#cheap romances

[foolscapper]

forgive me babes, i had internet issues, so i whipped up a 30 minute quickie. but they sounded great in the second half I caught 😭

[doriana-gray-games]

Hi! Just wanted to say real quick I love love love your game and have been silently following it for over a year. This is the first time I’m sending in an ask though haha. What does Anne think of the ROs? And has she picked up on anything from Watson in their non-platonic route?

Thank you! Have cookie ❤️🍪 (I did not have kitkat.)

Anne and Neel feel the same about the ROs and it’s like this:

L: “Who?”

A: “Who??”

H: “😖 Too intimidating.”

W: “Best person ever (except Sherlock) ✨ So nice, approachable, warm ☺️.”

MC: “😳 or 🥺”

I think, at least in an opposite gendered route, that people would be gossiping and wondering about the MC and W's closeness, whether they’re platonic or not.

But I think Anne and Neel spend more time than most (except maybe Mrs Hudson, romanced Lestrade, or pining Watson themselves) about the nature of your relationship lol.

‘🤨 was Watson just being nice when they told me to save a slice of their favourite bread for Sherlock when they woke up? Could the bread be a grand romantic gesture? 😔 I need to ask Mrs Hudson again…’

[stealingpotatoes]

why did the new DA trailer have to drop while im on holiday and ~2500 miles from my drawing tablet

[aleximustd13]

Finally in my little gremlin hands. Can't wait to read it tonight!!

[anhonest-puck]

it’s been like a solid million years since i’ve posted my art. have some gee way. also my first my chem art i’ve posted so 👍Thats cool

[zhoras-bitch]

Thank RC for introducing the slot feature before the Love, Sin and Evil Vol. 1 finale bacause

RIP my diamonds though.

[haunted-vespera]

THE NEW MY CHEM POST ON INSTA????? HELLO ???? WHAT DOES THIS MEAN!!! PLEASE BE MCR 5 AND A TOUR BUT WITH CHEAP TICKETS 😭😭😭😭😭🙏🙏🙏🙏

[aro-culture-is]

aro culture is getting so fucking tired of people using the fact that there's a queer romance in something as a reason you should watch it. like haven't allos had enough of romance? queer or otherwise? I'm not saying queer representation is bad, of course, I'm just fed up with asking what a book is about and in response all I get is "oh it has queer people in it" cool! what is it about? having queer representation is not the be all end all of media can we please have ONE thing without romance in it. please.

.

[askmarcille]

Marcille! I see you with books around the castle pretty often so I was wondering if you had any suggestions?

( @ask-utayaboy )

Books? Oh, um, yeah I have some books...

*Her face becomes a bright crimson as the stack of books behind her crashes to the floor. It's a bunch of...cheap romance novels? With titles like "The Sword in the Sheath", "Passions of the Chimera Girl", and "The Salty Mermaid", you get a feeling that Marcille is a girl who loves cheap and filthy romance novels.*

[csphire]

Dammon Thinking

[llycaons]

if there's a tag that's 'past lwj/wwx' and the other tags aren't 'breakup and make-up' or something to that effect I swear to god...

[rielzero]

ah, the long lost art of ...traditionally doodling with the cheapest ink pen you can find. /s

[sluttyten]

I had a dream last night that some new NCT album teaser pics dropped and Haechan’s was a shirtless one and the man had a six pack , like he was ripped

[greenerteacups]

Hi GT, I was reading one of your wonderful responses and you mentioned you don't love what they did to Remus, and I have to say I 100% agree. In my opinion his relationship with tonks is weird (regardless of whether people think he had chemistry with Sirius) like he's at least 10 years older than her and he tries to leave her and it just seems like he goes along with HER infatuation without really caring about her very much. It also puts Tonks back into JKR's frequent dynamic for women, which is "badass who really wants to be with a guy who doesn't seem to appreciate her much" (see Hermione/Ron).

Do you have any further thoughts on that? I always found JKR's writing about women in relationships/who want relationships really weird. You definitely do it better.

JKR has many strengths as a writer, but I don't think anyone would say her romances are one of them. I think a lot of authors either consciously or subconsciously look down on romance as a genre because it's associated with sensuality and frivolousness, but writing and selling the idea that two people should and do want to kiss each other is like, really fucking hard to do, and it requires a certain set of skill checks as an author that not everyone has. Just like writing good horror or good fantasy, good romance has tenets and rules and things you can do to get the audience on board with you, and JKR didn't execute a lot of those things (to my satisfaction, YMMV) in the books. Bad romance is also a high-stakes problem, because it risks flattening out your characters and pitching them into OOC territory if the audience doesn't buy that the dynamic evolution is natural. But again, that's something you don't know if you haven't written romance, or tried to, before.

Mostly, you have to really lean into the vulnerability of the thing. Romance is silly and goofy and embarrassing. It makes you say dumb things and act in dumb ways. It can't be ironic or chilled or demure. At some point, to make a real human connection, someone has to get down, take off their dignity, and bare the rotten core of themselves. When we propose, we kneel on the ground. We get dirty. And all authors have a great terror of embarrassing themselves. They're doing something tremendously vulnerable; of course they want people to think they're cool and intelligent. It's embarrassing to put yourself in the head of a 15-year-old boy with a crush. It's embarrassing to write about a suitor earnestly confessing their love, because — what if this is too much? What if it's corny, what if it breaks the audience's suspension of disbelief? What if my readers are laughing at me? What if I'm the butt of the joke?

Anyway, I think a lot of really great books have terrible romance subplots for that reason. In The Great Gatsby, we never actually see Gatsby and Daisy alone together. We get their story second-hand, from people who can deliver it in a cool, reflective tone of mystery; we don't see them undressed, undone, emptying their hearts to one another. And Nick and Jordan, the romance we actually get to see develop, are easily the weakest plot in the book. Meanwhile, authors like Tolstoy have an incredible gift for writing romance that feels right, and is sensual without verging into purple prose. But Tolstoy is one of the greatest writers of all time. JKR wrote some very good books that a lot of people loved very much, but for her, the romances were accessories to the story. They weren't a focus. I'm certain she cared about Remus and Tonks's relationship, in the same way she cared about Ron and Hermione's relationship. Both take up too much space to explain otherwise.

TLDR: Writing romance is hard because it's really easy to fuck up, even if you care about it. I don't know that JKR put all that much thought into selling us on chemistry and interpersonal dynamics of the couples she threw together; I think she writes for plot, and the couples emerged as a part of that. That means the couples that don't necessarily make sense on paper lose out majorly because the audience doesn't know exactly what they're rooting for, and the couples that do make sense on paper lack a certain... I dunno, va-va-voom.

[tarn-ati0n]

Ah shit I'm becoming a Fire Emblem guy aren't I.

[fictionadventurer]

I know I just said that we shouldn't categorize people in history, but when it comes to the presidential podcast, I do find myself sorting presidents into "good" and "garbage" piles based on how they treated their wife.

Good

Ulysses S. Grant gets top marks here. I'm not crazy about his wife, but he was, and they're cute together. She was sunny and upbeat enough to boost him through a lot of years of struggle, and he was devoted to both her and the children.

Theodore Roosevelt was a loving husband to both his wives and a ridiculously devoted father to all his children.

James Garfield starts out in the garbage pile because he married her without love and had an affair, but the way they both overcame that to fall deeply in love is a pretty beautiful redemption.

Woodrow Wilson seems to have had a pretty good relationship with his wife. I know less about them so this is a tentative classification, but she was willing to basically help run the country after his stroke, so it suggests there was something good there.

Garbage

Warren Harding reigns in the garbage can. Multiple unrepentant affairs with long-term mistresses.

FDR was already on pretty shaky ground in my mind, but once I learned he had an affair with Eleanor's secretary, and then Eleanor stayed with him through polio, and then at his death he was with this same secretary while Eleanor was away, he lost a lot of points.

Middle Ground

Lincoln and his wife had a pretty rocky relationship, but from what I can tell they tried to make it work and were planning on taking steps to improve things before his death.

Chester Arthur's wife hated that he was constantly away on political business, which gives him a lot of bad husband points, but also she did want that high-class, high-status lifestyle, and from what I can tell he did love her and had a lot of regrets after she died.