#i wrote a fic instead of my college admission essays

[praytriarchy]

Summary: Silco must contend with his failures. His almost-lover. His almost-revolution.

He comes to the conclusion that it would be easier to just throw it all away.

Then, he finds a letter in the mines.

@zaundads hey!!! I wanna enter your arcane art book raffle so badly that I wrote over 3k words after months of a complete and total dry spell!!! This is my raffle entry, I love you for starting this raffle!!!! I hope you like my contribution :)

[landwriter]

Sooo I wrote this while half-asleep like a week ago and wanted to read it over in the morning before sending (to see if it, you know, made any sense), and then I forgot about it until coming across it on my notes today, so here it is now:

Remembered another thing: having two different verbs for "to be" ("ser" and "estar"). This isn’t exclusive to Portuguese (I know it exists in Spanish, at least), but it's something that English doesn't have and that can give trouble to English speakers learning Portuguese (partly because we suck at coming up with simple general rules for when to use which that cover every last usage of "to be" and why in many cases only one is acceptable. I’ve explained it as “ser” is for things that are permanent, that are part of the subject’s essence – only for someone to promptly point out that you must use “ser” for professions, and people change profession all the time and someone’s work is hardly part of their essence. So Idk, if anyone’s read a really good explanation please send me a link so I have something to refer people to).

The lack of this distinction doesn’t seem, to me, to make English more ambiguous. At least I’m hard pressed to come up with an example where despite the context I couldn't tell if an "is" meant "é" or "está".

Out of context though.

"It's cold here where I live." Well is it cold now in particular, or is it a generally cold place?

"I'm happy." Is this a general statement about the overall condition of your life, or are you experiencing the feeling of happiness at this moment?

But while in context it's not ambiguous, I feel like it's a distinction that English speakers don't really make inside their minds. Like, they’re using the same word, not two different verbs which just happen to sound the same and have the same spelling. I certainly don't think about it when speaking English. But when speaking Portuguese, it's inscribed into the language.

Anyway, I just thought it’s a neat difference you might like to know about. I don't really have a way to work this into a fic. Maybe a situation where Hob wants to underline that something "não é", it merely "está"? Or the opposite? Eu estou triste, mas eu sou feliz? Mais do que estar feliz com você, eu sou feliz com você?

Or some wordplay? Ele está sonhando, em um certo sentido, mas, mais do que isso, ele é o próprio sonhar. He is (está) dreaming, in a sense, but more than that, he is (é) the dreaming itself. (fun fact, we use the infinitive, not the gerund, when we want to use a verb as a noun).

There's potential in the breaking of the rules, I suppose. Like, species is a "ser" case. Always. I am (sou) human. Buuut Dream being Dream, he isn't (não é) human. But maybe he can be (estar) human, in the time he spends with Hob. (Now I've entered playing with language territory. I wouldn't risk something like this in, say, a college admission essay or a Portuguese test).

Unrelated to any of the above, Flower King!!! Thank you for writing it. It is utterly breathtaking and so inspiring I spent an entire afternoon working on a new fairy tale WIP instead of working on the WIP I meant to work on. Like, I wrote two paragraphs of it and then opened a new document and spent hours just doing a new thing instead.

!!!! This is incredible, and I love love love your examples. There are SO many beautiful possibilities in breaking the rules and wordplay in a given language - that's one of my favourite sort of uses of language, is using grammar or any other form of linguistic, like, expectations and structure to say something. What a great case of something that (to me) is so elegant in the source language and can only be translated with tonal emphasis or extra words in English. I innately understand your example of Dream's relation to being human - I remember debating over capitalization for the same ends: his waking body vs his Waking body. Is love (He is in love, I am in love with you, It is love, etc.) a case that can use both? Can you use ser vs estar to distinguish between, say, an act of seduction versus a permanent state of being seduced by someone? Can you write shit like 'I was seduced; I was seduced.' or analogs? Because that's SO fucking sexy.

I feel like it's a distinction that English speakers don't really make inside their minds. Like, they’re using the same word, not two different verbs which just happen to sound the same and have the same spelling.

For me, at least - one representative of 400 million native speakers, and ppl's minds most certainly work differently around language, caveat, caveat, etc - I do sometimes feel a distinction between a specific & general state of being. Especially re: feelings. It comes out in tone, but I also think we use a lot of things that might not seem like obvious context in low context situations. These are probably super regional too (See how Canadians say yes by saying "No, yeah" and no by saying "Yeah, no", but also say yes by saying "Yeah, no, [yeah]" or any other positive marker. "Yeah, no, for sure." and "No, yeah, totally" are both agreements. Very intuitive!!) But take "I'm happy." - the context there is usually in the grammatical form used in the question - if you ask how's it going?, it's a now-in-particular answer. If you use present perfect or whatever the fuck it's called, you know, the auxiliary verb nonsense, and ask how's it been going? it's an in-general answer. It's also in the answers: I'm good is something you say when you've just fallen over and people are concerned, vs. I've been good when you've just seen friends for the first time in months and they're concerned. But that only comes up to the present and doesn't necessarily imply a future of good-being - I'm not sure if ser is different in that respect.

Are the two verbs used liberally to distinguish between temporary versus non-temporary emotional states like in your first example? Is it a common mode of expression to use both in one sentence? Can you use language like and instead of but? Is it seen as inherently contradictory like a transliteration would be in English? Because I'm absolutely feral for this. I love how effectively it holds meaning - to be able to say 'I'm shitty (right now) but I'm happy (in general) with nothing more than a different verb instead of having to add context. I wonder if it affects or enables a different mode of emotional expression?

Here, when people ask how you are and things are temporarily crap - in a banal way, like job stress or home repairs or exams - you instead generally make these insane understatements that serve to provide implicit subtext (things are actually shit), and also underscore the perspective that your emotional state now is not the same as your outlook on life (but you're still chugging along). i.e. "Oh, it's been [intentional pause]...busy."; "Not six feet under!"; "Things have been a little tough!". If you just said "I'm not happy," that would actually stop people dead in their tracks. Often we sub out the subject (I) when mentioning the less positive emotion and then stick it back in for the positive one we're couching it in. It softens things: "It's been stressful, but I'm stoked for winter break." We're trying to navigate the good and the bad in a linguistically and culturally acceptable way. What's it like in Portuguese? I would sort of love it to be both linguistically elegant and culturally normal in English to just communicate the complexities of our lives within the scope of a short exchange. We're not a country with loads of "It's bad and it's good and I'm here" idioms. But I know they're out there! Somewhere!

As someone who is generally Hob-levels of delighted (by life, my community, my friends, the mountains, a good tea or a bird, etc.,) but recently totalled my car which genuinely fucken bites, this bizarre little dance has been coming up a LOT at holiday get-togethers these past couple weeks hahaha. How have I been? I am* stressed to the tits, I am** happy. Happy to see you, happy to be here, happy. It is a part of the subject's essence! I WANT TWO VERBS! Please!!! *estar **ser

I'm so in love with the power of this - even if they've got rules that baffle Anglos - the way you've at least generally explained it is SO cool to me. I love the examples!! It's SUCH a neat difference. Am constantly delighted and humbled by the knowledge you guys bring to my ask box. Thank you for this rad Christmas Eve gift, dude. <3

Also thank you so much re: Flower King - that's exactly how I wrote it too so I'm glad it's contagious hahaha! Thank you so much for reading it. It's my pleasure to write and share stuff <3<3<3 I look forward to your fairy tale (and would love to hear more about it!)

[drunkjaked]

hey sax, would you be able to expand on why you don't like longer fics? and even the thing about lowercase fics im so curious now that ik how you feel about them

Instead of sharing my thoughts (I can be really critical and fussy so I'll keep quiet) I'll leave 2 recommendations. These are some of my fave fics I've ever read:

The Art of War More by @/kpopfanfictrash (I'm so shy to tag, I'm such a big fan lmaoprotantor 😭😭😭)

Cherry by @fallinforgyu (Also shy to tag but Bunny and I r bffies now so I should get over my shyness)...

Proper like review type thing under the cut !

TAOM: This fic has like a college admissions scandal at the centre of it AND IT'S ABOUT JUNGKOOK MWAH! Anyways, really well written and such a good read AND E2L <333 And so so so amazing I love it so much, it's literally 42k words long and I loved every single word more than the last. All of this author's work (that I've read, mostly about Taehyung + Jungkook) is just phenomenal I love it so so so much.

It's so well done and I've never read a fic so plot driven (plot being the admissions scandal) that didn't make me lose interest - like I read it because I wanted to read a JK fic not because I cared about admissions scandals but OHHHH MY DAYS did this fic have me so engrossed in the whole thing, like even if this wasn't a fic or if it was about someone I didn't like I would have enjoyed this fic THAT is how good the plot is here

Cherry is just.. I literally started using cherry lip gloss because of this fic??? I HAVE GONE OUT OF MY WAY TO CHANGE MY LIFE BECAUSE OF THIS FIC?? If that doesn't tell you how good this is then.. idk what will .. it's around 30k I'm pretty sure (2 parts). The way Bunny wrote this is just so perfect I've literally never read anything like this in my life I can't believe it exists and I get to be alive to read it (AND IGET TO CALL MYSELF BUNNY'S FRIEND????In shock and awe at the state of my life????).

It's set in the 80's and it's the summer time "and the only thing hotter than the summer sun is the desire that courses through your veins." ??? THE FIRST LINE IM LITERALLY sigh I think about Cherry in all aspects of my day to day life and I adore it so much, I could write an essay on this fic (but I enjoy writing essays so this is something for me to consider), definitely due a reread.

And what's so crazy is that I'll see a picture / video of Heeseung and think omg Cherry Heeseung.. this has never happened to me in my life. So, yes, Cherry is that good

WARNING u will cry and sob like a child <3333

These 2 fics gave me hope that there are long fics out there for the impatient and concentration impaired ! If u have any long fic recs I would love to check them out but I really have to psych myself up to read them so it may be a while before I do.. Also omds sorry for the caps in here I'm typing on my laptop and I've been doing uni work all day so I'm in proper typing mode atm (in terms of my capitalisation anyways).

[sarah-crewe]

OKAY COOL 1, 2, 3, 7, 9, 12, 15, 18, 20

1. book you’ve reread the most times?It’s probably A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett because it was my absolute favorite when I was little and has endured to the point where I wrote my college admissions essay about it and got a quote of it tattooed on my body. Other top contenders are Matilda and the Harry Potter series, but I’ve lost count for all three so I couldn’t say for sure. 

2. top 5 books of all time?I’m morally against this question. How could I possibly pick the best five of ALL TIME?? Ridiculous, not valid. I will list a general group of favorite off my bookshelf and give you top five of the half year instead (not even counting the players handbook, which I must have read cover to cover at least 5 times). General favorites: A Little Princess, the Monster Blood Tattoo series (renamed The Foundling’s Tale series in the US) by D.M. Cornish, Matilda/The BFG/The Witches by Roald Dahl, The Glass Slipper by Eleanor Farjeon, Fugitive Pieces and Poems by Anne Michaels, the Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane series by Dorothy L. Sayers and later Jill Paton Walsh, When Women Were Warriors by Catherine Wilson, Dealing with Dragons (and the next two sequels) by Patricia C. Wrede, Girls Made of Snow and Glass by Melissa Bashardoust, the Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling.

Top 5 of the Last Six Months 5. Lumberjanes4. Who Fears Death by Nnedi Okofor3. Educated by Tara Westover2. The Prince and The Dressmaker by Jen Wang1.Girls Made of Snow and Glass by Melissa Bashardoust

3. what is your favourite genre?Broadly, my favorite genre is probably “diverse YA fiction especially with female characters, especially with wlw characters” but that’s not really a genre. Honestly, I dabble all over the place. I like historical fic, I like scifi, I like fantasy, I like realistic modern fiction. I think it more comes down to the plot/characters/writing if I like it or not.

7. is there a series/book that got you into reading?Not that I remember, but I started reading and voraciously when I was four, so it’s a little fuzzy. I do know that I was super super into the American Girl series and the Magic Attic Club series in kindergarten, but I don’t know if that was the one that started it.

9. when do you tend to read most?I would say I read most reliably when I’m waiting for something, but, I don’t think I have an answer for the spirit of the question. Following the letter of the question, I read most often when I’ve been hooked by the book and I just need to finish it now.

15. recommend and review a book.A book I read recently, not yet mentioned, that I would recommend is The Librarian of Auschwitz by Antonio Hurbe. It is a difficult read and I feel it’s very important to state that upfront. I think education and literature, even for young adults and adults, can have a tendency to write in such away that they can avoid standing face to face with a horror of history, letting people glance sidewise at things that have happened in order to make it sting less. Hurbe forces the reader to stare unflinchingly into a truth that many other books avoid by bringing the reader to the brink of concentration camps or by fading away early on. (Side note, another book I have read recently which also did this was Lies We Tell Ourselves by Robin Talley--an excellent look at desegregation through the eyes of teenagers at a level I never recieved in many many years of schooling.)

18. do you like historical books? which time period?I love historical books. I like pretty much any time period, but I’ve read enough that if I’m going to read something from a “popular” time period (Victorian, WWII, etc), it needs to have a really catching premise. As such, I’m interested in unique time periods, like Patricia C. Wrede’s Thirteenth Child series, which is a fantasy story set around the time of Western Expansion in the US. 

20. what are things you look for in a book?The first thing I look for is wlw and everyone knows it. Beyond that, I want respect for female characters, solid writing (but I can excuse some for a really good plot and characters), and something that hooks me/keeps me interested. I recently read a book called The Bone Witch (killer title) and the tagline was “Let me be clear: I never intended to raise my brother from his grave, though he may claim otherwise. If there's anything I've learned from him in the years since, it's that the dead hide truths as well as the living.” Killer. Fucking. Tagline. Unfortunately, the story dragged so badly, I couldn’t read it. 

thanks to @seemssostrange​ for the many questions

tagging @jennamacaroni​ and @youstartedoutrandom because book stuff