished hebrew??????

Like they were creating a family crest for one of their jewish characters and had this design with the tree of life and some hebrew and wanted help on getting the hebrew correct and said "hebrew speakers and that probably include jews, I think. I need your help with this hebrew".

Like excuse me what. Not all jews speak hebrew and not all hebrew speakers are jewish, but the majority of hebrew speakers are jewish. Adding jews as this after thought which may technically be included is awful.

Last order of business. This time, not about the jewish characters but the arab and muslim one.

Therre is this character they play who is a Muslim arab amercian and they said in their intro post for this character "I'm not sure which arab country specifically she is from as I'm not educated enough". Like excuse me what. There are cultural differences between different arab countries, not in a way which they're completely different from each other but it is a thing.

And to make matters worse, she has a YouTube video giving tips on writing diversity well.

And idk it just really irks me as they are a published writer, who is all about good diversity representation yet can't even do it properly. Consulting jews, not even jews actually, hebrew speakers to use their words, is not enough to give good rep. You need to talk to rabbis, jewish community leaders in general.

[mimiri22-6]

Ok so, something's been driving me crazy for the past 2-3 days now; I can't find one fanfic!

-its a stranger things fic

-eddie still dies

-Steve visit his grave regularly

-wayne visits the grave to clean graffiti off it...or Steve does that, I can't remember now

-wayne talks to Steve about Eddie

-Steve slowly falls in love with these stories of Eddie and mourns never knowing him

-the kids graduate and are semi scattered around out of hawkins...or just spend A Lot less time with Steve nowI CAN'T FUCKING REMEMBE-

-leaving Steve and Wayne to themselves

-Steve and Wayne move in together/Wayne moves into the Harrington house because they are both just so sad

-meanwhile Eddie is slowly helped back to his body my El being directed by some gov/lab people

-its a success, and her and Eddie get along. I think.

-eddie still has to recover because he was comatose/dead for the past year(s?)(maybe the kids didn't graduate yet?????IDFK)

-El did all of this in secret without telling anyone, but since she would be gone for a long while she told a lie or something? Or she told the truth that she was going to the gov again, but didn't say why? I forget exactly how she loopholed her way out of not lying about where she was going

-El brings Eddie back while Steve is visiting Eddie's grave again and gets whiplash when Eddie speaks up behind him

-one of the gov guys, maybe the main one, was with and says something along the lines of'this is compensation, we found him and said 'we can use this'' he doesn't Really say that, but that's the vibe

-it was originally on Tumblr in multiple linked parts, I'm pretty sure, but it eventually got put on AO3 too? Maybe? Hopefully

-I Rb'd it but I stopped religiously adding tags forever ago when I Still couldn't find anything

-multiple povs, obviously, but specifically Wayne, Steve, Eddie, and El I'm pretty sure.

-i think I was looking for 'wayne munson major character death, or something' at the time and now I've exhausted all avenues and it's taking prescious time out of my homework hours because I can't stop thinking about it.

OH

-im pretty sure I read it back in 2023, if not, I 1000000% didn't read it this year and I Really think I didn't read it last year, aka 2024. So date published is narrowed down two, BUT I STILL COULDN'T PIN IT DOWN-

-Edit: Timeline for when I most likely read it is ACTUALLY February 3rd 2023-late June 2023 AT IT'S MOST NARROWED, CURRENTLY. I've gone backwards in my post history, and now I'm using the tumblr mass edit tool to try and find it. wish me luck o7

-it could be tagged steddie, but I was thinking it might have been one of those'i wrote this platonically but you can interpret this anyway you want' fics and that's another reason why I'm so unsure about this fucking thing

-there was absolutely no sign of the author bringing Eddie back in the first part/chapter until Eddie gave Steve whiplash

-the pov after Steve was Wayne and then maybe El and then Eddie? But the first 2 I'm pretty positive of

-i have no clue if there was a prologue, but they do bring the party back together to surprise them with Eddie and I Think that's where it ends

-it felt like a long read, but I could be wrong, it definitely wasn't short though

I was doing the search again this morning and I still haven't eaten and the cats haven't eaten, and I still have to read/consume material before class today and and💥(I'm legit going a little mad looking for this thing, I haven't been able to sleep a full night)

[unofficial-underfell]

Hey guys, I've been thinking about making this post for a long time and I think its finally time I do so. After realizing that some of my last work was done over a year ago, I don't think I can really ignore it anymore. While I haven't quite thrown in the towel on this quite yet, it's pretty evident to me and I'm sure to everyone who still follows this blog that my fervor for the project has drastically decreased. And has been kind of dead for a while. The comic has not been a priority to me, or posting online much at all actually. I did some soul searching and found that I'd started relying on outside approval for my art instead of doing art for the sake of wanting to tell a story and express myself throughout my work. I have limited energy and depression and sometimes it feels like i get such little progress done even though it takes all of my energy. While I'm trying to go to the gym more and build better habits my energy levels and mood still have a lot to be desired, and I'd rather use the limited energy I have to work on something I'm more passionate about.

I've been trying to grow my skills and absorb more stories and I've moved around a lot and started to listen to what I really felt, and I found that a lot of the art I want to focus on deals with heavier and more mature topics. I do love this story, and all of the characters and I feel like I could make a really clever subversion of what is expected from an Underfell comic. But I feel like in these uncertain times with the world and with all of the stuff going on right now, I'd like to use my energy to work on stories that hit closer to the things that I feel are important. So that's why I've not been posting much.

I'm working on a book, and I've actually got quite a lot of progress done on it, but because of all the horror stories online about people stealing author's original works, I'm kind of holding off on publishing any chapters before I can copyright the first draft of the novel. So my online activity will still be pretty scarce for a bit, though I'll still post occasionally on my @cosmicpixel01 account. I'll try better to not be so radio silent though lol. Even if that means I'll post something boring about my dog or books I'm reading just so everyone knows I'm still alive.

I don't want to call it quits on the story. But I also feel like you guys have been kept waiting to see what happens for a really long time, and that makes me feel so guilty. I will try to finish up the pages I have in the works, and I'm probably going to switch to a different format that is some drawings, some writing to finish the story. I'm sorry that I wasn't able to finish it the way I intended for you guys, even with all of the support and kind words and even the fanart that I've kept in a folder on my desktop. I am letting a lot of you down, but I feel like the radio silence is probably more irresponsible than just going out and saying something. And I'm sorry I've kept you all waiting for a not-so-happy update on the blog.

I hope that some of you will continue to follow me for some of my other exploits and see whatever other things I have going on, but I understand that you all followed me for Undertale so I don't want you to feel any sort of guilt if you decide not to. I'm just happy you all supported me for so long.

I'll try to work on this blog again soon, and if anyone has any questions, my asks are open, though I'll probably keep the asks private. Until then I hope everyone stays safe out there. And from the bottom of my heart, thank you.

-Avery

[wrongcaitlyn]

okay fuck so i got an anon ask for solangelo fic recs and then i made a draft on my phone but then deleted it bc i wanted to type it out on my computer but then that deleted the ask too so!! hopefully this reaches the anon i apologize deeply for losing your ask😭

but anyway. SOLANGELO FIC RECS. ALWAYS. ANYTIME. I HAVE SO MANY

so first of all if you wanna check out my ao3 i have a bunch of recs in my bookmarks (57 solangelo ones im pretty sure)

but here are some of my favs

i'm put in awe (of something so flawed and free) by CordeliaRose (@cordelia---rose)

archaeologist!Nico & trauma surgeon!Will AU. this fic is. ohmgyod. nico's internal dialogue is just absolutely perfect in this fic and i laughed so hard and god it was just so beautifully written?? but also solangelo are literally so cute. like. ahglskdf. i gotta reread this actually but anyway (also anything by this author, absolutely hilarious, such good writing)

dumb, dumb love by thegoldenappleofdiscord

five times nico and will are dumb and in love, and the one time they are totally 100% dead serious. i love a good outsider's pov, and this fic is just gorgeous. it's a bunch of different perspectives into solangelo, and it's pure fluff, and it's got some of my favorite solangelo quotes (like, when i read fanfic i screenshot parts i rlly like and i practically screenshotted this entire fic), and their characterization is just so so accurate they're so so in love

paris by ethannku (@ethannku)

Nico has a travel YouTube channel. And a crush on one Will Solace. i'm such a sucker for socmed au's and this one is done SO so well. my all time favorite. and it's sequel too!! the formatting i am in awe of, but other than that, it's just a really good time and i just love all the little details. i've reread this too many times to count and was SO excited when a sequel was published, and i can only hope that there's more to the au in the future!! (also this author writes incredible solangelo fics and even more valgrace fics which i recently just bingeread and are soo good)

Perfect Places by buoyantsaturn (@buoyantsaturn)

“My name’s Will,” he started - so far so good - but then continued, “and I guess my favorite food to cook would be, um, frozen pizza.” Was Nico only attracted to idiots? this one's fucking hilarious. i can't even put it to words like their dynamic in this fic is so funny and yet so cute and nico is honestly just like. shocked that will is somehow still alive?? will's a safety hazard. but also piper and jason in this fic are so funny too, it's honestly just such a good, fun read (and, once again, this author's incredible. read everything by them)

I Can't Help It If You Look Like an Angel by the_oncoming_stormaggedon (@lordstormageddidnt)

Will Solace is a pre-med student whose friends run a true crime podcast called "Nothing to See Here". Nico di Angelo, despite not realizing he's a missing person, is the subject of one of the episodes. They meet by chance in a random bar, and shenanigans ensue. i mean, if it's got a taylor swift title, i'm already sold. and then it's part of a series called "Hey Stephen is a solangelo song and i will die on that hill" which is the realest thing ever?? but ASIDE from that, i could honestly rec this entire series (+ the other series it's a part of, "Nothing to See Here" which is all part of the same au) and also everything by this author - it's hilarious, i just love the premise, and the writing is so good!! and hey stephen is a solangelo song, thereby reinforcing my "fearless is will's favorite album ever of all time and i will die on this hill" argument

Even When the Music's Gone by the_oncoming_stormaggedon

It's the 74th Annual Hunger Games, and Nico and Will are the last two tributes alive. haha this is pure angst. just gutwrenching angst. love a good hunger games au and some MCD!

can i handle the seasons of my life? by buoyantsaturn

“I think that most people your age finished high school, and whether they knew what they wanted to do with the rest of their life or not, they went to college. That was their version of ditching everything they knew in order to find themselves. Maybe it’s time for you to stop taking advice from other kids who grew up the same way you did, and take it from someone who used to be normal.”  FAME AU FAME AU FAME AU FAME AU i mean, not REALLY about the fame aspect of it, but i still love it so so much. will's essentially a nepo baby turned not-nepo-baby turned college student and nico's naomi's driver, and there's even... there's EVEN A VERY BRIEFLY IMPLIED POLLEN. yeah they're relationship is just so cute in this and i love the au and i love how it's written and ugh i need more fame au's in my life

so it turns out teachers don't live at school by RegretfullyRegretful (@marbleheavy)

Nico's TA and students are determined to figure out something, anything about him. Of course, it would all just be a lot easier if they asked. Either way, Professor di Angelo is decidedly a lonely hermit. (Someone should really tell his husband and baby that) this was one of the first solangelo fics i ever read, and it's just. so. funny. another outsider's pov bc i love it, and just... the assumptions abt nico, the fluff of solangelo, and then their story of how they got together is so...ahhsdlkjs this author is just a master at tooth-rotting fluff go read everything they write

my lover's the sunlight by demigodbeautiies

Figure Skater Nico di Angelo has a run in with Ice Hockey Player Will Solace. It doesn't go too smoothly, but then again - when does it ever? OLYMPICS AU. FAME(ISH) AU. IM OBSESSED THIS IS WRITTEN SO WELL and like... the very brief part where it feels a lot like a fame au like i just i'm obsessed can you tell. the writing is just beautiful in this, i love nico's internal dialogue, and... i mean, it's an olympics au. ofc its perfect

The Stolen God by TsarinaTorment (@tsarinatorment)

Python is defeated. The prophecies are restored, and Nero has fallen. Apollo has not been seen since. His trials are over; why isn’t he back on Olympus? okay so. this is a bit of a longer fic. and it's a post-toa, pjoxmcga crossover, and it's not *entirely* focused on solangelo - but when i tell you that this fic, if i weren't reading it on ao3, i would truly and full-heartedly believe was a real life published novel - i am NOT LYING. i rec'd this to my friend right after i read it bc i was just like so so obsessed with it and it's literally just. the plot?? is insane. i'm in awe of the author, bc this isn't even the only novel-length fic that they've written with an insane plot too (their fic Eclipse is also phenomenal, but it's more focused on apollo and hades so i didn't rec it here) there's some fierrochase here, lester being lester, and some very very very cute solangelo! and meg! i think sometimes you read a fic and you're like "oh, shit, that could be a novel, and i would think it's better than some actual novels i've read" and this is one of them

(Please Don't Let Me) Fade Alone by TsarinaTorment

Please. Don't let me. the summary's really short here so it's basically that will gets very very very injured and then apollo saves him (rip, i'm sorry, i suck at summaries) once again this isn't necessarily nico focused... it's much more will & apollo. this author writes the absolute best stuff for the apollo cabin, genuinely, if you love will/cabin 7/apollo PLEASE read everything they've ever written but this is just so angsty and the hurt/comfort is so real and goddd it's so good

he was seen on occasion (pacing the rocks, staring out at the midnight sea) by stargirltv

Nico di Angelo is a completely normal eighteen year old. He attends high school, has a socially acceptable amount of friends for a social outcast and has been in a relationship for the past four years with the guy he’s pretty sure he’s going to marry. He also happens to be the world's biggest bedroom pop artist, ‘Hell’s Angel’, with a fan base that will stop at nothing to uncover his true identity and a Father that continually pushes him to be better. His boyfriend freaking out under every single one of his tweets is making it a bit easier for them to figure it out. so. fame au. y'all already know the premise of this is just absolutely hilarious and the interview?? the posts?? will just being will and i absolutely love his characterization?? and the friend group?? this is one of the funniest things ever but also just written so well anddddd yes yes yes it's a fame au POPSTAR NICO RIGHTS except he's not *really* a popstar in this one but like close enough oh AND it's a taylor swift title??? like this fic was made for me basically

okay that was MUCH longer than intended but i hope you enjoy some of the fics on here!! pls let me know if y'all ever want more recs i read literally so many fics - and if you guys ever want to give me any recs, feel free to do so! as of today, i have read *checks fic tracker bc i'm obsessive and need to keep track of everything* about 7.3 million words of fanfic this year. and that's actually less than normal (for me)

also if anyone reads patrochilles please read this fic it's literally been in my head nonstop for the past few weeks since i've read it and it's one of the best things i've ever read and like holyshit if you read patrochilles read it read it read it

[olderthannetfic]

Sending this to you specifically because I feel like you're the only normal brained person about this series.

I read Captive Prince a couple of years ago and liked it fine, as someone who doesn't have a strong preference for or against m/m and therefore isn't well-versed enough in its clichés to notice whether it reads like something full of cliché fanfic tropes. I really liked the use of language, some of the historical/political stuff, some of the ways that the characters are made complicated or unreliable.

The problem is, I've since coincidentally read most of the books that were Pacat's inspiration and. Well. Like 80-90% of the stuff in there has direct parallels in one of those. I'm not sure if there are more than three original thoughts in there.

I am not joking, if you read 1. The Lymond Chronicles and House of Niccolò by Dorothy Dunnett; 2. The Nightrunner series by Lynn Flewelling and 3. The Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice, you will find that some of the scenes were ripped off beat for beat, many jokes were taken and just lazily reworded, a lot of the character beats and arcs are at best a mashup of 2 or maximum 3 things from those books with the serial numbers filed off really poorly. There's a scene where some characters discover a suicide victim whose structure and descriptions are completely ripped off from another series, except Pacat fails to see what made the original scene so impactful. A lot of the pretty use of language is also directly copied from those, including some really really specific descriptors. It's so blatant!

And I don't see how people are okay with this! I know people who are fans of several of these works and they're totally cool with it! And honestly if it were some rando's unpublished original project I'd be cool with it too, but as a published beloved worldwide phenomenon with rabid fans? C'mon.

And another thing is, all of the other series mentioned above are balls to the wall insane. She just... she just made it bland. She took off most of the edge and reshuffled the elements into a fairly straightforward MLM love story with some light kink thrown in. It's not a BAD series, but I feel like I'm disappointed that someone read all my favourite books and THAT was their takeaway?

--

I started reading, got to the name of the series and burst out laughing.

And, wow, you brought up something totally new that I hadn't thought about! I'm impressed. Genuinely. Usually, I rant about all the reasons I hate the series while debunking the standard anti talking points.

--

I've read the Vampire Chronicles, but that was in the 90s and I read Captive Prince in like 2016 or after. I had zero recollection of common points. I haven't read The Lymond Chronicles despite years of hurt/comfort fans bugging me to do so, and I think I got like a chapter into the Nightrunner series before getting distracted...

The reason I found Captive Prince annoying and derivative is that it also reads exactly like the original m/m that was available when it was first being written, most notably the work of P.L. Nunn who was extremely famous for horny fan art but who also wrote some original m/m fantasy novels. The scene where they finally bone reminds me heavily of the one from... uh... what's the P.L. Nunn one where the prince creeps on that archer dude and he gets raped because of course and then the prince has to be ~patient~ and it's peak boring 2000s rape recovery tropes?

The rape backstory is not only lifted from Fushigi Yuugi (the author's fandom at the time) but is shared with basically 100% of original m/m from that era. It's sometimes the uncle, sometimes the stepfather. One single time that I can think of, it was the foster brother, but mostly it's that "funny uncle" type. Unless it's gang rape from a bad Gundam Wing fic. That was also everywhere.

Once somebody told me the author had previously shipped Tamahome/Nakago, I realized that they'd taken what would be a kind of unusual anime ship and made it a thousand times more boring by dumbing down the scary, tall general with the tragic backstory into an uke-appropriate waif.

So I guess what I'm saying is that there may be some inspiration you aren't familiar with, but it's the same story as what you said above: this is the blander remix.

--

As for why people are okay with this... honestly, most of the people who really adore the series whom I've talked to point to how it encapsulates the exact tropes and tone they loved in anime fic circa 2000.

As a fellow weeb, I loathed the tone of said anime fic circa 2000 and could not wait for tastes to change, so Captive Prince is a hideous blast from an unlamented past for me.

I think most people who love the series aren't familiar with its inspirations. Those that are may have consumed them quite a while ago and don't realize quite how direct the parallels are. Or, for the inspirations that aren't overtly canon m/m, the lure of it being Exactly Right may overshadow other things.

(They also mostly haven't read 90s fantasy doorstops that actually contain political intrigue, tactics and strategy. Captive Prince is a piss poor entry into this genre and should be recced for m/m, not this other stuff people constantly think is in there. None of these characters can reason their way out of a paper bag.)

More than any of that, there's a lot of love left over from when the series was a serialized original story on Livejournal in an era when we had vanishingly few original m/m works, especially long ones in a fantasy alternate world.

I think that is what gets it a pass when a new m/m novel presented as "m/m romance" or posted on one of the webnovel sites would be mocked for unoriginality. Many Captive Prince fans aren't (or weren't when they read it) all that familiar with the smorgasbord of original m/m available today. Many are unfamiliar with anime fanfic circa 2000, so this feels adjacent to the fic they've read but a little fresher... instead of like the week-old sardine tin I found it to be.

[bettelaboure]

⊹Maybe I do⊹ | Choi Seung-Hyun

⊹ Pairing: Choi Seung-Hyun x Original Character ⊹ Warnings: almost none, at little bit of swearing. ⊹ Word count: 2,7k ⊹ Authors note: this is an excerpt from the piece "Cheonsa", which I'm gradually publishing on Wattpad. Since I'm increasingly returning to Tumblr to read, I really hope it sticks here. P.S. English is not my first language and I hope that doesn't scare you <3 ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹ ⊹

The past few weeks were unbearable for Gaia. Practices, meets with new people and unfortunately businesspeople. When she signed the contract, she expected to be only a choreographer, but it turned out to be a fucking theatre. Smile for the camera, laugh at the table with investors, and be sweet and pleasant to every older man in the building. YG Entertainment made her a doll for the public eye. It was like a double-sided window. On the inside, she had conflicts with dancers, the choreography director, and the Big Bang boys; on the outside, she was a pretty woman laughing in a music video while holding Seungri’s hand or sitting on Seung-Hyun’s lap.

Tonight was no different. She looked into the mirror at the women’s restroom. At the behest of the group's stylist, she wore a long red dress with a cutout at the back. Her hair was down in sloppy waves, and her usual rings and earrings had been replaced with diamond ones. She had to come back to the table with everyone.

Sitting back into her place between the choreography director and the stylist, she received a worried glance from Ji-yong, who was sitting in front of her. Gaia brushed his glance away and focused on an empty wine glass.

“Miss Kang, how is working with these gentlemen so far?” One of the YG Entertainment board members asked.

“Lovely men. At first, it was hard to break them, but now it is like a fairytale. I shout at them, and they do what I want.” Gaia sweetly responded, and older men laughed. “But actually, it’s a great experience. I think we got used to each other, and now every dance practice goes smoothly. I couldn’t ask for better artists.”

Ji-yong let out a little chuck, knowing the truth. Every group member could sense her sarcasm even if it sounded nice.

“You are a lovely lady, Miss Kang. “The Old man smiled at her, which made Gaia uncomfortable. “I think you should join us on their tour.”

“I’m not sure it’s a great idea.”

“Why would you say so?” An older man in a suit was persuasive.

“I have to work with other groups, Mister Gong. There wouldn’t be another choreographer to replace me while I travel.” Seung-Hyun locked his eyes on Gaia. He could notice how hard she tried to be polite, but her body language gave signs of annoyance.

“I think you should even step onto stage. I would love to see you dancing. Don’t you think it would be brilliant, Hyun-Suk?” Mister Gong looked at YG Entertainment’s CEO. Yang Hyun-Suk just nodded his head slightly while drinking his wine.

“As much as I appreciate you noticing my talent, I won’t take the opportunity to be on stage from one of my dancers. They work too hard to be robbed.” You could hear a little bit of angriness in her voice. Her dancers were her kids, whom she hated and loved at the same time.

“Just keep that mind in your head, Miss Kang. I think you would be a great accessory to the group.” Gaia narrowed her eyes as these words reached her.

A young woman politely smiled at Mister Gong and focused on her fingers, which played with the napkin. She hoped this dinner would end quickly so she could lie in bed and ignore the world. But as dinner was about to end and everyone was saying their goodbyes, Ji-Yong touched her shoulder to grab her attention and asked her to join them for an after-party.

“Gigi, please. It won’t hurt you.”

“C’mon, Ji. You know me enough to understand that I won’t join you.” Gaia said while getting on her coat.

“Don’t be a party pooper. Find some guy, dance a little, have some drinks, and be fun for once.” Ji-Yong rolled his eyes.

“With one condition – one drink and you drive me home.” Guy laughed at her words.

“Good one. I won’t drive you home, but I’m sure Seung-Hyun would. He’s driving tonight.” Gaia wasn’t okay with the idea of Seung-Hyun driving her home. They had too much tension between them after every dance practice. At some point, it looked like he would avoid her after every practice. Even at this dinner, he would avoid her presence. “Gigi, this is your chance to make friends. I can’t listen to your problems alone forever.”

“You don’t listen to my problems. You and your boyfriends create them.” She sarcastically said.

Ji-Yong rolled his eyes and accompanied his friend towards the car.

“Look who joined us,” Seungri said after noticing Gaia near Ji-Yong.

“No insulting, sarcastic, or funny comments, Oppa. We are trying to befriend her.” A short guy gave his friend a warning look while getting comfortable in the seat.

The drive to the club wasn’t silent. Men talked about the dinner, giving out their opinions about how shitty it was and just a moment for board members to feel like they are at the top of the world. Gaia stepped into the club with Ji-Yong’s hand on her lower back when loud music and the smell of sweaty bodies hit her. She noticed that guys were going towards the VIP section, which didn’t surprise her. Of course, this type of celebrity would go only to the overpriced section. Everyone got their bracelets and crashed the couches while Seung-Hyun and Seungri asked everyone’s drink preferences.

“What would you like, Aegiya? Mohito, Pina Colada, Sex on the beach?” Seungri gave Gaia a sarcastic smile.

“Long-island, thanks.” She rolled her eyes.

Men went to get drinks, and Gaia scanned the room. Her eyes stopped on a girl that wasn’t at the dinner. It was her dancer, Min Hyo-rin. Young-bae’s hand was around her waist, whispering something in her ear. That made the girl laugh and blush a little. The couple noticed a young woman glancing at them.

“It’s not nice to stare, Gigi,” Young-bae said while covering his girlfriend, who was getting a little shy.

“Just wanted to say ‘Hi’ to Hyo-rin,” Gaia replied, getting her drink from Seung-Hyun’s hands. “Thanks.”

The man just nodded and sat near Gaia. She could still feel a weird tension between them, but not one word left her mouth. She joined the group discussion about upcoming performances. Seung-Hyun took his chance and stared at the woman in a beautiful red dress, sipping her drink. With every drink, she would smile and laugh more and more. He could see her natural smile, and it made his body burn. He couldn’t help but punish himself with though that a woman like Gaia would never want anything with him. She was too feisty, too funny, too bright, and too pretty to be with him. It burned like hell to watch her dance like nothing else matters in every practice, to have her in his lap while filming music video and cannot show her how it makes him feel, to see how she rolls her eyes whenever he caught her smoking, to see her in her sleeping shirts getting a glass of wine for the evening and won’t being able to join her. It wasn’t a crush, it wasn’t falling in love, it was pure attraction to her.

The conversation next to him distracted Seung-Hyun from his thoughts.

“Please, dance with me.” The man saw Hyo-rin begging Gaia. Not even a second later, the girls got up from their seats and went to the dance floor. After finding a spot near the crowd, they started to move to the beat. Seung-Hyun could see how Gaia pulled Hyo-rin closer to herself when a slower song began to play. She placed her hands on Hyo-rin’s hips, and the smaller girl blushed slightly.

“They look hot like this,” Young-bae whispered near Seung-Hyun while men watched girls slowly moving their hips to the beat. That burning feeling again. Seeing her so relaxed, not giving a fuck about anything, just giving herself to the music.

Ji-Yong approached the two fellas watching over the dance floor.

“Can you take her home? She looks like she had enough of alcohol tonight.” A short guy placed his hand on Seung-Hyun’s shoulder and nodded towards Gaia. Seung-Hyun only shook his head and walked over to the girls.

“The party’s over. Let’s home.”

“C’mon, Seung-Hyun. Don’t be party pooper. Didn’t you advise me to be more fun?” Gaia brushed her finger through his chest.

“Let’s go.” He helped the woman put on her coat and waited for her to say goodbye to the group.

He opened the car door, and she fell back into the passenger seat. Seung-Hyun got into the car only to realise he didn’t have home keys. Man drove through different parts of Seoul than their house. The ride was silent; only the radio gave a little more comfort to the journey. The car stopped at a high-rise building.

„That‘s not home.“ Gaia looked at Seung-Hyun.

„I don‘t have house keys, so we have to stay at my apartment.“ He let out a low breath and opened the door for her. The woman holds onto his hand while getting out of the car. A slight touch made the man‘s body burn. She held his hand for the whole walk to his apartment door.

“That’s huge.” The woman said while letting off his hand.

“I’ll let you sleep in the bedroom, and I’ll take the couch. Get comfortable; I’ll try to find something for you to sleep in.” Seung-Hyun left her sight, and she was mesmerized by the whole living room and the kitchen. It looked like her dream apartment with a light gray couch, a small coffee table, and a swinging chair facing the window with a view of Seoul. He came back with a T-shirt and a boxers in his hand.

“Here. You can change in the bedroom, those dark doors on your right.” Gaia thanked him and went to the bedroom. It was simple but modern. One king-sized bed, two bed tables, and a few doors that she assumed led to the wardrobe and bathroom. And that mesmerizing view through windows. After she changed into Seung-Hyun’s clothes, she returned to the living room and saw the man pouring himself a glass of wine.

“It’s rude to have a drink and not invite your guest to join you.” She smirked at him and sat down next to him.

“It is not for you, G, to judge me now.” He replied and got another glass for his guest.

It was silence between them. They kept drinking their wine while listening to quiet music. Gaia got herself together to shut it.

“Are you avoiding me, S?” Her look toward him was full of emotions—sadness, confusion, curiosity.

“S? Is that your nickname for me?”

“Don’t avoid my question.” She got closer to him by an inch but could already feel his body tense up.

He turned his body to face her. “I’m not avoiding you. You are just too much for me.”

“What do you mean?”

“Your confidence, the way you carry yourself, the way you talk to everyone, the way you sarcastically smile when insulting someone, God, even the way you smoke. It’s too much.” He lit his cigarette and placed it between his lips.

“I don’t understand. Explain.”

“Don’t be demanding, Cheonsa. It’s not simple, and I won’t.” He felt her fingers touching his, stealing the cigarette and getting a blow.

He watched her taking another hit of cigarette.

“Why are you always in suits?” Her question caught him off guard.

“It gives me confidence.”

“Shouldn’t you be confident from the way you look? That devilishly handsome face, etc.?” She moved her finger in circles to pinpoint what she had in mind.

“I didn’t look like that my whole life. I used to be chubby, that fat, funny friend.” He let out smoke in the air.

“You look handsome now, but I don’t see you being funny. Did your funny side vanish?” He let out a laugh.

“I guess. Now I get a question.” He leaned a little bit closer to her. “Have you always been so stubborn and difficult towards people?”

Gaia leaned on the couch back to hold her weight and placed her head in hand.

“No. You won’t believe it, but I used to be sweet, very polite and naïve. It just disappeared year after year. A broken heart can change you pretty bad.” She sipped her wine. “When I was 16, my family moved to Lisbon. I was new in town, a new girl in school, the new girl in a dance troupe. And there was a guy who was kind of similar to you. Tall, handsome, but great dancer.”

Seung-Hyun laughed at her last words.

“I was naïve and thought that he was interested in me. He used to ask me on dates, get me coffee to our dance practices, and take me for a ride around the city, but it quickly ended. He fucked me and left. I didn’t get a call, a text message, or even a ‘hi’ at practices. He treated me like a ghost. And it took enough to make me the way I am. I cured my broken heart with one-night stands, bottles of wines and packs of cigarettes.”

Listening to her made Seung-Hyun put the missing pieces in his puzzle. He wanted to hug her but decided it would be too much.

“I don’t want to get married.” The sound of a deep and low voice caught Gaia’s attention.

“Huh?”

“Guys and I used to talk a lot about love, soulmates, and creating a family of our own, especially when Young-bae got with Hyo-rin. I almost always was sure I didn’t want to get married. Since I was young, I have been different; I have never played with kids outside, and I have only lived in my own world. I’m melancholic, and I don’t want someone to carry the burn of me their whole life. It wouldn‘t be fair for them.“

“I kind of agree.“ Gaia said, quickly correcting herself. „Not your part. I think that everyone should experience being in love at least once, but for myself, I don‘t want to get married either. I look at myself as a complicated person to understand.“

“How do you cope with that?” Seung-Hyun leaned to Gaia so close that their nose were touching.

“I get with some guy to relief basic human needs, and then carry on in life until next one.” She whispered, her hot breath brushing against him.

“Why do you have to be so difficult and so beautiful?” He pushed a slight hair strain behind her ear.

“Because if I were simple, you wouldn’t want to kiss me.” She whispered back. A burning feeling overcame his body, and Seung-Hyun crashed his lips into hers. His heart starts pounding, panic setting it, but Gaia gladly answers back.

Gaia’s fingers gripped the edge of the cushion, her knuckles white, as Seung-Hyun broke their kiss. His knee brushed against hers—just barely, but enough to make her breath hitch. She glanced up at him through her lashes, her heart slamming against her ribs.

“You keep looking at me like that,” Seung-Hyun murmured, his voice low, teasing, “and I might think you actually want me to do something about it.”

Gaia swallowed, her throat tight, her pulse thrumming in her ears. “Maybe I do,” she whispered.

That was all the invitation he needed. In one smooth motion, Seung-Hyun reached for her, his hand sliding to the back of her neck, his fingers threading through her hair as he pulled her in. Their lips met in a slow, searing kiss that made every second of unfulfilled desire between them crackle like a lit fuse. Gaia melted into him, her body arching instinctively as his other hand splayed over her waist, pulling her closer until she was practically in his lap. The warmth of his touch sent shivers down her spine, and when he deepened the kiss, his tongue teasing against hers, she let out a quiet, needy sigh. Seung-Hyun groaned in response, his grip tightening as he shifted, pressing her back against the couch. His lips left hers only to trail hot, open-mouthed kisses along her jaw, down the delicate curve of her neck. Gaia tilted her head back, giving him more, her fingers fisting in the fabric of his shirt.

“I should’ve done this the first night in your room,” he murmured against her skin.

She let out a breathless laugh, her fingers sliding into his hair, tugging lightly. “And if you asked me earlier, I had keys...”

Seung-Hyun smirked against her lips before kissing her again, more profound this time, as if he was making up for every second they had spent pretending they didn’t want this.

[jesncin]

Hi! Thanks for answering my other ask! I also haven't seen a lot of criticism for Lonely City aside from a few tumblr posts that saw the same issues with it that I did, so I made sure to read the comic again just to ensure that my criticism is accurate (that's why this reply took a few days). I'm sorry for how long this ask is, but I hope it makes sense 😅

Basically my main issue with it is the ableism present in the comic as well as certain racist or colorist writing choices. There are other issues regarding queer rep that don't fit into these categories, too, but those might be more of a personal interpretation so I'll summarize them at the end.

I'll try not to focus too much on complaints about characterisation in this ask, since that can be a matter of personal taste, unless the differences in characterisation play into the other problems I see in the comic. Also just in advance: this is my personal opinion, which may ofc be off, but that's why I wanted to ask for a second opinion in the first place.

These first two problems are unfortunately pretty common in DC comics in general, so it's not like Lonely City is unique in doing this, but since the comic spends a lot of time promoting itself as progressive they left a particular sour taste in my mouth. It felt disappointing to me to see a comic claim progressiveness and add OCs of color while still running into the same bigoted writing choices as other DC comics.

The first writing choice I has issues with in this regard is the depiction of Catwoman herself. Catwoman's mother Maria Kyle has been depicted as afro-cuban since the 90s, but despite that fact comics almost exclusively portray Selina as a pale blue eyed woman who gets treated as white by the narrative and other characters in the universe, completely ignoring her mother's race. Lonely City goes out of its way to show that Selina is half cuban - which is great! - however, since the artist still decided to draw her as a pale blue eyed woman and the comic doesn't make any reference to her mother being black whatsoever this just rubs me wrong. It's not like the author simply wasn't aware of Selina being canonically half afro-cuban, since her cuban heritage keeps getting referenced, so it can be assumed that the author must be aware of her mother being a black woman as well. To me this makes it stand out even more that she is drawn and treated as a white(-passing) cuban woman, instead of a black one. It's unclear if this was the author's decision or a requirement by DC editors (though Selina is drawn as black in Absolute Batman and iirc in one of DC's highschool AU comics so it doesn't seem to be a publisher mandate), but either way it means that despite being fully aware of Selina being half afro-cuban, the comic completely ignores her mother's (and by association Selina's) canonical blackness.

The second issue to me is the depiction of Waylon Jones/ Killer Croc. Waylon has been coded as a black man fairly often throughout his appearances in DC comics, with at least one comic directly drawing him with brown skin instead of the usual crocodile green and the new Absolute Batman directly depicting him as a black man without the crocodilian traits the character usually has. Now, presumably in part due to this DC has been changing their approach to the character from writing him as an animalistic cannibal monster to more sympathetic characterisations as a regular human man with a skin condition who got ostracized, treated as a monster or assumed to be a violent and aggressive perpetrator due to the way his skin looks even before having to get into crime because it was the only career path available to him (which ofc also plays into an interpretation of him as a poc or at least as an allegory for racism). All of this is presumably something the author of Lonely City would be aware of, so the choice to depict Waylon not as a regular human with a skin condition but as someone more visually animalistic (given that Waylon is drawn with a snout and animal eyes), as well as having other characters directly refer to him as an animal, insinuate that he would just urinate on the floor and generally writing him as 'unhygienic' (stating that he doesn't care to flush after defecating etc) feels ...not great. Of course it is debatable wether the author wants Waylon to be read as black in Lonely City (his outfit design does seem to potentially point to him being coded as an older black man though), but even if that isn't the case the writer still would likely be aware of the character being coded as black or as a racism allegory in other works, which makes the choice to depict him as gross and animalistic a problem.

Now these next two cases include one of the most glaring problems I saw with the comic's writing. The writing, at least to me, seems pretty ableist. Of course ableism in regards to mental health is a problem with DC and especially Batman comics in general, but before reading Lonely City for the first time I genuinely thought it wouldn't be an issue here, since the comic markets itself as progressive and even goes back to depicting Barbara Gordon as a wheelchair user, which current comics have unfortunately moved away from.

The ableism in Lonely City imo particularly shows in the writing of Riddler and TwoFace, so they're going to be the characters I'll talk about here. Their cases basically represent opposite problems with the way DC tends to portray mental illness: in Riddler's case Lonely City decides to completely erase his mental health problems, while in TwoFace's case they use his mental illness to portray him as more evil.

I'll talk about Riddler's portrayal first, since TwoFace's is the arguably more offensive one. The Riddler as a character has pretty consistently been portrayed as struggling with his mental health, mainly with ocd and some variant of bpd. He's also usually portrayed to have low empathy, either due to npd or general neurodivergence. These are core character traits that usually still persist even when the character gets 'reformed' in canon and aids the 'good guys' (like in his arc as a P.I. in comics in the late 2000s or in Batman Unburied/Secrets in the Dark), which, if handled well enough, helps balance out the portrayal of mental illness in the character's appearances by essentially stating that it's not his mental health issues that made him a villain and that they aren't an inherently bad or evil trait.

Now Lonely City essentially does the inverse of this: not only does the comic write its version of Riddler as a mentally stable, fairly well adjusted and empathetic man that seems to lack pretty much every single one of his usual mental health issues, they also ascribe his mental illness (as well as his usual flamboyance and queer-coding) to him having been a cocaine addict that has been 'cured' by the time the comic's plot takes place. There's no issue with giving the character an addiction ofc, if handled well enough, and Lonely City isn't the first comic doing that either; the problem, to me, lies in the comic specifically pointing out that Riddler's usual characterisation - and everything that comes with it regarding his mental health - was not something inherent to him as a person but instead was caused by drug abuse. By doing this, as well as by portraying him as well adjusted and neurotypical after his rehab, the comic essentially posits that the ocd/bpd/npd/general neurodivergence associated with his usual characterisation were 'weird' negative traits exclusively caused by him doing cocaine and that he needed to be 'cured' of them in order to be able to reform and become a better person. It essentially states that he used to be weird, ridiculous, villainous and "crazy" because of drugs, but now that he went to rehab and got "cured" he is normal, well adjusted and a good man that is fit to be a romantic option for Catwoman. And while the comic states that even as a villain he never seriously hurt anyone, it still makes the suggestion that he got cured of mental illness along with his drug problem, and that he had to be cured of both of it in order to reform.

Now, it could be argued that this negative portrayal of mental illness as something caused by addiction or something to be cured of wasn't the intention of the comic - and maybe it really wasn't - but that's where the second problem comes in: Throughout the entire comic there are only two direct portrayals of mental illness we get to see: the first is Riddler's short flashback to his "embarassing" pre-rehab self, the second, more direct, portrayal of mental illness is TwoFace. There are further mentions of characters with mental health problems, but those are only short and offhand, though not without their own problems, which I'll get to during this argument.

I've already discussed the problem I see with the way Riddler's mental health is handled, but the portrayal of TwoFace is ...worse, imo, to say the least. In Lonely City TwoFace is characterised as a far-right fascist politician, trying to force his bigoted and classist policies onto Gotham via police brutality and propaganda. He is also the only character in the entire comic that is consistently shown to struggle with his mental health: Every other character (including post-rehab Riddler) is shown to be well-adjusted and mentally healthy, their problems mainly stemming from grief or circumstance, not mental illness. Meanwhile only TwoFace exhibits behavior linked to his mental health on panel: in closeups he is shown to have ocd tics, like having to rhythmically tap on his desk when agitated or struggling with the thought of needing to use his coin, his behavior is often erratic, other characters treat him as off-kilter and ultimately when he is defeated it is said he will be interred at Arkham again. Arkham, specifically, where at the point of the story only the "truly evil" and mentally ill villains like Scarecrow are still being held, as the comic makes sure to point out. By doing this, by showing only TwoFace to struggle with his mental health, by mentioning that only the irredeemable villains are still at the mental health hospital, by showing all the reformed rogues to be mentally healthy and stable - the comic directly associates mental illness with being a bad person.

More than that, by not only making TwoFace a bigoted fascist but by specifically revealing that his bigotry and fascism was caused by his "evil alter" after all at the end, the comic directly links being far-right with being mentally ill. Seeing the comic handle things like that and especially the "evil alter" reveal at the end was a genuine shock and huge disappointment for me, especially after how much Lonely City seems to flaunt its supposed progressiveness throughout the story. Writing TwoFace as an evil racist bigot and Trump-allegory not (just) because he is a privileged white man in power, but specifically as someone that is a far-right populist because he is "crazy" and mentally ill is just so...hurtful. Add to this that throughout the story TwoFace's fascist policies are consistently portrayed as the actions of one single mentally ill "maniac" that others only go along with out of fear or sense of duty instead of being a systemic issue (the police commissioner keeps telling TwoFace off about his fascist policies, his financial backers stop supporting him once his right wing ideology becomes too overt, whenever TwoFace issues commands for police brutality police officers voice their concerns with those actions and only go along because they are scared of Harvey and then ultimately abandon him as well). And in the end, fascism in Lonely City is defeated not by thorough systemic reform but by simply throwing the Trump-analogue into a jail for mentally ill people "where he belongs". It's extremely frustrating to me, as you probably can tell, and it just feels so disappointing to see a comic presenting itself as progressive and anti-fascist while falling into the exact same ableist tropes as every single other comic that portrays mental illness as something evil that needs curing to even have a chance at becoming a good person, and fascism and bigotry as something caused by mental illness instead of a sytemic issue (and specifically having the police 'only following orders' while actually disagreeing with fascism, when far right ideologies infamously thrive in the police system irl).

Like I said at the beginning of my ask, there are other issues I have with the comic as well, but those might be more based on personal opinion, so I'll summarize them here: Another thing that irks me about the comic is that despite showing pride flags in the background multiple times the queer rep in it is, imo, flimsy at best. Harley and Ivy are mentioned to have been a couple, but Harley has been fridged before the events of the story while Ivy gets killed during it, making the comic essentially commit a double "bury your gays" with the only two explicitly queer characters in it. Yes there is the implication that Barbara Gordon might be in a queer relationship with her campaign manager, but as far as I could tell during my second read through it's never actually made explicit that they are a couple or that either of them are actually queer, it's only ever implied. And while Catwoman has been canonically bisexual for over two decades, there hasn't been a single mention of her queerness (that I noticed) throughout this entire comic either. Of course her ending up in a relationship with a man wouldn't erase her bisexuality (nor Riddler's for that matter, who had been confirmed as canonically bi prior to Lonely City's release), however since there aren't even any allusions to Catwoman being romantically interested in women whatsover in the entire comic (as far as I could tell, maybe I missed something if so feel free to correct me), personally speaking I can't really count this as bi representation, since for all it matters if a reader that isn't aware of Selina (and Eddie) being canonically bi in other comics reads Lonely City they would most likely read her and Riddler as a heterosexual couple (particularly since as previously mentioned the comic imo does erase Riddler's usual queercoding as well by ascribing his flamboyance to his cocaine addiction and by having the 'clean' version dress and behave in a very heteronormative way, for example by dressing mainly in beige and muted colors instead of his usual bright greens and pinks and by otherwise acting like the stereotypical "dad" character in a sitcom). Having Catwoman end up in a relationship with a man wouldn't be an issue otherwise, but in combination with other queer rep being either only alluded to (Barbara) or being killed off (Harley and Ivy) the fact that Selina's bisexuality is never even hinted at and her "happy end" in a comic that set out to write a story about Catwoman being her own character separate from her relationship with a man (Batman), that she so often gets defined by, being that Selina ends up in a by all accounts "heterosexual" relationship as the (step) mom of a teenager just leaves a bad taste, imo. It really wouldn't have been hard to make her (or Barbaras) queerness explicit, but the comic didn't do that.

Either way though, I'm sorry that this ask has gotten so incredibly long and seems so negative, but like I said I only saw a handful of people make the points I did here about Lonely City with everyone else treating it as perfectly progressive and it really made me doubt if my criticism and disappointment in the comic (I really wanted to like it!) has any ground at all. And since you seemed to have the same issue with the MAWS fandom and generally always have thoughtful commentary about representation I thought I might as well ask you for a second opinion.

Please don't stress about answering btw., and if you disagree with any (or all) of my points here I'd also love to hear why you think I'm wrong, after all that's why I'm sending this in the first place. Either way though, I hope you have a nice day and thanks again for letting me talk to you about this!

Hwoof! Okay this is a lot! I'm gonna put this under a read more so that it won't be a super long scroll. But my takeaway is that this kind of fixation on continuity and details is detrimental for engaging with larger themes and an elseworld interpretation of these characters. Media crit thoughts below! Spoilers for Catwoman: Lonely City.

I know it might seem redundant, but being aware of the premise and parameters for this story can help us better understand the decisions that went into it so:

Catwoman Lonely City is an Elseworlds miniseries (4 long issues) under Black Label; an imprint publisher of DC. It follows a much older Selina Kyle, recently released from jail following the death of Batman from a massacre orchestrated by the Joker (known as Fool's Night) 10 years ago. During the time she was in prison, Gotham had changed. Costumed heroism and villainy is heavily outlawed, resulting in what seems like a safer albeit less free Gotham under the rule of Mayor (reformed) Harvey Dent. Catwoman has one final score in mind; to break into the Batcave and find out what "Orpheus" is. The last message Batman gave her before he died.

The entirety of Lonely City is written, drawn, colored and even LETTERED by Cliff Chiang. Which is nuts.

This story is tightly written with an expansive cast system. The main themes are about grief and aging. There's so much emphasis placed on how a lot of these characters feel like they're past their prime. We see Selina struggle doing the acrobatics she was once used to. The theme of needing to "let go" of the past is paralleled with the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice "Don't look back". Ultimately it asks what the point of all that costumed heroism was for and why it's worth chasing those glory days.

So keep all this in mind as I respond to each of the points you brought up!

Catwoman

So talking about a character's race like that of Selina's is tricky. I try to avoid using words like whitewashing in cases like this since she's not a character that started out that way like say- Sunspot from X Men. Instead when I'm criticizing things like Caped Crusader I'm looking at it from an angle of narrative opportunity. If Selina's going to be white again (and rich) what story does it tell? And my conclusion for Caped Crusader is that its commentary on classicism would've been stronger if Selina was portrayed like she was in Reeve's The Batman. To me, she doesn't offer much the way she was re-imagined in Caped Crusader.

I don't personally feel that's the case for Lonely City. Despite being an elseworld, Lonely City is very holistic in its application of Selina's history. The writer recognizes she's a white passing Hispanic woman in this story. In a flashback to her youth, Selina is portrayed as looking exactly like Julie Newmar (as opposed to Eartha Kitt) did as Catwoman in the 60's Batman show.

In terms of how her whiteness is integrated into her character, there's a flashback sequence that goes back to Selina's time in jail. She meets an Asian woman named Yoona who's dealing with racist harassment from the other inmates. Selina tries to train her to stand up for herself, but it backfires. Yoona's not as good at fighting, ultimately saying "guess we can't all be Catwoman". Selina tries to stand up to Yoona's bullies herself-but the big criminals of the place decide to fight back by killing Yoona and placing her corpse in Selina's cell. This causes Selina to close up, feeling guilt for putting someone vulnerable in danger.

Narratively we see this as one of Selina's arcs in this story. She can't break into the Batcave alone, so she recruits a handful of new friends and former rogues to help her. But the whole time she's worried she's putting them all in danger for her own goals. She's hesitant about training the Riddler's daughter Edie to help out on the heist, she later loses Killer Croc, and then Selina gets so paranoid she cuts Edie and the Riddler off the team. Part of Selina's growth in this story is to accept help and support. She can't do any of this alone.

The whole point is that the story ends with exactly what you're asking for in your criticism. Selina lets go of her past in some way and lets someone new take on the Catwoman mantle; Edie, The Riddler's afro latina daughter. It's a story about Selina letting go of her pride and guilt so that she can trust the newer generation to take the role. Yes things will be harder for this girl, but Selina's got to have hope; because some other girls can be Catwoman after all. Meta-textually this combines the differing histories of Catwoman into a conversation about legacy. Selina's whiteness plays a role in this elseworld story, so it justifies itself in my eyes instead of being an uncreative default.

Killer Croc Waylon Jones

I'm not an expert on Killer Croc history but from my brief brushes with him throughout being a Batman fan, I say there's 2 Waylons; 1. a guy with a skin condition 2. a guy who is a crocodile man. There's merits for either take, each with varying levels of sympathetic portrayals. He's also been white, coded as Black or straight up re-imagined as a Black man.

While I think there's a conversation to be had about dehumanization and treating a Black character as animalistic- I know at the end of the day the reason some writers pick the Crocodile variant of Waylon Jones is just because they want Batman to fight a gator guy. So he literally is just that, a gator. Not much malicious intent behind that, he's just an animorph gator. I think it's unfair to treat the "skin condition" variant of Killer Croc as the more progressive version of his character. Sometimes I'm playing Arkham Asylum and I wanna see a big croc instead of a guy with a skin condition running at me in the sewers. Either version is fine, I say with respect to furries and monster-boinkers.

At most, we see Waylon being a part of that arc where Selina's worried about putting vulnerable people in danger. Waylon dies in one of their heists and it causes Selina to close up again. I think it's fair that jokes made about him peeing on plants from Ivy/Eddie can be read in bad taste considering his history, but this take really is just the Animal Guy version of the character. I think going in too deep about the allegory of his marginalization would've lost the focus of this story in the short time frame that it had.

The Riddler Eddie Nygma

I think interpreting the way Eddie Nygma talks about his past and recovery as a broad "mental illness is evil" is reductive to the story. When he says "Hey, I was doing a lot of coke then." during his flirty catch-up date with Selina, I don't think he's saying "the substance abuse made me evil, Selina." The point of change/redemption for Eddie isn't necessarily "rehab". Eddie explicitly states that when his wife/partner Lorena died, it made him question what he was doing and put his life together. That included getting into recovery. He mentions he wasn't always there for his daughter Edie, but that he is now-he's no longer just thinking about himself. That's a conscious decision on his part.

I personally try not to get caught up in concepts like "the core of a character" because that can be subjective and people can choose to shift the pieces of a character and focus on something else. Reeves' Batman for example is a very untraditional Riddler take, he's a serial killer, and not a dapper guy at all. I'm more concerned with the concept of "through-lines" in characters, because it reveals what's resonant about them to be worth revisiting.

I get that Eddie's perceptive + genius mind and egomaniac tendencies is a huge part of his character. But I don't really know what (in your words) a "balanced out" take on Redeemed Riddler's mental health/neurodivergence in a story like this should look like. He joins Catwoman's heist team, he offers his expertise and says some quips. Is there something else he should be doing to demonstrate mental illness isn't evil or what? I know there's other redeemed Riddler takes where he still has his ego, but I don't think that fits for what story Lonely City wants to tell with him. He's narratively a humbled character in this. Lonely City wants to explore that kind of Riddler.

I'm gonna group your later queer criticisms here since I want to keep this categorized by character. But your argument about Riddler's queer coding erasure and acting like a heteronormative dad is missing the bigger cultural picture. The Gotham Rogues are heavily queer coded because- they're villains. It didn't start out as earnest representation because these were the un-questioned historical short-hands to how villains where characterized and designed. Sure as time goes on, some of that characterization will be reclaimed and canonized as queerness, but to read representation solely on historical coding is a misleading approach to analysis. Because it relies on signifiers over narrative.

Again, one of the main themes of Lonely City is about how these characters have aged passed their primes. They're tired and nostalgic for their colorful pasts, but are trying to move on in their own ways. The Riddler now looks unflamboyant and toned down to reinforce that theme. Eddie's tired now, he's wants to be a better dad, he has experienced the long prophesized twink death that comes for us all and has to embrace his new silver fox status. To hyper-focus on the details where he must perform a certain type of queerness is greatly limiting to queer representation.

John Constantine is one of DC's most prominent queer characters. He was coded and then canonized as queer early in his original Hellblazer run. In his backstory he used to be this over-the-top non-conforming punk young man, but then he was sent to a mental facility after accidentally banishing a little girl to Hell. He came out of that traumatizing experience looking,,, like how you describe Eddie Nygma looking like in Lonely City. Gone is John's colorful non-conformity, and all that's left if this beige coat wearing homeless guy. But that's the point and tragedy of his story. He's still queer even when he's not performing what people stereotypically associate as being visibly queer. So if you want to read Riddler as queer in Lonely City, nothing is really stopping you. I don't know how else to end this point other than saying there's nothing homophobic about mellowing out into your silver fox era.

Two Face Harvey Dent

To fully understand the portrayal of Two Face in Lonely City, we need to talk about what role he plays in the narrative. Because it's broader than you think.

Two Face exists as an allegory for Gotham itself in this story. After Batman died and costumed heroism/villainy is strictly outlawed, Gotham seems like a better, safer city. But in reality, it's a heavily policed city, where only the richest are doing better off. It's got the appearance of progress, but really it has same systemic problems still bubbling within. That's Harvey Dent's character in Lonely City. He promises people he's reformed, but really we just see his classic standard downfall happen again when challenged.

Much like with what I talked about queer coding villains, Two Face never started out as earnest representation of DID. The horror surrounding his premise is often really reliant on the vilification of DID. And once again, much like Waylon, sometimes we get sympathetic treatments of that part of him.

But I think the trouble with Two Face as DID rep is that as long as that "darkness bubbling within him" is represented through an alter, he's going to struggle with how his premise is tied to the vilification of DID. There are some takes of Harvey where this part of him is removed completely like in The Dark Knight, where his descent is a straightforward story about a good guy getting corrupted rather than an alter showing up. On one hand you can see that as erasure, and on another hand maybe it's refreshing to have a take that doesn't rely on an evil alter. Your mileage will vary. Tons of people with DID love Harvey, it's complicated!

Calling Harvey a Trump-like bigoted fascist is reductive of the narrative allegory he represents. I notice there's a tendency in media analysis to label any remotely bigoted or rich villain character as being a stand in for Trump or Elon Musk and that's a superficial reading. I've seen many fictionalized stand ins for Trump in media, and Lonely City's Harvey Dent doesn't feel specific enough to be a commentary on the guy.

Trump is a blatant bigot, spouting explicitly racist rhetoric and mocking disabled people. Harvey in Lonely City is performative about his justice. When talking about Barbara Gordon, he says "she's not the only one with a disability" as he touches his disfigured face. He's shown saving a brown boy from a fire. Things Donald Trump would never do. We don't see the usual fictional Trump-isms like allusions to building a wall or tweeting about celebrities.

Harvey's not evil because he's mentally ill, his alter isn't what motivates his actions. That reading ignores how Harvey genuinely believes what he's doing is good for Gotham. You say that the police in this story only go along with what they do because they're scared of Harvey, "and specifically having the police 'only following orders' while actually disagreeing with fascism, when far right ideologies infamously thrive in the police system irl" but that ignores scenes like this:

Where the police have no problem enacting prejudice and threatening violence without Harvey's supervision. When the police commissioner is frustrated with Harvey, it's not because he's some good guy being forced to be bad by the Mayor. Whenever something goes wrong, Harvey uses the commissioner as a scapegoat so that he can keep his own reputation intact. When the commissioner advises Harvey that it's bad to attack protesters, it's not because he disagrees with bigotry- it's because it looks bad on Harvey as a candidate. When one of the bat cops abandons Harvey in the climax (only to get shot by him), that's not him disavowing bigotry, it's him being fed up with being bossed around.

You say that "in the end, fascism in Lonely City is defeated not by thorough systemic reform but by simply throwing the Trump-analogue into a jail for mentally ill people "where he belongs". But that reading ignores scenes like this one:

Where after Barbara Gordon gets elected as Mayor, she's still criticized even after the protesters had her back earlier. Despite Barbara starting out the story begging Catwoman to leave vigilantism behind to become a respectable member of society, she ultimately learns that doing things from within the system isn't enough. That corruption still exists in Gotham and she's going to have to play dirty to fight it. That's an awareness of systemic problems, not a story where all the problems are solved when the antagonist gets punished.

Then there's your reading of mental illness in this story. Much like how your queer analysis relies on signifiers like performance of queerness in order to be read as queer at all, you do the same thing with mental illness. If you're willing to read Harvey tapping his fingers during his debate with Barbara as OCD tics, -even though it's a classic visual short hand for portraying nervousness or impatience- or his attachment to the coin as OCD -even though Harvey's obsession with duality and chance being a theme to his character- and confidently claim that "only Two Face exhibits behavior linked to his mental health" then you're willfully ignoring another strong candidate for a mental illness reading: Selina Kyle herself.

We see her taking meds after she's released from jail. We see her immediately remembering Bruce's death when meeting the Bat-police. We see her obsess over Bruce's final words to her, unable to let the past go. We see her struggling to open up and accept help after Yoona and Waylon die, she even acts out in paranoia. We see her thinking she's protecting others by pushing them away. We see her getting so focused on Bruce's final message for her, it seems like there's nothing else she has planned after the finding out what it is.

When asked about this, she continues to justify that she's protecting others "No one else is going to get hurt." She's self-destructive, not looking out for herself anymore. When she finally makes it to the batcave and watches it self destruct, she's willing to just sit there and go down with it. "Life after Batman is a dream, he said. I should have believed him. And life after Catwoman? Maybe I could've figured it out...with enough time."

I don't know about you, but that's not reflective of what you described "Every other character (including post-rehab Riddler) is shown to be well-adjusted and mentally healthy, their problems mainly stemming from grief or circumstance, not mental illness." Sometimes grief can result in self destructive mental illness, it's not any less because it's stemmed from a tragic circumstance. Our main hero character, is struggling with how her grief and love is consuming her. It may not look like classic vilification of mentally ill villains, but it's still explicitly there.

To bring this back to Harvey, no, I don't think the end is supposed to be some kind of twist that everything bad was his evil alter's doing. Harvey wasn't lying when he said he embraced his alter and made a compromise with him instead of running away from that part of himself. This is the classic Two Face descent, everything seems fine on the surface but then his inner darkness resurfaces. Harvey explicitly says "we had a deal, do things my way-" before being interrupted by his alter who says "-Fuck the deal, Harvey!" They both agreed to be doing things Harvey's way for a while, but his alter's tired of all the pushback and finally decides to take control in this moment.

There's a lot to critique at the core of Batman's mythos, the inherit copaganda in a rich man's goals to eliminate crime, the vilification of mental illness for its horror elements among many things. It would take a much bigger shake up of the status quo to see these things challenged outside of a "there's a lot we still gotta fix" ending. I think criticisms where people say "Batman beats up mentally ill poor people" is pretty disingenuous. It ignores that many of his rogues are well off and powerful, but it also infantilizes them as villains. Batman's rogues aren't clueless mentally ill people, they choose to do bad things. Some of them are mentally ill as they commit crimes, but they make a choice. Harvey Dent isn't bad because he's mentally ill, he's bad because of his flawed beliefs.

I don't think Harvey being sent away to Arkham in Lonely City is supposed to send the message that he'll only be good if he's a cured, neurotypical guy. We see how the jail system treated Selina during her 10 years behind bars, the whole system's broken and the comic is aware of that.

Queerness: Barbara Gordon, Harley Quinn + Poison Ivy and Catwoman (+ Riddler)

"Bury your gays" does not refer to when queer characters die, it is to talk about how they're treated as more disposable/expendable than their non-queer counterparts. A character being "fridged" is not about them dying, it's about how they're treated as disposable for the development of another character.

Harley Quinn is just as much a "fridged" character in Lonely City as Batman is. Both Selina and Pamela are grieving over the loss of their loved ones, but they react in opposite ways. Pamela's moved on to the point of leaving Gotham, while Selina's fixated on Bruce's final message to her. I don't know how we're supposed to have a story about grief without someone dying? So I don't really know what this kind of criticism is asking for.

Sure, Ivy dies in the story. But she goes out in a defiant stance against Harvey's vision for the city. She's comes full circle in recognizing that Gotham wasn't all awful; it nurtured her and taught her to accept herself. She dies because the story has stakes and consequences to its actions. Again, I don't think being queer means the characters should be invulnerable and immortal. Ivy has the same narrative weight to her death as Waylon did.

I agree that Barbara's queerness is subtle in Lonely City. But I don't think that's a bad thing. My impression is that she recognizes she's in a very dangerous position in Gotham, hence she keeps her relationship with her campaign manager Josie very private. But when you look into it, there's really no denying it or reading it any other way. In these finale panels, what business does Barbara have to be in Josie's son's room? Even more so, why is he named Wayne?

The comic even bothers making Selina pause upon hearing that name. Barbara named him after Bruce, so wait- how come she has a say in naming Josie's son? When Wayne tells Selina "Are you here for mama? She's in the back." Selina goes to the office to see only Barbara in there. Josie shows up in the room way later. Hence, Barbara is also Wayne's mom. If we genderbent Josie, the nature of their relationship wouldn't be up for debate.

I get that it would be cool to have a queer Barbara story, but this is a detail in Catwoman: Lonely City. It implies something interesting about Barbara still hiding a part of her identity even though she's not a costumed vigilante anymore, but that's it. Normally I'd like for these things to be expanded, but I'm aware this is Selina's story's first and foremost. And it's a miniseries. At most, this relationship is an interesting characterization detail.

Ignoring the fact that Selina's silver fox futch game is on fire in this series, I think the queer Catwoman criticism falls into the same problem with relying on queer signifiers and performance for representation. I get that an elseworld needs to re-establish its take on these characters since I don't know if they're queer in this iteration or not. But for a tight story like Lonely City, what exactly do I stand to gain from Catwoman turning to the camera and telling me she's bi again this time?

Lonely City is about Selina's grief over Batman turning into an obsession. When Bruce was alive, Selina would ask him if he ever considered retiring from his mission and settling down with her. Bruce would lead her on, saying that a life like that is just a dream for him "but when I do let myself dream Selina...in that life? I'm with you". So she clings on to that, hoping that the final message he left her, "Orpheus" could maybe be some kind of recognition of their love. But in the end, she discovers "Orpheus" is a lazarus pit meant to temporarily revive someone from dying. Bruce was asking Selina to revive him. "The cape came first [...] nothing else mattered, nobody else mattered...not even me."

Her relationship with Eddie is meant to show that a part of her does want to move on from Bruce and find love elsewhere. But she's caught between her self destructive quest and having to think about what life after Catwoman looks like. Ultimately she learns she can move on without sacrificing who she is as Catwoman by passing that mantle on to someone new. For a tightly written 4-issue miniseries, I don't see how having Selina hitting on a woman or saying she finds a woman hot, or Eddie doing that for men really adds anything to that story. Maybe if it was a longer series we could've gotten something about queer solidarity? But I'm content with Lonely City the way it is right now.

I've written in my comic essays before about how I don't want "show not tell" to dictate how queer characters have to have very specific relationships (bi person must always be with man and woman) or display specific attractions (bi woman must show interest in woman at some point) or express themselves in a specific way (queer man has to be flamboyant) to be considered queer. But I also don't want the verbal confirmation of queerness to be mandated in every story with queer characters. Taking either points to an extreme would result in really formulaic queer stories.

Maybe Selina and Eddie at the end of Lonely City are a bi couple who are happily mellowing out into their old age, judged by on-lookers as a straight couple because they're not performing bombastic queerness hard enough or something, I hear that's a very bi thing.

Also "Selina ends up in a by all accounts "heterosexual" relationship as the (step) mom of a teenager just leaves a bad taste, imo." Man, what you got against step moms? :((((((((( The teenager is robbing rich people too, it's not that domestic.

haha but I hope this doesn't come off as mean spirited in any way! I think Catwoman Lonely City is a rich text to discuss so I'm interested in people's interpretations of it.

When I talk about performatively progressive things like My Adventures with Superman, it's that media like that wants the clout of looking like it deals with serious topics (like Superman's immigrant allegory), but it'll be squeamish about tackling that in any serious manner. It's a show that has surface level diversity but is unwilling to discuss how that diversity informs its world. MAWS shows us an endearingly girlfailure Lois Lane who needs the help of men to get hired as a journalist because it believes that's far more relatable than being a jaded successful career woman. The show loves rebutting Superman discourse about red undies and being a nice guy who saves cats from trees, but it can never show us what its version of Superman's ideals are. It's a show that fails to say anything of substance.

Meanwhile Catwoman Lonely City is a story about loss and what a Gotham trying to move on from its costumed past looks like. It's wrapped up in issues of class disparity and racism, but in the end of the day it's a really personal story about grief and aging. Its characters' identities inform the way they navigate its political world. Lonely City takes advantage of the Batman mythos' history to tell its remixed story.

At times, that means working within its limitations. Two Face is a character that would require a really big re-imagining to separate his premise from the vilification of DID (which I was hoping Caped Crusader would do, but alas), and this elseworld version plays him pretty straight and standard to tell a story about repeating cycles and facades. It has the bad guy sent to Arkham, as is the usual for Batman stories.

My main concern when reading Lonely City was that the characters telling Selina to "let go" of her costumed vigilante past was going to lead to an ending where Selina has to settle down and be a respectable member of society. But that didn't happen! Barbara recognizes that working within the system isn't enough. Instead of Selina getting assimilated into the government like an honorary cop, she's still a vigilante robbing the rich.

Catwoman Lonely City ends with the recognition and hope that things could be better, that its problems don't end in the final page. And that's way more substance than anything MAWS could pretend to have.