#i hate that book with PASSION

[inkskinned]

this is just my opinion but i think any good media needs obsession behind it. it needs passion, the kind of passion that's no longer "gentle scented candle" and is now "oh shit the house caught on fire". it needs a creator that's biting the floorboards and gnawing the story off their skin. creators are supposed to be wild animals. they are supposed to want to tell a story with the ferocity of eating a good stone fruit while standing over the sink. the same protective, strange instinct as being 7 and making mud potions in pink teacups: you gotta get weird with it.

good media needs unhinged, googling-at-midnight kind of energy. it needs "what kind of seams are invented on this planet" energy and "im just gonna trust the audience to roll with me about this" energy. it needs one person (at least) screaming into the void with so much drive and energy that it forces the story to be real.

sometimes people are baffled when fanfic has some stunning jaw-dropping tattoo-it-on-you lines. and i'm like - well, i don't go here, but that makes sense to me. of fucking course people who have this amount of passion are going to create something good. they moved from a place of genuine love and enjoyment.

so yeah, duh! saturday cartoons have banger lines. random street art is sometimes the most precious heart-wrenching shit you've ever seen. someone singing on tiktok ends up creating your next favorite song. youtubers are giving us 5 hours of carefully researched content. all of this is the impossible equation to latestage capitalism. like, you can't force something to be good. AI cannot make it good. no amount of focus-group testing or market research. what makes a story worth listening to is that someone cares so much about telling it - through dance, art, music, whatever it takes - that they are just a little unhinged about it.

one time my friend told me he stayed up all night researching how many ways there are to peel an orange. he wrote me a poem that made me cry on public transportation. the love came through it like pith, you know? the words all came apart in my hands. it tasted like breakfast.

[bennetsbonnet]

Two statements about characters can and should co-exist: Pride and Prejudice edition

Mr Bennet has a close relationship with Elizabeth and provides amusing observations on the folly of human nature BUT he is a terrible husband and father who consistently neglects the women who rely on him for absolutely everything; Elizabeth and Jane turned out so well in spite of him, not because of him.

Mrs Bennet's behaviour is understandable given the era in which she lived and the subsequent pressure she was under to get her daughters married well, which wasn't entirely for vanity reasons given that Longbourn was entailed BUT she was still fundamentally vain, ridiculous and rude; such pressure, even combined with an absent husband, still does not make her behaviour justifiable, nor her a sympathetic character, as she enabled Lydia (whose subsequent elopement with Wickham almost ruined the family) for far too long.

Mr Collins is unfairly portrayed as a middle-aged sycophant in most adaptations, rather than the young clergyman who sucks up to his patroness in pursuit of a more lucrative living that he was BUT he is still a ridiculous character who you are not meant to feel sympathy for when Elizabeth rejects him; he is rude, hypocritical and thinks of himself far too highly considering how vapid he actually is.

Caroline Bingley is often too harshly judged as a 'pick-me,' even though her relentless pursuit of Darcy is understandable given his wealth & status and how important it was for women to make a good marriage BUT she was still rude, vain and treated Jane terribly; plus she was a hypocritical snob, given the manner in which she looked down upon the Bennet family's relations despite the Bingleys' own background in trade.

Elizabeth is incredibly witty, courageous and endearing and instantly likeable which makes Darcy's slight of her at the Meryton assembly all the more of an affront to us as readers BUT, while it explains her dislike of him, she is no means perfect herself; she had far too much misplaced pride in her ability to successfully read others' characters and consequently ignored positive accounts of Darcy in favour of believing the deceitful Wickham, given her prejudice against the former.

Mr Darcy was harshly judged by Elizabeth, even though there are many more sympathetic elements to his character than immediately meet the eye BUT he was not shy or innocent; he was always a haughty rich man who had never been told no, thought far too highly of himself and, ultimately, thoroughly deserved to be rebuked and subsequently made to reform his character.

[lotstradamus]

have you read any books as good as captive prince in terms of plot :/ im desperate!!!

the only series I've read that really evoke that Captive Princeish countries-on-the-brink-of-war, shifting alliances, spies, WHAT IS HAAPPEENNINGING vibe are The Masquerade by Seth Dickinson (The Traitor Baru Cormorant is book #1) and The Queen's Thief by Megan Whalen Turner (The Thief is book #1).

both of those series deliver a Prince's Gambit Patran Soldiers Arriving On The Field At Hellay jaw-dropper and are so SO satisfying. they will also make you cry LIKE a little bitch lmao

OH MY GOD ALSO??? HELLO???? C. S. PACAT'S NEW YA* FANTASY SERIES DARK RISE??????????? (Dark Rise book #1!!!) we're only on book 2 of 3 but I trust her enough to say: you absolutely have to read it now immediately. on the surface the plot seems SOOOO simple and straightforward (it's VERY pastoral English 20th century children's fantasy vibes, but it's C. S. Pacat so...) but thematically it's very similar to Captive Prince: dead brother angst, hidden identities, sexually fraught gold collars, hot blond bitches and WAR. and sis THEE twists. THEE levels. I spent 85% of the first book like yeah okay I guess I'm into this and the last 15% with my mouth open in shock. I read book two in one sitting the day it came out and transformed from a woman into a sentient scream. 10/10.

*I have to laugh... ok girl ! filth !

[starryarchitect]

found a legal pad lying around so I produced yet another work doodle because what is self control

aaaaand then I remembered he had his helmet at this point (I've been drawing him helmetless too much for the animatic so I completely forgot it) so I redrew it digitally with the helmet—and I let him smile in this one, as a treat

[janevolturi]

i’ve taken the longest break between posting about new moon and eclipse because every time i read a chapter from eclipse edward does something evil and bella doesn’t deck him for it

[derangedthoughtssideblog]

thought about enjolras for 2 minutes. now i'm deeply unwell

[handweavers]

thinking about this tiny extremely autistic kid in my middle school program for kids too mentally ill for normal public school who brought his electric guitar to school everyday (it was taller than him) and he'd sit in a giant cardboard box and play tabs during math lessons. we were in 7th grade and he was doing math books for 3rd graders. he liked to cluck like a chicken and did a lot of flapping and he almost never left the box that was dubbed his chicken coop and i was the only one who wasn't mean to him about any of it so he'd let me sit in the box with him and help him with his schoolwork and he'd follow me around during breaks from class cause he knew i wouldn't let the other kids be cruel to him. i used to ruffle his hair affectionately and it would make him smile and blush. he had a pet rat that he really loved and talked about often and i'd call him rat boy as a nickname and he liked it when i did that. when we went on field trips he'd sit with me on the bus and we'd talk about music and he'd tell me about different animals he liked. when i started playing guitar i'd bring mine to school sometimes and play with him and it made him really happy. he used to come to school with bruises on his face a lot and i didn't ask. he went back to regular public school for high school and i never saw him again.

[anxiouspotatorants]

Actually you know what I need to rant about this: while literati is technically a good girl x bad boy dynamic it is written so incredibly well and avoids so many pitfalls and stereotypes that it makes a good girl x bad boy hater like myself (I’m only half joking — I don’t think any trope is inherently good or bad but I tend to dislike most pairings with this dynamic) fall head over heels for their story and relationship.

So much of what makes the two of them work is the contrast between how others perceive them and how they truly are. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of people who understand who Rory is as a person (Lorelai, Lane, Paris, Richard and Emily to a certain degree for starters), but she's constantly met with the expectation that she just does good and is supposed to make everyone proud 24/7. Stars Hollow as a group especially are big on this, as seen f. ex. through how Taylor takes Rory's one comment about an inappropriate DVD and twists the whole thing into a censorship crusade and makes Rory its poster-child even though she wants nothing to do with it and tells him so repeatedly. But instead of hearing Rory disagree with him (like he would Lorelai and Luke) he assumes that she actually agrees with him - and why shouldn't she when she's the perfect sunshine paragon of good who would never disagree with her elders? Also her grandparents treat her as incredibly fragile and childlike, like she must be too innocent to ever do anything wrong and so whenever she does something it has to be somebody else's fault (usually Lorelai, but occasionally Jess or whoever else was present). Time and time again Rory is treated like something innocent and naive and weak — but not by Jess. He sees her as a person.

And it obviously goes the other way too. Jess is treated like shit by pretty much everyone else. Either people hate him unprovoked or very much provoked (he did do a lot of pranks in his first few weeks and while I'm a Dean-hater I'm not blind to how much Jess picked fights with him), or they’ve simply given up on him. He tells Rory himself that every authority figure he had back in New York gave up on him too, from teachers to principals to his very own mother. But Rory doesn’t treat him like a lost cause, she treats him like the smart, brilliant and asshole-ish teen that he is. By having faith in him she also often holds him more accountable than others. Where f. ex. Lorelai or the other adults just roll their eyes, Rory physically drags Jess into doing his shifts at the diner. While others write him off, Rory chews Jess’ ear out for not helping Luke more and for willfully making enemies out of the Stars Hollow adults.

They don't put each other on pedestals or below each other. Jess doesn’t try to make a sinner out of Rory and she doesn’t try to make a saint out of him. There’s genuine respect between them. They expect each other to have integrity and treat others with kindness and honesty, and the rest is good old chemistry and common interests.

I particularly love how in so many of their scenes (especially pre-relationship) when they spend time alone they just get to be these goofy nerdy kids. They argue about controversial authors and dig through records shops and eat hot dogs and make fun of each other and try to make each other laugh. It’s not just sexual chemistry as it too often is in a dynamic like this (and often uncomfortably sexual when writing teenagers - looking at you Gossip Girl), and not just well written intellectual chemistry — they have platonic chemistry too. A hell of a lot of it actually.

While I don’t think ASP wrote them through a purely deconstructionist lens on the good girl x bad boy dynamic (if she did plan on writing the dynamic at all), there is something to be said about how where many around them treat them like stereotypes they treat each other like people. To so many people, Rory is a perfect small town princess, a little miss sunshine with booksmarts for days but too delicate and sweet for anything with grit and weight. To a lot of the same people and many more Jess is a pathetic brutish and maniacal lost cause, hell personified in a chainsmoking leather-wearing teenager. But to each other they are actual human beings. Kind and mean and flirtatious and scared and reckless and smart. Rory really thinks that with the right motivation and mindset Jess can be the kind who does (and at the end wrote) incredible things. Jess really believes that with a little more practice and support to step out of her comfort zone she can be the amazing journalist she wishes to be.

They don’t have this stupid «we’re so bad for each other but we can’t stay away» thing that too many trope users rely on and don’t even justify in the plot. Everyone else might think they’re not fit for each other, but they knew they were each other’s person from the very first day.

[atlabeth]

every time i see ai generated fics on ao3 a piece of me dies man. like what do you mean??? you’ll never get good at writing if you don’t let yourself be bad first!!! you learn by writing shitty fanfic and having a great time with it!! there are literally no stakes if you write and post a bad fanfic because everyone is just doing this for fun. and honestly the worst written fic in the world is still better than anything chat gpt can come up with because at least it has soul. at least you came up with the plot on your own and struggled through writing it and put a part of yourself into it, no matter how bad it is. i don’t care if you’re scared of your writing being bad or you don’t know where to start or you can’t get a grasp on the characters, get the fuck over yourself and write it on your own oh my god

[bookhobbit]

I have no idea if this is just like an artifact of What I'm Seeing Lately. So it could be purely bias in what's crossing my view not a real thing. But I've seen such a sharp rise in the last like 2ish years of Girl Power popular media being like "only losers ask you to split the bill! Yuck!" I feel like when I was growing up it was pretty common for Girl Power popular media to be totally okay with splitting the bill as a sign of, like, Equality In Relationships. Is this...an actual change? Is it just a change in what I'm seeing rather than what's out there? Idk. Weirds me out though.

[orangechickenpillow]

Howl Pendragon as a character prepared me for Astarion Ancunin and I feel like I can't really explain that to anyone who doesn't just get it like you have to have been there when Howl turned himself into literal goop because his hair was dyed one (1) shade redder than usual

[ofmermaidstories]

a little concerned about the number of adults im seeing on twitter who think YA should be for them, and not like… the young adults aka teens it’s intended for??? get the fuck out of their space!!! “oh i don’t want to read about smut all the time” ok there’s like a million other genres for you to choose from…. go pick one!!!!

[trailerparkdad]

welcome to the life of a quiet lab technician

[sapphiresenthiss]

So I found this several years old gem of a sketch in my old scraps folder... and finally decided to post it because why not. Nostalgia.

RIP Harry. Also Voldemort is secretly 2% cat and only 98% snake 😂

[sweetgem97]

I would love to take a Moment of Silence to appreciate that the Ever After High fandom is still alive and healthy on Tumblr.

[justiceforplutoo]

the thing about reading classics is that people have really high standards of what makes a classic and expecting to understand everything really ruins the whole experience. I started with 1984 and, yes, that impacted me, but I put too much pressure on myself to like and understand it the first go round.

a classic book is just a book.

you don't have to understand it. you don't have to like it.

sure, you can read Frankenstein and be like, "Wow, I sure loved analyzing this text. I feel so smart." OR you can let yourself underline the part that says, "I was encompassed by a cloud which no beneficial influence could penetrate." and write 'no beneficial influence could WHAT NOW?!'

be silly. yeah, it's really rewarding and cool to read a classic and devote your whole life to understanding every sentence and making all the connections, but also... just let yourself read it? have fun with it? you're allowed to hate a classic book (Catcher in the Rye) even if it's a classic. you're allowed to be traumatized by a classic book (Of Mice and Men) even if it's a classic.

I think that a lot of this is common knowledge, but we also need to give ourselves the reminder! it is just a book! how it impacts you as a book should not change just because it's a classic!