#ingrid neropiuma

[mbovettwrites-blog]

200 Followers Extract!

As a thank you for 200 followers, here’s another piece of the Blackbird world - this time, pertaining to Ingrid’s backstory.

Tagging: @kbcypher, @katefarron, @bitteredplum

TW for mentions of abuse.

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The cactus on the windowsill had been rotting for a week.     It had changed from having obscene, mouldy warts sprouting where its blossoms should have been to being shrivelled and peppered with a chalky dust. Nicia would be disappointed when she finally came home.     This time, when Ingrid collapsed on the cotton sheets and turned glazed eyes up to the window, it wasn’t her stomach or chest that was bruised and throbbing. It was her hand. Her left hand. A black mass was carved into the back of it, where her fingers were still twitching and her palm was still clammy with sweat. It curved like a crescent moon, curling around the centre of her fist like a crown of glass shards.     A broken crow’s feather. The crest of her family – and the mark that branded every bloodied corpse they left in their wake.     She hated it. And she loved it.     She hated it for what it made her. Someone like Aziz or Lucinda – one of the brutes her family hired to do dirty jobs and train their younger members – could be tattooed anywhere. Aziz wore his long and thin on his collarbone, mapping a scar left there from his childhood. Lucinda’s was hidden on the small of her back, the rips in the plumage cast up to her neck by a motionless wind. Ingrid was not allowed that privilege. Her parents, Luna and Niloz, had them on the back of the left hand. So did her sister Sirena, five years her senior. Nicia would have hers there as well in two years’ time, when she too turned fifteen. It was only the Neropiumas themselves who were marked in that spot.     Ingrid wasn’t a Neropiuma. Not by flesh and blood. Luna had made it clear from an early age that Ingrid was not her daughter. Aziz had brought her back to the house on Paradisostrada after a mission one night when she was a baby, and Luna had pounced at the chance to raise another fearsome Neropiuma killing machine. They had kept her birth name, one of Verlinden or Sovaki origin, rather than giving her one from L’Agio. To show that she would never be their true kin. Her middle name, Merlo, was the name of the tame garden blackbird – to show that she could never be as skilled or ferocious as the others, who were named after vultures and owls and all things with pointed talons and hooked beaks.     To mark her on the left hand was no honour. It was humiliation.     And yet she loved it. No matter the intent behind it, it held power. She could use the ugly symbol to wield command over the other murderers in the White Eagle syndicate. If they sneered, Luna would still punish them for it. Her true kin or not, the White Eagle matron had raised Ingrid since she was an infant, and she would not stand for one of her possessions to be insulted.     Mana below, that mark stung. A glaring red rim had risen around it as her body tried to rid itself of the graffiti. If Nicia was here, she would have tended to it, and tried to cool it with ice wrapped in cloth and soft bandages. But Nicia was gone. She had run away almost two weeks ago, after she’d watched Niloz crack his fist into Sirena’s skull. The two eldest Neropiuma sisters were accustomed to that treatment from their father: Niloz had left Ingrid with glorious purple marks on plenty of occasions, and Sirena was no different. And Nicia? Luna had always shielded her from it. Nicia adored both of her sisters, and she had run to the bathroom to vomit after she’d seen the blood stream from Sirena’s nose. In the night, she had escaped.     When she was found and dragged back home, Luna wouldn’t be able to shield her any more.     Ingrid wondered if Luna would even beat Nicia herself.     Suddenly cold, she curled in on herself, pulling her knees to her chest.     Where was Sirena? She hadn’t seen her after Aziz had taken her into the tunnels to be marked. That had been two hours ago, and as far as she knew, Sirena wasn’t meant to be leaving the house to work that night. Sirena would only leave when the most tense and high-risk meetings were scheduled. Border brushes with the Ironsteps and the Goldbacks. Visits to the house of Don Marco, the Black Brimstone leader, and weapon exchanges with Don Ferdiad’s henchmen. None of those were happening tonight. Not when she’d just been formally inducted into the White Eagles.     Maybe, if Aziz had never stolen her away from her crib, she would be spending her fifteenth birthday happily. Maybe her parents would bake her a cake – coffee cake, her favourite – and her siblings, if she had any, would be sat with her, rather than vanished into the frosty night. If she was from Verlinden, she would be dancing with her friends in the garden or at the riverside, and if she was from Sovaki, she would be gorging on a banquet of her favourite foods.     Instead, she closed her eyes, tucked her head down, and tried to take up as little space on the plain bed as possible.

Welcome to the Mavericks’ Club, where the bad kids look good.

[mbovettwrites-blog]

Major Update #1

Before anyone gets confused - this is @/blackfeatherantics. I guess you could say I’m ‘re-branding’ for the new year? lord that sounds way too professional for a teenager.

So, yeah, there’s going to be some changes around this place. There are a few reasons for this, some of which are also to do with why there’s been next to no NaNoWriMo and/or Blackbird coverage for ages. First of all, however, let me list some of the changes that I’m making over the course of the next couple of weeks leading up to January:

New URL (as you can already see)

Updated blog aesthetic that’s going to be a little bit more ‘me’

Less of Blackbird, more of other minor projects (at least until around the end of June)

Greater focus on poetry

Less tag games, slightly less frequent posting, and less ask games

More original content (not necessarily about writing), more writing advice, and more aesthetic posts

Now, the reasons for this are as follows:

The former URL was no longer fitting as it had nothing to do with writing and Ingrid’s name was updated from Blackfeather to Neropiuma

The current aesthetic just really isn’t my thing

Exams. I am in my final year of British secondary school/high school, meaning that my school is putting huge pressure on me and my classmates to do well in both our mock exams, which are in January, and more so on our real, final exams, which are between March and June. This, combined with the work I’ve been contributing to a yet-to-be-released online magazine, has severely affected how much time I can devote to large-scale projects like Blackbird and creating good quality content for this blog. poetry is going to become more common on here because I personally find it easier and less time-consuming (and a little more enjoyable) than prose writing.

I have put a little more focus on my new studyblr/langblr @mbovettstudies to help me get through the season of endless studying and the sacrifice of good sleep.

I don’t know how long this change of focus will last for, but the best I can predict is around the last week of June, which is when my last GCSE exams will take place and I will finally begin a lovely, long summer holiday (about a month longer than the younger years in my school! Yay!). 

Thank you for the patience, lovelies! x

Tagged::

@kbcypher; @gingerly-writing; @scribble-dee-vee; @tourneyofashvara; @ava-burton-writing; @jade-island-lives; @gracebabcockwrites; @ramblingrubyred; @katefarron

[mbovettwrites-blog]

@katefarron Thanks for tagging me, sweetheart! I’ve been meaning to get around to doing this tag for an age, and now seems like a decent enough time to catch up and join in.

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1. Do you listen to music when you’re writing?

Yes! I have a playlist on Spotify called ‘on broken wings’ which I use as a sort of soundtrack to Blackbird to keep my spirits up when I’m writing. If I’m doing poetry for Write the World, I use ‘suspended in the universe’ instead, if only for the aesthetic.

2. Does your family/friends know that you write stories/poems/etc.?

Everyone’s aware that I write a lot; not everyone knows about my WIP. My mum, however, is highly invested in it. She is hell-bent on me creating a character who could be played by Tom Hardy in her fantasy movie adaptation, despite being reminded countless times that that’s never going to happen.

3. What was your favourite book as a child?

Everything and anything by Enid Blyton. The Famous Five, The Magic Faraway Tree, The Secret Seven, The Adventure Series… I have them all still in their box sets, tucked away on my bookshelf, waiting to be opened up and read for the thousandth time.

4. Tea or coffee?

Both. You will never find a way to make me choose between them.

5. Notebooks and pens or laptop/computer?

It depends. I keep a notebook to jot down ideas and thoughts in, but major projects like Blackbird are kept on my laptop.

6. How old were you when you started writing?

Honestly? As long as I can remember. However, about four years ago when my mental health plummeted into hell, I stopped for about two to three years. I’m quite newly back into the practice, but like with riding a bicycle, once you’ve trained yourself to be a wordsmith, you’re one for the rest of time. You never forget something you love.

7. What is the first line of a WIP you’re working on?

“Being an ex-heiress of the White Eagle crime family meant that Ingrid Neropiuma had been forced into many undesirable situations in her eighteen years of miserable existence, but even she would have to admit that this was a candidate for the top ten.” - B L A C K B I R D

8. Do you base your characters on real people subconsciously?

I think I might do so without realising it. The relationship between Ingrid and Rouge, and the characters themselves, have startling connections to @bitteredplum and I which I only noticed after I got a couple thousand words into the WIP and started having them interact for the first time. It was like an out-of-body, incredibly surreal moment in which I realised what I’d managed to do by entire accident.

9. What does writing mean to you?

Everything and anything. It’s an art - it can be whatever you need it to be in the moment. If you need advice and guidance, spill your mind onto paper and mentor yourself. If you need to vent your emotions, channel your anger into your poetry. If you need to forget yourself for a while, delve into a world entirely of your own creation. Writing is the most beautiful thing to grace the earth, because it can be whatever you want. It’s like a highly abstract Room of Requirement.

10. What is your least favourite trope to write?

You will never, ever catch me writing any form of the damsel in distress trope. Subvert it all you want, I will never enjoy writing or reading it, period.

11. Do you have any favourite authors?

·         Leigh Bardugo, author of the Grisha trilogy, the Six of Crows duology, The Language of Thorns, and Wonder Woman: Warbringer

·         Sarah J. Maas. Hear me out, because this is a problematic one. I used to love the worlds she created in Throne of Glass, but when I read the ACOTAR trilogy, I noticed some… questionable themes. Exhibit A: The love interest for the second two books is introduced in book one as the biggest, most moronic, sexist, violating pig imaginable, and his skin-crawling behaviour is excused because it’s for the MC’s own safety. Exhibit B: Erotic scenes with aforementioned dickhead love interest every other damn chapter. In a YA novel. I have now picked up on these themes throughout all of her books and she’s on the list of favourite authors not because I adore her books, but because her convoluted prose and questionable research skills are hilarious.

·         Dante Alighieri. The Divine Comedy = religious self-insert fanfiction of Dante being escorted around the afterlife by his senpai in a quest to find his dead girlfriend. Also, the Hell City of Dis is entertaining. And Satan is frozen up to his tits in an ice field.

·         Neil Gaiman. I’m in the middle of reading American Gods and I love every bit of it.

·         Rick Riordan. This requires no explanation whatsoever.

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Ok darlings, here are my questions for you:

1.      How long have you been working on your WIP(s) for?

2.      What song would you assign as your protagonist’s theme tune?

3.      Do you have any favourite spots (gardens, parks, cafes, etc.) where you like to write?

4.      Poetry or Prose?

5.      Where do you draw inspiration for your writing from?

6.      Is there any popular book that you wish you had written and why?

7.      What’s your planning process when you start working on a new WIP?

8.      Do you work best in mornings, afternoons, or at night?

9.      Would you prefer to self-publish or work with an agent and publishing company and why?

10.  How do your emotions/moods affect your writing?

11.  What’s your favourite line of your WIP/one of your poems?

Tagging: @gingerly-writing, @brynprocrastinates, @ramblingrubyred, @gameranilah, @scribble-dee-vee

[mbovettwrites-blog]

Character Moodboard:: Ingrid Neropiuma

    Rouge gave a more nervous laugh. “That doesn’t seem particularly sensible.”     “Oh, sweetheart,” Ingrid drawled. “Geniuses are never sensible. They’re madmen.”     A raised eyebrow. “And you believe you are a genius?”     “Don’t be such a lemon. This is Hylin we’re talking about. You don’t get in by being average. This train is chock full of some of the sharpest young minds on the planet. We’re practically guaranteed greatness.”

The proudly bisexual protagonist of ‘Blackbird’, Ingrid is a criminal’s daughter running from her twisted home and family, desperate to unlearn the toxic mentalities and attitudes instilled in her from a young age and redeem herself so that she might have a shot at a normal life. Raised to be aggressive and terrified of being labelled a monster, the events of the story force her to begin considering whether to bury the part of her she hates most, or embrace it. Her internal conflicts and overly dramatic personality make her an incredibly fun character to work with. 

[mbovettwrites-blog]

Group road trip! But the car breaks down half way...

Oh sweet gods, this would be chaos.

Neptune Vasquez is, despite his punk-rock aesthetic and “fuck the police” attitude, is still the only one with a functioning understanding of the world and therefore the only one who can drive

Everyone expects a wrecked 20-year-old car near its death

But no, Neptune Vasquez owns a suburban mom’s minivan

Ingrid and Eben are gone the moment they see it. They’ve lost their minds. They’re going to laugh themselves to hell and back.

Timo says he likes the colour and Neptune almost faints

Neptune is now the mother of the group for the rest of time

Rouge will tease him about the minivan until the end of days

“You and Timo can drive it to L’Agio for your honeymoon”

“Fuck off, Scarletina.”

After three hours of pandemonium they finally hit the road

Every five minutes before they get out of the city, Matei has a heart attack and thinks he’s forgotten something important

“SHITBUCKETS I LEFT THE CAT OUTSIDE”

“where. the fuck else is it gonna go.”

The actual journey out of the city is even worse.

Eben chooses the music

His playlist is mostly death metal with the occasional ABBA-esque love song thrown in

Ingrid can only stand it for half an hour before she throws his phone out the window

Her music isn’t much better, its basically Eben’s without the ABBA

Rouge falls asleep on Lowin’s shoulder and drools everywhere

Ingrid flirts shamelessly with Matei just to see his face go red

Neptune gives Timo the same treatment

Akira asks if they’re there yet every thirty seconds

Lowin prays for death

Matei prays for mercy

Eben doesn’t pray, he just glowers out the window like the angst-ridden teen he is

Neptune headbangs and almost gives Matei his fifteenth heart attack of the day

“eYES ON THE ROAD EYES ON THE ROAD”

“OH SHUT UP AND KISS NEROPIUMA INSTEAD”

Cue Matei having a different kind of attack

Ingrid’s tempted to take Neptune up on his proposition

The break-down is worse still.

Matei passes out from terror at what awaits them

They’re in the middle of the Verlinden wilderness, they haves wolves and bears and stuff out there

Eben throws a hissy fit

Neptune uses Timo as a human shield

Rouge is just sobbing on the ground

Meanwhile Lowin and Akira are the only two actually trying to fix the van

They do not succeed

Ingrid tries gathering firewood and prepares for a night in the wild

Eben throws another hissy fit

Rouge eventually resorts to her weird humour to try and change the mood

“Just like my life, this van is broken as hell.”

Lowin refuses to give up on the van

Akira busts out a crate of wine bottles she somehow smuggled into the boot of the car

Cue her and Ingrid getting shitfaced and helping nobody

Somehow give Lowin a medal for her resilience and mad skills

Neptune is apparently terrified of the dark, as is discovered when night falls and they haven’t moved anywhere

In the end they give up and sleep right there until someone drives past at 6am and tows them all the way to the nearest station

“So lets maybe never do that again”

“Agreed.”

[mbovettwrites-blog]

For the wip ask, 1, 3 and 18 ^.^

1: Summarize your WIP in 10 words or less

Teenage murderess wonders if she should try killing other criminals.

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3: Does your WIP have a title? If so, explain its significance. If not, what are you calling it for now?

My current WIP project is called Blackbird, and its in honour of the lead character, Ingrid Neropiuma. Her name among her family and the media was Blackbird due to the fact that she left objects depicting birds - pictures, carvings, charms, etc - at her victims’ bodies, as well as the black feather mark that everyone in her family used.

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18: What’s easier, dialogue or description?

Worldbuilding and describing scenarios has always been one of my strongest points in writing and it is definitely what I find easier, though it’s helped by the fact that the dialogue in Blackbird is generally difficult to write. Most of the characters speak in manners very different to my own and the ones I’m used to writing, so things like Ingrid’s excessive use of slang and Rouge’s penchant for incredible comebacks are sometimes a struggle to write without sounding cheesy or clumsy.

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Thanks for asking! x

[mbovettwrites-blog]

‘Embarrass Your OC’ Tag

Once again, this one comes from @gingerly-writing! The aim of this tag game is to answer questions in character as your protagonist in order to expose them and do some sweet character development. Let’s get into it!

WIP Title: Blackbird

Protagonist Name: Ingrid Piuma

What is the most embarrassing thing you did as a child?

Oh, there are plenty of embarrassing things that I did when I was younger. The worst was probably when I went through a phase of obsessing over fairy tales and folklore. Luna wouldn’t buy me a princess dress to wear, so I rummaged around in Sirena’s wardrobe until I found one my size. I cut up the bottom and the sleeves and glued bright buttons onto it as ‘sequins’, and danced around the house until everyone else got home. That was probably the first time that Sirena really raged at me, too!

Which other character do you secretly have a crush on?

This one’s tearing me up inside. Having Nadira around again is... complicated. Bittersweet. I know she’s not here for me - she only wants to protect herself. Even so, it doesn’t feel like we’ve been apart for a year. And yeah, maybe I still love her. Maybe she’ll hate my guts until the day she dies, maybe she’ll come around. Maybe I don’t want to know that just yet.

What bad habit do you hide from your friends?

Oh my gods. There are too many to count. The most obvious is the whole ‘heiress to a multi-national crime syndicate’ thing. Though, to be fair, Nadira does know about that. If the others found out that I run rampant in the streets with the White Eagles most nights, beating the crap out of equally horrible criminals and stabbing the ones who we don’t like, I don’t think I’d be calling them ‘friends’ for much longer. Semi-frequent homicide isn’t the sort of thing that most people are okay with.

Everyone has a soft side. How would you describe yours?

Number one: Nadira. Does she despise me? Yes. Do I look out for her anyways? Obviously. Number two: Nicia. Touch my sister and you’ll find yourself in a ‘stab first, ask questions later’  scenario. Reluctant number three: Matei. His adoration for Rosa Nerezza is definitely going to get him into some serious trouble, and if I don’t bail him out of it, nobody will. They won’t be able to.

What kind of dirt does your best friend have on you?

I don’t have a best friend? Nadira used to be something like that, though, and if she wanted to, she could dig up some proof that I’m a White Eagle and boom, my life would be ruined. I’d say that’s some quite serious ‘dirt’ to have on someone.

Tagging: @kbcypher, @s-the-dragon, @necwrites, and @stephaniewrites