#but this is just a main series book. multiple Main Plot-important things happen in this one

[haveyoureadthisscifibook]

our next above-average yes result, above a children’s book (notionally) average of 15.8% yes, is Anne McCaffrey’s Dragondrums.

vote yes if you have finished the entire book.

vote no if you have not finished the entire book.

(faq · submit a book)

[frizzle-mcshizzle]

what's something about kotlc that the book/readers gloss over?

what's something that should have happened in the books that didn't?

if you could bring back a character BUT you had to kill another character to replace the one you saved, which ones would you choose? (geez hope that one makes sense)

if you could make one of the main cast go evil, which one would it be?

which backround character would be most likely to be the main character of a tragedy?

yay more questions!!

what’s something about Kotlc that the books/readers gloss over?

(oh this is gonna be long) to preface, i understand why most people gloss over this, and the only reason i notice is because of the adoption in my family, but its just something in kotlc thats so deeply important to me, and its the reason i love the series as much as i do.

kotlc is the only series ive ever read that has realistic, non stereotypical, adoption, where the main focus isn’t on adoption. most stories with a premise that focuses on something other than adoption, would pretend like the main characters biological parents/who raised them, where non existent after the first book. the main character would call their new parents mom and dad quickly and there would be no issues. because obviously adoption is all sunshine and rainbows.

in keeper it takes time for Sophie to even feel comfortable calling Havenfeild home, Eda and Grady struggle with adopting a new child who looks so much like their dead daughter. Sophie struggles with missing her family and feeling like she’s replacing them. it takes multiple books for Sophie to call them mom and dad consistently and for them to properly act like a family. thats how i should be, it takes time to feel like someone is a part of your family

adopting someone into your family is like falling in love, it happens slowly, then all at once, before they become apart of your heart for the rest of your life.

and thats what keeper did, she captured the feeling of adoption perfectly, without making it the main plot, it just happens in the background and i will forever love that

what's something that should have happened in the books that didn't?

few things actually

Tam being the one to release Gislea

Teirgan officially adopting the twins

Kesler actually having a more negative reaction to the Squall reveal

it doesn’t focus on Talantless and badmatches enough and i wish that was touched on more

Kesler and Grady being best friends

Dex’s parents being a bit more relevant (totally not baias

if you could bring back a character BUT you had to kill another character to replace the one you saved, which ones would you choose? (geez hope that one makes sense)

it did make sense, but honestly i think more characters should die and every character that has died heavily impacted the plot, and undoing their death would change a lot about the story but i will give a list of characters that i think should/will die

Forkle

Oralie

Prentice

Jensi

if you could make one of the main cast go evil, which one would it be?

people have said Dex in the past because of the neglect from the team and his mom being in the black swan without telling him. but because of his kidnapping i don’t think he would

but…Tam, not even go evil, but what if he had been so badly manipulated by the neverseen that he switched sides, what if he actually was a traitor, how would Linh feel, how would Teirgan feel, just imagine the effects that would have on everyone. how hard it would be to fight their friend, their brother in battle.

which backround character would be most likely to be the main character of a tragedy?

i mean we already have, Oralie, the Twins, Wylie, the Ruewens,

and Brant and Jolie’s story is literally a tragedy (@crymeariveronceagain i am right about that right?)

Kotlc is a series sprinkled with tragedies throughout you just have to look, they’re there, most of them are just hidden in the background. 

[arsonisticscholar]

Your mxtx posts are getting to me. I am so intrigued by the fanart. So my question is

Where do I start? 👀

Ooooo heheheh

Sorry I kinda went on a rant there but I hope this helps lol

(Post typing I kinda went on a little rant but you can decide depending on the info I put in there, I’ll cut it for the sanity of my followers and I’ll separate the different sections a bit and highlight what each section talks about. Veeery mild spoilers but one is a plot ‘twist’ that gets exposed in the first book and one is a content warning so. But also they all have a bit of violence which gets graphic at times so keep that in mind)

Ok there’s three different series by mxtx in release order: scum villain self saving system(svsss) (idk the Chinese name oops) the grandmaster of demonic cultivation or mo dao zu shi (mdzs) Heaven officials blessing or tian guan ci fu (tgcf)

I won’t include major spoilers but there’s still stuff like typical trigger warnings that I might want to add

Ok there’s a few different ways you could read them depending on how familiar/comfortable with different things

~~~

The easiest thing to say no for reading is sex, and while there are no plot points that you’ll miss by skipping anything and only once has there been a sex scene outside of an extra chapter this still could be important for some so I just wanna be sensitive. If you’re not totally comfortable with sexy stuff or want to build up to it go in this order:

Heaven officials blessing (nothing explicit, some innuendos and references and implied and it does happen but it’s never descriptive at all, I wouldn’t feel morally objectionable if I gave it to a young teenager)

The grandmaster of demonic cultivation (explicit extra chapters, is not generally sex related during the main plot)

Scum villains self saving system (has an explicit sex scene during the main plot, has multiple sex scenes in extra chapters, and has casual references to sex and sex jokes throughout)

~~~

If you’re not super familiar with Chinese names or words (idk you’re nationality but I’m American and white and it took me a minute for sure) or if you’re not familiar with xianxia terms then read in this order

Scum villain (mostly sticks to courtesy names so only one name per character, doesn’t get too deep into politics, and doesn’t rely to heavily on genre knowledge for worldbuilding without explaining it)

Heaven officials blessing (has like three different names per character, gets pretty deep into those Heaven officials drama, but easy enough to follow once you know the characters, relies a little on the reader already being familiar with the genre but does enough of its own worldbuilding that it’s honestly fine if you were familiar with Chinese names then this would be the easiest to rawdogg and understand what’s happening)

Mo dao zu shi (uses both given and courtesy names and nicknames and every name under the Sun to refer to a character, gets suuuuper deep into inter-sect drama, and got a little hard to follow at points keeping track of family trees and which sect was where and that guys sister is who’s wife?? Might need a whiteboard idk, also most of the worldbuilding is around the politics and sects relationships so if you don’t know much about the genre might want to pull up the fandom wiki)

~~~

If you wanted to know the length of each series it’s

Scum villain (4 volumes, 3 main plot 1 extra chapters)

Mo dao zu shi (5 volumes (eng ver.) 4 1/2 main plot second half of 5 extra chapters I think? Or 4 main plot 1 extra chapters)

Heaven officials blessing (8 volumes, first 7 1/2 main plot ends the 8th vol with extras)

~~~

And ik you said you were curious about the fanart so if you’d like visuals to help decide,

Top left image: on the left is Luo Binghe, on the right is Shen Qingqiu/Shen Yuan/Shizun(just teacher but a lot of the time people in the fandom just call him shizun lmfao)

Top right image: on the left is Xie Lian, on the right is San Lang/Hua Cheng

Bottom image: on the left is Lan Zhan/Lan Wangji/Hanguang-Jun, on the right is Wei Ying/Wei Wuxian/Yiling patriarch

~~~

I personally read them Heaven officials blessing, Mo dao zu shi, scum villain

My favorite to least favorite is scum villain, Heaven officials blessing, Mo dao zu shi

The most popular are mo dao zu shi, Heaven officials blessing, scum villain

~~~

The content that exists for each series are:

Heaven officials blessing:the original completed book series, season 1&2 with 3 on the way of animated series, live action in production, audio drama with upcoming episodes, and a few volumes of comics

Mo dao zu shi: the original completed book series, a completed (but heavily sensored) live action show, season 1(?) of an animated series, completed(?) comic series

Scum villain: original completed books, season 1 of a 3D animated show, actually that’s it I’m starving

[the-ellia-west]

Hello! Just came to drop by and ask about your current WIP, TCOT! I've seen your prompts for it and I want to properly know more about it. Sorry if it has been explained in your masterlists but I can't seem to find a solid explanation and decided to go here instead.

So! What is the story about? Who are the main characters? And what do they look like? And anything else you want to share about it?

Thank you so much for the Ask @justalittlebuddy

And I didn't really ever make a thorough explanation of it. Just a small synopsis, which only explains like the first 7 chapters?

So Here, a massively long ramble about TCOT, what it is, the conflicts, the characters, and everything.

Alllllrighty!

Here we go!

Explanation of the plot and general premise

TCOT is meant to be/ I'm hoping to make is an about 8 book Series of low fantasy setting with high action, high stakes, romance subplots, and way too much drama.

It's meant to be a basic War-centered fantasy story with good vs Evil with tons of interesting side plots and characters that make it its own interesting and unique project.

Main plot has never been a strength of mine, so I stole one from stereotypical children's media and twisted it into my own thing, adding way too many branches until I turned it into a tree.

The Story is meant to be a pitchfork shaped plot with An underline of the war plot while exploring the psychology and character arcs of all my lovelies in depth.

Now I probably accidentally re-explained that like 4 times as I tend to do, but whatever, Its general structure goes with the heroes down on their luck finding more ways to fight back against the Villains until something works. Other than that I can't explain without spoiling like the 17 consecutive character arcs that interweave to make the story what it is.

All I can say, is Kasi's shift from a seamstress to a warrior, Xhaazi's mental shift from a Jokester to a fighter, Chrin's shift from a nervous seer boy into a powerful influence, Sokuna's shift from a defender to a leader, and all the villain's arcs, that I can't say anything about unless Major spoilers. :]

The Characters

TCOT's main focus is on its characters and their arcs as already stated, There's multiple species, trauma, murder, magic, and morals thrown all about like party confetti in this series.

I can't say a lot about their arcs, but each and every one of them goes through some transformation into something completely different from what they were at the beginning, and This list of characters has an incredibly important arc which weaves together to create the big main plot:

Kasi, Xhaazi, Chrin, Sokuna, Marril, Shyre, Viasaki, Kila, and Geon

I will give you a parapgraph about each because I'm feeling talkative

Kasi

Kasi is a young Outlander who lives outside the walls of Feyrama's Capital City of Terefin with her father Julan and her twin brother Xhaazi. The twins never knew their mother and Julan doesn't like to talk about her. Kasi is a hothead with strong emotions and a tendency to throw-things-first-ask-questions-later. She's fiery and passionate, but she also has extreme emotions in the opposite directions, as in she gets overly excited sometimes, breaks down crying at minor inconveniences, or has panic attacks. But she's gotten good at controlling herself and seeks solace in her loved ones and her job.

Xhaazi

Xhaazi is Kasi's twin brother and a jokester, younger by an hour, and very easily excitable. Just like his sister, Xhaazi has a tendency to feel emotions very strongly, but he doesn't let life phase him and tells jokes to cheer up his friends and family as he loves seeing others smile. Their approval is everything he wants and more. He's upbeat and excitable, enjoying silence as well as loud places. He loves spending time with others and will help wherever he can in any way he can.

Chrin

Chrin is a very powerful young seer boy, who is related to secondary nobles through distant family. But no matter what happens, Chrin is all sunshine and smiles, seeing the silver lining on every cloud and keeping a level head in even the worst scenario, a stark and well-needed contrast to the twin's extreme reactions. He cares for everyone and just wants his efforts and love to be appreciated, as well as to help create a better future for himself and everyone he loves.

Sokuna

Sokuna is an adult shade who ran away from the other shades to protect her daughter from the ruthless training and bloodshed that comes with being a soldier raised from birth. She does everything she can to make a happy life for herself and her daughter in a world that hates them, trying to see the sun between all the rain.

Shyre

Shyre is a young noblewoman and Heir to the third most notable family in Feyrama, the family in charge of negotiations and Trade. She is kind-hearted and well-meaning, though a little naive to the true problems and violence of the world. Shyre can be categorized as a chronic optimist with a lot of passion and not a lot of street smarts.

Now... onto the villains...

Geon

Geon is Less of a villain than he is... actually I don't know what he is. Geon is a Prince who is the bastard child of the Roselite king and an Ahelite Sorceress (Ahelites are an Elven servant race) Born blind, he was shunned as inferior in every possible way by everyone except the only legitimate son of the King and Queen, his older brother Damian. Goen is kind, compasssionate and soft spoken, with a tendency to go against orders and isolate himself because no one in the palace besides his mother, Damian, and his assigned Aid Trissa, care about him. Well at least he's like this until... Shit happens.

Marril

Marril is a paid Assassin. He is also a Hitman. But mostly Assassin. He was cursed at a young age to serve the Shades and their king, and has been trying to scramble free of its torture for years. Guilt-stricken and angry, he is rude, callous, and generally a menace to people he doesn't like, he uses sarcasm and violence as coping mechanisms. He is formal, but a very generally angry person with a lot of trauma who just kinds of needs some help and a cup of coffee.

Viasaki

Viasaki is the First Lieutenant under Tias and The Vessel, controlling a battalion of soldiers. He is a strategic genius who uses most of his time to care for misfits and lost soldiers. But despite his empathy, he will usually follow orders without question. He wavers between his own thoughts, and listening to the voices in his head, while sometimes being controlled by The Vessel. The only thing truly keeping him anchored to reality is his utter hatred of Kila and Tias.

Kila

Kila is Tias' Warrior, also known as the second in command or most trusted of someone with high rank, you only get one, if one of your soldiers volunteers and proves themselves worthy in skill. Kila is worthy and works to stay worthy no matter what. Worthy of status, worthy of love, worthy of a home, worthy of not being thrown out of the mountain at any second, worthy of not being hit for doing a bad job. Kila is a raging perfectionist who sees the world as the strong and the weak. She is a chronic people pleaser and hothead who like to do things her way even though she tries her best to be the perfect servant.

(The only reason she doesn't try to please Viasaki is because she sees him as weak)

Anyway, those are my lovely babies, time for

Conflict

All of the Conflicts from TCOT come from the characters and circumstances

But the main ones are these:

The Main Trio really Fuckin' hates Marril

Viasaki and Kila CANNOT FUCKING GET ALONG

and

Y'know, war

Each book will be structured around a specific character, and developing their arcs, some will get multiple, it's just generally the arc that gets the most progress, and the character that has the most POV time.

Book 1 is basically an intro and set up for everything, but I love it, and I can't wait until we get into the real meat of this shit.

Anywayyyyyy, Book 2 is slated to be a Kasi book, #3 is planned to be a Viasaki one, and I'd have to find my google doc for the rest.

Anyway, thank you again for the ask and this chance to ramble! This is the premise and characters of TCOT! I hope you enjoyed and You'd want to read it!

(Also, if anyone wants to draw these little losers or look at Physical descriptions of them, I am trying my best I swear to make those.)

[affiesque]

As promised, here’s the second half of my random thoughts and observations about Desire Catcher now that I’ve finished my latest rewatch (links aren’t working for me right now, but if you want to read the first half just click on one of the tags on this post and it should come up easily). The entire series is 24 episodes, most of which are somewhere between 35 and 45 minutes long - so, depending on what types of shows you usually watch, it might be a bit of a commitment. But I definitely think it’s worth it.

OK, time to brace yourself, as there’s a lot going on in this second part…

At the halfway mark the relationship between Luo Fei and Lu Fengping is starting to fray (oh look, it's my good friend angst again) - essentially, Lu Fengping is frustrated that his mom’s murder remains unsolved and Luo Fei hasn’t given him much in the way of clues like he was supposed to. Lu Fengping ends up working with the main villain (Bai Ya Xing), who is behind all of the crimes/murders that have been happening, to find his mom’s killer and get revenge. (I won’t spoil the details, but I will say that this particular storyline could probably have used some fleshing out, as the details and motivations don’t quite come together in the end. As I’ve noted before, the real draw with Desire Catcher is the relationships, so you can kind of wave those plot holes away - unless that sort of thing really bothers you, which I totally get.)

There’s a bit of a cat-and-mouse game going on throughout the middle episodes, with Lu Fengping getting more cagey and Luo Fei chasing after him a bit, attempting to figure out what he’s hiding. You get Luo Fei trying to casually inquire with multiple people as to Lu Fengping’s whereabouts when he’s gone for no more than a couple of hours at a time (we get it bro, you’re obsessed), not to mention lurking in the shadows near his apartment at night (yikes, dude). During this period there are definitely times when Lu Fengping looks almost guilty for pulling away and for what he’s planning to do, like he wants to confide in Luo Fei but he can’t - there’s a particular wistfulness to his expressions that’s so on point and gets me every time.

One nice little touch throughout is the many dinner dates the two leads go on - granted, one ends with Luo Fei leaving before they even eat anything, and another has him answering Lu Fengping’s question “Does everyone look like a suspect to you?” with “Yes - you look like one too,” so not exactly the most romantic situations (social skills are not Luo Fei’s strong point). But I am a sucker for those little intimate moments - misty evenings with blurry streetlights, tables piled high with steaming dishes and clinking glasses, the muted conversations of the people around them - and of course the sharing food = love symbolism.

Speaking of tropes, if you’re a fan of jealousy, then DC has got you covered. Again, no big plot spoilers here but Luo Fei finds out Lu Fengping has brought a girl home one night - not for the reason he (or anyone else) thinks, but you can tell he’s in his feelings about it (and Lu Fengping, I love you, but maybe in the future do not kidnap a stranger - even if you had your reasons and you were sort of helping her in the moment). He ends up getting arrested (twice!) for the abduction and when Luo Fei fails to help him, their “big breakup” begins in earnest - Lu Fengping saying “I shouldn’t have counted on you right from the start” got me right in the heart, ngl.

*Books as symbolism alert* - we get just one shot of some books strewn around Lu Fengping’s apartment in the second half, but I did find it interesting that the subtitles call out two of them specifically, which feels important. Those are “The Sea, The Sea” by Iris Murdoch and “It Takes More Than A Carrot And A Stick” by Wess Roberts. The former is about love and loss and romantic ideals by an author known for writing about morality and the power of the unconscious - things that seem relevant to a hypnotist, I would think. The latter actually made me laugh audibly when I noticed the subtitle: “Practical Ways Of Getting Along With People You Can’t Avoid At Work.” Sounds about right for them.

Here’s another alert - BIG GIANT SPOILERS AHEAD!! Click below with caution…

OK, so the big event of the second half is Lu Fengping faking his death(!!) in order to give him the time and space away from Luo Fei/the police to move ahead with his revenge plan. Long story short, Luo Fei thinks Lu Fengping has blown himself up, goes through the five stages of grief, figures out he’s still alive and somehow manages to be like, “Hey, thought you were dead but no biggie - let’s not even hug it out and instead just go right back to teasing each other and solving crimes - it’s all good.” Honestly, I’m glossing over a lot here - how absolutely devastated Luo Fei (and everyone else, for that matter) is when he thinks Lu Fengping is dead, how they finally yell a bit about their feelings and come clean about certain things when they reunite, how the OST rips your heart out again and again in these moments (“Did we meet just to be torn apart?” - I mean, come on), how relieved Lu Fengping looks when he realizes that Luo Fei doesn’t hate him for what he did, how Luo Fei suddenly can’t stop smiling (you’ve come a long way, baby). I think these are probably some of the strongest scenes in the entire show, but I must admit that the way they don’t truly address the fallout of something this intense still bugs me (stay tuned for a fic I’m writing on that very topic, in case that sort of thing interests you - and @thinkonce-acttwice, I ✨promise✨ I’m actually working on it!).

I know I haven’t mentioned Liang Yin in this second-half review yet - what happened/happens to her still plays a major role in the story of Lu Fengping’s mom’s death. I won’t give the details here, but do note that there are some flashback scenes of her getting attacked that might be rough for some viewers - so please keep that in mind. However, aside from a couple of moments where the men in her life feel the need to protect/shelter her despite her being quite capable of handling things herself, I will say that the story gives her back some agency, and it does feel as if by the end she’s come to terms with her past and is in a good place overall. And the relationship between her, Luo Fei, and Lu Fengping gets a really nice resolution - a sort of found family thing that brings them all together.

There’s lots of plot movement as we work our way through the final episodes - the big bad villain is vilaining, there’s an evil nurse who’s in on the shenanigans, poor Professor Ling (Lu Fengping’s mentor and fellow hypnotist) gets accused of being a fraud and ends up in the hospital, Lu Fengping almost stabs himself in the heart while hypnotized by Bai Ya Xing (though of course Luo Fei shows up in the nick of time to save him - I swear, despite knowing that this is just a “bromance” show, every time I watch that scene there’s one split second where it seems like they’re about to lean in and kiss - oof), poor Liang Yin gets kidnapped by the big bad villain (unfortunately, more “man pain”). I tell you, this show is a roller coaster ride every freaking episode.

I won’t spoil the final ending too much, but rest assured Liang Yin is fine. Stuff happens, Lu Fengping ends up in prison - though he sort of puts himself there on purpose, sacrificing himself for Luo Fei, even if he doesn’t come out and say that’s what he’s doing. And he basically gets a form of justice for his mom’s death. The very last bit sees him return from prison on parole - he reunites with the police team and Luo Fei in a slightly cheesy but rather touching moment, though, again, even just a quick hug would’ve been nice…

Bottom line, I love all of them, your honor, and will probably never be over this show - there’s so much to unpack in terms of the role of fate in our lives, how broken people can find something in each other to live for, how to forgive others and, importantly, yourself.

OK, again, this one got away from me, and I know I’m probably forgetting like a million little things, but hopefully I’ve managed to entertain at least one other person with my ramblings. And if anything here has sounded intriguing, please check this little show out so it gets the love it deserves! 🖤

[jeanmoreaux]

okay enough time has passed: theories predictions hopes dreams fears what are you expecting from TSC

so. while my mind is still processing the tsc announcement i think i am finally read to try and answer this ask djdjdjjdjd ((had to add a read more because this got longer than i intended 🧍🏼‍♀️))

nora said it’s about jean learning to live, so i assume the story will either overlap a little with the og series’ timeline or begin with jean’s start at usc (or somewhere close to that). i don’t expect a bigger time jump than that tbh. also, thinking about pov i assume it’s single narrator/main focalizer (hopefully jean!). i’d be very surprised by a multiple pov narration happening���doesn’t really feel like a nora thing to do. to me. also i assume it's gonna be a one book thing. not a series.

i do not expect the foxes to be a big part of the story beyond maybe seeing them at a banquet or championship game. i cannot even see renee being a big part of the plot tbh. ((but don’t be fooled i will eat up these glimpse for sure)) nora seemed so. hesitant? to touch tfc that i don’t assume she wants to include them much.

we have no idea how long the book is going to be, but i assume it’s not gonna be longer than tkm? so as much as i love jerejean i don’t think it’s gonna be a thing nora is going to explore with this story. not just because of things she said in the past, but also because i think it would be hard to deal with jean working through his trauma and moving on to live life and not just exist AND develop a relationship. ((same goes for the renee/jean pairing tbh)). and i am fine with that. the most important thing for me about this book will be jean and seeing him heal and adjust and get better. i don’t NEED more. if we get more that’s great too, but i have my doubts about that.

i assume we will still get a decent amount of jeremy and jean interactions because i can really see jeremy (as captain but also just as the person i assume him to be) to take on the responsibility of caring for jean and help him recover from everything he has been through with riko and tetsuji. i think not matter what happens he’ll have a big part in helping jean navigate his new environment.

and omg do i expect jean to STRUGGLE!! the trojans are THEE anti-thesis to the ravens in attitude so i see jean really being a slightly disruptive force at first. while i think he’ll adjust to the trojan way i cannot see him being like the others. he’ll always be a little different but i think it will make the trojans stronger (i can totally see jean teach them raven drills lol).

now moving on from that and more into trojans and exy territory I WANT TO SEE THE TEAM DYNAMIC SO BAD. and i am sure we will see it. i want to see the trojans be soooo patient with jean and absorb his anger and hurt and trauma and transform it into something bearable. i want for jean to HAVE FUN playing exy and not just play it because he has to. i want him to really fall in love with the sport in a way that is not affected by the fact that the moriyama still own his game.

at the same time i want to see him build a life outside of exy. i want him to de-centre exy and find hobbies that fulfill him. i want him to have genuine friends. i want him to spend time like other 20 somethings. i want him to get a taste for a normal life and mundanity. and i want him to like it. i want him to learn to sit in that feeling of just. being okay. without the fear of things going sideways at any time. i want for tenderness and not violence to become the norm.

as for stuff i’d LOVE to see. i know i just said i don’t expect to see much of the foxes, i would kill for a jean and kevin interaction that has them Talk to each other about the past and the present and maybe even the future. not sure we’ll get that but a girl can dream. i honestly don’t expect a neil and jean reunion. but who knows? ((also. maybe jean reuniting with his sister??? that would be something wouldn’t it.))

i am a little scared and a little nervous to see what tsc will be about and how jean’s story will play out, but i do trust nora to do the characters and the story and us justice. ((that doesn’t necessarily mean giving us what we want but the story as a whole being a good fit for her characters and the aftg thesis of exploring life after trauma)). i also hope she won’t mess with aftg too much. i don’t think she will. but just to have it said.

in the end the only thing i want out of tsc is jean getting to a point where he feels okay and sees a future for himself that makes him want to live rather than simply exist. i want to see him embrace his new found freedom and get hobbies and interests and friends and break out of ravens’ nest MENTALLY for good. i want him to be able to look at himself in the mirror and be okay with the person he is. and excited to become the person he’s slowly becoming. i want him to learn to live life in the sun <3

[linklethehistorian]

Linkle’s Fazbear Frights & Lore Insights #0: Disclaimer & Important Notes

As per the results of the poll I put out, going forward, I plan to discuss my current thoughts on the possible lore implications and relevance of each Fazbear Frights story to the canon of the games, after I finish each story, as well as a possible retrospective after each whole book, as each contains multiple stories.

Now, since this will be an on-going series that will span many individual posts across likely very many months or even years, I have made the decision that, rather than copying and pasting a massive set of disclaimers and important notes above every single post I make on the subject, I will just make a dedicated post here, and then link back to it at the beginning of each said post.

So, with that said, please bear the following in mind:

Firstly, I feel it very important to note that I am a ‘Frights Fiction’ truther (a position in which some people stand believing that while the books are canon to the game universe in the sense that they do exist, they are canon in the same way as the video games comissiones by Fazbear Entertainment, are intended to be goosebumps-like novels sold within the game’s own universe to help discredit the actual happenings that occur within the game’s universe by mixing up their truths with untruths and exaggerations and selling them as fiction, with the name for the first series of books taking inspiration from the former horror attraction, Fazbear’s Fright.); if you are not a subscriber to this, please be respectful and just keep scrolling. I am not interested in a debate on whether or not you subscribe to it; I’m just here to share my thoughts with those who are interested, so I would be appreciative if you did not try to start arguments in my comment sections, or in reblogs.

Secondly, I do not particularly intend to get into explaining or defending the concept of Frights Fiction as a whole in these posts, so if you are genuinely interested in the concept, but have never heard of it before, there are many good videos out there which explain the concept quite well if you are interested, but my personal recommendation if you’re interested in the topic is GiBi’s Horror Homestead, as he is going through each book bit by bit and pointing out all of the evidence to support it (and he’s just a really great, criminally underrated FNAFtuber in general).

Thirdly, this will hinge on my personal understanding of FNAF canon lore regarding the games, and, yes, will include both theorizing with facts and evidence, and likely a lot of speculation as well. If you disagree with a stance I have regarding canon, again, I refer you to matter #1; please be respectful and move on. I’m not here to discuss anything except the relevance that the books could have in regards to the lore, in accordance with the Frights Fiction stance.

Fourthly, there will be spoilers. Obviously. If you don’t want to be spoiled, don’t read this until you’ve read them.

Fifthly, I’m calling the Crying Child “Garret”. It’s the only name he canonically has in any form of the series that doesn’t require puzzle solving to come to the conclusion of, and it’s my preference. If you like any other name, just mentally replace it in your head when you read it.

Sixthly, it should be noted that, as Scott has confirmed in a decently recent interview with Dawko that he just writes down the basic plot of his stories and all the important points he wants to cover and then lets the other author flesh it out more fully, we have no way of knowing outside of the main plot exactly what details were his ideas and which aren’t; therefore, there’s a good chance that a few or even multiple of the things I bring up are just massive coincidence and have no meaning whatsoever in reality. Nevertheless, I do think there’s value in discussing it, but that fact is also why I will often try to provide far more than just one detail to back up most of my more elaborate interpretations and ideas — because we can’t be sure that any one single tiny detail within the books has value, unless of course it’s something Scott has specifically said is important.

Lastly, while I will be giving my general impressions of each book as a story as I go along and probably sharing where it ranks currently out of all the books I’ve read, I do not have any serious intentions to discuss any of the books or individual stories beyond this other than as it regards the lore implications of the games. If you’re looking for someone who’s going to break down the book word by word and analyze in a meta way what the book could be trying to say and possible interpretations of its message in terms of being a standalone story rather than a part of a larger picture, this series of posts is probably not for you. I again will recommend GiBi’s Horror Homestead, if you’re interested in someone exploring themes and general symbolism and interpretations, as GiBi does this during his videos, too, and it’s very interesting and thought-provoking.

And with that, I hope you look forward to the upcoming posts! If there are any story-specific disclaimers or notes I want to put out there, I’ll do so in the post about the story, itself.

[wondereads]

Weekly Reading Update (11/06/23)

Reviews and thoughts under the cut

Binti by Nnedi Okorafor (6/10)

This book has very little space for the kind of story it tries to tell, and it does its best. For an almost space opera-like plot, with intergalactic academies, alien conflict, and ancient tech, less than 80 pages is ridiculously small. As such, a lot of this book feels really rushed. A lot of worldbuilding stuff, such as the history between the Meduse and humans, what Binti’s edan is, and how otjize is so special, is just never explained. I definitely found this book interesting; there’s a major tone shift a third of the way through, and I loved the message of understanding differences and peaceful conflict resolution. However, everything is wrapped up too neatly, especially concerning Binti’s emotional state. Trying not to spoil too much, Binti goes through an incredibly traumatic event and has a very important aspect of her changed without her knowledge or consent, but she seems just fine at the end. I appreciate the attempt to wrap up such an ambitious story for a novella, but I would’ve much preferred a more open ending concerning that.

A Study in Drowning by Ava Reid (6/10)

This book started out very strong. The writing style really has that drifting, surreal style that fits a book trying to emulate gothic horror, and I really liked where the plot is going. I love books where the main character can't figure out if they can trust themselves or not, and the whole idea of discovering the secrets behind a truly impactful novel was so interesting. It was a little slow, but I was fine with that. Unfortunately, the ending is all kinds of rushed. The main antagonist is defeated very easily with virtually no explanation as to how, and although there's a character that the entire story practically revolves around, she only shows up at the end once everything is said and done to fill in the holes. Then there are multiple issues, plot and character wise, that are just never resolved. Unfortunately, the ending kind of ruined it for me, otherwise this could've been a 4 star read.

Down Among the Sticks and Bones by Seanan McGuire (9/10)

After over a year, I'm continuing the Wayward Children series, and I'm loving it so far. This book functions as a prequel, telling the story of Jack and Jill in The Moors. I loved the very obvious classic literature influences, namely Frankenstein and Dracula, and Jack and Jill are both amazingly complex characters with an incredibly interesting relationship. I will always have a soft spot for Jack, and her unexpected romance was one of my favorite parts of the book. I'd say the only thing I didn't like was that Jill is so unlikable to me. I really wanted her to face some consequences after what she did, and while I can see how she became this way, it doesn't mean she should get away with it, especially considering the context of the first book. However, the series is unfinished and has multiple books I haven't read yet, so perhaps we'll see them yet again!

Gwen & Art Are Not in Love by Lex Croucher (CR, 43%)

I'm really enjoying this one so far! After so much intense fantasy and sci-fi, it's like a little palate cleanser. I love how this book takes tropes usually used in contemporary romcoms and repurposes them for the historical setting. There's also a fair amount of worldbuilding, since this is a very different history from what we know. I'm glad it's established to be that way, because there is some pretty blatant messing with the timeline, but I appreciate it since it brings more diversity than historical romances typically have.

Lodestar by Shannon Messenger (CR, 43%)

There are things happening in this book, and I don't like it! I've grown fairly attached to these characters, and I'm constantly stressed about them. I feel like stakes are rising rather quickly in this installment, like more is happening than in the others. One thing I noticed during this segment of reading was that I quite like the addition of Tam. Linh is still sort of a half-formed character to me, but I really like how blunt Tam is and how he still has the perspective of an outsider on Sophie's group and their dynamics. He seems to say things none of them think of, and I like how he shakes things up.

A Day of Fallen Night by Samantha Shannon (CR, 42%)

I know, I know, I've been working on this one for a while, but it's a very dense book! I've put it aside for now in exchange for Gwen & Art, since I have to review that one, but I'm hoping to finish this before the November halfway mark.

Clockwork Princess by Cassandra Clare (CR, 16%)

I’m finishing up my reread of The Infernal Devices, and this one is not that great so far. While I love the smaller interactions between Jem, Tessa, and Will, virtually everything so far has been interpersonal conflict despite the fact that a madman with a clockwork army is just out there somewhere. Like, did they forget they have like actual jobs to do? It’s mentioned that a good amount of time has passed since the last book…and you’ve done nothing? I know you’re all in the most complicated romantic relationships teenagers can be in, but please, think of the world.

[faerywhimsy]

TL;DR

Nobody: ....

Me: So Benji Mahmoud could have been an incredibly important and dynamic character, with relevant ties to multiple themes Prince Lestat did a good job pulling on. I would have been real happy to have seen more of his character and, since I didn't, I guess I'll settle for writing about it here.

Hyperlinks go to the posts I thought of as I wrote this.

I've been feeling pulled to post a lot of head canons that involve Benji lately and I think I'm starting to kinda stumble across why it all of a sudden feels important to me.

Like a lot of things in this fandom, it actually starts with Daniel.

Daniel is the only character we see in the original TVC trilogy, in real time, being human and then being brought into the blood. He's just Some Guy who happens to start all this shit that blows out 13 books. And that's relatable. Most series have that character through which the reader comes into the world of the story. It's an established narrative technique.

And then we get the final TVC trilogy, the three books we never thought we'd get because Anne kinda finished the series a decade before and went on to bigger and better things.

*cough* not *cough*

So we get the final trilogy. In which we are introduced to a blond, male character, human when we meet him but, oh no, he gets involved with vampires and ultimately ends up begging to be turned, then spends the rest of the series as a vampire.

Stop me if you've heard this story before.

Now I've got nothing against Viktor. His romance with Rose seems sweet, and he's always going to have a bit of the centre stage just because he's the literal genetic clone of our main protagonist, Lestat. It's a bit hokey but, you know, so is a lot of what we ended up with in the later books. We're just grateful it didn't all end with Blood Canticle and now weed out the things we like.

It's just... I can't help thinking an existing youthful vampire from TVC would have given deeper resonance to the story than introducing a new character with a similar trajectory did.

What might the last trilogy might have been like if Benji—the third human-turned-vampire we meet between these two characters—had been just a little bit more utilised. Not as a love interest, or a plot point, but for himself. Cause just his placement in time and circumstance offers a lot of narrative potential.

We first meet Benji Mahmoud as an important character in Armand's recovery after he attempts suicide. He asks to be made into a vampire, but isn't obsessed by it, pretty much accepts it and moves on when Armand tells him it can't be done. ("Oh, never. I don't have such a power. It's never done." "Then who made you?" "I was born out of a black egg." - TVA)

There's a lot of a sense that he and his companion Sybelle are replacements to a writer who no longer wished to write about Daniel in Armand's emotional trajectory, and I know that put me off both these characters for years. But the side effect is, we get a continuity to show Armand doesn't just stop after Daniel walks out on him, and can choose to read that Armand was hurting and traumatised when recounting these events to David.

Back to Benji. When Benji is turned, he is 12 years old and it's the end of 1998. There's a reason I like both of these things: 12 years old is just about the youngest I've heard any us fans picking up the TVC series of books (omg that's way too young for this content, my friends, I mourn all our brain chemistry), and the birth year of 1986 makes Benji not just a millennial, but lot closer in age and experience to a lot of us than the far off birth year of 1952 for Daniel-the-Baby-Boomer. I also think it would have been a lot easier to remember to read Daniel as not a millennial had there been another character front and centre who was.

The way I see it, Benji could have added so much nuance as a character of TVC if he'd been fleshed out. Most of the time if I remember to think of Benji in canon, he seems like the faded middle child, a plot point with a name in Prince Lestat, nothing resembling a fully fleshed out character.

And that makes me sad. Sad for his character, and sad for us. I'm not saying get rid of Viktor, don't get me wrong, I'm just saying that in a cast of 183282 vampires, there was surely enough room to do more with Benji than give him a radio show recorded within the walls of Trinity Gate.

Like, just off the top of my head: Did he ever leave those walls? Was he still as much of a smart ass with a commentary on everything after 20 years in the blood? What did he figure out that he liked to do with his time when he wasn't recording? Did he remain close to Sybelle? How did he feel about forever holding the visage of a 12 year old? What kind of evil doers did he hunt? What was his relationship with Armand? What did he think of Daniel? Was it a bit awkward coming face to face with his maker, Marius, after so long? Was he included with the guys whenever Armand, Lestat and Louis caught up? Is he more like Daniel at court, really fitting in more amongst the more ancient characters, or does he prefer coming across as one of the wiser young ones when he visits Auvergne?

Hell, if Viktor is basically Lestat's son and Benji is kinda Armand's son, what do the interactions of that Next Generation look like??

Conversely, what were Armand's thoughts beyond the immediate aftermath of Benji and Sybelle having been brought into the blood? Did he lose interest in Benji after Marius turned him? Was he protective of him? Were there times when he looked at Benji and felt woefully guilty about Claudia who died for the offence of being a child vampire? Was Benji a way for Armand to heal the mistakes he had made with both Claudia and Daniel in different ways before him? Louis and Benji live in the same house for at least 10 years together; what were their interactions like and did Armand have any thoughts on those?

[goatofgehenna]

I have to rant about this article and I don't know where to do it other than here. So I'm currently playing a modded version of this game, it's much better than the vanilla game by the way, but reading this article made me very angry for a multitude of reasons.

I was already kind of irritated that the game was lacking so much in the way of interpersonal relationships with npcs, like pretty much the only way you get friends in this game is going on quests you can't interact with most of the Hogwarts students or really most of the townspeople. I wish we had a little bit more of a Sims like structure going on there, like come on I want to make some acquaintances some friends some best friends some enemies some crushes I can't do any of those things unless I'm just following a quest line and because the lines of dialogue don't really have any consequences, as in I can be as mean as I want and the character just kind of takes me on the quest anyways, it makes the character interactions feel lackluster.

To comment specifically on the romance element though for which this article is addressing - it disturbed me that they were calling it unethical or morally dubious to add light romance options. Have they read the original Harry Potter? Pretty sure half of the cast had crushes by the time they were fourth year or fifth year. Have they read any kind of a teen fantasy novel, forget about a teen romance, I mean like teen adventure... literally anything.. I grew up on those kinds of books - adding romantic side plots is almost a staple to them and it's not morally dubious - it's a natural part of coming of age which is another important part of that subgenre.

The Sims has multiple age groups. You can start utilizing the flirt social interaction with a teen Sim. I have never seen anything dubious about hugging, first kiss, hand holding, going on a date with the teen age group in that game. Do they think that the Sims is unethical because they've been adding this category for over 20 years?

I mean this just isn't a real argument here - it's an aggravating cop out. I don't need this to be wizard dating Sim, I just want to be able to have more variety of meaningful interaction with characters. I want my dialogue options to actually mean something. What if I had a reputation counter or a relationship counter again like in Sims... It would mean that my dialogue choices might affect how likely characters are to open a side quest to me. Say that I was really mean to them they probably wouldn't offer me to join their secret club.. I would have to go back to them and interact with them in a nicer way to win over their favor.

This reputation thing could even extend to how the other students talk to me and engage with me in the hallways. It would make the entire world of this game feel more alive and more like you the player are in control of what's happening.

I just got very aggravated at the fact that they're essentially gaslighting people for wanting a literally normal human interaction in a totally age-appropriate for it game, even being that the main characters in this game are older than or the age of the characters in the original series of books that this game was based on when they were having these kind of first crush scenarios. Like... What the hell are they even talking about?

Okay I'm off my soapbox now lol 🤣

[jessequinones]

DragonFire (Book 2 ) Fallen Star Review

TLDR

That kind of sums up my experience, too long, didn’t read. I got 80% of the way through this story before I gave up which is a shame because the beginning was good but then it kind of fell apart.

In the beginning, Blaze is hyper-fixing on figuring out who/what he is, all the while Risha really needs some loving, like girl, if he hasn’t noticed your advances for an entire year, best to move on. Anyway, it felt like LJ Davies has a better understanding of his characters, they feel more fleshed out (except for Risha) and I’m enjoying it. The problem started in the first fight scene.

I know I have aphantasia and difficulties imagining most things, but that first fight scene and every other fight scene felt pointless and I couldn’t see anything. Again, I know I have aphantasia, but even I can at least keep track of a fight if it’s written well enough. These fights felt like they were filler even though several characters died, the story moves on like nothing happened and we get no time to reflect on the loss of any of these characters.

Sure the story tries to reflect on one of the character's death, but it reflects it by saying “We’ll just give them space” and before the dragon who’s affected by someone’s death gets to speak about their feeling, they get captured but not until after getting angry at Blaze and Risha for having a nice romantic moment the SAME NIGHT one of their friends died.

It feels like LJ Davies forgot to add in a few moments and decided to throw these things in because none of them felt right.

Blaze and friends escape their village, while escaping, Blaze and friends, (except for Pyro) begin to play games WHILE ON THE RUN and are confused as to why Pyro is telling everyone to knock it off.

Blaze kills a dragon and is confused, upset, and hurting, thinking he’s a monster, at the fact he killed one of his own kind and feeling disgusted by it? That never gets brought up again.

One of Blaze’s friends gets killed? Let’s have Blaze and Risha spend a nice moment together the same night.

There are just so many moments that either feel off or are just never expanded upon it took me out of the story because I honestly don’t know which moment was gonna be important and which one was filler.

I don't even want to get into the fact of how Blaze was in the wrong, Pyro was right, but the story made it feel like Pyro was in the wrong. You see what happened was that Blaze saw a village getting attacked and wanted to save them. Pyro said they're currently on the run and need to get to their destination, it'll be a foolish idea to try and save a random village because they might get killed, so what did Blaze do? He goes to the village and nearly dies but only to get rescued by his friends at the last minute putting everyone at risk and it's because of him (which the story doesn't bring up mind you) that led to the death of one of his friends.

Also...what was the plot of this book? I stopped reading at the 80% mark, I feel like I should know what the main plot of this story was. The first book was simple, save Tarwin. This one...save Blaze’s friends? That’s not the plot of the story, they all get captured trying to get to their location but they get taken to the same place they were heading to anyway which was to do what again? Was it to clear Blaze's name? Stop the invasion? Who was invading?

Who’s the main villain of this story?

I need to read a different review or google the summary of this book just to have an understanding of what I read because this book was really...really boring and it felt like there was a lot of filler.

The chapters were long and with my slow reading speed, it took me days to get through one of them. They just wouldn’t end and I like to read at least one chapter a day, if it takes multiple days to read one chapter, I’m not enjoying the story.

To be honest, I’m most likely not gonna read any other books in the DragonFire series because I’ll most likely need to have an understanding of this book to read the next one and I can’t be bothered.

The first story was simple, save Tarwin while also showing off the world. There’s a monster that keeps appearing which all leads to a showdown at the end. It’s not the best book I’ve read, but it got the job done, I truly can’t tell you anything about this story and I just put it down yesterday.

What I can tell you is there’s a shadowy demon thing who’s planting seeds into Blaze’s mind that he’s a monster? I have no idea how it got inside Blaze’s skull, nor why it’s there. Its sole purpose is to inform Blaze he’s evil and that’s it. However, all of those “You’re evil” lines are useless if you remember Blaze is the poster child for being a good boy. Honestly, the story would be better if the shadow monster wasn’t there and Blaze is telling himself this, not an outside source.

There are also knockoff goblins who all sound the same and their sole purpose is to be evil and serve the dark lord I guess? There are two different goblins (let’s be honest, that’s what they are even if they aren’t stated that in the books). There are two of them who are named and not only can I not remember them, but they sound the exact same. One is supposed to be the leader of the other and I can’t tell you which.

I like the beginning. I wish I could’ve seen more of the Princess, heck, maybe even throw in a love triangle (not the one with Boltock, Ember, and Pyro). I just needed to connect with Blaze and his friends and taking them away from Blaze, even if it’s for a moment really didn’t help the story because I knew nothing bad was gonna happen to them despite the story saying something bad was about to happen one of them, I just couldn’t care so I’m moving on.

[onenerdroaming]

My first media review in ages! I know I said last year I'd get to Legends and Lattes as soon as I was in a headspace to write about the stories I listen to when hiking, but I'm not going to lie, saying I would review it and then forgetting about it entirely basically is my review of that book. All set up and no pay off.

Today's review is the new audible original audio drama: Slayers: A Buffyverse Story by Christopher Golden and Amber Benson.

Before anything else we have to talk about the frankly confusing discourse I've seen around Slayers. I have been following all of the new comics coming out connected to BTVS so I've honestly been shocked by this "Buffy is being disrespected and erased" discourse? There is one current long term ongoing series. This series is called The Last Vampire Slayer, and is about a world where all of the Scoobies as well as all of the Slayers save for Buffy were brutally killed years ago. Now an older jaded Buffy has to deal with a young Slayer (the only one she knows of who was not killed upon being called) who has tracked her down to beg to be trained by Buffy. Before it became an ongoing series, it was a miniseries about the young slayer talking Buffy into training her (the fact she is Willow and Tara's orphaned daughter got Buffy to decide to keep the kid from dying), which I will admit is all I read because that was all I needed to know that series really wasn't for me. I'm not a fan of that level of dark and gritty.

Honestly, the whole "Buffy is being erased" thing feels like a game of telephone being played with second hand information.

People of course tend to point to the short miniseries that recently came out where Faith arrives in Sunnydale in a position of power. The Scoobies look to her as the person in charge, because just before she arrived in an effort to try and help Buffy with her magic Willow accidentally took away Buffy's powers. This leads Willow down the path of becoming Dark Willow, and once the comic establishes Faith in her confident established position, the powerless Buffy saves the day from Dark Willow and gets her powers back in the process - reinforcing for the millionth time that Buffy doesn't need her powers to be the best at this (as in she figures out what is happening, tracks Willow down, gets Faith to act as her backup, and then saves the day). Oh, also that comic ends with canonical Buffy/Faith, Xander/Spike and Willow/Tara so color me confused about why the fandom hated it so much.

Before that we had a few other comics all of which were, of course, centered around Buffy, including a long running ongoing (the main Boom! Buffy comic) essentially about how Buffy was the best Vampire Slayer across the multiverse, where there is a massive battle across the multiverse with many different Buffys (complete with musing about how one writes Buffy in plural so truly all spellings including Buffi are valid here) and multiple multiverse traversing characters make it clear that Buffy is special because she is so important in so many worlds.

Ok, so all of that said - and here is the key thing that confuses me - this is an audio where the main draw is the original BTVS cast are reprising their roles.

Buffy fans know that neither Sarah Michelle Geller nor Allison Hannigan have ever, ever, in the history of BTVS supplementary materials, played their roles. Not for the PS2 game Chaos Bleeds (where literally every other member of the cast played their character), not for the never actually picked up or aired animated series, not for the Season 8 motion comics. This is something Amber Benson (who was in Chaos Bleeds) and Chistopher Golden (who wrote Chaos Bleeds) would most assuredly know from the start of the plotting process. It is also possible they were asked and said no - all of that said, truly the chances of either of those actresses appearing was less than zero.

That means there were two options - recast them the way those prior projects did (which dragged alllllll of them down and would muddy the whole ORIGINAL CAST RETURNS appeal) or write a story that makes sense without them (or Xander, but truly fuck him and I am glad to report he's only name checked like one time in the entire story). So of course Buffy does not appear in the story (although a wild drinking game would be to take a shot every time anyone talks about how amazing she is. In the story itself Cordelia demands that Spike, Clem, Giles and Indira stop talking about how great Buffy is all the time because it was getting old). This also means that as amazing as the cliffhanger at the end was, it felt more like a massive bone being thrown to the fans for the purpose of fanfiction rather than setting up any future story, since obviously they will NOT be able to continue with the set up plot due to casting concerns.

Ok - so now to review the audio itself. I will confess, I was not a fan of Spike's narration at the start of each episode. But my irritation with him evened out as the story went on and the cast moved past Spike and Clem. I loved the fact that our new character Indira is a massive fangirl, there to endlessly exclaim over how cool Buffy is as she tags along. I loved the way the alternate universe was used to explore different versions of the characters we know and love. Cordelia as a jaded Slayer with PTSD was fascinating, as was Anya as the lone witch left on the side of good freaking out over having to face down her best friend. Evil Tara and her relationship with Dru was of course an absolute delight. But of course the role that most impressed me - and the only actor in the audios who sounded 100000% exactly the same as she did back when the show was airing - was Drusilla. Wow, talk about an incredible performance from Juliet Landau. I also really loved the role Clem played in the audio, it was so great to have him fleshed out more and playing such a key role in the cast.

Actually ok, I lied a bit, another actor's voice was fairly unchanged and immediately recognizable. That of course was someone I was not excepting to hear and I actually shouted when that character popped up because well... with the amount of success that actor has achieved I didn't think they'd be here. But through the power of their personal friendship with Amber Benson, there they were! That was a really fun surprise cameo and I am not going to spoil who (although if you are curious this actor's inclusion in the cast is listed on the internet).

There were a few such cameos - the audio did a great job folding in those fun little reward moments for Buffy nerds. Also it gave us Anyanka as a yappy dog? I did not know I needed to hear Emma Caulfield Ford play a vengeance daemon as a tiny dog, but I am so glad this audio gave it to me.

I don't want to spoil too much of the story, but I very much had a blast listening to this, and would highly rec. it. As much as I really really really loved the ending and would love to read a million fics exploring what happens next in that universe, I am pretty sad that it is unlikely we will be getting the story the cliffhanger implies.

Truthfully I really hope this audio is not a one off and we can look forward to more Buffyverse audios in the future. Plus, who knows, maybe if they are successful enough even SMG may one day get involved (although I feel that really is a long shot).

[magic-is-something-we-create]

This or that: Writer's edition tag!

Thank you for the tag, @pens-swords-stuff!! i love these kinds of games so much :D

this post is long, so apologies in advance! that said, i'll tag @writeblrfantasy, @ettawritesnstudies, @ren-c-leyn, and @enchanted-lightning-aes, as well as anyone else who wants to play!! as always, absolutely 0 pressure to participate if you dont want <3

(explanations for choices are optional, i am just a wordy bitch and want to Speak At Length about many things)

- historical or futuristic

as much as i write fantasy, i LOVE a speculative tech-based setting way more than i love a historical or pseudo-historical setting - which is uh. why my main fantasy world does in fact have a cyberpunk corner and Heavily Implied To Be Aliens pantheon.

- opening or closing chapter

the closing chapter is ALWAYS one that ive been champing at the bit to write for the whole book, and its always so satisfying to finally get out on the page

- light+fluffy or dark+gritty

case in point: whispers and the copious amounts of various horror, gore, and downright gut-punch scenes in millennium saga

- animal companion or found family

bonus points for the found family if theres an animal companion of course, but as much as i love wrench, she is a) not the most important member of the party and b) also a robot so i dont think she counts as an animal anyway outside of andy's dubious claims to fitting under the "dragon" definition

- horror or romance

i will write 1000 instances of "what the FUCK" for every page i struggle through writing romance as someone who does not experience attraction

- hard or soft magic system

I LOVE MAKING PUZZLES OUT OF WORLDS AND MAGIC AND STORIES. THATS IT THATS THE POST

- standalone or series

surprise! TMS may be a series and my long-running main WIP, but uh. 90% of my concepts are standalones. and tbh i like writing standalones more because i dont have to struggle with multiple books of plot and characters fitting together

- one project at a time or always juggling multiple

while i have a bajillion ideas, i struggle to get any work done if im not 100% invested in the story at hand, so i work on one at a time (while allowing myself to switch if i need to of course; but if i do switch, it's never just a few days. its months, and often seeing something to completion)

- one award winner or one best seller

honestly? id rather be recognized for my hard work in creating the characters/story via an award than via a bajillion people reading it,,, though theoretically if its winning an award at least enough people have read it to a) nominate it and b) vote for it, so? best of both worlds kinda?

- fantasy or scifi

YOU THINK I, GENRE BLENDER GEORG, COULD CHOOSE--

- character or setting description

please god. my beta readers didnt know what color embers hair was until chapter 13 because i couldnt fuckin figure out how to put a description of it in naturally. ill take describing massive trees and open ocean and vast plains of ice and cluttered rooms and stained glass windows any day but dont make me describe the narrator or i swear to fuck

- first or final draft

its the puzzle box gremlin in me like "NYEHEHEHE THE PIECES. THEY ARE THERE. PEOPLE CAN SOLVE THEM. NEYHE" and that simply cannot happen in the first draft

- love triangle in everything or no romantic arcs

we write polyamory, one (1) enemies-to-lovers, or no romance at all in this house (it feels so alienating to write no matter what but if its for the story ill do just about anything)

- constant sandstorm or rainstorm

can i say blizzard? i want to say blizzard. same "dont go outside or you'll die" as sandstorm but less worrying about water and also more excuses for the characters to light a fire and Talk About The Horrors or just commit arson

[time-to-write-and-suffer]

IF writers write one single book/game that's good first before you plan a series of barely coherent fanfic tropes mashed together instead of an overarching plot challenge <3

I like series personally. I mean not wayhaven length long series but I like duologies and trilogies. I feel like it gives the romance more depth and time to be fleshed out whereas in some stand alone IFs I've read the romance was barely developed before it actually happened, but at the same time the story I tend to like more in the standalone because sometimes in multiple book series it can be dragged out. But Wayhaven is on another level of dragging out, I think it would have done well with being 3 or 4 books long. Idk what other plot will be able to make it seven. I think it would have also made for a solid duology if the story was better paced and the characters and story beats were better written though. One of my main issues with some IF finished or unfinished is the way the romance is written, idk how to explain but a lot of them and how they develop I'm not the biggest fan of or either that or some of the romance options feel 1 dimensional and the mc has no sense of agency whatsoever. On the other hand there are some ifs I've also really enjoyed so I guess it depends. I would love to know more about your opinions on this topic. I think it's a really interesting point and I enjoy reading your thoughts on different topics.

Thank you, that's very sweet of you to say! ^^ And enables me to do more self-important rambling. Although I would love to hear more about why some romances work for you and others don't, since I'm maybe gonna try my hand at writing an IF eventually.

Ok, back to the thing.

Honestly my main issue isn't that there's series, it's that it's often pretty blatant that they're a series solely for the sake of being a series? And not because the author actually has enough material to justify having multiple releases. You feel me?

So like, yeah! If you're using the extra time to develop characters and plot and flesh out the world, if there's a clear progression of events and things are evolving and happening, then obviously write a series! But if you just go "Oh I have all these fun ideas but there's NO way they'll fit into one or two books, it simply MUST be a trilogy/quadrilogy/pentalogy etc etc" without even planning shit out? It's like ... Ok you have a lot of ideas but did you ... do anything with them? Do you have a plan of where you're going? A lot of the time I see announcements of "This will be a trilogy/series!" before the first book is even finished so like ... How do you know. And then you get to the second book and you realize, oh, you didn't know. You just made that up.

And you can say that "Omg Eff, you don't KNOW how these authors operate, maybe they did plan and figure stuff out and your standards are just different and snobby and rude!" and maybe you'd be correct. But I've now read several multiple-book series where you could remove entire chapters, subplots, and yes, one entire BOOK, without changing the status quo or disrupting any character development at all, by just tightening up the writing and shuffling events into previous or next books. I've also read books that were firsts in a series and came away thinking "Okay? Um? Where is this going, exactly? What's the overarching plot? Why should I keep playing this?"

When it gets to that point, I just feel like ... What are you doing, ya know? How are you outlining this shit that things are just randomly happening for no reason. Subplots dropped entirely without a word. Character development stagnating because you've planned all their progression for a different book so in this one they can't do anything to evolve at all. Why is this a series if you're wasting so much time faffing about in one spot until you've stamped the earth into a flat circle.

Also, if you'll allow me to get pretentious for a moment, as a Gamer who's studying Gaming for my Gaming Degree, I feel that the medium of IFs isn't as close to books as people believe just because it's primarily a written medium. You can have plenty of books where people faff about doing fuck-all. Those are generally not good books, but it's excused because of the medium. The author has complete authority over the progression, and the reader is along for the ride, their only choice is whether they engage or not.

However, with IFs, because you've added player interaction into the mix, the things that you put in front of the player need to be justified, need to be worth interacting with. You've already sacrificed a portion of your authority for the sake of player empowerment, so you need to give the player something to DO with the authority you've given them. If you have entire sections of a game where the player becomes too aware of how little their actions matter, how little thought you've put into what you're presenting, how the only thing they're able to change is the replies to a character's words, it becomes less of someone enjoying reading a story and more of a chore to click through the pointless options and watching your character do fuck-all to change any outcomes.

When you write a book where characters faff about, that's your choice as the author. You have absolute authority and can decide when the faffing stops.

But when you write a game, you need to engage the player, you can't faff about forever. The story does not exist without them. The things you put in need to be there for a reason, because someone, by definition, by design, will be on the other end poking and prodding at it, and if you put in shit that doesn't need to be there, then you're wasting your own effort and also the player's time.

Idk. Does that make sense?

I also disagree that single-book romances tend to be worse, IMO they usually work better for me because they're actually planned and structured as stories, as the rest of the books. If you need to rely on word counts in the millions to tell a romance, that's not great, methinks. IFs also give you plenty of time and word count for romances, as well. Like, a 100k fantasy romance is on the longer end for a book, but an IF with a 100k word count would be considered on the shorter end, so readers are plenty ready for much longer word counts and it's even a selling point, usually.

So there's really no reason to justify having multiple books to write a good romance. An IF has no material reason to fit standard tradpub guidelines, so if you need bigger word counts, it's like, go wild. One counterargument would be that IFs romance routes are generally shorter than romance books, because all that WC doesn't actually go to the individual romances but is split up between regular plot, variations and other routes, but again, there's nothing really stopping you from writing as much as you want.

There's also the problem of most IFs having a lot of romance options, but they all tend to be different people with different romance timelines, so stretching out every romance to a slow-burn in different ways just for the sake of giving every route something to hook the player in each book becomes kinda tedious and transparent eventually. So I think multiple-book romances aren't a guarantee to be better than single-book romances (not that you were claiming this, I'm just out on a mind journey rn, apologies).

Anyway, that last bit got a bit off-topic and I'm already seeing some holes in my argument that I don't wanna think about lest this post becomes infinite, but, uh ... There ya go! :')

In the end, I think it's not about what's better, but about structuring, and having a vision, and not wasting my gotdam time and attention and money just because someone couldn't write a proper outline or self-edit. Single-book IFs have just been better at showing restraint and artistic vision in my experience, hence why I generally side-eye any upcoming IF or demo that advertises itself as the first in a series.

Cuz I just don't trust like that anymore.

[randombrainworm]

Worm reads Discworld, part 1/41

The Watch sub-series: Guards! Guards!

“Listen, if anyone ever sets fire to this city, it’s going to be me.”

OR: A drunk, a dragon and a dwarf, but somehow nothing’s quite what it seems.

Of course I’m starting with this one. Of course I am. It was an obvious choice. That bastard (affectionately) Samuel Vimes owns my heart. He’s a cynical pragmatic who’s done with the world but at the same time cares deeply about his city, he knows what it means to be poor, to scratch the bottom of the social ladder from the other side of the pavement, his job is the only meaning of his life for a long, long time until she meets a Lady who takes care of dragons for a living (and is quite obsessed with them in fact), is way taller and stronger than him and on a direct opposite of the wealthy spectrum (not that money matters to Vimes) and falls fast and hard for her (relatable. I too would ask Lady Sybil for her hand in marriage). And YET, Vimes’ character doesn’t experience a major shift, he doesn’t decide to give up on his job in Watch and focus on personal life only - no. Unlike many protagonists, Vimes proves that it’s entirely possible to hate-love your job and not abandon it while at the same time make room in your life for something more.

But I’m getting ahead of myself (forgive me, I could write essays about Vimes and Sybil and the importance of the Watch). So let's get back to the book itself:

Ankh-Morpork:

Ankh-Morpork is presented to us in a low point. It’s functioning (somehow), but things aren’t going extremely well. The Watch is a joke, a bunch of nobodies who don’t know any better summon a dragon that, for most of the book, may or may not exist, and the supposed heir to the throne is… An interesting case of a dwarf.

Carrot:

Now, having read later books, I really like Carrot, but the first book didn’t really sell him to me until the last dozen or so pages. Admittedly, he too had to try to wrangle the chaos that’s Ankh-Morpork (which makes this story a good starting point in my opinion - we can watch the city through the prism of an outsider, not that different than ourselves) but I didn’t see much of the “Where people went wrong was thinking that simple meant the same thing as stupid.” (a sentiment explored multiple times in “Men at Arms”). I suppose my main problem was that because of the book’s structure I wasn’t sure until the last moment in I should treat him like one of the main characters or an important support to Vimes’ arc.

General remarks:

The overall plot was pretty straight-forward and you could quite easily figure out where it was going, even though the strangeness of the Discworld still managed to make me raise a brow (the rats… If only they could read). The characters (always Pterry’s strength, in my humble opinion) are diverse and interesting and there’s just enough of the outer layer peeling off to get us hooked in their future development (simple watchmen who maybe are ready to risk their lives instead of pretending All’s fine, even if they do it with eyes tightly shut; the genius Patrician who always has plans B to M at ready). The magic is a tad bit confusing, but that's a given in this series and the fact that it was the first book on my reading list definitely didn't help. The Watchmen getting a swamp dragon as a pet was precious, especially the bit when Carrot bought him a rubber hippo. Not to mey it's good to see a middle-aged woman who's passionate about something and isn't a snob or a blushing mess. Sybil's friendship (?) with Nobby was especially nice, people seen by others as weirdos solidarity for the win!

Rating:

GREEN - from my experience, the first book in the series is always either a total success with later ones being unable to reach its level (this happens when the author put all their good ideas into the first book and had to scrap something together because of the tight deadline) or the first book is the weakest and the rest of the series gets increasingly better as the author gets a feel of what does and what doesn’t work. This is the second case, I believe. Guards! Guards! is a strong basis to build on, should it be other author I’d probably give it PINK, but I know what PTerry is capable of.

Until next time,

Worm

[mdhwrites]

🦝 You know that time traveling sand thing? It was kind of strange, actually wonder if time traveling was even a good decision for Luz to meet Philip?

Funny enough, it was me calling these out for making no sense that got me asked if I just am looking for a reason to hate TOH by one Discord group I was in. Didn't voice any other issues with the episode, just that somehow made someone in that Discord snap (and I didn't complain about the show NEARLY as often back then as I do now). Never spoke about my opinion of TOH after that in the Discord but that was still stated as part of the reason why I was kicked out eventually. But no, seriously, they make no sense. "Never is in the same place twice." That... That kind of implies that once perceived, if you stop perceiving it, it would change locations. It also implies that as a portal, it wouldn't lead you to the same place as you first enter it because, by the fact that it transports through time, it would otherwise have shown up in the same place BEFORE. But it's a mcguffin for the episode that is mostly just made to be ensured that it can't be used multiple times so it's functional if maybe dumb (there are more questions it raises btw). As for Luz meeting Philip: Fuck no. Okay, that's maybe a little too harsh. The idea of traveling back to the Savage Times is actually a really tempting one. See what the Isles was like before Belos. If it's this bad now, how bad was it to make everyone just concede control to him. How did order and safety mean that people can still threaten to wear your skin (something that happens in episode 1) from whatever was happening bef-

It's utopia. It's literally fucking utopia. You murder someone's best friend, possibly their brother, and eat their palisman and what is the consequence? We'll bully you a little and burn your book. That's fucking NOTHING. It is part of why Belos' rise to power makes no fucking sense because we aren't made to see that these people want for anything. Yes, it's meant to make the coven system and Belos' rule look bad but you know... You could have done that by actually showing us how it's bad in the current day. But that would have actually meant having Luz interact with Belos in literally any way which would have continued the plot and for some reason that just wasn't allowed. But she interacts with him here! Where the ex-head of the Emperor's Coven and Eda's apprentice can't see they're being played even when both agree something's off. Where you have teleportation magic, with blinding light, without a LIGHT GLYPH and then the early reveal that Belos and Philip are the same person, cheapening the genuinely great and amazing reveal of Hollow Mind. And for what? For ANOTHER episode in S2B like Them's the Breaks Kid where the last two minutes are all that actually is important or matters or adds to the narrative or characters (yes, Lilith's stuff gets progressed but GOD I hate Cool Aunt Lilith and she also wasn't necessary for the story). And that's questionable because it is the worst type of stinger: One only for the audience. After all, that's not actual plot progression. It doesn't move anything forward, or tease a bigger threat. No, this is just giving the audience information that WILL have to be told to the main cast eventually, it's too big not to and too important, so it's literally just a waste of time. The most it does is give your fandom more things to play with a little earlier than they would have gotten otherwise. Elsewhere Elsewhen is in my bottom three episodes of the series because I don't find it entertaining, I hate the characters and it hurts the show front to back with its retcons. Which... Pretty much both of the other episodes do. Though to give Reaching Out (Escaping Expulsion is the third) credit, at least it has a fine enough B plot to enjoy and some good animation. The animation is probably also what makes Escaping Expulsion also go above Elsewhere Elsewhen, even if the damage to the show from those other two episodes are WAY worse in my opinion. Elsewhere Elsewhen... It feels like nothing important is happening and the writers know it and so no effort was put into it. I don't even feel like the people who made it at least enjoyed what they were doing except for a couple very brief moments.