#done fucked up my beloved characters

[seapiglet]

"I'm sorry about the car," Aziraphale was saying. "I know how much you liked it. Perhaps if you concentrated really hard-"

"Gosh, I'm sorry," said Crowley, who knew how much the angel had treasured his book collection.

Presented without comment.

[lepusrufus]

I totally forgot to post this here too didn't I

[ablog]

Girl help I wish to travel to different dimensions just to watch a movie/show I really like a little to the left

[fellamarsh]

another thing i've been trying to do recently is read more self-published stuff. "but fell," you say, "you're a self-published author. surely you've been reading self-published stuff all along" and then i laugh for so long in response we both become uncomfortable.

see, the fear (which has for a long time been killing my mind) that i'll read other self-published stuff and find out that it's so much better than mine that i might as well stop writing forever kept me from doing that basically ever. i have a hard time not unfavorably comparing my work to others and had convinced myself i was being smart by withholding an avenue of de-motivation (reader: i was not being smart). it also doesn't help that i'm pretty low income and have a hard time spending money on books i haven't already read, and that self-published stuff isn't always available at the library---but really a lot of it was just me being a coward. which i'm working on. i could talk about how this particular cowardice is Very Silly, but i think enough has been said about it on writeblr and in the Writing Space in general that i don't feel the need to (though i will if anyone wants me to).

instead, i wanna talk about the self-published things i have read in the past few months and ask about the self-published things you love!

so: what happened was i got real sick, and while i was real sick i (naturally) read over 200,000 words of ace attorney fan fiction in the span of a few days. eventually i got bored of it (and also maybe annoyed at how people were characterizing some of my guys), but i still wanted to read something gay and romantic and nice, something i knew was gonna end happily, which isn't my typical fare.

now you may be saying (having gotten over all the uncomfortable laughter from earlier) "fell, you write gay romance. what do you mean that's not your typical fare?" listen. until a couple months ago i hadn't read a cut and dry romance novel since before i finished college. for context: i graduated in 2015. i know it doesn't make sense. i'm a guy who doesn't make sense.

but in this case it worked to my advantage. not the not making sense thing, but the not having read Published Romance in 1000 years thing. I didn't know where to start. I was very skeptical of everything the library had Available Now in the Gay Fantasy Romance category. what if it was all bad and also not good?

and then i scrolled past the familiar cover of our very own @ashen-crest's A Rival Most Vial.

now this was comfortable territory! this was a novel by a very nice writeblr person whose posts i enjoy! i already loosely knew the plot, i was familiar with the characters, i knew the names of things like rosemond street and the griffin's claw and that ambrose had blue hair and that at the end of it all there would definitely be Boyfriends. i didn't have to worry that this would be bad! i only had to worry that it would be really good!

but i wasn't worried about that, because i was officially Not Writing at the time, and because why the hell hadn't i read this book yet Ash literally emailed me some very kind words last year when my cat died??

Y'all, I devoured ARMV. If you haven't read it yet---especially if cozy fantasy is more your thing than it is mine---you should check it out Immediately. It was fun! It was heartwarming! It was sweet and earnest and confident! I was delighted to find it was occasionally hot! Ambrose and Eli snuggled up into my sick exhausted heart and found a permanent little place there. (Especially Ambrose. I have such a thing for Stiff Guys who Kind of Suck for Tragic Backstory Reasons and are So So Lonely They Don't Even Realize It. gawd)

(And a very small part of my brain spent the whole time wondering why I had been so afraid to really engage with the work my community is doing. The community that I'm in. The one I'm a part of. Why?! Maybe more on that later.)

But from there the curse was broken! I immediately devoured @stjohnstarling's What Manner of Man in a similar sort of frenzy (and hooooly shit guys am I excited for the expanded, finalized version to come out at the end of next month!) and started digging into @lurinatftbn's The Flower that Bloomed Nowhere (which I can already tell is going to be an All Time Favorite).

And now I want to ask you what your favorite self-published books are so that I can read them, too, but I think I will in another post that doesn't dedicate so much space to talking about my various and sundry Issues and isn't Terminally Long

[zukkacore]

I love my beloved sb moots but it is imperative when I import to everyone part of the reason I like them so much and it’s fucked up is that there have always been 5 Jaces. This is not a bit. 5 Jaces sounds like a bit but. Jaceprime is the center of Porter’s world which makes him different from all the other disposable Jaces. But Jaceprime also was built on top of a person that was dead since the beginning of FHJY. Porter loves who Jace is—was—but also loves who he thinks Jace can be and should be. But the thing is. Porter loves who Jace was (real, first Jace) while also loving the idea of Jace & who he thinks Jace can and should (post shatterstar Jace). But Porter also loves who Jace is (post shatterstar Jace) while also still being hung up on the person this jace could be. Used to be. (Real, first Jace). He grieves someone who is still here. Am I talking in circles here

[rhaenyra-first-of-her-name]

Idk what it says about me but the reveal has just made me like Armand more.

Yeah, go commit more crimes, my dear. His sad eyes have bewitched me. I stand with my cancelled wife.

But Armand is absolutely insane. Like he went from abandoning his og plan to rolling with Louis in a matter of days? Never say that this boy wasn't flexible. He is literally sick of everything in his life and is like, whatever 🤷‍♀️

Louis, Louis, Louis...... You are insane too for staying with him for 77 years to spite your ex. You are petty and I love this idea but you are still insane. I think this might be the first time you flabbergasted Armand and me. Love your petty ass, Louis.

Also since Armand let Louis sorta win their divorce fight, after just establishing him as the Big Bad™, for now, this man is forever scheming, 24/7. He is working overtime. Forever a stage director. (Okay, not really. He doesn't have the emotional bandwidth to be an effective manipulator, he's just an opportunist and oh boi, are the opportunities finally opportuniting after the shitstorm of his life so far.)

[beanghostprincess]

No because I've seen so many people complaining about Joseph cheating being out of character when the first thing I said when I found out was "oh yeah checks out lol" .

[outlanderalien]

Everyone arguing about whether Giselle is trans or not, or whether trans people should claim her or not due to her being a sadistic pervert forget one crucial thing:

I love her <3

[the-kipsabian]

(so it turns out i never posted this actual video so like.. here. i have so many brain worms about this now cause like. holy shit my dude. once again asking where. OH WHERE. the fuck is/was this character after his return and why wasnt he given a fair chance when all the building blocks were so obviously fucking there.......)

[imperiuswrecked]

“It wasn’t really Namor’s fault that Ramonda died” IT WAS. IT WAS. WHY ARE YOU TRYING TO TAKE THIS AWAY? I’M SORRY IF YOU CAN’T STOMACH NAMOR NOT BEING PERFECT BUT PLEASE STOP. For fucks sake, it was by HIS HAND the queen died! Yeah there were outside factors pushing Wakanda and Talokan towards conflict but stop trying to erase the fact he has and would kill people!

[b33tlejules]

Hey you. Reading this. Play Honor Bound.

Its like 5 dollars on steam Right Now.

[danidoesathing]

I agonized over which to pick because I just want to ask about all your fics in progress!! I narrowed it down to two and that's just going to have to be ok

the world is staged and the script is set (you cannot change the ending)

Jukeboxes and Maple Syrup

its very funny you pick those two because those like. two of the only three on that list that ISNT lord huron related lmao. those are both hatchetfield fics ive started in secret. regardless those are the main ones im working on right now SO

the world is staged and the script is set (you cannot change the ending) is a fic based on the ending of TGWDLM where like. you know how in the credits where Emma starts begging the audience for help? and like. you know how in TTO how the audience is also referred to by Bliklotep's title? soooo the fic is the ending but i throw him in the mix and ramp the already existing horror of "begging for help and being ignored a cheering crowd" by going "realizing said crowd has been treating your suffering and death as a source of amusement right before you die". only fun times in hatchetfield

"She stumbles to the edge of the stage. The stitches in her leg have come undone and there’s blood seeping through the bandage. That is real. Emma is real, and she needs to help right now."

Jukeboxes and Maple Syrup is a fic that takes place directly after the end of Yellow Jacket that focuses on Daniel and Sophia like. right after the ending. we dont really see them after the Otho fight and we still have no clue is Sophia is even ALIVE and also i miss them dearly. the fic mostly focuses on Daniel trying not to have a panic attack in Miss Retros because one friend is missing after almost dying and the other is in the hospital after also almost maybe dying and he doesn't really know what to do. Not a whole lot of plot it's mostly him trying to deal with that whole. mess. luckily he's got Miss Holloway and Duke to make things a bit easier (responsible adults? in MY hatchetfield? its honestly only these two but its better than nothing)

"He feels so stupid. Sophia is in the hospital and she might never wake up. Hannah is missing and could be kidnapped or dead or worse. And he’s just sitting here in a cozy diner with pancakes and orange juice, and Hannah’s Jacket but not Hannah and not Sophia."

[projectdivaar]

SEASON 4 FINALE.........I felt genuinely ill the whole time like my stomach was twisting I was gonna throw up oh my god what the FUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[b1gwings]

swashbuckler rogue my beloved

[kabutone]

like not to sound like some edgy piece of shit but that is also why horror is like such a breath of fresh air to me lmao like in almost all the horror media i've seen

[abyssalpriest]

Working with Leviathan be like

Leviathan: *completely both rewrites a severe trauma trigger back into something neutral and freeing, and further reconnects me to the Sky and myself off plane and pre-incarnation in the space of 24 hours* yeah nice, anyway we should play video games now I'm tired