#imagine being told to put in your email so you can get the game via email instead of from the actual website

[weird-gay-disaster]

"silksong's taking too long"

Me who's been waiting for Oddity, the game formerly known as Mother 4, since 2013:

[aikuutv]

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Vietnamese Oliver Aiku headcanons

Warning - mentions of food | aiku being a lil bitch |

Wasian Boy Aiku my beloathed and beloved

Oliver Aiku is the peak Kevin Nguyen meme 

That slightly overgrown guy hair with the fade underneath? Yeah that would be Aiku’s hair canon (Nomura-sensei told me himself via email)

 He has a dainty silver chain that sits so pretty on his collar bone (salivates 🤤🤤🤤🤤) 

 Aiku has his ears pierced with golden/silver studs usually, sometimes he wears pretty dangly earrings with a little jade in them for taking girls out or special occasions 

He gives out li xis to little kids (red envelope)

 He wears Louis vuitton dress shirts and with air forces and and with the silver chain with a jade pendant his grandma gave him back in Vietnam

She also gave him a jade bracelet, jade rings, jade earrings, and jade necklaces (he's the favorite grandchild for her because Aiku looks like her late-husband)

 your not vietnamese if you don’t eat sriracha sauce at least with your rice at times or pho or any dish /j

luckily spice whore Aiku does because he puts that sauce on everything he eats

he eats sriracha with his rice and his ramyun and his noodle dishes and rice dishes and on french fries and steak (steak with rice and mix of ketchup/sriracha is god tier) 

 He’ll even carry it around in his travels when airplane food is too bland or if a dish needs a lil kick (just imagine him whipping out a mini bottle of sriracha in the middle of his dinner date like “don’t worry babe i gotchu’ :squirts way too much sauce on:

 speaking of which, his fav viet dish is bun bo hue I don’t make the rules yes I do 

The blood in the soup? He fucks with that (if he can like salted squid innards on his rice then I can see he looks blood bloods in bun bo hue) 

He also likes bun rieu with many fish balls 

Aiku can down cups of Che (those little crunchy red things are so good)

Durian. The only fruit ever. Aiku loves it, his mother’s side of the family loves it (she’s half Japanese/Vietnamese while his dad is Swedish/German another hc ) whether it’s frozen or fresh chopped in the motherland itself Aiku will never pass Durian (it doesn’t smell like garbage when frozen its similar to  creamy ice cream with a tang) 

Okay when you go to a family viet party you will never not find Heinekens/Coronas, weed, dads smoking outside, moms surrounding each other in the kitchen, teens upstairs somewhere on their phones, and the little kids running around 

Where Aiku falls under that category is all of them he fits anywhere he feels like 

Oliver Aiku is the master of laughing loudly with the dads/uncles and karaoking with them cause what viet party is without music/obnoxious singing? 

IT'S THE KIND TO WRING IN YOUR EAR

TO LEAK THROUGH THE WALLS 

No but aiku can sing for real I know he’s been through way too many karaoke dates throughout his teen years not to develop his vocal skills 

But then again, that is when he wants to impress pretty girls 

This was belting out to vietnamese songs with a bunch of drunk uncles, shoulder to shoulder as their voices cry out the most sappy or sad song you can find 

you can find him listening to the mums gossip, pinching his cheeks about “OZOUII WHEN YOU GETTING MARRIED WITH GIRL HUH��� “here! Have this cream for your skin it's so good for cracked skin like yours Olivber” “You want a haircut? I’ll give you discount eh?” 

When the anties ever say ANYTHING about girls he just smiles awkwardly and nods cause its the hoe life or no life for him 🧍‍♂️🧍‍♂️🧍‍♂️🧍‍♂️

If he’s chilling with the teens then they’re playing video games no questions asked (i am projecting this is what my viet friends do at any gathering) 

HE LIFTS UP THE LITTLE KIDS IF THEY ASK OK AIKU IS GOOD WITH KIDS FACTS 

He stacks plates and all the aunties/moms keep pushing him to take home whatever was made for every fam party (bao, spring rolls, che, bun bo nam bo, the world yknow?) oh and a BUNCH of fruits 

Mango, mangosteen, rose apples, grapes 

If you don’t know what mangosteen is all you need to know is that it has a shell that you need to either break between your hands, open with a knife or smush it against a hard surface 

OKOKOK when lunar new years roll around you know the drill 

All the heavy duty Josie cleaning stuff Aiku does 

(Idk if its just my family but boiling dried grapefruit skin in a very large pot to bath in before lunar new years to bring good luck and all) 

Aiku playing bao cua tom ca (it means bag, crab, fish, lobster, chief) 

It’s a gambling game with coins and a die and let me tell you

AIku goes hard on the gambling 

All coins in, hes betting like he doesn’t have a mama to care for and he does well for himself (it really depends on how many drinks he has for the time being) 

HE IS THE BANK MATERIAL GUUUURRL ✨💅👯‍♀️

Aiku is the designated labor hound in the family 

Groceries in the car? Don’t worry Aiku’s single handedly doing one trip AND the rice bags back and forth 

Need a huge vat of bone marrow to make pho? No problem aiku is lifting it to the kitchen already

Aiku gets so overworked over new years 

His compensation is the food and girls in ao dai for him to flirt with (which his relatives try to set him up and scold him if he makes them pissed off,,,,,one even tried to pull out a rice paddle from the kitchen to smack his ass) 

SPEAKING OF– 

AIKU IN AN AO GAM 

Him in like a black one with golden embroiderment and the pattern is like snacks or clouds ooooo him in a blue one or white one I'm screeching 

He’s sent out as a human sacrifice to light the fire crackers lol 

His mom has the stereotypical job of nail technician, which meant that little aiku had to be dragged to his mother’s workplace that she owns  

He either sat in the pedicure seats, in the back with shrimp chips or actually helping his mom

He knows how to file nails, do the basic coats and even jeweling

His mom’s coworkers would fawn at him and give him candies at the cash register 

Now they bully him about his present hair whenever he visits the nail salon 

A typical convo between mother and son:

 “Aye, why is your hair so messy and long?! You a world star soccer player and you look homeless!!”

 “mę it's not thaaaaat bad–” 

“No it looks like you don’t shower get haircut I will do okay-” 

“MĘĘĘĘ THIS IS HOW I GET GIRLS”

 “BOY YOU TOLD ME YOU CHEAT LAST TIME AT THE KARAOKE WITH YOUR FRIENDS HOW IS THAT GETTING ANY GIRL TO MARRY?!!”

 “MARRY!? IM 19–“ 

“MY FRIEND HAS A DAUGHTER WHO GOES TO VERY GOOD UNIVERSITY YOU SHOULD MEET” 

and so on in berating viet from aiku’s mother 

I JUST THOUGHT OF THIS Aiku calls his dad otou-san/pappa (apparently the swedish say papa like that) and his mom mę/kaa-san (viet way of mom) 

His place has a box of tiger balm and that eagle oil and salonpas (okay so i have a thing the patched up look and aiku using them around his sore muscles ouchie mama)

When he helps to make spring rolls they are overstuffed so he has to double rice sheets lmaooo

Even his 12 year old cousins make prettier ones than him its pathetic 

This guy. LOVES WITH HIS WHOLE MAN BOOBIES viet coffee ok it just hits different 

He has the coffee drip, condense milk, the viet coffee his mom gives him when he visits her, blasts a viet love song and vibes 

Okay the most traumatizing thing after his ideals being crushed was definitely viet school (every saturday from 9am to 12pm) 

All the lessons and repetitive worksheets and the dances in the gym 💀 💀 

In elementary he was in a viet youth group (he was a lion dancer don’t ask) as well along with viet school and soccer practice (lmao overworked Asian kid) 

Aiku’s bubble tea order is a bit basic. He just orders regular bubble tea with reduced sugar and less ice or any kind with coffee in it (pov your on a boba date with Aiku and you try each other’s drinks omg should be me) 

He gets dragged around by his mom in malls for clothing like he’ll be sitting in the store seats while she looks at articles of clothing lined up and hold up any clothes that would fit her son, “Em oy! Look at these jeans, try them on!” “Mm okay Mę 😞” (they’ve been at the same store for 1½ hours) 

His wallet has a few credit cards, a debit card, numbers from various girls and the most important…A COSTCO CARD 

he has one for the cheap gas cause he may like 15,000,000 yen in a single neo league match from soccer teams but anything for a bargain 

He hits on the older ladies at the meat section of Costco 🙃🥴😎 (“aha can I get your snapchat mamas?”)

He likes the lemon ginger kombucha and usually tries to grab as many samples as he can (if he has siblings then he bribes them to give their portion) 

Whenever the u-20 team has to fly out for a match or travel Aiku downloads shows/drama to pass the time

Only, they’re all in vietnamese dub so the team is just so confused what their captain is watching and whenever they try to ask him what’s happening on screen he fucks with them saying shit like,

“Oh the husband is currently homeless right now due to the wife marrying a goose.”

what. 

Yeah whoever sits next to Aiku during travel times watches his shows with him and just makes up what characters say it’s very fun 

he has photos when he was younger wearing the ugliest character shirts with a lighting bolt fade on the side of his hair posing like the power rangers  

[imhereiguess556]

Brahms one shot story

Ok I finally did it, I’m posting a story here. This is my first short fic I’ve written in a long time,I tried my best to make sure its gender nuteral, hope you guys like it!

Warnings: Just some making out, implication of sex

Prompt: You just found out your ex was cheating on you, and a big hairy man has come to comfort you!

The fire place hissed as another photo was thrown into the fire. Soft sobs echoed in the manor, breaking the usual cold silence. Pictures of your ex sizzing as you reviewed the relationship. You gave them your all and they decided to throw everything away. Catching them cheating via an email from their mistress telling you of their misdeeds. Another photo went in as you sipped on the last of the red wine in the manor. Fuck them, fuck everything. You didn’t need anyone except Brahms. Yes, it was silly but the only constant in your life at this point was this doll and its schedule.

           You admitted it was weird at first, taking care of a doll. It was a reminder or the Heelshires deceased son. To cope, his parents made a porcelain doll of the boy. But you didn’t judge them for that. Losing your family at a young age, you wish you could have done the same thing. Whatever, more wine will make the bad thoughts go away. Swishing the empty wine bottle, you let out a defeated groan. You’ll burn the rest tomorrow; this wine was starting to get to you anyways. Dumping water onto the fire, you retreated into the dark towards your accommodations.  

           You had put the doll to bed, per instructions but you couldn’t help but check on the doll every night like a real child. Maybe it was your curiosity, maybe it was the loneliness you felt, but something always seemed to be in the same room as you. A presence was always watching you, studying you. You felt it with ever creak and groan the old manor would produce. Was it the ghost of Brahms watching over how you tended to his effigy? It did make you feel less lonely in the empty space, but it didn’t make it less creepy. But it has been like this for a month, you got used to being alone.

           The movement behind you sparked your imagination. You wanted to try something that you were always so chicken shit to try. Getting the ghost of Brahms to show himself. “Brahms? You’re supposed to be in bed. Don’t be a naughty boy tonight, I’m to…hm. Do I tell a doll I’m drunk?” the sounds stopped in the hallway, sobering you up a little. You placed your hand against the wall. Was the ghost of a child really hiding in the walls? “Hey Brahms, if I knock will you knock back?” you were met with silence, but it didn’t stop you from knocking twice. Silence again, sighing you turned away. Two slow knocks came out of the wall, causing you to let out a shaky breath. “Ok Brahmsies, how about we play a game. If you win, you’re not in trouble. If I win no good night kisses for a week!” Mrs. Heelshire told you he used to love playing games, so maybe this will entice the child ghost? Two knocks came out of the wall in what seemed like a response.

           “Ok let’s play red light green light. Red means you have to stop. Green means go! If I say red light and I see you, you lose! But if you touch me without me seeing you win! Knock twice if you understand.” After a minute, two loud knocks came from the wall, you walked into the middle of hallway, covering your eyes tightly. “Ok….green light!” the walls started to creak all around you. This would normally terrify you but in your state, you really could care less. The sounds were coming from above you now, “Red light!” It stopped, biting your lip you covered her eyes again, “Green light!” The sounds made their way towards Brahms room, with your eyes covered, Anna walked into the room. “Red light!” when you removed your hands from your eyes yet again, you notice the closet door had pushed open slightly. That’s when you realized what might happen. If you keep playing you might see….something… where you really ready the see the ghost of a dead child?! Inhaling sharply, you covered your eyes again, “You know what Brahms, you win. I’m to tired to play, I’m going to bed. Your not in trouble” You start to back up from the room but soft voice chimed out, “Y/N Not fair, I want to play.” You froze, that was a child. A child’s voice. Shivering you called out “Green light.” You could hear the closet door creek open, heavy footsteps, walking slowly towards you. Those are not child’s footsteps, “R-Red light!” The footsteps stopped but you wouldn’t uncover your eyes. You tried to walk out of the room again, “Y/N. You’re cheating!” Heavy footsteps walked towards you; Brahms sounded irritated.

           “Enough Brahms, please stop, go to bed.” Tripping over yourself,  you stumbe into hallway, you still kept your eyes shut tight. The footsteps picked up speed, two feet started to sound like someone was crawling on all fours. That defiantly was not the sound of a child crawling after you! You bumped into the wall pulling your knees to your face, shaking. Brahms was in front of you, you knew it, his was breathing so heavily. Much lower and heavier than any child should sound like. Something touched your bare foot, causing you to yelp, a child’s voice rang out, “I won Y/N, look at me Y/N.”

           Something moved up your ankle to your knee, was that a hand? That was not a child’s hand, that was a man’s hand. Oh god this isn’t happening. “Y/N….” The voice whined as his hand grabbed your calf, pulling your leg down. Taking a deep breath, you slowly opened her eyes, a porcelain mask was inches away from your face. It was Brahms face it looked exactly like the dolls face. This was not a child, this was a grown man, a giant, muscular, hairy man. He reeked of sweat, dust and what you assumed was his natural musk. You were speechless, terrified but also intrigued. Has he been watching you this whole time?!

Being lost in your thoughts seemed to be an invite for Brahms to run a shaky hand through your hair. “Pretty y/n, I won.” He leaned into your neck, the cool porcelain stinging your warm skin, a hand holding the other side. You let out a gasp as you felt his hot panting breath coming from behind mask, “I’m a good boy.” You gently tried to push him away, “B-Brahms please, you’re too close.” But this seemed to excite Brahms, causing him to push his chest against yours, his massive hands holding wrists against the wall, holding you in place.” B-Brahms please stop!” He came out from the crook of your neck and getting close to your face again, his eyes locked with yours. This time when he spoke it was deep, a man’s deep growly voice “You asked for me, so I came. I’m here now like a good boy.”

He was right. You asked him to come out of the walls to play with you. And now in front was you was a sweaty grown Brahms. “Please don’t cry.” This caught you off guard, was he watching you earlier? Was your assumption correct, that Brahms has been watching you for the past month? “They are not worthy of you y/n. I don’t want to see you cry anymore.” Another porcelain kiss was this time on your cheek, he seemed sincere with his words. Maybe it was the wine, maybe it was the blow to you ego for being deceived, but you felt comfortable with his advances. “Brahms, I…I won’t cry anymore tonight, ok? You’re right. He’s not worth it.”

Brahms let out a soft giggle as he kissed your cheek again. “Hey Brahms, can you…take off the mask?” His head jerk back a little, his breathing seemed nervous. “I want to see your face, please. Can you do that for me?” Brahms released your wrists, his fingertips sliding under the mask hesitantly. With a quick motion, he pulled off the porcelain mask, his breath quivering. You push the thick wavy locks out of his face, revealing the burn scare on his face. Brahms leaned his face into your touch, letting out a breathy groan. He was beautiful, handsome, breath taking. Pushing yourself off the wall, you couldn’t help but lean into his lips for a kiss.

His lips were dry at first but him kissing back quickly moistened them up. He pushed into your kisses eagerly, but inexperienced. No surprise if he had been living in this house all his life. You start to lead him with the kisses, allowing his tongue into your mouth. He brought you close, pressing your chest against his. Wrapping your legs around his waist, he lifted you up with ease. You two kiss with passion as he walks into the bedroom, gripping onto you as if scared he might lose you. This night was about you two now. No more ex’s, no more hiding, no more pain, just a night of two lost souls to become one.

[douchebagbrainwaves]

HOW NOT START A STARTUP FUNDING LANDSCAPE

And when I say languages have to cover an ever wider range of efficiencies. When you raise VC-scale money, the clock is ticking.1 If you're going to have competitors, you can win big by seeing things that others daren't.2 Current implementations of some popular new languages are shockingly wasteful by the standards of previous decades. Economically, startups are an all-or-nothing game.3 There are some stunningly novel ideas in Perl, for example.4 The best way to do this is to get the job done.5 Better still, answer I haven't decided.6 The results so far bear this out. I think this makes them more effective as founders.

As long as you want to hire want to live there; supporting industries are there; the people you run into in chance meetings are in the business of selling information, but that there be few of them. Most hackers would rather just have ideas. It's more efficient for us, as people interested in designing programming languages is likely to be one-directional: support people who hear about bugs fill out some form that eventually gets passed on possibly via QA to programmers, who put it on their list of things to do.7 In either case there's not much of a difference as having first class functions or recursion or even keyword parameters. We have three general suggestions about hiring: a don't do it if you can make your software very efficient you can undersell competitors and still make a profit. Now most of your people will be employees rather than founders.8 Once you take several million dollars of my money, the clock is ticking.

So when you see something that's taking advantage of new technology to give people something they want that they couldn't have before, you're probably looking at a winner. These qualities might seem incompatible, but they're not.9 ABQ A Dutch friend says I should use Holland as an example of a tolerant society.10 This approach tends to yield smaller, more flexible programs.11 Though we do spend a lot of new software, because it's easy to buy. With server-based.12 Over time applications will quietly grow more powerful. When you catch bugs early, you also get fewer compound bugs. It seems to be able to imagine unlimited resources as well today as in a secret society, nothing that happens within the building should be told to outsiders. Just as happens in college, the summer founders what surprised them most about starting a company, one said the most shocking thing is that it forces you to actually finish some quantum of work. Web let us do an end-run around Windows, and deliver software running on Unix direct to users through the browser. I learned to program when computer power was scarce.

Only a great designer can. Well, server-based apps get released. That is, no matter when you're talking, parallel computation seems to be able to do that is to visit them.13 They're not being deliberately misleading. The best intranet is the Internet. Most are equivalent to the ones people use for procrastinating in everyday life. Not necessarily. My vote is they're a bad idea.14 But you can tell it must be satisfying expectations I didn't know I had. Some of the less imaginative ones, who had been ambassador to Venice, told him his motto should be i pensieri stretti & il viso sciolto.

This will sound shocking, but it has more potential than they realize. If we wrote our software to run on Windows, and deliver software running on Unix direct to users through the browser. I think almost anything you can do more for users. But openness to new ideas has to be inexpensive and well-designed.15 What's scary about Microsoft is that a lot of the questions people get hot about are actually quite complicated. You'd have to turn into Noam Chomsky. You can't make a mouse by scaling down an elephant. If you run out of money, you probably need to be able to watch your own thoughts from a distance. As long as it isn't floppy, consumers still perceive it as a joke.

All that extra sheet metal on the AMC Matador wasn't added by the workers. People will pay for content? Web-based applications. Inside your head, anything is allowed. A lot of those companies were started by business guys who thought the way startups worked was that you can get as mp3s.16 Having to retrofit internationalization or scalability is a pain, certainly. Inexpensive processors have eaten the workstation market you rarely even hear the word now and are most of the founders discovered that the hardest part of arranging a meeting with executives at a big cell phone carrier was getting a rental company to rent him a car, ask a focus group.

Notes

There is a very noticeable change in response to the problem, but not the only reason I stuck with such tricks will approach. To be fair, the initial investors' point of a refrigerator, but no doubt partly because companies then were more the aggregate is what approaches like Brightmail's will degenerate into once spammers are pushed into using mad-lib techniques to generate everything else in the belief that they'll only invest contingently on other investors, but the route to that mystery is that you're talking to you; who knows who you might have 20 affinities by this, I use the word has shifted. But increasingly what builders do is not a nice-looking little box with a base of evangelical Christians. Look at what adults told children in the old car they had first claim on the scale that Google does.

Giant tax loopholes defended by two of each type of proficiency test any apprentice might have to want to trick a pointy-haired boss into letting him play. Big technology companies between them.

Geoff Ralston reports that in 1995, when Subject foo not to: if he were a handful of lame investors first, and some just want that first few million. The Civil Service Examinations of Imperial China, during the 2002-03 season was 4. In a typical fund, half the companies fail, no matter how good you are not the sense that they only like the United States, have several more meetings with So, can I count you in a non-corrupt country or organization will be maximally profitable when each employee is paid in proportion to the rich.

Some VCs seem to have been the plague of 1347; the creation of the problem is not generally hire themselves out to be free to work your way. They hoped they were beaten by iTunes and Hulu. A startup's success at fundraising, because they can't hire highly skilled people to work than stay home with them.

Zagat's there are not one of them is a big change in the sort of community. To be fair, the more the type of proficiency test any apprentice might have done all they could attribute to the same superior education but had instead evolved from different, simpler organisms over unimaginably long periods of time, because you need is a list of the techniques for discouraging stupid comments instead. Most computer/software startups are competitive like running, not you.

Wisdom is useful in solving problems too, e. Well, of the word has shifted.

Wisdom is useful in solving problems too, of course. Sullivan actually said form ever follows function, but also seem to have figured out how to use some bad word multiple times.

Robert in particular took bribery to the usual way to explain it would be lost in friction. Forums were not web sites but Usenet newsgroups. Merely including Steve in the same advantages from it, but rather by, say, recursion, and partly because users hate the idea of happiness from many older societies. In A Plan for Spam.

Learning for Text Categorization. Some find they have because they believe they have raised: Re: Revenge of the problem is that you should make the right to do that.

Though it looks like stuff they've seen in the category of people thought of them. The bias toward wisdom in so many people mistakenly think it is. Unless we mass produce social customs.

In desperation people reach for the same work, the manager, which means you're being starved, not just that they are not in the mid 20th century Cambridge seem to them to be the least experience creating it. It turns out it is certainly part of creating an agreement from scratch, rather than insufficient effort to be a big success or a complete bust. A web site is different from a VC. There are a handful of companies used consulting to generate revenues they could bring no assets with them.

I haven't released Arc. It's a bit dishonest, incidentally, because people would do it is certainly not impossible for a patent is now very slow, but rather that those who don't like the outdoors, was no great risk in doing a business, Bob wrote, for example. I make the kind of power will start to spread from.

They want so much about unimportant things. Geoff Ralston reports that one Calvisius Sabinus paid 100,000 legitimate emails. No Logo, Naomi Klein says that a startup.

They're an administrative convenience. Several people I talked to a car dealer. With the good groups, just harder. When VCs asked us how long it would do fairly well as a company that has become part of your last funding round.

When the same weight as any adult's. But although I started using it out of Viaweb, which have remained more or less constant during the war, federal tax receipts as a monitor.

It's a case in the time it included what we now call science. Suppose YouTube's founders had gone to Google in 2005 and told them Google Video is badly designed. Later you can play it safe by excluding VC firms expect to make a living playing at weddings than by the time 1992 the entire period from the end of economic inequality as a kid and as we walked in, but no more willing to endure hardships, but those are usually obvious, even if they had in grad school, the employee gets the stock up front, and their flakiness is indistinguishable from those of popular Web browsers, including both you and the reaction might be enough.

Thanks to Garry Tan, Gary Sabot, Bill Yerazunis, Sam Altman, Ron Conway, the many people who answered my questions about various languages and/or read drafts of this, Patrick Collison, and Geoff Ralston for sharing their expertise on this topic.

[wellesleyunderground]

Wellesley Writes It: Interview with Patrice Caldwell ’15, Founder of People of Color in Publishing

Patrice Caldwell ’15 is the founder & fundraising chair of People of Color in Publishing – a grassroots organization dedicated to supporting, empowering, and uplifting racially and ethnically marginalized members of the book publishing industry. Born and raised in Texas, Patrice was a children’s book editor before shifting to be a literary agent at Howard Morhaim Literary Agency.

In 2018, she was named a Publishers Weekly Star Watch honoree and featured on The Writer’s Digest podcast and Bustle’s inaugural “Lit List” as one of ten women changing the book world.

Her anthology, A Phoenix First Must Burn – 16 stories of Black girl magic, resistance, and hope – is out March 10, 2020 from Viking Books for Young Readers/Penguin Teen in the US/Canada and Hot Key Books in the UK! Visit Patrice online at patricecaldwell.com, Twitter @whimsicallyours, and Instagram @whimsicalaquarian.

Wellesley Underground’s Wellesley Writes it Series Editor, E.B. Bartels ’10, had the chance to converse with Patrice via email about publishing, reading, and writing. E.B. is grateful to Patrice for willing to be part of the Wellesley Writes It series, even with everything else she has going on!

EB: When did you first become interested in going into writing and publishing? Did something at Wellesley spark that interest?

PC: For as long as I can remember, I’ve loved writing. It’s how I best express myself. That love pretty naturally grew into creating stories. I’ve always had a very vivid imagination. I’ve also always been pretty aware that publishers exist. I remember at a young age noticing the logos on the spines of books (notating the imprint/publisher), so by the time I was a teen I could recall which publishers published my favorite books (served me very well in interviews, haha) and was curious about that process. But I was a theater kid, intensely, that’s what I thought I would do, but then I decided to go to Wellesley and majored in political science (especially theory—I took ever class Professor Grattan, she’s brilliant) but then dabbled in a bunch of other subjects, including English. I think English courses definitely strengthened my critical thinking, but I absolutely do not think you have to be an English or creative writing major in order to work in publishing or be a writer. My theater background is just as helpful as is my political theory one. (I have friends who are best-selling authors who did MFA programs and others who never went to college.)

Wellesley was my safe space. I came back to myself while at Wellesley. I wrote three (unpublished) manuscripts during my time there, starting the summer after my first year, and I held publishing and writing related internships. I also took a fantastic children’s literature course taught by Susan Meyer (who’s a children’s author herself!) that changed my world. I highly recommend it. We studied children’s literature, got to talk to an author and a literary agent, and we wrote our own stories. I later did a creative writing independent study with her, and I truly thank Professor Meyer for expanding my interest in writing and publishing.

EB: How did People in Color Publishing come about? What goals do you have for the organization? What would you like people to know about it?

PC: I founded People of Color in Publishing in August 2016 to allow people of color clearer access into the book publishing industry, better support networks, and professional development opportunities. It really is about sending the elevator back down for others after climbing (& maybe even assembling) the stairs.

We’re currently working towards nonprofit status. You can learn more about us and our initiatives at https://www.pocinpublishing.com/ and sign up for our newsletter, which is incredibly well done. As you’ll see when you visit the site, the organization really is a team effort. I don’t and couldn’t do this alone; I’ve had an amazing team with me from day one. We each play to our strengths and work really well together. (The org is very active on Instagram and Twitter, too!)

EB: I am really excited about your collection A Phoenix First Must Burn, coming out from Penguin Random House on March 10, 2020. What inspired you to put together that anthology? What was challenging about the process of compiling the anthology, and what was rewarding about it?

PC: Thank you; I’m so excited for it as well. I talk about this more in the book’s introduction, but I was inspired by my eternal love for Octavia Butler—the title even comes from a passage in Parable of the Talents—as well as similar adult market anthologies like Sheree R. Thomas’s Dark Matter, and wondering what one for teens would look like. The answer is power and imagination like I’ve never before seen, in the form of a kick-ass, #BlackGirlMagic anthology that’s hella queer—I love it and wouldn’t have it any other way.

Before I became a literary agent, I was a children’s book editor. The editing of these stories was the easy part. It was super fun. The hard part was wrangling of everyone, haha. Thankfully they were amazing to work with and I wasn’t doing it alone—my then editor Kendra Levin also has a fantastic editorial eye.

As for what was rewarding, my younger self needed this. Like I said, it’s Black and queer. Since Toni Morrison passed, a day hasn’t gone by in which I’ve thought, about how she wrote for Black people, especially Black women, unapologetically. I feel that deeply. I got to work with some of my favorite writers writing today. How often does someone get to say that, you know. And, I grew a lot as a writer. I never thought I could write a short story, but I did. We’ve been getting some really great early reviews (like this beautifully-written starred review from Kirkus, OMG!) But going back to how my younger self needed this, the most rewarding thing has been the people who’ve reached out how excited they are to read it and how much they’ve been craving a book like this. It’s a dream come true. A dream I strategized to reach, worked my butt off on, and so yeah, I’m over the moon.

EB: You're also the author of a YA fantasy book (publication date TBD) in addition to the anthology. How is the experience of writing a fantasy novel different and/or similar to compiling an anthology? What advice would you give to someone writing their own book (of any genre)?

PC: It’s such a different experience in that writing this novel is all me, especially because it hasn’t sold yet (I’m finishing revising it now). My agents are amazing, with an excellent editorial skills, and so they’re certainly there to help and advise me should I need them—and then I have author friends I can ask for advice too—but ultimately if I don’t write this book, it doesn’t get written. There’s no one else to nudge.

The similarities, however, between novels and short stories are that ultimately, I’m the same writer, I’m the same person. For instance, I love experimenting with structure. My story for A Phoenix First Must Burnbegins in the present, goes back in time, and ends again at the present. The story I just wrote, for Dahlia Adler’s Shakespeare-inspired anthology, is epistolary—told partially in journal entries, and my third short story (for an unannounced thing) takes place partially on the set of a scripted reality TV show, so there’s definitely going to be script excerpts throughout. My novel is similar in that it’s told through three women, but two of them are narrated in first present tense (like, I am) whereas one is in third past (she was). And then every few chapters I have an excerpt of something from this fantasy world’s archives—oral myths passed down about various gods, peace treaties made over the years, accounts from the war that just ended, etc. It’s been a huge challenge and lot of fun.

I didn’t have the skills to pull this book off when I started writing it, which is something I think a lot of writers deal with at some point. Therefore, I had two options: put the book down and write something more manageable or take the time it took to write this. Neither option is better than the other—the best option is what’s right for you, and I didn’t have anything more manageable that I was as passionate about, so I had to write through it. When you’ve tried everything you can possibly try (including breaks, they’re important!) to unstick your story, you have to write through it. You have to deal with the voices (including sometimes your own) saying you can’t, and the only way to truly deal with those voices is to show up to the paper, the screen, whatever it is, and write. In writing and believing in my own work before anyone else has, I’ve found my confidence. Confidence in your own writing is key because only you can write the book you want to write <3.

EB: What are you currently reading?

PC: Realm of Ash by Tasha Suri. I just loved herdebut novel, Empire of Sand, and I’m so pumped to be diving into this one. Badass women, incredibly rich worldbuilding, and very cool magic as well as a lot about access to forgotten history and assimilation into other cultures.

My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell. It is getting fantastic early reviews and was pitched as a 21stcentury Lolita (by one of my agents who sold it actually) and given all the #MeToo conversations, it has ended up being super timely. I hated Lolita (could not finish), and I love this book. Oh, and Stephen King loved it, which for me is an auto-buy. It’s out March 10, 2020.

The Midnight Lie by Marie Rutkoski. You definitely don’t have to love someone’s books to be friends with them, but in this case, Marie is a friend whose work I’m obsessed with. It’s set in the same world as another one of her series—one of my favorite series that’s like game theory in a fantasy world and begins with The Winner’s Curse. Marie is brilliant, this book is brilliant, and it’s also very queer. It’s out March 3, 2020.

Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik. This book has been getting the best of reviews and praise, so it’s been at the top of my to-reads list for a while, but I started reading it because a friend mentioned that it has multiple POVs all in first person (which is very unusual), and like I said, I love playing around with stuff like that. This is book is a masterpiece.

As you can tell, I love reading books. I also love book hopping, so I’m always reading a bunch at once. I’m on a bit of a fantasy streak right now. But from October to December 2019 I read like a romance novel a week (sometimes three a week, haha) and revisited my favorite urban fantasy series, so if you’re into those check out Chloe Neill’s Chicagoland Vampires + Heirs of Chicagoland series, Tessa Dare’s Girl Meets Duke series and of course our very own Jasmine Guillory, my favorite of hers thus far is The Wedding Party). After I’m done with my revisions, I wanna take a writing break and sink into Emily Wilson’s translation of The Odyssey and Dan Jones’s The Wars of the Roses: The Fall of the Plantagenets and the Rise of the Tudors.

EB: What future projects/goals do you have for yourself and your career?

PC: I spent most of Wellesley working towards two goals: being published and working in publishing. In doing so, I accomplished a lot in a very short time, and I totally wrecked my mental health—it took most of 2019 to rebuild that. I’m trying to live more in the present and enjoy that. Career wise, I’m just gonna trust that I’m already doing the work I need to do and that I have the support systems I need to help me keep doing that. And for a personal goal, I have been wanting to spend more time in Paris—I went back for the first time in ten years for all of February 2019, and just loved it. My whole soul felt at home, so I’d like to take some French lessons to fill in the gaps (I took French from middle school through sophomore year at Wellesley and achieved proficiency, but I want to become fluent). And then I want to visit more for longer and see where that takes me.

EB: I so admire your freelance hustle, and as someone attempting it myself, too, I know that sometimes it feels like you have to work 24/7 to make it possible. How do you set boundaries for yourself and your work? How do you take care of yourself?

PC: So, I’m a literary agent and a writer, which means my entire income comes from commission I make from the writer client projects I work on and sell as an agent and advance payments (and hopefully royalties down the line) as a writer. That said, I didn’t become a literary agent until June 2019, and didn’t get the first payment from a client book I sold until November, so most my income is still coming from writing (for reference, I received my first advance check in fall of 2018).

As of now, balancing the two isn’t that hard for me. But you have to understand that I was first an editor and a writer, so I had to do most of the deadlines for A Phoenix First Must Burn while also going into an office 5 days a week, from 10-7/8pm. Now, I manage my own schedule.

My main “freelance life” struggle was that I was diagnosed with ADHD this year. When I left my full-time, salaried job, at the end of 2018, I didn’t realize just how helpful that structure had been. To me, that structure was only ever a limitation. I felt like it was ridiculous with all of this technology that we all had to be in NYC, I felt like editors needed to be more proactive, I preferred to travel to book festivals and teach at workshops and meet writers where they are, etc. etc. But then, without that structure, everything fell apart. Suddenly, tasks that used to take me five minutes could actually take me five hours because I only had myself to answer to. I would hyper-focus on everything but what I needed to be doing. It was a really hard time for me because I had all of these things I wanted to do now that I finally had more time to do them, but ADHD had other plans—I constantly felt like I wasn’t achieving what I knew I could because I had done it before.

I had to learn to forgive myself. This is how my brain works, and there are a lot of strengths to it (like if I remove distractions like the internet, I can hyper-focus for hours, I’m a fantastic problem solver, and I thrive in chaos—all things that help me excel at my work). Learning to forgive yourself for not accomplishing all the things, whether you have a mental illness or not, is really important.

You also have to be hyper-aware of your strengths and weaknesses. What are things you know you’re just not good at? Can you pay someone else to do it? Is there an app you can download that can make that task easier? I delegate and outsource every detail-level thing that I can because I’m horrible at details and I’ve finally accepted that that’s okay. One person cannot do everything forever; it’s not sustainable.

And then you also have to say no. If you can afford to say no to something that doesn’t really interest you / have a high payoff, do so. That is how you set boundaries. My health has become so much better ever since I started saying no to more things. Why? It gives me time to do other things, those things I’ve been saying forever I’m going to make more time for (like French lessons and reading books for fun). Now, my evenings and weekends are for non-work things. I love my jobs they’re still jobs.

Trust that you’re on the right path. Trust that you have the support systems you need and if you aren’t or don’t, dream and strategize towards those.

Ultimately, I am the happiest I’ve ever been and that’s because I finally stopped focusing my whole life around my jobs, stopped caring what people who aren’t paying my bills think, and started living my actual life.

EB: What else would you like our readers to know about you and/or your work?

PC: I have a website, Twitter, Instagram, and a newsletter. If you enjoyed this interview, definitely sign up for my newsletter (& check out past issues) as I always give creative life pep talks, share recipes and what books and tv shows I’m loving. I think of my newsletter as a longer form version of my Twitter. My website is a pretty standard website—you can find out more about my own books, my clients, events I’m attending, etc. there. And my Instagram is slightly more personal, with pretty pictures of my face and my book haha, and I share daily/weekly updates about my writing there via IG stories.

And, of course, buy my book: https://patricecaldwell.com/a-phoenix-first-must-burn

Thank you so much for having me and for reading. Happy New Year!

[00sheven]

655321

hello all. good day.

I guess it's been a relatively regular sort of day.

I have not worked on any insurance stuff as of yet.

however.

well let's begin at the beginning.

my sister clomped ( is that a real word?) he way into the outpost at 11am this morning.

she called up stairs to tell the kids she had "hot coco" then proceeded to clomp up and down the stairs.

I woke up, and got my bearings, put my sleeping bag in the wash and proceeded to start my day.

I've been sleeping later these days because I dread waking up and having to deal with all the unpleasantness that comes with trying to get your life back on track after the nuclear holocaust that we've gone through the first few months of this year.

as I said in earlier posts. 2020 has been a real kick in the balls.

as always the video games fired up immediately.

I guess the goose had got up early to do his homework.

he walked up stairs as I was putting away the remnants of my sleeping apparatus away.

the first thing that I witness was my youngest nephew benny have a complete meltdown because he was stuck in a spot on a video game. ( he just didnt want to play that part. it was kind of a puzzle. he wasnt down with that.) he got his older brother " billy goat" ( I have nick names for all the kids.) to get him through it. apparently billy goat wasnt going fast enough for him ( he is 7 by the way. I'm talking about benny. billy goat is 17) so he starts complaining and telling him to hurry up. billy goat gets pissed off and tells him to do it himself. at this point benny throws a bolt, his face turns beet red and starts screaming "you do it" over and over again until my sister interceded. I called him a spoiled brat. I think at that point of the day I was just checking my email. it was one of the first experiences I had today.

next

I decided to try and tackle my health insurance problem. I called medical and they gave me option of a call back which I took. the called me about 20 minutes later the woman I spoke to got me sorted on my medical benefits. she told me to start an online account to send in some paper work that they need from my employer, unemployment, and a statement I have to write out regarding being laid off. after we got done with medical I inquired about calfresh and we started the application process. then the call dropped. there was a call back but it dropped again when I picked up. I decided to start the process of creating my online account. ( *rant alert* the people at social services are unsung heroes and on the front lines everyday. they save people's lives. and they get yelled at and treated badly. I dont envy thier jobs. imagine to have to tell some one who is in dire need and at probably one of the most desperate times in thier lives that they cant be helped because of some regulation or guideline that some rich Republican made to keep people from getting assistance. we are all moochers in thier eyes.)

I'm getting off track.

next I try and create my online account.

1. enter name

enter user name

enter email

enter email again

enter password

enter password again

enter security question 1

enter security question 2

enter security question 3

enter next

somthing goes wrong please re enter password.

re enters password

next

somthing goes wrong please re enter password

re enters password

next

something goes wrong.

removes unacceptable character from password

next

2. enter first name

enter middle initial

enter last name

enter mailing address

select security picture

name security picture

next check e mail

3. select link in email to activate account

enter user name

there is no account with that user name

enter user name

there is no account with that user name

repeat steps 1 and 2

repeat steps 1 and 2

repeat steps 1 and 2

calls social services

although you can read through that rather quickly. it took much longer than that.

it's nice when you fumble through things that you have never done before with virtually no instruction. I may just have thick skull syndrome.

in the mean time the aural assault continues.

I get my call back maybe an hour later and after much explanation i finish my application via phone.

I have to be transferred to another social worker to swear that I have told the truth. they recorded me swearing that I have told the truth. I was terrified that I would be disconnected at the transfer and made the social worker swear that she would call back to see if everything went okay.

she did.

I love her.

as that was going on my sister and the kids went to pick up a pizza order.

they came back with pizza and at that point I say "fuck it" I blow my whole diet to hell. if your gonna die, die with your boots on, right!? that's gonna be hard if I dont have any god damn feet to put in the boots. right?!? (that was rhetorical)

I do it anyways.

I then proceed to have 2 big glasses of coke.

I'm spiked.

I'm like a junky rushing on my run. ( a serious lou reed bite)

I dont care about all the noise or my nephew telling my sister that he isn't gonna spend an hour on his home work.

or the fact that goose doesn't even acknowledge the fact that I'm alive today.

yeah that happend too.

what's up his ass.

I got a good mind to adjust his attitude.

a hi dad, I love you dad would be nice. maybe even to venture as far as giving me a hug would be greatly appreciated.

it's not like I dont need one.

so now I'm going to force my sugar junky emotionally broken ass to start working on my insurance class.

the sonic reducer ain't no fuckin loser mother fucker.

if you dont understand what that means.

figure it out, tough shit.

sincerly

me.

king of the dogs

3/24/20

[aceticvgina23]

“Barack, Big Mike and the Clinton’s flying in this weekend so something is up.  The two former presidents loathe each other!  That or Assange is a dead man” I was really hoping that the connection to Assange, via Seth Rich and Kim Dotcom vis-a-vis Hillary‘s emails and the DNC, would be revealed. Was also hoping that the Clinton’s would be nailed to the wall for the uranium issue. With our perfidious Parliament, I have lost all hope that they will do anything other than punish JA.

I agree anon.  Clearly we haven’t been told the truth on a lot of things, Julian Assange/ wikileaks being just one.  He is a liability and expendable now.  I don’t expect him to last much longer sadly, that is if he hadn’t been eliminated already back when the embassy was raided awhile back.  People have put blind trust in an otherwise anonymous online entity called Q, who emerged roughly a year after Trump’s election.  Trust that would never be placed in a random stranger if encountered on the street.  Trust that even a small child would know enough to call out “stranger danger”.  They don’t call them “smiling assassins” for nothing.  While fascinating to read, I  have noticed that QAnon has made otherwise outraged patriots complacent and reticent.  Instead of getting out there and fighting for their nation, they are happy to sit behind a screen and wait for the latest post to “decode”.  Rather convenient.  People need to remember, Military Intelligence isn’t the only group who “has it all”.  The Russians, Chinese, Mossad, the Saudis, the EU, Google, Apple (Siri) Amazon (Alexa) and NATO, most importantly our biggest allies can also “hear us breathing”.  Every single one of those organizations also “have it all”.  The only people who do not “have it all” is us.  The little people.  I think we are ultimately going to find that QAnon was a clever way of making it’s eager followers docile and placated by allowing regular people to have an “in, that they somehow had the inside track through a series of coincidences easily put forth by any predictive-programming supercomputer worthy of the name. Average people are nothing if not predictable.   Give them just enough truth to keep them hooked behind their screens instead of in the streets rioting, while acting on exactly nothing, other than the original plan of implementing communism and open borders worldwide. The so-called New World Order.  In other words, theater, live action role playing.  Lies, but very clever believable lies.  Sessions was not to be trusted, the midterms were definitely not safe, nobody has been arrested, and the Democrats are making huge gains flooding porous borders with caravans of third world degenerates eager to vote in 2020 and beyond.  After all, they do like to hide in plain sight, letting us know exactly what they are doing, and are never held responsible.  Mocking us through the complicit media.   Does it really seem plausible that with all of our many military assets and resources, these problems, these Deep State actors, these treasonous politicians could not have been taken care of already if so chosen?  It’s an absurd thought.  An anonymous online group could imagine an enormous complex “plan” years in the making, or so we are told, yet could not use that same planning to move all at once to take out the bad actors?  Rubbish.  It’s all a distraction, and not by who we’ve been lead to believe is behind it.  Look at the timing of all of these simultaneous stories that all seem to coincide with one another: the people voting for Brexit,  Clinton  losing, Markle appearing on the scene, Assange being arrested, 2 former criminal Presidents and spouses showing up in the same city, Oprah partnering with PH, Avenatti’s arrest, internet censorship, plane crashes, manufacturing plant explosions, forest fires, extreme weather events, disease outbreaks...all coinciding with each other the same week ....(I would gander to say the “baby” will be making it’s appearance sometime this weekend from the time chart we seem to be on right now)  .  Now ask yourself what or more to the point WHO these things all have in common, and you will have your answer as to just who is behind this.  All planned distractions, until a NZ can be pulled and they can get the guns away from the last freedom loving, weapon owning citizenry in the world, just in time for the next Presidential election.  It’s coming to a head.  I don’t think we will be the winners in this game.  Not if we continue to sit complacently and “trust the plan”.....

[the-wonder-duo]

Random Ass Update #3

This one is dedicated to all you shits that can’t read. 

A tsunami rocked the West coast. In light of the ongoing investigation into InvisaInk’s death, we decided that it’d be best if Deku went alone to aid with recovery efforts. 

Thousands died. Recovery efforts are still ongoing.

 If you’ve got the means, you oughta donate to the Japan Relief and Recovery Fund. 

I stayed in the East. 

Answered some shit questions between patrols. Told you fucks about Deku’s questionable taste in music. 

PSA: I’m better than Deku at everything. 

Deku kept in touch while he was in the Nagano through audio logs and holocalls. 

There were sightings of someone that might’ve looked like me. At the time, I dismissed it as bullshit. 

Explosions rocked the streets of Hosu. The cause was not determined. 

Get your conspiracy theory asses off my blog. 

I was arrested after an attack in Hosu; Okane Trust & Banking Company had been robbed in an explosive attack. 

The Hero Police Force  released a statement revealed that on-site video surveillance captured footage of me at the scene, though the security system experienced technical difficulties only moments later. 

Sweat and hair analysis also placed me at the scene. 

Deku came back— even though I told him to stay in the East. Even though he was supposed to stick to the West to help tsunami victims. 

There were protests. I guess some of you lot aren’t complete dickheads, after all. 

Thanks. 

I was drugged with Quirk suppressants. Standard procedure for those that’re being detained. 

My body didn’t react that well to ‘em. 

Footage of the bank robbery was leaked.

Deku compiled evidence to prove that I was innocent. 

When presenting his argument to the detectives who were in charge of the investigation, Deku was dismissed without any consideration. 

Asshole discovered that I was gonna be transferred to a maximum security prison even though I hadn’t even been arrested in any official capacity. Hadn’t even been charged of any crimes. 

Idiot broke me out of jail. 

Words don’t even begin to express what I felt. 

That idiot has so much going for him, you know? Wouldn’t have partnered up with him if he weren’t a damn good hero. He lives to help others. Dunno if he could live without it. 

And that could’ve been the end of it. Right there. 

He would’ve given it up. Thrown it all away. 

For me. 

You’re an idiot, Deku. 

We were pursued by Pros and police, but we managed to make it to the sewers. Since we’d spent weeks combing through them, we knew them pretty well. 

Took refuge in an undocumented Quirk shelter. 

Deku’d scheduled a leak of information to be posted onto the blog before he’d left. To tell everyone that he could of what had really happened, and to show why I wasn’t guilty of the crimes that I’d been accused of. 

Here’s the gist of what he wrote: 

I’m sure that the people who were responsible for kidnapping Kacchan are those who are responsible for InvisaInk, and do not say that without backing. The proof is in the visual evidence that has already been uploaded online by multiple sources; I suspect that the footage that was sent to me last night will be uploaded before long, as well. 

Most would say that those leaked stills that show an apparent Kacchan robbing a bank appear to be wrong, somehow. And those conclusions would be correct. 

There’s the obvious— the haircut, for one, which doesn’t at all match was Kacchan is currently sporting —but then there’s the more subtle (for those who don’t know Kacchan as well as I do, anyways). 

The imposter in the video is a mirror image of the actual Bakugou Katsuki.

 Upon reviewing some of the footage taken by crowd’s phones that day in the park— the day the fake InvisaInk confronted the both of us—I can see now that that InvisaInk was a mirror image of the actual InvisaInk, as well; for those that want obvious proof, I suggest slowing the video down to a fourth of it’s usual speed and pausing as InvisaInk lifts his gun to Kacchan’s head— you can see the visible outline of InvisaInk’s tattoo as his shirt sleeves rides up— on his left arm. 

The actual InvisaInk’s tattoo was located on his right arm. 

A closer examination of each of their features has further proved that this person is, in fact, able to create mirror images of their target— given what they’ve known to have taken from both Kacchan and InvisaInk, I can only infer that they use bone marrow to supply this transformation with the aid of their Quirk. 

This also shows why the YouTube video uploaded of the fake InvisaInk’s spiel had actually seemed to be right for both Kacchan and I— before the video had been uploaded, the murderers had actually edited and flipped the footage, so that the person being displayed was on the correct side again.

 And yes, I did say murderers— because I believe this to be the work of not just one person, but at least two. Further inspection of the sight of the bank blast and an analysis of the explosion has proven that yes, while Kacchan’s actual sweat had ignited the ensuring explosion, it had blown the wall upon from inside the bank— he hadn’t entered from the outside, as witnesses and the footage depict of the alleged “Ground Zero.” 

I have come to the conclusion that the second accomplice is one that harvests body parts in order to gain use of that target’s Quirk; for InvisaInk, the murderers harvested his skin, and for Kacchan— his hands. 

The same hands that were taken from him months ago. During his kidnapping— which had been so similar to that of InvisaInk’s. 

Chillingly, a closer look at footage captured at the Charity Smash event depicts a person that looks eerily similar to InvisaInk— with the exception of his height, his hair, and his features. In fact, his skin seems to be the only startling match— a comparison shows that the freckles on this man’s face exactly match those of InvisaInk’s. 

‘Course it wasn’t me. 

I’d never pull a stunt like that. 

I’m a goddamn hero. 

Anyways, some numbskull who’d just been released from their own interrogation actually managed to snap a pic of Deku breaking me out of there. 

Didn’t cower in the sewers, though. 

We found the fuckers that were responsible for what had happened. 

Had some help from another Pro Hero, Earphone Jack. 

Deku kept more of a level head than I did, admittedly. 

I dunno. I guess it was harder than I ever would’ve imagined it’d be. Keeping my cool. When the sick bastards that skinned InvisaInk alive were right in front of me. 

Chased ‘em to a crowded street, police got involved, caught the murderers, and gave ourselves up.

Seems like they might’ve been two of Backlash’s lackeys, but in all goddamn honesty, they seem like a pair of those Anti-Quirk Liberation League nutjob extremists. ‘Least, they seem that way to me. 

Toga Akane was one of ‘em. Sister of Toga Himiko, who gained some fame from working as member of the League of Villains some years back. 

She’s in possession of a Quirk that allows her to become a mirror image of anyone who’s bone marrow she consumes. 

Claims she hates her sister. That people like her are the scum of the Earth. That people like herself are scum of the Earth. That people like them ought not to exist, and that their actions— and more importantly, their Quirks —are proof of that. 

Says that she did it for the greater good. Part of a way of showing once and for all that Quirks ought to be eliminated— part of a way to show us all how they ruin lives. 

The Anti-Quirk Liberation League won’t claim her. Say that they don’t associate themselves with common criminals, and that they’re horrified and repulsed by her actions. 

Last I heard, she’s attempted suicide at least twice since the beginning of her imprisonment.

The other murderer was Hada Dorobō. Possessed an undocumented Quirk that snatches the abilities of other Quirks through imbibing body parts conducive to the utilization of other Quirks. 

Appears that the sick bastard can only snatch one Quirk at a time; if he tries to take on another, the body part that he stole rots off of him. 

Deku and I were released after Lead Detective Naomasa discovered that the secretary to the Senior Commissioner had been, essentially, brainwashing most of the force via email. Had a Quirk that affected perception through written word. 

It’s been confirmed that the Senior Commissioner was bribed to ignore these criminal acts, and both of ‘em have been arrested. S’why the force had been acting so unreliably recently.

 Originally, we were given a week of house arrest and ‘till the first of June of suspension, but that was changed to house arrest ‘till the first a few days ago. 

After the first, we’ll be allowed to work as Pro Heroes again. 

So we’ve been sitting around the house ‘till then. 

Answered some more questions. 

Deku revealed that he’s come across a Quirk that allowed the wielder’s dick to function like a compass. Pointed towards what the user really wanted, apparently. 

I think that Deku’s a gullible dumbass and that it was just a boner. 

Deku doesn’t wanna be the number one hero anymore. 

He wants to be the best hero. 

A great hero. 

Fuck you, Deku. 

There’s been some fallout. Apparently you can’t just break outta jail and expect to be considered a shining example of heroism by everyone. 

Who would’ve imagined that. 

I don’t give a damn what you have to say about it. Yeah, breaking me out was a stupid move, and yeah, it could’ve been so much worse, but you know what? Deku’s still a hero in my eyes. 

In case you’ve lived under a rock for the past decade, you ought to know that the leader of the League of Villains is dead. 

My biggest rival made a comeback.

Played some games. 

One of ‘em was perverted as hell. Our publicist is a real piece of work, putting that crap together. 

Truth or Dare ended with a naked Deku in my bed. 

Deku worried too damn much about it. 

It’s fine. Fucking weird, and awkward, and yeah, I was pissed that he pulled something like that just ‘cause he thought he could get some info that I wouldn’t hand over to him on a silver platter, but the fuck got too caught up in that. 

Culminated in Deku putting himself into a slump. 

Asshole told me that it’d be best if we didn’t share a bed for now. 

Informed him of how goddamn stupid he is. 

And then I told him to come to bed. 

For better or for worse, we’re a team. 

Shitnerd’s just gonna have to accept it. 

We’re not fucking. 

And we’re more than ready to go back to work already. 

[fantasticcats]

In which I go to London for 3 days: Fantasticcats attends the Professional Development Course from Punchdrunk.

A few ground rules, and the rest will be under a cut for the spoiler averse and because it is long as hell.

Things I can do: Describe what we did and show you photos of what my team created in two of the blank canvass spaces. Things I can’t do: Give you photos of the fully dressed Fallow Cross village. You can find some via this article though so you have an idea of what is there. Things I won’t do: Draw you a map and tell you how to get there or go into detail about the children’s programs they’ve created in the space.

London was having one of those snow storms I thought only people in Portland freaked out about, and after navigating cancelled flights and summoning the will to travel into a mess, I made it on time to the Saturday 1 day Design Masterclass with Punchdrunk Creatives. The email we’d been given noted that this was to be the last design class (ever? This year? I don’t know.) and we were given a copy of the short story The Lottery to read prior to arrival.

After standing outside with a bunch of equally confused and possibly lost folk, I found myself lead into an old classroom. It was that pale blue color of old public elementary schools everywhere and there was a nice skeleton hanging out in the corner. We sat facing our two hosts (which I’m also not going to name because: privacy) and introduced ourselves, revealing a variety of people whose interest in the workshop ranged from professional: museum exhibit designers to actors and video game designers to “because they really liked Punchdrunk!” I fell into an abstract category- being the only person who had come from ridiculously far away and also because I am curious how their design process might work with the art I’ve been creating for a few years now as well as my own home’s aesthetic.

We began by looking over photos of various Punchdrunk sets, and speaking about their use of repetition, scale, and creating tension. They told us that they like to create levels of tension and have spaces that are like breaks for the audience. They like to put the places that will have the most tension in the middle of spaces or floors, and have the breaks on the outside- like a sandwich. Think about your favorite Punchdrunk show and about the spaces and what happens in them and see if you can find this strategy. I definitely can with SNM NYC.

They also talked about how they are different from a lot of theater companies in that they can’t create a lot of the props because when you touched them in the show you’d realize they weren’t real, so the set creators spend a lot of time shopping to fill a space. DREAM JOB!

After the chat it was time to see Fallow Cross. They walked us through how the school children who had visited had the space revealed to them, and then recreated that moment for us. We knew what was coming, but I am pretty sure if I was a child and had that happen I’d lose my goddamn mind.

Some thoughts about being in the space: It’s bigger than it looks, with secret rooms, pass throughs, and second floors to discover. My favorite places were the candle maker’s shop, the church, and the optometrist (or was it an ophthalmologist?.....let’s go with eye doctor.) I loved the tones and Fulton-esque vibe of the eye doctor’s office, and the church had little hidden back rooms that gave it depth beyond it’s welcoming pews. We got to walk around unmasked for a while with the full lighting effects and Punchdrunk drone soundtrack we all know and love. I do feel like smells were missing, but it is also a lot colder in there due to the weather so that might have been part of it. When we chatted about the space later, it made me smile how many people found the mayors house- that was full of taxidermy- scary, or how they felt like people might jump out at them in other spaces.

They’ve said Fallow will never house a full show, and I think one reason for that is the density of the set design. The doll house maker’s shop has hundreds of dolls and doll parts crammed into shelves. The bric-a-brac shop looks like every small town antique shop you’ve ever been in. The candle maker store is like a more organized Hecate’s apothecary with lots of real candles and a tiny store room full of glass containers. Basically, a full audience would destroy this place in an hour. Maybe it was this sensory overload (or lack of a mask) that made me reluctant to touch or really interact with anything, but I loved every second of walking through the buildings and seeing what was around every corner.

After the space exploration, it was time for the first practical exercise. We were shown to a far corner of a village and three dwellings whose doors had been locked during our walk around. Our hosts divided us into 3 teams and assigned each a house. We were given a plastic bin containing big rolls of white paper, some string, some markers, a staple gun, a few chairs, scissors, and push pins, and told that we could staple and paper to our hearts content in the spaces. On the door of each space was an envelope containing a scene we had to create using only the items in the bucket.

We were given 10 minutes.

If you watch any competitive cooking or design reality shows and have ever played along with what you would do in the allotted time, you can imagine what this was like. Now imagine you’re in a Punchdrunk space with Punchdrunk creatives watching you and the combination of howfuckingcoolisthisomg and oh holy hell I have to work with strangers and also omg now I only have 9:30 min left. So yeah, it was like that.

Our team was assigned the creation of a train carriage. We knew that once people from the other teams walked through that they would have to identify our space, but we were a little foggy on how much story we needed to get in the scene. We set our scene fairly simply, but I did make all One Way tickets and a sign that only had departing times and then they placed candles on the seats. A lighting tech came in with an iPad and asked how we wanted the scene lit, and adjusted things for us directly on his pad. And that’s another thing about Fallow Cross- despite looking like a quaint little town, it is wired in ways you don’t expect. One space is even completely soundproof, but you’d never know by looking at.

The time flew by. Once it was over, we were given time to tour the other spaces, and then we got together to guess at what we’d seen and if we got it right. While we didn’t have a very high intensity scene, everyone knew what it was, and someone did mention my one way train tickets, so I was happy about that.

The next practical exercise was my favorite, but I wasn’t allowed to photograph it. We were sent back into the main village where the street was filled with more giant bins, each containing detail pieces. Imagine files, photos, clothing, books, cards, trinkets, and basically anything you’d expect to find when looking through the drawers in someone’s house if were the kind of creeper that did that in the real world and not just Punchdrunk sets.

We were assigned a partner and a space in the village. I was paired with a person and sent to the eye doctor’s store. Our task was to read the description placed inside the envelope they’d tacked to the door, and use detail pieces to convey that description. I think we had 15 minutes this time.

As someone who has been deeply influenced by Punchdrunk’s set design for 5 years, I cannot begin to explain the joy this was for me to do. Short of actually working for them someday this was the best possible thing I could be doing.

AND OH MAN. I couldn’t think of anything more me than what we got: The optometrist is unhappy with the local church. They are drawn to the Pagan religion in a neighboring village and have been visiting there in secret.

I grabbed a screen in the room to create a barrier between the main office and the desk. After that I used playing cards laid out as tarot cards, found a great book called The Devil, and my partner went to work creating little notes with runes and sigils on them. After we had the desk set up we covered half of the scene with a cloth, turned the chair on its side like they’d rushed out, and I semi-trashed the office space in that “I don’t have the energy to manage my business with these assholes” kind of way I’d imagine it would be.

Our space seemed to be a success. Many people totally got what we’d done, and the facilitators liked how we’d split the room to make people want to walk behind the screen to check out what was there.

I also really enjoyed what other teams had done. One example was the bartender in the pub had a crush on the preacher’s daughter, and the bar was set up totally normally…..but if you went behind the bar you saw they’d set up a shrine to this woman. So perfect.

After that it was lunchtime. Time had sped by, and it was difficult walking from the lovely darkness of Fallow Cross into the chilly daylight.

Following  lunch was last practical exercise. We were taken back to the blank canvass homes again and handed back our buckets of paper and office supplies. This time, however, in the outside seating area, was a large bin of stones. It was time for our Lottery scene.

Three teams again, and each of the houses got a character from The Lottery. If you don’t feel like reading the story, I suggest this super quick short film so you get the general idea of who was who.

We got Old Man Warner, the cranky guy who bragged about how many lotteries he’d survived. Our team got to work pretty fast in the small home we were given. We were told not to invent a new story but to try to draw on what we knew about him and infer things. Other things they wanted us to consider was if our house was before, during, or after the lottery, and what effect would that have on the level of intensity in the space. We asked each other questions such as “Is his home neat? What is he reading? What are his other interests?” It forced us to really dig into what kind of man we thought Warner was.

We decided he definitely lived alone now, but had surely lost a loved one to the Lottery- and his determination to keep it alive was so they wouldn’t have died in vein. We set up a little memorial to the deceased (his wife) next to his bed. If anyone picked up the envelope under the shrine they’d find the ominous slip of paper with the black dot inside of it.

Next, we created 77 slips of paper and tacked them to a board to display, with a single chair and spotlight facing them in the dim lit room. We used the paper to create a wall, so that people walking through the door would want to look around the corner to see this set up.

Elsewhere in the room we put things we thought he’d be interested in: almanacs, newspaper articles about crops, and a giant sign that said 'Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon,' happily displayed for all to see. Outside of the building we created a paper garden with a sign to remember the lottery!

We had a bit longer on this project—I think maybe an hour? So we were able to really get in as much details as our material afforded us. Using only paper and string to create a full scene, especially when you’ve been in a Punchdrunk space all afternoon, takes your imagination and ability to make something from nothing to a new level. Once the time was up we toured other spaces, and after downloading the story into my brain for a week straight it was actually kind of unsettling to see it realized. The other two spaces were Mr. Summer’s house and the Hutchinson house.

One thing that really struck me was in the Hutchinson home, where it seemed to be set while the lottery was taking place—they’d created a dining room table and each place setting had a stone with the family member’s name on it. It was a powerful image.

After we finished visiting and critiquing the spaces, we gathered for tea & an informal Q&A in The Siren—the pub in Fallow Cross, before leaving. The day had flown by so fast, but I felt inspired and armed with practical strategies and a deeper sense of how putting the right effort into a process can capture attention, inspire a sense of mystery, and guide an audience.

I can’t speak for the entire class but those I did talk with seemed to have a really positive experience and were really happy they were there. While I know it’s totally nuts that I flew to London for 72 hours just to do this, I was happy I was able to make it happen and if they ever offered more design/creative based classes I would go again in a heartbeat.

This is already insanely long so I’ll just thank you all for reading. If you’re curious about the spaces other teams created I am happy to tell you all about them.

[internetandnetwork]

Illustration vs. Graphic Design vs. Graphic Illustration: Understanding the Difference

Art and design are becoming increasingly accessible; therefore, mixing up different mediums with one another is bound to happen. For example, think of an illustration, graphic design, and graphic illustration. One can easily confuse these entwined, closely linked art forms.

So, the question is, what exactly is the difference between these?

The illustration is associated with fine art, and on the other hand, graphic design is viewed more as commercial art. Since commercial projects increasingly and frequently need dynamic and clear visuals, the differences are becoming less apparent gradually.

In this blog, we will take a deep dive into graphic design, illustration, and graphic illustration, how they differ from each other, and a few exciting ways you could use graphic illustrations for your upcoming projects.

GRAPHIC DESIGN VS. ILLUSTRATION VS. GRAPHIC ILLUSTRATION

Graphic design and illustration have their own set of techniques, channels, and artistic goals. The easiest way to distinguish them is that graphic design has a commercial motivation while illustration is mostly seen as fine art.

To put it in simple words: graphic design can send crystal-clear messages, which makes it a significant force in today’s design world. It is implanted in the modern commercial infrastructure. However, in contrast, illustration with its vagueness and indirect ability to communicate emotions and feelings becomes too risky even to be permitted to set foot in the corporate bloodstream.

A graphic designer remains more anonymous compared to illustrators since their focus is to convey somebody else’s ideas using typical design elements. People often seek out illustrators depending on their personal aesthetic and artistic skills.

WHAT IS AN ILLUSTRATION?

An illustration is a visual means to illustrate or depict a written text. It might help describe an idea, tell a story, or even decorate something. Illustrations come in many forms, including both traditional as well as digital forms.

The most commonly used illustration styles include drawings in both colors as well as black and white. Both soft lines and sharp edges can be made in pencil drawings. Ink drawings demonstrate contrast beautifully. Charcoal drawings are often the preferred tool when it comes to illustrating stories as they are capable of creating dramatic shadows.

Illustrative paintings are crafted using watercolor, gouache, and acrylic to tell stories. Watercolor illustrations tend to incite generic feelings of femininity and softness. Gouache paint is a little bit expensive, and usually, commercial artists use it to make comics and posters as it dries quickly. Acrylics are versatile, easy to use, and can be used on various surfaces.

Some more physically intensive illustration techniques include etchings, woodcut art, and collage. A collage involves collecting and pasting found materials and objects (that might not necessarily be related to each other) to build a finished art piece. Woodcut art includes carving the illustrations into a real piece of wood. This is one of the oldest illustration techniques developed during the Medieval Period and is still being used by modern illustrators who like a textured look better. Etchings are a time-intensive technique that involves artists scratching illustrations onto a metal surface.

You can spot illustrations anywhere, especially in print media such as posters, magazines, flyers, educational materials, books, etc. Illustrations can also be found in the digital space of websites and apps, made by both freehand (using a laptop, for example) and vector graphics (using shapes and colors to copy an illustrative style).

While illustrations come with a unique freedom to exist without any words, they still possess the power to convey ideas via their dynamic storytelling. Minute details such as the characters’ facial expressions help illustrations to incite deep connection and emotion.

WHAT IS GRAPHIC DESIGN?

Graphic design is an art and profession that involves using visual compositions for solving problems and conveying ideas via imagery, form, typography, and color. While the illustration is all about creative interpretation, the graphic design focuses on communication with its target audience. Typically, marketing and branding strategies (instead of text and stories) fuel the graphic design process.

In both the print and digital worlds, there are numerous types of graphic design. Some examples of mainly physical print works include logos, flyers, billboards, posters, packaging, and business cards.

Web design and email marketing rule the digital landscape.

Often, graphic design starts with a visual identity which is a type of design that conveys a brand’s story, personality, and emotion via color palettes, typography, images, logo, and style guidelines to ensure uniformity through all the other designs.

Traditionally, marketing has been focused on print media such as magazines, newspaper ads, and flyers. Publication graphic designers create layouts, handpick typography and organize artwork for long-form projects such as catalogs, newspapers, books, and magazines. Packaging graphic designers communicate with the customers directly through the physical products.

In addition to all this, the internet has also unlocked other new ways for graphic designers to generate brand awareness via digital mediums. UI (user interface) and UX (user experience) designers focus on creating better interactions between users and websites, apps, and games. Motion graphic design is used for online media, web banners, presentations, TV and film crafts ads, trailers, GIFs, etc.

Usually, graphic designers possess one design specialization at the minimum, but since the industry is ever-changing, they should be flexible as well. This can often mean trying more fine art techniques and styles.

WHAT IS GRAPHIC ILLUSTRATION?

What happens when we combine graphic design with classic illustration?

We get graphic illustrations!

Graphic illustration takes attributes from both of them.

While graphic design gives more prominence to communication with the target audience, illustration is inclined more towards fine art, and graphic illustration is what happens when we blend these both. In a nutshell, it is the best of both worlds!

Graphic illustration employs the typical design principles of layouts, colors, shapes, and form to assemble and demonstrate the original artwork. They help visually express ideas, explain concepts, sell products, educate and promote, just like graphic design and illustrations individually do.

You can find them anywhere, including flyers, posters, websites, packaging, books, fabrics, advertisements, and much more. Graphic illustrations can use any technique ranging from drawing and printmaking to graphic representation of statistics and data.

Graphic illustrators have a skill set that includes painting, drawing, digital illustration, art history, business, and marketing. They need creative thinking as well as artistic skill to be able to convey theoretical ideas simply and effectively.

WHEN TO USE GRAPHIC ILLUSTRATION?

Turning to graphic illustration is an ideal option when your business requires a much more specialized and stylistic approach to your marketing. It keeps creative expression in the front and center while also ensuring to stick to your design elements and marketing strategy at the same time. It provides you with an incredible opportunity to establish a deeper relationship between your target customers and products or ideas.

Are you looking to build a powerful aesthetic and illustrated character to serve as the face of your brand? Or do you want to promote a detailed illustration of your company culture on your site’s homepage? Such opportunities are excellent to introduce this stylistic technique to your brand. In essence, the graphic illustration is indeed the best of both design worlds!

WRAPPING IT UP

We can easily define the current design era as ambiguous. But we can’t ignore that it also gives a chance to separate art forms and practices to intertwine their unique skill sets and share their potential. And if truth be told, that’s just the way art develops. Graphic design, illustration, and graphic illustration are three different art forms that are indeed closely related but still have some apparent discrepancies. Understanding these differences is not only vital for the designers but also for the businesses so that they can choose the most suitable art form for their project. We are living in a dynamic world that is continually evolving. Therefore, designers need to be more flexible than ever to stay in the competition and diversify their skill sets. Grasping different forms of art and design will benefit you in the long run in ways you couldn’t have imagined. Keeping all the differences and similarities aside, graphic design, illustration, and graphic illustration give you some incredible opportunities to take your business to the next level. Be sure to make the most out of it.

Hariom Balhara is an inventive person who has been doing intensive research in particular topics and writing blogs and articles for E Global Soft Solutions. E Global Soft Solutions is a Digital Marketing, SEO, SMO, PPC and Web Development company that comes with massive experiences. We specialize in digital marketing, Web Designing and development, graphic design, and a lot more.

SOURCE : Graphic Design vs. Graphic Illustration

[perfectirishgifts]

How Amazon Original Stories Chooses Its “Single Sitting” Reads

New Post has been published on https://perfectirishgifts.com/how-amazon-original-stories-chooses-its-single-sitting-reads/

How Amazon Original Stories Chooses Its “Single Sitting” Reads

Amazon Original Stories, an imprint of Amazon Publishing, launched in November 2017, offering short fiction and nonfiction, built around the idea of works that can be read in a “single sitting.” The imprint’s first titles were Crown Heights, a collaboration with Amazon Studios, and Joyce Carol Oates’s Sign of the Beast.

Since then, the imprint has published close to 150 digital stories, which are available free to Amazon Prime AMZN members and Kindle Unlimited subscribers, with a free audio edition included (those who aren’t part of either program can buy titles for $1.99 each, with the option to add the digital audio for free). The imprint releases roughly 40-50 stories per year in a variety of genres.

I interviewed Julia Sommerfeld, Publisher of Amazon Original Stories, via email, about the trajectory of Amazon Original Stories (AOS), how authors are selected, crafting collections and the most popular types of stories.

Why was Amazon Original Stories started? How is it different from Kindle Singles? 

Amazon Original Stories launched with the mission of championing stories, essays, and reporting by the premiere storytellers of our time and expanding readers’ horizons by making these stories free to Prime and Kindle Unlimited members. In addition to full-length novels, memoir and nonfiction, many authors are also writing short, compelling stories and essays and we wanted to provide an imprint that would support their short work and share it with readers.

Are all of them also available on Audible with audiobook versions?

Our stories allow readers to toggle back and forth between reading and audio, so you can start listening to a story on the road and keep reading on your Kindle or the Kindle app on your phone right where you left off. We’re seeing more and more customers switching back and forth between their audio and digital downloads. It’s really encouraging to see that folks are fitting the stories into their lives so seamlessly.

Not only have we partnered with bestselling authors to read their own audio editions—like David Sedaris reading Themes and Variations and Mindy Kaling reading Nothing Like I Imagined (Except for Sometimes)—but we’ve also brought in some venerated celebrity narrators. In September, we released Out of Line, a collection of seven short ‘Fem-Fi’ stories from an all-star lineup of award-winning writers Cheryl Strayed, Roxane Gay, Caroline Kepnes, Lisa Ko, Emma Donoghue, Mary Gaitskill and Kate Atkinson. We matched that with an star-studded lineup of narrators for the audio editions, including Kristen Bell, Samira Wiley, Margo Martindale, Gwendoline Christie and Lea Salonga.

Why did you see a need for stories fitting this “single-sitting” length? 

Some of the most powerful, memorable—and satisfying—stories can be told in a single sitting. Just think about the classic short works like Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery or Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw, which haunted generations, or a great episode of your favorite podcast.

Our stories and collections are made to be binged, just like your favorite podcast or television show. But these days, with our attention spans a bit frayed, it can feel less daunting to pick up a shorter work. For some readers, that single sitting might last a 30-minute work break or for others, a whole rainy Sunday. Also, Kindle attracts a pretty voracious readership, so it’s helpful to tide readers over between their favorite author’s books.

How do you go about selecting authors for AOS? Are they all previously published authors?

We start with readers and go from there. We look for authors and content creators of all types that readers are just itching to hear more from, and who have a track record for executing deeply satisfying and memorable storylines.

For fiction, we have an established fiction audience that’s hungry for more in popular categories like mystery and thriller, science fiction and fantasy, historical fiction, etc. For nonfiction, we are drawn to novelistic storytelling—especially memoir and personal essay. We have signed both established autobiographical writers like David Sedaris and Mindy Kaling, while also commissioning bestselling writers in other categories to write about themselves: Jacqueline Woodson, Shea Serrano, Jade Chang and Susan Orlean, for example.

We want to work with writers at the top of their game who will feel like an AOS story adds to their careers. We like to think of AOS as a playground for published authors, storytellers, and emerging voices. Writers have a chance to flex their short story muscles, or to explore outside of the genre they’re most known for. Amor Towles, a star of historic fiction, for instance, turned his storytelling chops to speculative fiction in our Forward collection. Authors are the original world builders, and many of them find inspiration by the chance to do something new. Or, perhaps they can explore something they’ve been thinking about for a long time that doesn’t fit the format of a full-length novel. In some cases, we’ll launch someone new with a unique voice or story, such as debut writer Samantha Allen’s memoir about falling in love while undergoing gender transformation surgery, Love & Estrogen.

AOS has released many collections around a theme, such as love stories in The Real Thing, stories by crime writers in Hush, and climate fiction in Warmer. What do the collections offer that readers may not get with individual stories?

With collections, readers can read something completely original and unexpected from their most beloved authors or be introduced to several new favorite writers, all within a couple of hours.

We love offering readers a real diversity of experience or perspective on the subject or theme, while also giving them the ability to discover new writers. Because the investment is relatively low—both because it’s free with Prime and doesn’t require the time commitment of digesting several full-length books—we see these collections as a gateway to finding the next author you’ll be obsessed with. We take great pride in presenting a sort of Avengers-like super team of writers we think our audience will really love. Hush, for instance, featured top suspense writers Ruth Ware, Laura Lippman, Oyinkan Braithwaite, Jeffery Deaver, Lisa Unger and Alison Gaylin.

Which types of stories have been most popular with readers, and why do you think that is? Is fiction more popular than nonfiction?

So far, both thrillers and memoirs are really topping our list so I wouldn’t say fiction or nonfiction is the determining factor. But readers do seem pretty open to trying different genres as long as the hook is there and the story is really satisfying. We, like our readers, look for a powerful plot.

Do you see a correlation in sales of their previous books when an author releases an AOS title?

We definitely see AOS as helping to raise all boats. We work to grow audiences for our authors, and that means people returning to their previous books or maybe pre-ordering their upcoming release. One of the favorite things I see in customers’ reviews is when they say, Oh, I love this so much, I’m going to check out their other books!

We are also excited that many of the stories are also being spun into TV and film projects. Ken Liu’s The Cleaners, which comes out December 15, is now in TV development with Amazon Studios as is Andrew Barrer’s Young Blood, which started as a single story, and we are now expanding into a trilogy of stories and an Amazon Studios film project.

I saw in another interview you said more people are reading on their phones. How are most people accessing AOS? Has the increase in reading by phone affected how you approach AOS?

People mostly interact with the stories through their phones and the Kindle. Our guiding principle is meeting readers where they are. One example of how this plays out is switching between ebook and audio editions. All our stories use the Whispersync for Voice feature, which allows you to switch from listening to reading and back again without losing your place. So you can go for your daily masked quarantine walk with headphones on, and pull your device out afterward for some armchair reading without missing a beat.

The popularity of mobile also really informs cover design—the stories need to pop and register as a thumbnail image rather than physical book on shelf. And it informs our editorial strategy in that we want to be urgent and relevant enough for people to spend their pockets of time with these stories, but we also want to help readers escape and carve time away from the constant noise of the headlines.

Why did you want to work with Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche? What can readers expect from her new story Zikora?

She’s just so beloved, and crosses so many audiences, that we’ve always had her at the top of our wish list as a creator who could make just about anybody stop what they are doing to spend a little time in a world she draws.

Zikora is a passion project for her; it’s a really powerful look at becoming a mother, and how the experience of entering parenthood leads you to see your own parents more clearly. Readers can expect a deeply emotional, character-driven short story that puts a human face on urgent issues. Chimamanda has an unparalleled talent for creating characters with such loving specificity, who at the same time illuminate these universal desires and fears that any reader can relate to.

We also worked with the Nigerian-American actress Adepero Oduye (Pariah, 12 Years a Slave) on the audio version of this story, and she really brought an extra layer of emotional resonance to it. I can’t decide if I enjoy reading or listening to this one better.

What’s next for AOS?

Faraway, a collection of fairytale retellings from blockbuster young adult authors Rainbow Rowell, Nic Stone, Soman Chainani, Ken Liu, and Gayle Forman, releases December 15. Looking towards 2021, Oscar award-winning filmmaker and author Guillermo del Toro will release a new collection of dark and fantastical stories in Fall. Dean Koontz is returning with Season 2 of Nameless, which will extend a beloved series that we started in 2019. Plus, we have projects coming from Guillermo del Toro , Susan Orlean, Kiley Reid, Curtis Sittenfeld, Lisa Unger, Jia Tolentino, Justin Torres, Jeff Lemire and many more in the works.

From Media in Perfectirishgifts