#but tamora could not care less

[sgtcalhouns]

I’ve spent a lot of time over the years thinking about how felix and tamora are about pda. I think felix LOVES holding hands and kisses on the cheek and little pecks but he’s very polite and respectful and thinks anything else should remain private. and since tamora is so bad at letting her feelings show she’s generally anti-pda, and it takes her a while to get used to felix reaching for her hand and stuff. but then I think they do reach a point where they have settled into and embraced their feelings for one another where they just forget all the common sense they previously possessed and become absolutely unbearable to be around. just constantly forgetting that they are in public and everyone can see them. it’s like they’re physically incapable of leaving it at one kiss, it always turns into several kisses which very easily becomes making out before they’ve even realized it. and I DO like to imagine them doing that absolutely insufferable couple thing where they’re leaned in close talking to each other in soft voices about how much they like each other, completely nauseating, why did you even leave the house to do this just stay home

[s-u-g-a-r-rush1997]

If requests are still open I'd love to see some Sergeant Calhoun and/or Hero's Cuties! That character/ship needs more love

I love Hero's Cuties! It's one of my favorite WIR ships. Calhoun also happens to be my second favorite character overall, just behind King Candy. I was partially inspired by that one bit in the credits where Sergeant Calhoun and Felix are firing guns together. I feel like she'd absolutely teach him how to shoot.

It is a bit shorter than I would have liked, though. I'll have to do more content with Hero's Cuties, or just Calhoun even, at a later date.

Oh, and this takes place between the ending of WIR and their wedding.

Hero's Cuties at the Shooting Range

Pairing: Felix x Sergeant Tamora Calhoun

Rating: Safe for work

Warnings: none

“Focus, soldier,” Sergeant Calhoun barked, “eyes on the target, not the horizon.”

“Yes ma’am!” Felix gripped the pistol in his hands tighter than a kingsnake’s squeeze, knuckles white the pressure. His palms felt so sweaty he was worried the gun would just slip out of his hands.

“Wide stance, Fix-it!” Calhoun scolded. “Square your shoulders, remember? And for Pete’s sake, loosen your grip. It’s a gun, not a stress ball.”

“Understood, ma’am!” His hands were shaking, his heart racing a mile a minute. He could hear it loud beneath his earplugs. The target was just ten feet out. The shooting range was empty – Calhoun had made sure of it, worried that her fiancé would get too distracted or overwhelmed. Even without the constant noise and crowd, Felix found himself nervous all the same. He had never fired a gun before; hadn’t even ever held one before today.

Calhoun placed a firm hand on his shoulder. “Breathe, Felix.”

There was a loud crack and a hole appeared on the target in front of him, right at the very edge where he’d just barely grazed it. Not even close to the image of a cybug in the very center, certainly, but he’d actually hit the target this time.

He took his finger off the trigger, lowering the pistol, and turned to Calhoun with a warm smile on his face. She didn’t smile back. She wasn’t the most open of people, but he hadn’t seen her so closed off since he’d first met her nearly a year back. Her hand’s were balled up at her sides, her shoulders were tense; every muscle in her body was tense, in fact. Like a coiled spring wound far too tightly.

“Tammy?” Felix set the gun aside, taking care to make absolutely certain the safety was on, before facing Tamora fully. “Is something wrong?”

She hissed a breath out through gritted teeth, leaning back against the counter. Tamora gripped the edge, fingers curled beneath the underside so tightly the metal strained. Felix hopped onto the counter to sit beside her. His hand rested besides hers, not touching, just sitting there as an invitation.

She took the invitation, squeezing his hand hard enough to make his bones protest, before relaxing her grip just a bit. “I’m worried, Felix. I should have started training you sooner. The wedding is only a few months away. If something happens to you, I–” she inhaled sharply, lacing her fingers with his.

Felix gazed at her softly, placing a warm hand against her cheek. His brow furrowed suddenly, his lips pursed in a firm smile. “By my honor, ma’am, I promise you I will make sure that nothing will ruin our wedding. Not cybugs, not-not anything!”

Tamora released his hand, reaching up to grab the front of his shirt. She pressed a kiss to his lips, hard and firm – and no less breathtaking than their first or third or fourth. She pulled back with a smirk.

With a slap to his back, she barked, “then you’ve got work to do, soldier! Hop to it!”

“Yes, ma’am!”

[longsightmyth]

hi how do you cope with stans having bad takes and their overall illiteracy and refusal to critique the misogyny homophobia and racism in Sarah’s works and continue to elevate her popularity when there are better authors who could do with her fame

Unfortunately the extreme fans of sarah janet's work are not alone in declining to put thought into the media they consume. I try not to engage directly - that usually ends badly. Generally I just mention I don't care for her work and move on. If they press me I say why.

Also I just generally try to recommend better books tbh. If someone says they like tog because they like that celaena has more than one love interest and doesn't end up with the first, I go 'oh! You may like Tamora Pierce. Most of her heroines have more than one love interest, and she also has stabby ladies!'

'I like the worldbuilding' may I interest you in the books of pellinor in this trying time, or The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms

'Fantasy romance' I admit I usually lean more fantasy than romance in my reading, but I DO enjoy Blackmantle despite a couple of issues, because 'rightful part-sidhe heir reclaims her family's throne and eventually has to rescue her foreverlove from death after which they live forever!'

Dark fae romance: daaaaark is a bit of a misnomer (for the romance part) but the Toby Daye series has fae galore and a stabby kickass heroine who solves a lot of her problems by punching them in the face. Her stepmom is a mermaid. One who punches people in the face. It's a thing. The High Mountain Court isn't exactly dark either but it has fae and sexy romance.

Anyway my point is this: I am of the firm belief that a lot of people find sarah janet's work compelling or original because they haven't had the chance to read the books she works from (and I don't even in this instance mean the Suspicious Similarities). I think, and have found, that ALMOST ALWAYS (*almost*) the fans of hers who start reading other things start drifting more towards those other things. I genuinely believe this is the true reason bloomsbury wanted to publish her work in YA: YA readers usually haven't been able to read as many books as adults who read, and can therefore be offered less original things without noticing.

I don't mean 'oh lol kids don't know what racism is' but I do mean that, at least in the US, media literacy is being hardcore removed from the curriculum. It is a skill that needs teaching and practice, not an innate talent that some people Just Ignore. If people are given a wider range of things to read, they will start to see more patterns and question why some books do this while others don't.

And I think that Bloomsbury and Sarah Janet herself, in managing her books and writing as they would a brand, are deliberately driving what is (questionably) called 'tribal marketing' and encouraging an 'us vs them' mentality. You'll note similar marketing tactics with apple products.

[theladyragnell]

to further tortall yelling, ship opinions on the main 3 kel ships (kel/neal, kel/cleon, kel/dom)?

I do love yelling about Tortall!

Kel/Neal

I think if there's one thing about me as a shipper these days, it's that I will absolutely ship the f/m pairing where the canon and the fandom both agree that their friendship is 100% better than any romance could be! In other words, while I didn't ship this when I was younger (I tended, and tend, to be a pretty face-value reader--Kel got over her crush, I was fully content with that), on my most recent reread I was very much going "these two clearly care about each other way more than they care about anyone else" and they just have so many sweet moments! I'm glad it's not canon, though, because Kel would hate being a duchess nearly as much as Alanna would hate being a queen. This is why Kel/Neal/Yuki is currently a winner for me.

Kel/Cleon

Like Alanna/Jon, one of those ships that makes me glad that Tamora Pierce believes in transitory teen romances! It's sweet (though I question the choice to have Kel date one of her former hazers, however much kinder about it he was than the others, in the anti-hazing-and-bullying books; for that reason, Faleron or Yancen or someone might have been a better call), and the progression and the end of it always feel believable. I like it for what it is, and feel no need for it to be anything more!

Kel/Dom

I like it! If it had gone explicitly endgame, I definitely wouldn't have cried about it, Dom is definitely a charming and endearing character, and I like how much he respects Kel. But I do feel a bit like Pierce went "ah, I like her dynamic with Neal but don't want her to be with Neal" and kind of invented Older Hotter Neal (Slightly Less Mean Edition). I will also say that it was a relief but something that made it harder to ship them that, on a reread, Dom clearly doesn't see Kel as a romantic prospect not because she's unattractive but because she's young! Maybe by the end of their Scanra adventure that is changing, but given the Numair and Daine of things it's nice to see that there's clearly no attraction for him while she's still a squire.

[missbrunettebarbie]

Another Charmed kid from the future

This was inspired by a convo with @laufire about time travelling kids and how I never cared for the couples that got this trope. As a result, meet Lana Ruth Matthews, Kyle and Paige's illegitimate daughter from the future. Idk when I'm gonna write more of this but I do plan to explore this idea in more detail.

Lana wanted to punch her cousin. Unfortunately said cousin was currently less than a year old. Because she had somehow managed to strand herself in 2005, not 2008. And it was all because of the stupid spell Chris had written.

‘From present's hold, I now unbind,

Reverse the flow, my path to find,

To the days that prelude the sorrow's breath,

Take me to a time before my father's death.’

She supposed it was her fault too. She had forgotten that her father had died twice. The spell had taken her to a month before his first death, before he had become a whitelighter. Before her mother had met Henry. Before Kat, Tamora and HJ had been even born. 

And if she carried on her plan, they would never be born. Maybe HJ, but the twins could only exist if Paige married Henry. 

“Why did you even marry Dad if you loved Lana’s father so much?”

“Because Lana’s father wasn’t there!”

The argument arose in her mind unbidden. It had happened on Kat and Tamora’s tenth birthday, after Paige and Henry had argued all day about how to raise their children. That was the moment Lana Matthews had realized why her siblings didn’t like playing with her. Why she wasn’t allowed to call their dad her dad. Why she had a different name. Why her mom seemed to spend just a little more time with her than she did with the twins and HJ.

All her life, her siblings had made sure she felt like the unwanted child. Did she really want to let the Avatars kill her dad just so those stupid brats could be born? They sure as hell would love to erase Lana from existence if they ever got the chance.

And well, didn’t Uncle Leo always say that things that are meant to be find a way to happen? If her siblings were meant to be born, then Kyle and Paige would probably not get together even if Kyle didn’t die this time around.

Then it hit her. If Kyle wouldn't become a whitelighter in this timeline, Lana wouldn't be born either. At least not the version of her that existed now, the witchlighter that was more whitelighter than witch, the one that grew up half an orphan, who got her name from a cherished memory of her mother’s that had become bittersweet by the time it had made its way on her birth certificate. 

She really wished she had understood more about time-travel instead of blindingly trusting Chris with the ‘small details’. Now she was stuck three years too early, not knowing how the smallest change could affect the timeline. 

“Fear is a demon that has to be vanquished,” she mumbled to herself the mantra she had used since she was five and had been kidnapped for the first time. “You can do this, Lana. Just stick to the plan. Whatever happens happens. My only priority right now is to find Kyle Brody.”

Kyle Brody and the Avatars, but she would worry about them later. Thankfully Lana knew her father’s life the way other children knew fairytales. Finding him would not be a problem. Getting him to listen to a strange fifteen year old would.

[checkoutmybookshelf]

Do You Want to Rediscover a Lost Civilization? Because This is How You Accidentally Rediscover a Lost Civilization. (This Post is Spoilerific. Be Warned.)

Normally I don't do spoilerific posts, but this one is spoilery because I genuinely had no idea how to talk about Marie Brennan's incredible Lady Trent memoirs without spoiling the thing. You could almost call this post "What Happens When a Naturalist and Archaeologist Have Overlapping Fields of Interest" because that is literally what happened, and it's how they accidentally discovered a pocket of an ancient civilization that had long been considered lost. Oh, and there is some absolutely WILD human blood and dragon egg rituals in there too, so keep on reading.

Isabella, the Lady Trent, previously Dame Isabella Camehurst, nee Isabella Hendermore, loves nothing so much as natural history and dragons, and her professional and personal exploits are relayed in appropriately victorian detail in these five memoirs. Isabella begins with simple experiments that headbutt the field of dragon naturalism forward, but still bump up against the archaeological mysteries of the Draconeans.

Having finished this series, the peices scattered throughout the books, even that first one, are stunning. The Vystrana fire stones, Draconean ruins, and the *maked dead from page 1 but I completely missed it because I have a PhD in English* Jacob Camehurtst all play out over the subsequent four books and are all absolutely crucial to the steps that lead not only to Isabella finding the last pocket of Draconean society, but also discovering the morphology and breeding program that allowed bathing dragon eggs in human blood to create the hybrid Draconeans.

But wait, you say. Lady Trent is a dragon naturalist, why does she even care about the Draconeans? Well, that would be a combination of literally bumping into them everywhere--and when life is trying that hard to show you something, you sit up and pay attention--and Suhail.

Once poor, doomed Jacob takes a knife to the gut and passes away in book 1 (Y'all, I warned you twice there would be spoilers, so nobody gets to be mad right now), Isabella is supported by Tom Wilker, who is the best research colleague ever. But he is firmly a platonic friend, despite the emotional intimacy of their relationship. Then Suhail struts onto the scene. The entire vibe I got here was if Numair from Tamora Pierce's Tortall books had been transplanted more or less wholesale into Marie Brennan's work. And yes, that is entirey meant to be a compliment; in this house we stan Suhail.

Suhail and Isabella are, first and foremost, a partnership. Partners in life, in love, and absolutely in research. Suhail is an archaeologist who studies the Draconeans, and the pair accidentally bump into each other when their literal research sites overlap and everything just spirals from there.

What I love most about Isabella and Suhail is that they respect and support each other's research interests, even the bits that don't explicitly overlap. If there was ever an academic romance--and not in the modern sense of academia, but the deeper sense of two academics who love research for its own sake--this is it.

There's no magic in these books, but the overwhelming sense I had while reading them was a feeling of magic. In this case, however, it was the magic of discovery, and of being so good at what you do--and so lucky in your friends and colleagues--that something that is completely justified and scientifically sound in-universe feels like magic.

[star-anise]

🙄

I read feminist fantasy because I'm a feminist, and I take issue with it sometimes because I don't think it's good to assume that a reflexive animus against everything we personally don't like is automatically good feminist praxis. I understand why skirts feel dumb and oppressive to us now! I am in fact aware of basic historical facts and support the destruction of gendered norms that dictate which people get what freedoms in how they look, dress, and act. (Before you run the risk of thinking you might agree with me, I'm forced to disclose that I think this includes trans people.)

But my other point is: We lose a great deal by assuming that what works for our culture and society right now (and I wear pants 90% of the time, I know how comfortable and warm and safe they are around heavy machinery!) is what should work for everyone everywhere, forever amen.

I wrote this post because I was reading By the Sword, a 1991 novel by Mercedes Lackey about a woman who chooses to become a mercenary captain in a fantasy world. Lackey has written over a hundred books by now, and several of them were incredibly formative to my childhood, as were other feminist fantasy pioneers like Tamora Pierce and Sherryl Jordan.

Lackey got her start writing prose thanks to Marion Zimmer Bradley*, who's most famous for The Mists of Avalon, a 1983 feminist retelling of the legend of King Arthur. However, Bradley was perhaps even more influential for publishing the fantasy anthology series Sword and Sorceress. She put out 17 volumes from 1984 to her death in 1999, curating a space specifically for short stories about strong female characters in the fantasy genre. This launched a number of careers, including Lackey, and materially changed the landscape of fantasy fiction.

Unfortunately, though, a lot of feminist fantasy from the 80s and 90s had this undercurrent that said that only women who rejected femininity completely were able to accomplish anything or be meaningful or important.

And see, when you think most women are stupid sheeple who care about stupid shit and make horrible choices and don't amount to much, I really start to doubt your commitment to feminism.

*Also, despite her contributions to the field and her stated goal of combating sexual violence, MZB sexually abused her own daughter and was complacent about her husband's predation and assaults of young teenage boys. She only saw some kinds of abuse as an issue, and did not imagine how things that didn't bother her could still matter a lot to other people.

Anyway, sorry you can't find feminist fantasy books? Have you tried looking. You might need to get off BookTok and find some works that focus less on internet virality and more on being actually like, feminist and well-written. Perhaps find a search engine of your choice and type in "feminist fantasy". Then hit enter. You might find a thing or two.

Feminist fantasy is funny sometimes in how much it wants to shit on femininity for no goddamned reason. Like the whole “skirts are tools of the patriarchy made to cripple women into immobility, breeches are much better” thing.

(Let’s get it straight: Most societies over history have defaulted to skirts for everyone because you don’t have to take anything off to relieve yourself, you just have to squat down or lift your skirts and go. The main advantage of bifurcated garments is they make it easier to ride horses. But Western men wear pants so women wearing pants has become ~the universal symbol of gender equality~)

The book I’m reading literally just had its medievalesque heroine declare that peasant women wear breeches to work in the field because “You can’t swing a scythe in a skirt!”

Hm yes story checks out

peasant women definitely never did farm labour in skirts

skirts definitely mean you’re weak and fragile and can’t accomplish anything

skirts are definitely bad and will keep you from truly living life

no skirts for anyone, that’s definitely the moral of the story here

[hollyvorpahl]

6, 23 and 29 please!

Also, I apparently can't DM you if we're not mutuals? But I'm happy to keep talking like this if that's what you're comfortable with. :D

6. What kind of readers would be fans of this wip?

I could see fans of Legends and Lattes liking The Dot Duology and Of Glass Pens and Enchanted Treats. They're very low stakes stories that focus on the day to day of a young woman and the community she meets.

A Vow from the Winter Lord would maybe attract fans of Sjm and Elise Kova. However, it's still on the less epic scale. Important stakes but not full scale war style. So maybe those who liked specifically the romantic side to the story but didn't care much for the brewing war. 

23. How would you describe your writing style?

Um... a concentrated dose of my sense of humor? I don't see myself as inherently clever and I'm really not. So if you're reading something of mine that has a clever line or something funny, it took forever to come up with. The line also passed The Husband Test. If I have a line that I think is funny, I'll ask my husband if I can read him something. I read the scene in full with little context (he knows my stories so he understands what's going on) and if he laughs then it was actually funny and I keep it. 

For example, in A Vow from the Winter Lord, there's this lovely moment between Marian’s father and her love interest Lord Athello. Athello asks why Gregor calls Marian "Spark"? He explains that when Marian was little, he was very standoffish with her because he didn't quite understand the whole father thing yet. His wife left Marian with him in the forge one afternoon and she watched him work and would squeal with delight anytime sparks would erupt from the piece he was working on. This started their bond as father and daughter and he began to understand. He's called her Spark since. Athello calls Marian his "Little Duck". So Gregor asks the same of Athello. The answer, it feels like I'm explaining the joke so I'm sorry it isn't funny here, is that when Marian and Athello met she had been cursed by a Hag to be a duck for mouthing off to her. So Athello just sorta looks over at him and says, "She was a duck when we met."

Or lines like "Once you have animated your skeleton (that is the one you have arranged on the table, not your own)..." in A Princess Guide to Love and Necromancy. 

I see my narration as being a friend to the reader. A nicer, less foreboding version of Lemony Snicket. It gets to be clever and fun because I agonized over it for weeks.

29. Books or series or movies influenced your writing style the most?

How far back you want me to go? All the way? Okie dokie! Disney movies, particularly Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Hunchback and Hercules. Disney's Gargoyles and the Aladdin TV series too. Not Disney but still great is Anastasia. David Bowie in Labyrinth left a huge mark on my choices of love interest for my characters. The first few Barbie movies, Nutcracker, Rapunzel, Swan Lake and Princess and the Pauper. They really drove my love for feminine yet active protagonists. Most of which don't rely on combat training. Lord of the Rings, of course. Tamora Pierce was a big one. Ella Enchanted and Fairest were others. The Chronicles of Narnia, even though now I see how preachy they are. Neil Gaiman, particularly Coraline, Sandman and Stardust (book and movie, I actually like the movie more). The Merlin tv series and Tin Man had something to do with my writing too. Same with Once Upon a Time. Terry Practchet even though I haven't read a lot of his work. Lemony Snicket and unfortunately Harry Potter. Also... don't judge me but The Tinkerbell movies. I love the hell out of them and I'd be lying if I said they weren't an influence in A Vow from the Winter Lord. There are more but I'm drawing a blank now... I actually have shown my husband a lot of these things and he points out the things he recognizes as influences in my work.

I went into my settings and turned that thing off so you should be able to DM me now. I didn't realize it was on to begin with. I'm sorry.

[reddy-reads]

Solstice Wood, Patricia A McKillip

Okay I finished the book!

Thoughts (and spoilers) under the jump

1. I wasn’t sure I was going to finish it. I bought it months ago, possibly even a year ago, and it sat about 1/3 read on my nightstand for months--that usually bodes ill. Then, of course, I decided to make it the November book so that, one way or another, it’d be taken care of by the end of this month.

2. I picked this book up more-or-less at random after seeing it discussed in a thread about “books that have a magic system that hinges on something ordinary/everyday rather than Great and Obscure Spells” (a la Tamora Pierce’s Circle of Magic books). In this case, the magic is worked through needlework and threadcraft--the witches’ coven in the book is the local Fiber Arts Guild. They work their magic through sewing, quilting, crochet, knitting, macrame... and they use it to maintain and defend the boundaries between the mundane world and the Fair Folk.

3. The magic system is awesome! What we see of it. It’s not explained much, but it does get some description, and I loved that. The plot is... okay? Like I said, I plowed through a little less than half of it and then didn’t feel the need to finish it. Normally my favorite books get their momentum up before then. But more on this in a second.

The chapters are have varying character POVs, but it’s not really used to a super amazing extent (for the most part). If it wasn’t for the chapter headings like “Chapter 2: Steve” I’m not sure I could have told you who was narrating which chapters? Not to toot my own horn but I think even I have stretched myself a lot re: having the narration be really flavored by the POV character, and I think the characters’ voices could have been more deeply developed.

3b: Plot: having damned with faint praise re: plot and pacing just now, I will say that when I did pick the book back up again, the book did start to snap along pretty well. When the changeling appears, things really get moving. I think I said something like “oh man I hopped off too early this is actually kinda good,” so if you can get over that hump, it’s easy to finish. That said, I really don’t think authors generally intend for their books to sag in the early-middle.

4: Philosophically speaking, I did like the conclusion. Instead of ending in a big battle or dramatic sacrifice or big violent orgy, the book wraps with the matriarch of the family (and the head of the Fiber Arts Guild)... changing her mind. She has a perspective change, and she changes her previous stance of “the Fae must be kept out at any cost, they can never never never be allowed in our world” to “maybe we can see what happens if we stop reinforcing our spells. Maybe we can see if they’re as dangerous as we always believed, or if they’re only as dangerous as human people.” She doesn’t do a full 180 and suddenly embrace Them, but she does realize that maybe, in keeping out what she is afraid of, she is also keeping out too much. (Also, a great number of people she cares about turn out to be either part-fae or in love with a fay, so she changes her mind largely for them because she doesn’t want to drive them away any farther than she already has.) And I do love a book that has that sort of shift at its heart.

5: In conclusion: I’m glad I read the book, I’m glad I stuck with it and finished it. It definitely has some good points, and I think they largely outweigh the so-so things about it. But I’m not keeping the book, and I’m not sure I’d recommend it. It feels like a “if this seems like your kind of story, go for it. But if you’re not quite sold on it, maybe just see if you can get a library copy.”

And that’s November’s book: Solstice Wood, Patricia A McKillip.

[momentofmemory]

(&/or) 23 + Scott & Monroe

“It looks the same on paper,” Scott says, careful not to meet Monroe’s eyes. Eye contact builds trust in relationships, but it communicates aggression just as well.

Especially for prey and its predator.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Monroe asks. Her gun shifts at her side, and even from a distance, Scott can smell the wolfsbane in the bullets. “A national pity headline for your cause: Masked Assassin Guns Down Innocent College Student.”

“Actually,” Scott says, his hands kept where she can see them, “I’d really prefer no headlines at all. Especially if it means getting to finish my degree.”

Monroe laughs. It’s not even a cold laugh: she’s genuinely amused.

It hurts more, if he’s honest. The reminder that Tamora doesn’t have to be this way.

“Why are you here,” he asks.

Monroe plays with safety on her gun, turning it on and back off just so he can hear it. “I think that’s obvious, isn’t it?”

Scott laughs, too, but less genuinely.

He gestures to his surroundings—on the grass next to his hammock, in the middle of UC Davis’ Arboretum—still careful not to move too quickly. “If you wanted to kill me, there are less obvious places. And you didn’t have to come near enough for us to hold a conversation.”

“Maybe I wanted you to hear your justice coming.”

“I’d have heard you across the quad if you wanted that,” Scott says softly. “You wanted to be able to hear me, too.”

Monroe doesn’t answer, but her heart rate ticks up. That’s all the answer he really needs.

He sighs. “What it’s going to take for this to end?”

“You can’t stop me.”

“I got that,” Scott says. “But that’s not what I asked.”

Monroe fidgets with the trigger.

Across the pathway, a couple passes. Blissfully unaware of the danger—though at least, it’s not posed at them.

“It ends when every last one of you is gone,” Monroe says.

“Okay,” Scott says. “How are you going to know when that happens?”

Monroe’s grip falters.

“There were a half dozen people like me in Beacon Hills High, and I’m an Alpha,” he continues. “I didn’t even recognize what my own Biology teacher was—and she wrote my first letter of recommendation.”

“What’s your point?” Monroe snaps.

“You say it’ll end when there’s no more people like me.” Scott shrugs. “But you’ll never know when that’s done. You could slaughter thousands of us, but in the back of your mind, you’ll never stop wondering. Thinking, maybe—maybe there was just one more.”

“That’s all you have to convince me with?” Monroe scoffs, but she sounds almost curious. “You value your own life so little you’d rather rest on futility?”

Scott shakes his head. “Just basing it on what you might value. I already learned you can’t make someone care about you if they don’t want to.”

“Save the dating advice for someone else.”

“I figured that out from my dad, actually, but I’ll keep that in mind.”

Another startled laugh.

“That’s clever,” she says. “You could’ve been a good shrink.”

“So could’ve you.”

Her breath tightens behind him.

Scott tenses for the bullet.

It doesn’t come.

Instead, the safety clicks back on, and then Monroe’s shoes click across the pavement.

Away from him.

Scott doesn’t move for a quarter of an hour.

He half expects the searing pain of a wolfsbane bullet every time there’s so much as a breeze, but nothing happens. No parting word. No parting shot.

She's just gone.

[sgtcalhouns]

Moving

From you to me I sense a little animosity So stay away Or maybe, baby, maybe you should stay

Don't you make my heart beat faster Don't you make me mad Doctor, call the undertaker: This one might be bad

It's time for another installment of the Fresh Start au. Hurt feelings abound. Felix is angry for maybe the first time ever. Enjoy!

A bitter wind blew as Felix walked back to his hotel, but his own bitterness seemed to numb him to it. As a million thoughts and feelings swirled in his mind, he couldn’t even bring himself to cry; an uncharacteristic anger had taken hold, forming a lump in his throat that would not allow his tears to pass. Sadness and embarrassment were secondary as he ruminated on everything he had learned tonight. And deep in his chest, a sense of heartbreak he was trying his best to ignore. More than anything, he wished he could be rid of his feelings for Tamora, but the harsh reality was that this only hurt so deeply because he still loved her.

The knowledge he had gained tonight forced him to look back at their relationship through a different lens. He had always considered himself to be an optimist and he tended to give others the benefit of the doubt, habits which gave him a reputation among his friends for being too naive for the harsh reality of adulthood. Tamora was the first person he’d ever met who seemed to admire these traits. While she viewed them with a certain sense of disbelief, he never got the impression that she viewed him as less of a man because of them. Now, he couldn’t help but wonder when she had deduced that he wasn’t capable of making his own decisions. Had it been a lie all along, or had she decided somewhere along the way that he needed to be coddled like a child?

A strange sense of resentment crept in as he walked. He had been alive on this earth for nearly 30 years—he was a grown man, and he could do whatever he wanted with his own life. He didn’t need Tamora or anyone else telling him how to live.

As he neared his hotel, he found himself filled with dread. If he went back to his room now, he would spend the whole night wallowing in self-pity. He didn’t want to call Ralph, because he knew deep down that his friend would agree with Tamora. Back when he and Tamora were seeing each other long-distance, Ralph had made multiple attempts to convince him to stop running himself ragged traveling back and forth. It suddenly dawned on him that Tamora was likely the mastermind behind those conversations, and a new wave of indignation and disbelief overcame him. None of the people he cared most about had ever truly had faith in his ability to look after himself.

An unfamiliar sensation of restlessness rose up within him. Despite the freezing cold, he felt his chest grow hot as his heart rate increased. He clenched his fists, trying his best to shake off this new emotion, but sudden surges of anger coursed through him in spite of his efforts. Never in his life had he experienced the desire to hit something, but now he finally understood it. Something in his gut was telling him he would have the release he so desperately needed if he gave in to the urge.

There were few outlets for this aggression on the sidewalk at night, and he didn't want to cause any trouble. At the end of the street, illuminated by a dim streetlight, was a garbage can—Felix figured that was as good a target as any. For the first time in his life, he allowed himself to give in to his worst instincts. Negative thoughts flooded his mind and he made no effort to brush them off. You're weak. Everyone thinks you're a child. No one sees you as a man, and they never will. His steps quickened, he pulled his right leg behind him and put every ounce of his frustration into dealing a powerful kick to the trash can...

A dull, metallic thud reverberated through the garbage bin as the force of his own blow knocked Felix backward onto the sidewalk. His toes, which had previously been numbed by the cold, were now throbbing in pain, and his tailbone ached from where he had hit the pavement. From his spot on the ground, he was now able to see that the trash can was encased in iron which was firmly rooted to the sidewalk—a factor that would have certainly impacted his decision if he had noticed it sooner. If he wasn't so miserable, it might have been funny. Just when he thought it couldn't get any worse, a familiar voice sounded from behind him.

"What the hell was that all about?"

Tamora. He closed his eyes in defeat, groaning inwardly. Of course she had just witnessed the most embarrassing thing he had ever done.

"Please tell me you didn't see that."

"I wish I could," she replied, her voice growing louder as she walked closer, "but you and I both know I'm not a very good liar."

She reached under his arms and helped him to his feet. Unable to help himself, Felix let a bit of his unresolved bitterness slip out.

"You seemed perfectly capable when you told me you didn't want to be with me anymore," he said, brushing away her hands as they tried to steady him.

Tamora was grateful that she was positioned behind him so that he couldn't see the impact his words had on her. She had never heard him speak like this before, and there was a sharpness in his tone that caused the words to sting.

"Felix, I'm sorry," she said. "I came after you so we could talk. I don't like the way we left things."

A harsh laugh escaped him.

"I didn't like the way we left things three years ago," he shot back. He whirled around to face her and she was taken aback by the fire in his eyes. "Only I didn't get the courtesy of talking things out with you. You just disappeared from my life and I was left to grapple with that on my own."

“I know you’re upset and I understand, but I—"

"No, I don't think you do understand."

“I know I messed up. I shouldn’t have lied to you.”

“Tamora, it wasn’t just a lie, you—you broke apart my life. I had built it around you, and then you were just gone. You were gone and I had to figure out what to do when everything in my life revolved around you,” he explained, finally unleashing three years' worth of pent-up hurt. "And that was hard, but now I'm finding out you weren't even being honest with me when you left. I know we weren't always perfect but we were always honest with each other."

She could do nothing but stand by and watch as he poured his heart out to her, acrid words filling the air and burning her lungs like cigarette smoke.

"So now, after three years of coping and working on myself and trying to move on, I'm starting all over, because the truth is that you see me as some kind of child who can't make their own decisions," he continued. "And you were too much of a coward to explain that to me. I always said you were the bravest person I knew, but you were too scared to be honest with someone who loved you more than anything."

He attempted to take a step forward, only to brace himself against the garbage can as the consequences of his reckless actions caught up to him and he found that he could not put any weight on his right foot.

"Felix," Tamora said, trying and failing to hide the hurt look on her face, "let's get you inside so I can take a look at your foot. We can talk about this later."

She reached for him, but he pushed her hands away and stumbled backwards.

"I don't need your help," he said. "I can take care of myself."

This was almost enough for Tamora to resign herself to the fact that their conversation was over. But looking into his eyes, she could see the hurt that was causing him to lash out. It reminded her of herself. More importantly, it reminded her that every time she had ever lashed out at him like this, he opened his arms and his heart to her, giving her endless grace no matter what she threw at him. He was endlessly patient with her, even when he didn't understand. She had always hoped to return the favor someday.

"I know you can take care of yourself," she said, her voice level and calm. "But you're hurt. At least let me help you inside, and then I promise I'll go home and leave you alone. I'm not leaving you out here by yourself."

For the first time since his outburst began, Felix took a deep breath, his anger beginning to falter. As all the spiteful things he had just spewed at Tamora played back in his mind, he was horrified by his behavior. But when he met her gaze, he found a deep sense of understanding that he could not comprehend. She should be furious with him, but here she was, offering her arm to steady him. It took a long moment for him to find his voice again as he accepted her peace offering.

"Thank you."

[thatsparrow]

rewatched quest for camelot—my absolute childhood beloved—last night for the first time in maybe 14 years? and truly I could care less what anyone says about the plot, it is still such a delight. I had a blast the whole way through. ruber’s whole deal is just wanting power and being as over the top as possible in every scene. the music is spectacular. it immediately says “fuck disney” by giving us a dead dad instead of a dead mom. kayley was absolutely the blueprint for who I wanted to be as a child (completely unsurprising that I went on to read and fall in love w tamora pierce). i have listened to “on my father’s wings” countless times over the years, the line “this horse’s stride with one day’s ride // will have covered more distance than me” has such pleasing internal rhyme. ruber turning his henchman into mechanical part-weapons is so nonsensical in the context of this arthurian story but those designs also slap so hard. the timeline makes no sense, particularly that kayley was supposed to be born the same day that arthur pulled the sword from the stone, so all the subsequent civic development has happened in like eight years? it features celine dion’s oscar-nominated song “the prayer” which is beautiful and also becomes extremely unintentionally funny in that is dubbed over kayley running for her life and ending up in the forbidden forest, immediately countering every message of hope and safety that juliana wants for her. garrett is such a brilliant and unexpected protagonist for an animated movie from 1998, and “i stand alone” is an obvious classic. the timeline makes no sense their first day in the forbidden forest lasts forever and then the next day is over in five minutes. all the plants are alive and want to kill you. garrett changes his mind about kayley coming with him immediately and for no reason. they get to the end of the forest and kayley makes a comment about seeing the sky despite the fact that there were dragons flying around. what is the composition of the forest anyway? just kidding who cares bc the scene where she patches him up and they sing “looking through your eyes” is peak romance, daredevil’s ‘world on fire’ scene like 20 years before its time. they absolutely fall in love too fast but the whole movie takes place over like three days so who cares. him leading her through the tunnels to save arthur!! her echoing “I will not serve a false king” from her father at the beginning!! quest for camelot my absolute and eternal beloved

[elucubrare]

I was thinking about it and my own “there aren’t female scifi authors” sad era was caused by my dad (lovely guy overall, still affected by patriarchal systems in this way) just....... not ever having heard of any (that he could remember). And being that guy who blithely, with no ill intent, if you asked him as a kid (as I did) oh ok so is there a sci fi books about a girl (I wanted a girl protagonist I didn’t really think or care about authors at that point) he just said hmm no can’t think of any. And I didn’t care that much so that was that, I assumed there weren’t any. And my mom didn’t really read sci fi, didn’t think to ask anyone else about it or check for myself for a long time. This is maybe just a very niche experience or maybe a common one i don’t know. He does this with a lot of stuff — music genres, scientists, historical figures. My dad is the gentlest, kindest to women person, and working with women and girls takes care to listen and treats everyone with equity... actually exemplary in a lot of ways... but absolutely focused on men as when it comes to “knowing about great works and culture”. He doesn’t see it and can’t correct it either, unless you spend an hour a day helping him to. He was born in ‘49, so that may be part of it. Actively rejected so much of what he was being taught and long into counter culture but just didn’t quite see his way out of all of it until maybe lately, from him, my mom and myself and my sisters all staying close and talking about it. Anyway it did affect me and my sisters and how we just didn’t know who was out there. Sometimes stepping into certain museums feels that way, about marginalization in general. Like more women naked in the paintings than among the painters in the museum doesn’t mean there weren’t women painters, but it’s easy to forget that doesn’t follow. Curation and broad fame and fame among “the ones who get listened to” is a lens or a funnel or a filter or something along those lines.

i've been thinking about this for the week since you sent this, and i'm sorry your dad was like this (as contrast, my dad, born in '47, read me Tamora Pierce and Patricia C. Wrede as well as Tolkien*), but I don't think that filtration is an excuse for people now to say that The Problem with current SFF is Too Many Horny Men writing it.

It is fine not to like fantasy, and it's fine not to like the thing that feels like it's the face of fantasy (I think it's still Game of Thrones if you're not really into fantasy, but I'm not sure). It's less fine by me to dismiss everyone currently writing fantasy, and all of the women who wrote fantasy and sci-fi in the past by saying that fantasy is a genre by and for men. A problem with X Male Author is a problem with that author, not anything inherent to the genre.

And, like, I didn't have Secret Access To Female Writers! I went to the bookstore (when I was in high school in the 2000s) and looked at all the backs of books that looked interesting. It was in NYC, so they might have had more there, but I'm in Round Rock, TX (a suburb of Austin, yes, but about a tenth the size of NYC in population), now, and I can still go to the library and find a decent selection of SFF, much of it by women.

I'm sorry if this seems like I'm saying people should pull themselves up by the bootstraps, but I feel like I'm inside a garden with wide open gates and listening to people outside complaining about the gatekeepers.

[bibliophileiz]

There’s No Place like Magic School

A very fluffy holiday story for @prudencemelinda

Happy Holidays, Bri!

For Charmed Secret Santa

“OK, Magic School is officially ready for Christmas!”

With that announcement, Paige collapsed dramatically on the couch with a sound that was more humph than sigh. Smiling, Henry set aside the file on his latest parolee and put an arm around her shoulders, pulling her closer to him. Paige dropped her head on his shoulder and let herself relax for the first time in … well, all month.

There were eight kids staying at the school for the holidays this year – either because they didn’t have families of their own, or they did, but those families didn’t approve of their magic. Leo and the other teachers were pulling their hair out. Every year, it seemed more and more kids weren’t accepted by the outside world because of their magic.

Paige knew, logically, that it wasn’t her responsibility to take care of the kids at Magic School anymore. Leo and his staff did a fantastic job with everything from teaching them to feeding them and offering them emotional support, since Phoebe had introduced a curriculum that was less about duty and destiny and more about wellness and acceptance of yourself and your magic. 

And it wasn’t like Paige didn’t have enough to worry about. When she wasn’t chasing down demons with her sisters or running Whitelighter-related errands for the Elders, she was taking care of the new baby or arguing with Henry over whether to bind the twins’ powers (although honestly, after Tamora nearly burned the house down, Paige was starting to come around to her husband’s side). But then the whole family got together for Thanksgiving dinner, and Leo said Kaci’s parents told her that they were spending the holidays in Bermuda and she wasn’t invited – Kaci, who was only 9 years old, a scared and confused witch still learning to control her powers, and who Paige had once bonded with over a mutual love of The Wizard of Oz – and well, Paige had become a woman on a mission.

An exhausting mission.

But hey, it was done now. The 20-foot tree was strung with magical lights of the Whitelighers (or one half-witch, half-Whitelighter), as well as more mundane but still festive garland and tinsel, and she’d taken time out of work to help the students decorate it with handmade ornaments yesterday. Earlier this month, she’d set up a menorah enchanted so that the flames would stay lit through the final night of Hanukkah. She and some of the teachers had set aside a special room in Magic School and turned it into a winter wonderland, with real snow so the students could make snow angels and snowmen (and snowwomen. And snowpeople.) and have snowball fights. She’d organized a Secret Santa between the students.

That last one was what she was proudest of. Because the eight students all had each other’s names, but what they didn’t realize was that each of Paige’s family members had all their names too. Piper, Leo, Phoebe, Coop and of course Paige and Henry each had one, while the remaining two students were covered by other teachers who were still here for the holidays. In addition to receiving student-made presents, each kid would get their own big present from a very Charmed helper of Santa.

Now, late afternoon on Christmas Eve, everything was finalized. All Paige could do now was wait – and hope everything went off without a hitch tomorrow.

Henry must have known what she was thinking, because he kissed the top of her head and said, “Paige, you’ve worked really hard to give these kids a Christmas. Even if it’s not exactly how you want it, it’s going to be perfect for them.”

Paige crinkled her nose. “Nothing in our lives ever goes perfectly. Every time we try to plan a party or have a normal holiday, something goes wrong – a demon attacks, or one of the kids does magic we can’t reverse without calling in a family therapist.”

“Well, if you would agree to bind Kat and Tamora’s powers, we wouldn’t have that–”

“Oh my God, we are not having this argument at Christmas.”

Henry pursed his lips, and Paige knew they were far from done with this discussion, but he seemed to be willing to let it go tonight. “My point is,” he said, “what these kids are really going to want for Christmas is a family. Someone who cares enough to make the holidays special. That’s what you’ve done.” He gave her a squeeze. “Take it from someone who grew up in the foster system. All they need is for you to be there. The rest will figure itself out.”

Paige hummed thoughtfully. “You’re getting wise in your old age, Mr. Mitchell.” She leaned in and kissed him. He turned more fully toward her and deepened it immediately, and she moved so that she was straddling his lap.

Just when things were starting to get really interesting, Paige remembered what night it was – and that her house was suspiciously silent for one with three small children, two of whom were witches. “Um, where are our children?”

Unconcerned, Henry kissed her again. “With your sister.”

He couldn’t have killed the mood faster if he’d announced a marching band was about to pass through their living room playing “Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer.” “You left them with Piper?! On Christmas Eve, do you know how much baking she’s gonna do?! We’ll never get the girls to sleep tonight, they’ll be so hopped up on sugar –”

“With Phoebe.”

“Oh.” That was better. Phoebe would probably cast a calming spell over them and have them draw pictures from their favorite holiday movies while drinking glasses of warm milk at the kitchen table – all so she could coo over baby Henry Jr. Little Henry. Whatever they were going to end up calling him, Paige supposed.

“Well, I guess we better pick them up,” she mused, “seeing as it’s Christmas Eve and we should be having family time right about now.”

Henry shifted a little, causing a pleasant sensation in Paige’s … well …. “We don’t have to go right this minute, though, right?” he asked.

He shifted again – very deliberately, Paige realized – and well, yes, Christmas Eve with family could wait a few more minutes.

***

Surprisingly, Christmas at Magic School did go off without a hitch. Everyone exchanged magical presents and ate too much of Piper’s enchanted gingerbread castle that tasted like whatever most made you think of home (and which Chris told Paige that Piper had stressed over so much she’d banished him and Wyatt to the attic to play with Grams’ spirit for five hours on Christmas Eve). Now all the kids – including the Charmed Ones’ kids – were playing in the winter wonderland while the adults cleaned up wrapping paper and munched on leftover food.

“I say next year we make the leprechauns do all the work,” Piper grumbled as she spooned the leftover mac and cheese into a casserole dish. 

“You’re thinking of St. Patrick’s Day, sweetie,” said Phoebe as she gathered pieces of torn wrapping paper into a trash bag. She was in a good mood because Gwen had loved her Secret Santa gift of a spell book full of soothing spells, like how to keep distractions away while meditating and how to keep tea warm. Paige kind of wished Phoebe had given her the spell book.

Ah well, the Louis Vuitton knock-off was great too.

“I think it went well,” Paige said. “The kids were happy, and that’s all that matters.”

“Aw, sounds like Paige discovered the true meaning of Christmas,” Piper said, but she didn’t sound quite as sarcastic as usual.

“What did your gingerbread house taste like to you, Piper?” Henry asked.

Piper’s movements to put away the food stilled, and a thoughtful look came over her face. “The lemon cookies Grams used to make when I was little,” she said with a small smile. “Prue and I always insisted on leaving them out for Santa, you remember that Phoebes? Then when we came downstairs on Christmas morning, Grams would present us with three cookies each and say, ‘Santa left them for you, my darlings.’”

At that moment, Chris and Kaci came running in, still in snow covered hats and coats, their noses and cheeks pink from the cold. “Aunt Paige, Aunt Paige,” Chris panted. “Kaci has something to give you.”

Smiling shyly, Kaci handed her a box wrapped in sparkling silver paper. “Aw,” Paige said taking the box from her, “you didn’t have to get me anything, Kaci.”

“It’s for Christmas,” Kaci said.

“Can I open it now?” Paige asked. Kaci nodded.

Paige began tearing at the paper, noticing as she did that her sisters came up behind her to peer over her shoulders.

The wrapping paper fell away to reveal a beat up old shoebox. Paige flipped off the lid and saw –

“Oh, wow,” she whispered, her eyes filling with tears.

Inside were a pair of shimmering ruby slippers, close – though not quite the same – as Dorothy’s from The Wizard of Oz. “Kaci,” she said. “These are beautiful.”

“Put them on and click your heels together,” Kaci ordered.

“OK,” Paige said. She slipped her boots off and replaced them with the slippers. They looked a little silly over her candy cane stockings, but Paige had never loved footwear more.

Giggling, she snapped her heels together three times. “There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home, there’s no place like–”

And suddenly, she was standing in the winter wonderland. Lined up in front of her were the kids, with the twins dead center. “Merry Christmas, Paige!” they all shouted, and Kat and Tamora ran up to her. Kat handed her a handmade card.

“Aw, thank you guys!” Paige said. She opened the card. 

Dear Paige, thank you for making Magic School home for the holidays! Followed by the kids’ signatures.

���Aw, come here,” Paige said. “Group hug, everyone.” Partly because she was cold – she hadn’t expected to be transported to the snow – but also because she would have a million stressful Decembers in a row for these kids. “Merry Christmas, guys!”

They shared a hug, then Paige said, “OK, come inside for hot chocolate, everybody, it’s cold,” and they all trooped back to the great hall where the rest of the adults were waiting. Leo corralled the kids for hot chocolate, and Paige went to her sisters. 

“So I take it Kaci had some help with the enchantment,” she said, raising her eyebrows at them.

“Yeah, but she really wanted to give you something,” Piper said.

“And it was cute!” Phoebe agreed. “What else could we say?”

“You always wanted to be Dorothy,” Piper said.

“Actually I wanted to be Elphaba, but that’s neither here nor there,” Paige said. “Thanks, you guys.”

“Merry Christmas, Paige,” Piper said.

“Yeah, unfortunately the shoes only work at Magic School,” Phoebe said. “It’s complicated magic with a short shelf life, so….” She trailed off apologetically.

“It’s OK,” Paige said. “I’m just glad Kaci and the rest of them got a good holiday.”

“All because of you,” said Phoebe.

The three of them shared a quick hug, which Piper broke when Chris began throwing food at Wyatt, and the party began to break up. Paige slipped the ruby shoes off her feet and back into the box.

Henry, who had the baby asleep in a pouch on his chest, slid an arm around her waist and kissed the top of her head. “So did they have a good Christmas?” As he spoke, the twins ran up and put their arms around her legs.

Paige returned the kiss to Henry’s cheek and touched her daughters’ hair affectionately. “Yeah,” she said. “Best Christmas ever.”

[stvrchaser]

Flower Pressings and Consequences

word count : 1,000

relationship: lily evans x fem!reader

summary : lily’s newfound interest in the vibrant flowerbeds that seemed to sprout out of nowhere lands her in some unexpectedly delightful company

The air is cool and sweet. It caresses her cheeks and sends a pleasant shiver down her spine in spite of the spring warmth which seems to have melted away every trace of winter.

There’s a special beauty in the sight of rebirth. Where the flowers bloom and the creatures sing, an unrivaled vision to which none can compare.

That was, of course, until she found the pretty redhead hovering over her flowerbeds. Lily Evans, her name was.

Lily.

Y/N had a great fondness for flowers— the look of a fully bloomed garden, vibrant petals in contrast to green and soil, the peace of mind that came with the process of caring for them— she loved every bit of it.

So, she was quite surprised with herself that she’d been letting the pretty redhead rip her beloved tamoras. She noticed that Lily had started small, picking the few fallen petals as they eased into the heat of the season. She kept them pressed between the pages of a carefully maintained leather-bound book.

Recently, she’d gotten bolder, taking whole flowers in secret every couple of weeks. Y/N let her go on for a while, until the day that it had started raining.

It started off like most Saturdays. Lily would come out of breakfast shortly after she did, the same brown boots and leather-bound book in hand. Every time, she turned the corners to enter the secluded gardens behind the greenhouses, away from most of the public eye. And so, she let her marvel at her tamoras, as she often did. What Y/N hadn’t expected was to see her running into the greenhouse about ten minutes later.

She had been so immersed in the chapter she was reading about flowers native to Southeast Asia, that she hadn’t seen Lily abandon her flowerbeds. She merely stood by the door, wringing water from the hem of her cardigan. The front of her skirt was drenched in rain, as was her hair. Luckily, she managed to wrap the cardigan around her upper body.

“Oh, hello. I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to bother you. I just had to get away from—” Thunder rumbled. “Well… that.”

Y/N only stared at her, the open book still resting on her lap. Water collected at her lashes which fanned over her cheeks. They tricked down her face it perfectly shaped droplets. It gave her the appearance of a naiad or— hell, a goddess.

“I’m Lily, by the way,” she greeted with and outstretched hand.

She stood up to take it but froze when the book hit the ground with a thud.

Bloody idiot.

“I’m so sorry, I was just caught off guard,” she explained. “I’m Y/N.” Lily smiled and attempted to dry her hand on her skirt, but it didn’t do much. Y/N assumed she might have tried to reach out for a handshake, had she succeeded to rid her palms of the rainwater.

There was a long silence.

“I left my wand in my dorm room. I wasn’t expecting it to rain today,” Lily attempted to make conversation, feeling guilty that she’d interrupted Y/N. The least she could do was try to make things a little less awkward.

Y/N took note of the discomfort in her voice, but didn’t comment on it. Instead, she tried to return Lily’s efforts.

“That’s alright. Spring weather can be a bit unpredictable. Happens to everyone, really. Nearly got myself blown away by strong winds in early winter.”

Lily laughed— a small, sweet laugh that seemed to warm Y/N right up despite the chill from the lack of sunlight. She thought she might like to bathe in the sound. Like the trickle of water down a stream, hidden in the beautiful woods. Maybe it could single-handedly rid the world of its impurities.

“That’s Scotland weather for you,” Lily agreed. “Do you come here often?”

“Yeah, nearly all the time. Professor Sprout leaves me in charge of a few things in return, for letting me plant a few things of my own.”

“Really?” Lily inquired with a smile. Y/N swore her brain went fuzzy. “Which of these are yours?”

“Oh— uhm…” she shifted awkwardly. “None of these, actually. I prefer to work outside.” Lily blushed, well aware that she’d been spending a great portion of her time there.

“The roses… they’re yours?” Y/N nodded in response. “Well, they’re gorgeous.”

“Thank you.” Feeling quite bold, she continued. “I’m glad people seem to think so. I’ve been noticing empty patches lately. Someone’s been picking them.”

“And… is that alright?” Only if it’s you.

“They’re there to be admired. In whichever way one seems fit. I end up picking a few for myself.” She heard Lily sigh in relief.

“What made you so interested in gardening?”

“I mostly do it because it’s therapeutic. Although, they also make great hair accessories,” she joked.

“Oh, you’re so lucky. I do think the color is divine,” Lily sighed.

“Lucky? You say that as if you can’t do it yourself.” Y/N quirked a brow.

“Well, I kind of can’t.”

“And why not?”

“Well, it’s peach, isn’t it? So it’s fairly close to pink, and that just isn’t my color. It clashes horribly with my hair.”

“That’s absurd! I think you’d look beautiful.”

Lily breathed slowly, a warmth spreading over her freckled face. She look perfectly sun kissed. It made Y/N’s breath hitch, a pleasant pull tugging at the strings in her chest.

“You do?”

“Yes. I do,” Y/N insisted before plucking a freshly picked rose from a nearby vase. “Dare I say, it may be the best combination I’ve yet to see.”

Lily smiled wider at that. She wondered if she may preserve the joy of that day within the pages of her leather-bound book, accompanied by the petals which she had to thank for this wonderful consequence.

[checkoutmybookshelf]

It's Callie, and They are Not a Girl

So book Twitter can be a lot of fun, and book twitter is where I found Sir Callie. On a purely superficial level, there was a lot to recommend this book: a nonbinary protagonist (which is just vanishingly rare in my experience with books with LGBTQIA+ protagonists), a cover that absolutely slaps, a blurb from Tamora Pierce, and the author's very fun Twitter presence. So I got an ebook copy of the book (and have since ordered a physical copy; I tried, y'all, but I cannot do ereaders) and inhaled it in two sittings. Let's talk Sir Callie and the Champions of Helston.

*There will be brief mentions of child abuse below, so please take care of you and give this post a pass if you need or choose to! Author Esme Symes-Smith also includes a content warning at the front of this book, so cast an eye over that before you pick up the book! Again, take care of you first. The book (and this post) will be here if and/or when you are ready.*

Sir Callie is all about the experience of gender identity for kids in openly hostile environments, and Esme Symes-Smith knows that their book can be heavy at moments because they include a warning at the front of the book, which is a trend that I am a fan of. Give readers autonomy in making book choices and caring for themselves in those choices!!!

Callie is a phenomenal protagonist, because they know what they want and they are supported in going for it. However, Callie's journey becomes bigger than just achieving knighthood, it becomes about peer support and community building in a hostile environment, and it complicates what "winning" and "losing" look like in a way that is really fascinating. Callie learning in a concrete way that the word is bigger than they are and that they can make bigger waves than they thought possible is stunningly well done.

Another thing the book is not shy in exploring is how even the most supportive parents and allies can sometimes fail in support and allyship. Nick, Callie's dad, is a pretty decent ally. He took Callie away from an openly abusive home life and to a place where Callie could be supported. That said, Nick's experience is complicated by the fact that in the hierarchy of difference--which I'm gonna define in a sec here--he is far closer to what people in power consider "acceptable" than Callie is, and that colors his perception of the challenges Callie faces.

So in a paragraph-long digression, I want to define a couple of things and explain the difference between the hierarchy of difference and the oppression Olympics. The oppression Olympics are all about dismissing someone else's trauma because yours is worse. Don't do this, it's not helpful to anyone but the people doing the oppressing. There is enough space for everyone to feel their feelings, face their trauma, and heal. Now, this is absolutely not what Nick does in the novel. Nick is an openly gay man who adheres to every other standard that the social order deems "good" and "normal," so he gets significantly less resistance and stigmatization from the power structures that be than proudly and loudly nonbinary Callie does. Hierarchies of difference are complicated--and also bad, just to be clear--because where oppression Olympics can and do stop woth individuals, hierarchies of difference are often baked into systems and ideologies, conscious and unconscious biases, and regular and internalized ableism. This is way harder to be aware of for lots of people, and Nick's problem in the novel is that he doesn't recognize how high up in that hierarchy of difference he is. He almost treats his and Callie's positions as on par, and imagines that they will find the same level of mostly acceptance that he did. This is extremely not the case, but because Nick walks into Helston with that lack of awareness, his allyship with Callie takes some hits early on, and he completely misses that Willow is AFRAID of him until Callie says it outright. Nick does eventually get his allyship together, but I don't think he ever actually recognizes the hierarchy of difference operating on Helston. His partner Neal does, but Neal is sidelined from Helston for the majority of the novel.

I think the nuances and occasional failures of allyship are some of the most brilliant things that this book does. And it does not condemn Nick for those failures, it instead gives him chances to apologize and do better, which he DOES. A+ no notes.

The other thing that this book does really well, particularly given the book's intended audience, is showing how different people react to marginalization and abuse. Willow, Edwyn, and Elowen all experience outright absuse from Lord Chancellor Peran, and the book does not shy away from Willow's fear to the point of shutting down, Elowen's masking her anger and seeming fine, and Edwyn's desperation for his parents to love him turning him into something of a bully. The diversity of reactions is important to show, because no two kids ever respond to tragedy or negative circumstances the same way, and we cannot imagine a single acceptable response to abuse, because that's how it gets missed and kids don't get help. Normalizing multiple complex reactions is so critical.

Overall, despite being far too old to be the intended audience for this book, the strength in Callie and their friends and the nuance in the relationships throughout the book are just stunningly well done. If I could put this in the hands of every kid between 11 and 13, I would.