#it's exactly the kind of psychological horror I'm into

[thelittlecoughsomewhere]

Have you ever come across a piece of media that you feel was tailor made with specifically you in mind?

That's how I feel about Scherzo (Doctor Who)

[saburaito]

does anyone have any horror book recommendations? like the most horrific books that you can think of?

[l0v-ly-c4t]

Movie Night - Daisuke x fem!reader

Summary: You and Daisuke have a scary movie night, but it turns out he's too scared to sleep alone + after care

Pairing: smut and fluff

T/w: smut, mentions of Anya, protected sex, full consensual sex, loss of virginity, whinny soft dom Daisuke

Wc: 3,3K

A/n: This is an AU where the shitty compan- I mean, Pony Express doesn't exist, so our boy Daisuki is on college living his best life as the lover I know he is.

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━━ ❝ It has been some time since you started crushing on Daisuke. You met him when you first arrived at this school. Being the new student is taught, and he knew it, that's why he made so much effort just so you could have friends and feel welcome. After that you guys became best friends.

Obviously, you always thought he was handsome, and kind, and funny, but something about him kept bringing you closer, leaving you in the situation you're right now: friend zone.

The worst part is that, no matter how much you try to show him that you like him, he's just too danm naive to get a hint! Urgh, this feeling is consuming you from the inside.

Little did you know that he thought of you in the exact same way you did of him. Well, not exactly "exact same way." He had his own little way.

It took him a while to realize his feelings. At first, he just thought of you as his prettiest friend. He would stare at you and be lost in your looks without knowing why. He would always try and be useful for you, being it by carrying something for you or paying you something to eat at the cafeteria. He wanted to be around you all the time, he would get bored and blue without you.

It is actually impressive how he didn't realize his feelings until very recently, when he saw you talking very closely with another boy. How to describe his feelings? It wasn't jealousy, it was more a sense of loss. He finally realized that being friends didn't mean that you would always be by his side. For that, he needed to be more than friends. THAT'S when he realized his feelings.

But then, he panicked. "What does it mean??? Do I... l-like her?" Silly little thoughts like this were frequently on his mind. Oh, if only he knew that you thought of him too...

You and Daisuke were chilling on your sofa, waiting for the other friend of yours, Anya, to show up. You had decided to make a little movie section in your house since you and Daisuke haven't been able to talk much with Anya. She's just really focused on getting her degree.

You were both on your phones. Daisuke is playing some silly mobile game, and you are just scrolling down your tumblr timeline, looking for something fun to pass the time. It was already 8 pm, and Anya hasn't given any news yet.

"Dude, she must be really busy. She didn't even send a message or something!" Daisuke says, his lips almost pouting like a disappointed kid. "Don't worry, she has a lot of work to do, we can hang out another time." You confort him.

"Yeah..." he answers. "Is just that I was so excited, I was like 'Let's watch a movie, yay, bom bom clap!!!' But now I'm just 'yeah, movies'" He emotes.

"What?"

He sights. "Nothing. Do you still want to watch a movie? Just the two of us?" He asks.

"Yes, it'll be fun! Let's watch something scary!" You give the idea. Daisuke instantly smiled at your words, thrilled to watch a super super horror movie with you.

You let him choose a movie, and after a while, deciding which one, you finally settled on a psychological horror movie. You sat by his side on the couch, eventually laying your head on his shoulders.

Daisuke didn't even notice, but he would probably have blushed if he wasn't so absorbed in the screen. If you didn't know him, you would say he was scared.

After about 2 hours later, the movie ended, and Daisuke was just too pale. "Daisuke U good? Are you scared?"

"Me? Scared? Pfff, c'mom y/n!!! I'm the thoughtest guy you know!" He said, playing it off. "U sure? I don't want you coming at my room at midnight"

"Don't worry, you'll get your well-deserved beauty sleep, and I won't bother you," he said. "Whatever you say gorgeous" you played.

You guys watched some other movies, one scarier than the previous one. I mean, scaring for him. You were just cool, but Daisuke was biting his nails and playing with his fingers the whole time. You didn't pay much attention at the beginning, but as time passed, you could literally see his nervousness.

Worried for your friend psychological state, you decide that you should both take a bath and go to sleep, even though Daisuke kept swearing he wasn't dirty enough for a bath and that he could sleep that way just fine.

Both of you cleaned up you decide is time to sleep, the clock already hitting 2am. "S-so, am I going to sleep here? In the couch? A-alone?" He asks.

"Why? Are you scared?" You tease him, resulting in him making an angry face to prove it to you that he wasn't scared. "What? Naah, I'm, like, totally fine." He says. Oh, how he regretted that later that night.

You were almost falling asleep when you heard a light knock on your room door. You got up and checked just to see Daisuke, with the puppiest eyes you had even seen on a man, standing in front of your door eith a pillow under his arm. "Daisuke," you called. "What are you doing?

"You were right, I'm scared. Can we sit and talk just so I can fall asleep?" Daisuke said, silently begging for you to let him in already. You invite him to sit on your bed, and you both stay there for a while, just chilling. You were almost falling asleep again when he started a conversation.

"So.." he said. "Are u seeing someone?"

"Why are you asking this so randomly?"

"I-i don't know, I'm just trying to break the ice ans start a conversation" he eyes you. Even though the only light comes from the moon past your windows, you can notice the little blush forming on his cheeks and top of his ears. You also blush at the sight.

"Sooo, are you seeing someone or not?" He asked again "no I'm not. What about you?" You look back at him. "No"

At that moment, being right there on your bed sitting and talking in the middle of the night. That was so good to Daisuke. He didn't know why, but just to know that you weren't seeing anyone got him full of happiness, his sleepless far gone now.

You eye him, his lips hard pressed together. This feeling is new to him. He doesn't know how to describe it. He just wants to kiss you, hug you, and be close to you. So close that your bodies become one. In a fearless act, he leans closer to you, his eyes asking for permission as your lips grow closer and closer.

When your lips touch is like heaven to him. You were coight off guard, but you followed his actions without thinking twice. The kiss is slow and passionate, and the chemistry is just right. In a slow move, he drags his hands along your arms and place them behind your neck, pulling you even closer. He couldn't believe in his own actions. He was actually kissing you!

While one of his hands is still behind your neck, caressing the hair and pulling you more and more to him, his other hand travels to your tight. He's so scared he moves in slow motion. What if you feel uncomfortable? What if you pull away from him? He's so scared, but he needs to touch you, or he'll drive himself crazy.

Your body grew hotter as you felt the warmth of his hand gently caressing your tight. A low sound scales his lips when you pull the kiss apart, leaving him with a red face and pouty lips. "Is this real?" You asked. Daisuke didn't reply, he was too embarrassed of himself to do so. It all happened so fast he didn't have the time to think straight about his actions.

The kiss was something you wished for a long time, and now that it was actually happening, you needed time to cope. To be honest, you have always imagined you and Daisuke together. You have always wished for him, craving for him silently. You wouldn't let this chance go to waste.

He stares at you with doe eyes, melting your heart. He looks so cute and so sexy at the same time that you actually feel dirty for having this kind of thought about him. Not knowing how to proceed, you both just stare at each other. For a moment, it feels like time has paused. For a moment, everything is about him and you, sitting on your bed with clumsy feelings and red lips.

"H-hey, so.. c-can we do more? Like... I want to kiss you more." Daisuke breaks the silence. You look at him, but it feels like you're looking straight to heaven. All you want to do is kiss him more. Not just that, you want him in a way you never wanted anyone before.

"S-soo... are you going to accept or... it's okay if you don't wanna, really!! A-actually, I don't even know why I'm asking, haha!" He fake laughs. His face became more redish and fluttered. He was about to pull completely away from you when you throw yourself on top of him.

You kiss him again, this time in a more needy and desperate way. You caught him off guard, but it didn't take long for him to respond to your kiss. Very gently you start to move, now sitting on his lap, never breaking the kiss as you do it.

He's overwhelmed. He can't say he never thought of you on his lap, but to actually have you there is a totally different level. He can feel himself getting harder as you get closer to him, pressing your body onto his.

Your hands go around his neck, hugging him while you press yourself on his chest. His arms hug you from your waist, caressing your back and sending you chills. He slowly lowers his hands until he reaches your butt, gently grabring it.

"Ahh, so hot" he says between kisses, making you shiver and readjust yourself on top of his laps. You start to grind on his lap, moving in a painfully slow rhythm. With his hands still on your butt you trail your kisses dawn his jawline.

He's lost in the feeling of your mouth in his neck, and just the thought of you leaving hickeys on him makes him even harder down there. How lucky was him for having a girl like you on top of him? He didn't know. He just knew he was lucky as hell.

"I-i need to tell you something.." Daisuke says. You make a signal for him to continue talking but never leaving his neck, your mouth glued to him like you need him to survive. "I'm- ah, I never... uhm, I-m a v-virgin" he finally says.

You stop the kisses, and he panics for a moment. You move back to look at him, his lips red and glimpse from the earlier kiss. You take your hand and put on his left cheek, caressing a little to bring comfort to him. "I-i'm a virgin too. Hehe" you say.

"So, like, do you want to stop here?"

"No- I mean... we c-could make it work. O-only if you want to, or course!!" You say, now being the shy one. Everything is new to you both, the feelings, the sensations, the craving, the desires: everything.

After a while, just admiring you, Daisuke comes back to kissing, not lasting long and going straight to your neck. Now, it was his turn to leave marks on you. The little noises tha scape your mouth almost making him cum right there.

The make-out is way out of control now, both of you kissing and praising each other as the clothes disappear one by one. At one point, you were only in your bra and panties sitting in front of him.

With his hand, he reaches to your arm, slowly making his way to your back. Your faces so close to each other you could count the moles in his face. "Can I take your bra off?" He asks. You nod, and he proceeds to do so.

He helps you take it out and throws it where the other clothes were thrown previously. He trails kisses down your bodies, starting from your neck and going all the way down to your clavicle. He worships you like you're the last drop of water in a desert, kissing and leaving hickeys everywhere he passes.

When he finally reaches for your boobs he can't help but stare. "Ahh, you're just so pretty~ I want you all for me," he says, looking at you.

In a bold movement, you push him down, forcing him to lay on his back while you crawl on him until you reach his lap again. For a moment, you stop what you are doing. "Wait, what about protection?"

"There in my pants, in the wallet, there is one we can use." he says. You get up quickly and gind the condom exactly where he said it was. "Do you always have this thing with you all the time? Why?" You ask coming back to him. You sit at the same position you were before.

"For moments like this." he answers, making you blush and smile a little. He smiles, too.

You look down at him, the volume in his boxes being extremely visible. "This looks painfull" you say as you help him take his boxes, leaving him full naked under you. "Oh, it is, c-can you help me?" He asks, his voice clearly more desperate than before.

You take of your last piece of clothing and open the condom. Stroking him a little before, you put it on his dick. "A-ah, that's... so tight.." he hisses. "I think you underestimated you size baby"

He blushes. "Hey, don't you think it would be less painfully if I was the one on top?" He asks

"Well, maybe... I'm not actually sure."

"Let's try then." He gets you on his arms and switches the position, now being on top. This view of you makes him feel like on cloud nine. The prettiest girl he'd ever seen all open and needy for him? Danm, he could cum just by the view of you like this.

Not being able to watch any longer, he positions himself and moves forward, his dick filling you inch by inch. The pain makes itself present, but it's not something you can't handle.

"Ah- ahh, you're so tight... shit" Daisuke says as he finally puts everything in. "Oh yes, ahh~ you're so hot, so tight, hmmm.. so fucking good"

He lay his body down, letting his weigh on top of you. You can hear his little moans in your ears as you try to get used to his length. "Danm Dai, I didn't know you were s-so big"

"S-stop it, if you talk like this I might already cum." He smiles. "A-ah, I can't believe I'm finally in you"

"I-i think.. you can move now.." You say, the pain now transformed into pleasure, making you crave for more and more of him.

He starts to push into you, the feeling consuming your senses. The extase is just too much. You actually feel like you could come right there already. "O-oh my god, ahh~"

"D-do you like it? Am I, ahh- am I doing g-good?" He asks. His voice filled with luxury, whispering right at your ear. "Y-yes, yes"

He slowly picks his pace, savoring and discovering your body. He wants to know every place you're sensible at, every move that makes you moan louder, he wants to kiss every corner of your body and make you feel so special that your would come just for him. Gosh, that's his greatest wish.

You were getting overstimulated, your clímax approaching so fast your moans started to go silent. Then, he suddenly stops. You look at him with a sad eye, a moan of protest leaving your mouth as you roll your eyes at the back of your skull.

"W-why'd you stop?"

"C-can we switch positions? Uhm, there's this one position I've always wanted to try.." he asks, his lips pouty like a little kid and his dick twitching inside you like a rock. You were in so much pleasure that you would accept anything this man asked you, so you instantly agreed.

He guides you how he wants, and you end up on all fours, with your chest glued on the bed and your ass up like a cat. He stands behind you, his eyes betraying him as he worships you. "Shit, you're so hot, you know that? Perfect, just perfect, ahh"

He positioned himself again, not sparing time for you to get used to him, going as fast as he can the moment he's inside you. He's crazy. So lost in the souce he can't make a proper sentence, he just yaps nonsense and moans desperately, seeking his hight just as he seeks your pleasure.

Your moans are like music to his ears. The more you moan, the more he knows he's good for you. "Aahhh, I don't think I'll- hmm, last any, uh longer" he moans.

He's now totally on top of you, his chest glues to your back while he leaves kisses, hickeys, and bites at your neck, making your pleasure ten times bigger. He's pushing as fast as he can, trying to make you feel as special as him.

"Ah, I-I'm gonna, ahh!" He screams. His movements become more erratic as he reaches his high. The condom becoming even more tight in his cock, now full of his liquids. You can feel his cock throb inside you, the feeling pushing you over the edge, making you both come at the same time.

The movements stop, and you just stay there trying to catch your breaths. After a while, he comes out of you and removes his condom. He lays down at your bed on his back, right by your side. You lay on your tummy and you look at each other.

"Did I do well? Was I good enough?" He asks.

"You were perfect, Dai" you reply. His eyes light, and he finally relaxes. You go closer and kiss his forehead, then his cheeks, then his nose, then you finally leave a peck at his lips. He looks at you with heart on his eyes. He's confident he's the happiest man in the world.

"So, are you seeing someone?" He asks. "Yes," you reply, "you."

After taking a bath, you both finally lay down to rest from your tiring movie night. He's hugging you from behind, leaving sugary kisses on your neck where the bruises start to appear. "Sorry I marked you, I went a little wild, hehe"

You turn to face him. "It's okay, Dai," you smile. He looks at you and throws a sad smile. You know him too danm well to recognize when something is off with him, and since he's just naturally honest, it's usually not hard to find out what it is that is bothering him.

"What happened?"

"Can I ask you a serious question?"

"Sure, go on," you reply.

"What's your favorite Pokémon?"

"Are you serious??" You ask. The sound of his laugher travellings straight to your heart.

"No, seriously now. Do you... happen to like me? Or something?" He plays with his fingers while looking down, just occasionally looking up to see your reaction. You don't even need to think before you answer him. "Yes, I do." You say.

When he was about to say something, you heard a ringtone, someone was calling you.

"It's Anya!"

"God, FINALLY!"

You accept the call. "Girl, you could have sent a message!" You sight. "It's okay, we understand. What I did all night? Ah, you know, casual things... cupcakes." Daisuke smiles by your side. "Okay, rest well, se ya!" You hang the call.

"Is my new nickname 'cupcake'?" He plays.

"Shut up."

F/n: Sorry if it looked like I was babying him, I just had this thought of him being a really sweet young guy. Also, sorry if it looked rushed, I am DEFINATLY NOT a professional, both in writing and in English. (Please tell me if I made a spelling mistake)

[leggerefiore]

A while ago I saw this trend (?) where someone would follow their partner around for a while without saying anything. Like whenever their partner would ask what they were doing they'd just stare at them like 🧍‍♀️ it was verry funny LMAO. How would fucked up hair trio (Volo, Lear and Grims) react to their S/O doing that?

(Also I feel you whenever I see you post about ur job. I have never felt less confident in myself than when I have to work in retail 💀)

(retail is a form of psychological torture.)

cw: mentions of knives in Volo's part, mostly worrying about being followed

characters: Grimsley, Lear, Volo

♠️Grimsley❤️

♤ The gambler was always so aware of his surroundings. He had to be, naturally. His position as an heir to a wealthy family had set him up to be used to cruelty and possible threats even as a small child. He was simply aware of his safety. Then, in becoming a gambler, he further honed that skill. Not to mention, his poor Liepard seemed just on edge. Someone was following him. Why? Well, he could assume a few reasons. He was not the most beloved person and maybe owed a few too many people money. He flipped a coin as he kept himself in mostly populated streets. Though, when, he finally gained an opportunity to glance at who was stalking after him. He blinked. What…?

♡ “Darling?” He called out as he turned around fully to face you. His mind rushed with possible reasons. Did you think he was cheating and decided to follow after him? He tilted his head and waited for a reply. You gave none, however. Your eyes simply peered into him. It was truthfully a bot unsettling… You were not exactly the type to do things like that. His hand found his Liepard's fur as he pet her. Was this… some kind of game? A challenge, perhaps? For what goal or gain? He rushed with so many possibilities, but nothing came out right. You were simply just following him. It was unsettling, but there was nothing he could do. He wandered back to the apartment you both shared.

◇ Stopping in front of the door, he glanced at you on the other end of the hallway. You simply stood there. He had enough. Grimsley walked towards you with a brisk pace and found himself staring deeply into your eyes with his piercing own. The icy blue could send a shiver down most people's spines. He watched as you finally gave a reaction, shrinking back a bit. A chuckle left him. “Oh, man, is my cute stalker scared?” he shook his head and caught your chin with his hand, “How about a role reversal? I'm pretty good with going undetected.” Suddenly, you broke down and explained it was a prank. He tilted his head. While he did not really get it, to each their own, he supposed. He did want to repay the favour, though.

👑Lear💎

🪙 The prince was a busy man. He had places to be and duties to tend to. This tended to give him a certain aloofness that others tended to notice. Though, he was still trained from a young age to be aware of his surroundings. He was entirely competent about what was happening around him. Which is why he noticed a certain oddity as he engaged in his various duties. Someone had been following him. No, not either of his retainers, who were at his side. He felt unsettled. Horror stories of attacks on various figureheads played on his mind, but he refused to show any weakness. He was going to be king. These little things could not bother him. Yet, at the same time, he simply had to look. His gaze fell back to see who dared followed him. A deadpan then fell across his face.

🪙 “I order you to stop trailing behind me at a distance of about three metres!” he ordered, “If you wish to travel with me, your place is at my side!” Sawyer and Rachel turned around to see you just standing there. You stared at them without saying a word. Lear honestly felt a bit discomforted by your actions. What in the world were you doing? Knowing it was only you following him had relieved a lot of his concerns but left him confused. You were more than welcome to join him in his tasks…? He rather enjoyed having you at his side. Yet, you did not move unless he did. It was oddly frustrating. Sawyer scratched his head at the situation while Rachel clearly was fighting back a laugh.

🪙 This continued on until he grew far too frustrated with the situation. Why on earth were you doing this!? He could not comprehend why you would wish to follow him rather than come to your rightful place at his side. It felt as if you were subtly rejecting him! He crossed his arms and gave up on whatever needed his attention. It was not urgent enough. Stomping toward you, he grasped your wrist. This seemed to snap you out of whatever had overcome you. He pulled you along to where his retainers waited for him. “You belong here,” he grumbled, “Whyever would you follow me…?” Lear shifted to grasping your hand. He simply refused to comprehend and was only mildly annoyed by the situation.

📜Volo💫

⭐️ The merchant had a terrifying awareness of the world around him. Nothing slipped by him, and it was truly both a curse and a blessing for him. He was always cursed with an innate curiosity that seemed to torture him. Though, it also benefitted him. He was fully aware that someone was following after him. His movements were deliberately made to see if it was mere coincidence or purposeful. He determined the latter and grew more worried. Was someone aware of his intentions? Did they plan to attack him? He certainly was not going to allow that to occur. A knife he kept on his person for protection had his hand resting on it. He turned around to catch the pursuer unawares. Yet, as he went to pull out the knife, he froze dead in his tracks.

⭐️ “… What in the world are you doing?” he retracted his hands and crossed his arms. You stood just a few metres behind him, watching him ominously. This would have made him nervous had he not already been aware that you were not possibly with knowledge of his plans. He waited for you to reply, but nothing ever came from you. This immensely frustrated him. He could have attacked you — Many times, the merchant had to deal with bandits attempting to steal his goods and possibly his life. The blond shook his head when you only stared at him wordlessly. This was not something that he could dare to stand for.

⭐️ With eerie speed, he approached you and caught your wrist in his hand. A single grey eye stared through your very being. Whatever resolve you had to keep pranking, the merchant faded, and you shook your head, trying to explain just what was happening. Your words calmed the panicked thoughts in Volo's mind. He had been utterly terrified you had somehow uncovered something. “… I see, I see,” he tried to pretend he was not a hypocrite who had not followed you around himself, “Well, I must say… I had thought it was a bandit. Please be more careful.” He brought a hand to cup your cheek while stroking it with his thumb. When he parted, you felt oddly on edge. The blond simply kept walking as he had before.

[thechekhov]

Hello! Just wanted to say I love all your content but I wanted to ask if you had any advice/tips for running curse of strahd? I'm working on getting ready to run it with some friends/my partner and while I've run a fair amount of homebrew stuff this is my real first attempt at a legit module so I was curious if you could share anything since I believe you also are running/had run that module as well?

Thanks for asking! This is a very fun question!

I have indeed run Curse of Strahd. It was my first foray into long-term DMing and my team and I finished that campaign a little under a year ago. It was awesome, and I'm always excited to talk about it. Curse of Strahd had be a great game if everyone is on the same page!

First of all, I'm gonna say

Having Experience with Homebrew will be a huge boon

When I ran CoS, I followed the actual module about... 60% of the time. It was good... as a baseline/blueprint. But the reality is that I changed up a lot of the details. Either because I didn't like the vibes of the story, or because the plot points were antithetical to my team's goals. I changed up an entire floor of Ravenloft. I threw away a whole storyline for a major NPC because I felt it was too boring.

I think most people who run Curse of Strahd do this, actually. I've heard countless tales of how others Homebrewed their own meat onto the skeleton, and still came out of the campaign with an awesome, Strahd flavored experience. So don't worry about that part.

Here's my advice:

1. Everyone should vibe with what Strahd IS as a game.

Strahd can be a lot of things - you can Homebrew your own motivations into him, or make him a her, or change the history of his castle if need be. But if there's one thing Curse of Strahd is... it is DARK.

The Venn Diagram of Parties Who Understand That Suffering Can Be Fun To Roleplay and Parties Who Had A Good Time Doing CoS is probably a circle. You cannot do this adventure with a group of people who just want to hit monsters a whole bunch. It's an inherently 'oh my god this SUCKS' adventure. That's the main theme. Your players need to be able to enjoy that sort of game, otherwise they will just be miserable.

One of my players, upon arriving in Barovia, immediately said 'I hate it here' and then continued to say it for the rest of the campaign. That is kind of the catchphrase of CoS. Your players need to be comfortable with that sort of bleak horror and overall misery. It makes the end and the potential to finally end Strahd worth it.

That being said, Strahd can also just be... a lot. It has death and torture and psychological horror in there. KIDS DIE. Please discuss this stuff with your table, and remove elements if they guarantee a bad experience for everyone!

(Yes, you can trim down some of the viscera if you need to, that's fine. But keep in mind it will still be tragic. It SHOULD still be tragic. I set some boundaries for myself, but I also killed a whole town in an avalanche. It happened to be the only town my players had grown to like. It was a dick move. It was exactly what you would expect to happen.)

2. Read ahead - A LOT AHEAD.

For a self-contained world, Barovia isn't actually that big. It's a very small map, compared to some that span continents. That means you have the ability to flesh it out, as it were.

To add to that... some areas are... severely underdeveloped plot-wise. Sometimes there are places your players will go where it FEELS like it should link up to another point in the game but it just... doesn't. There is room to expand there. Use your Homebrew skills to connect the dots that the module doesn't!

I greatly recommend taking the time to either read through the whole adventure OR listen through some video-essays. There IS some cool stuff that comes in in the later game that you can grab and put down breadcrumbs for from day one. Or add to your own story twists.

My recommended resource for this is the Curse of Strahd DM's Guide video series.

...and to that end...

3. Start living in Ravenloft Castle WAY before your players get there.

Listen..........listen. look.

Look at this, and suffer as all GMs have suffered.

Castle Ravenloft is unarguably the biggest, stupidest, most architecturally ludicrous hurdle when it comes to GMing CoS. And I am here to tell you - IT IS DOABLE.

You can understand the castle, you can grow comfortable with it. But you need to start early. Hell, I think I began to set up Ravenloft maps before my players even knew it existed. Then I stopped, because I was scared.. but then I went back, and I.... roleplayed SOLO on my off-days! I set up little scenes between Strahd and others and imagined him setting traps, and doing other things. It helped me understand which staircase led to where, and what floors were accessible from which angles.

A part of me actually thinks that there should be a mini GMs-only class where a more experienced Strahd GM takes some time with other GMs to guide them through a map of the castle. A CoS Learning Oneshot, if you will.

There's also a LOT of talented mapmakers that create beautiful, digital CoS maps! Here's one:

Even if you are playing analogue, at a physical table, I greatly encourage you to check it out for reference. The official CoS maps are bleak and a little bit more... rustic? Than they are gothic.

Anyway, in order to avoid talking your ear off, I will end it here.

My last bit of advice is... to have fun!

Yes I know I just said that Strahd is an inherently bad-vibes game. But it's actually GOOD to let your players goof off now and then. Don't be afraid to let them do shenanigans. It builds character, and allows them to regain the energy they need to role-play properly heavy elements later.

My group did a whole bunch of funny stuff. They felt so bad about losing Ireena that when they saw Ismark, instead of explaining themselves to him they cast Darkness and tried to scramble away. There was a running joke that the cleric was too good to know about sex, so they used the euphemism 'play cards' around her, much to everyone's amusement. They got kicked by a walking house once and never forgot nor forgave. And finally, they defeated some Flame Skulls by putting them into a bag of holding.

Anyway, the point is... have fun! I wish you and your party the best of luck. :)

[stick-ball]

saw a hc about jean moreau being hyper sexual especially post-ravens. thoughts? feelings?

thoughts AND feelings! Oh the joy of being given a chance for a hot second to discuss this. You came to the right place my love. ❤️

Trigger and age warning : rape, sex connected trauma, dissociation, psychological abuse, controlling relationships, discussion of sexual acts.

Okay so, being hyper sexual. You know who does that in the books? Andrew actually. I know some might look at me weirdly rn like, 'what the hell are you talking about, he doesn't let anyone touch him'. Yeah, that's true! But that doesnt take away from the knee jerk reaction. (I'm sorry I know this isn't exactly what you asked but I need to discuss andrew first, and that has a lot to do with jean, bear with me).

Andrew finds a partner that he can to some limit trust (leverage, deals, careful observation, "training" them to behave how he tells them) to follow his instructions, which gives him a sense of control. They can fuck, but it's him who's doing it. It's him who's touching, kissing ect. The other person, of course if they consent, get to partake but not create the experience. It's one of the very, very valid scenarios of hyper sexuality as a responce to rape. He is rewriting every poisoned nerve ending in his body. He doesn't actually get off from the sex. For his own release he needs privacy, as shown in the books. Andrew's problem can be, that due to his truly inhumane trauma he can fall into the mindset of defining his sense of self through sex. It's an action and he's a tool in this scenario. Then again, We circle back to control, which is also a key feature of his decisions and protectiveness. Taking total control of the situation which used to be utterly outside of it, with no way out of it. Rewriting it, giving the traumatic experience a positive ending, hell an ending - when, and as suddenly as he might want it to end, is the motivator here. I think what he finds satisfying in terms of sex, not control, is giving sexual consent to his partners and, which he finds just as important, them giving it to him. Because it wasn't given to him. It's a way of building trust.

The motivations sound pretty nice, even if heartbreaking, don't they? Seem uplifting? The problem is, even if in good faith, this process can be very harmful, trauma surviviors mention that (at least ones I discussed it with personally) it feels good, but in the long run it does what this type of coping mechanism always does to your brain (similiar reactions can be seen for different traumas), which is hurt it. It's a form of desensitisation that limits your brain's ability to percieve the situation. It's hard to rewrite and leads to hot and cold kind of reactions, so yeah, having a relationship with a capital R is, difficult. That's what I always understood as Nora saying they are never actually okay (andrew and neil). Or at least partly understood it as.

Okay, so this cleared a couple things up. Now JEAN. Jean and Andrew share some factors of their trauma. While not treated as such, Jean was technically fostered by the Moriyamas, and well, Andrew's experiences with being fostered are faaaaar from what it's supposed to be as well. The difference is in Andrew's situation everyone tried to pretend the horror is not happening, there must have been a lot of manipulation and coercion and just plain fucking gaslighting in these houses. Its hard to talk about but I can imagine some of these monsters wanted him to act like he is enjoying it, and thats just out if the emotional range of dealing with for anyone. Jean knew he's in a trap from day one. Moreover, when it comes to the rape's he was victim of it was ordered by Riko to be done by others. That's a different level of fucked up. What's even more important as distinction here is he stopped, when Jean stopped reacting and fighting it. Because what Riko wanted wasn't violation, that was the tool. He wanted to psychologically break him. When the fish stops flailing on the cat stops pushing it around.

And Riko was constant, his modus operandi was regular, and the psychological torture was the motivator behind most of his "conditioning" of Jean. This is a situation where the abuse has a cause for the victim. It sounds sick and I don't agree with it, but it's a game in their mind. In the books we can see that he learned how to limit the amount of attention Riko gave him and as we know he is not confrontational like Andrew with his problems. And yeah I don't mention Neil as confrontational here bcs he has conditioned himself to run from everything and say he's fine to everything so..., sometimes it erupts frk mit but that's not exactly the same, its a last resort.

Circling back, I think Jean is more likely to be sex repulsed. For him sex, which was a form of punishment, is a cause of anxiety. Sexual tension is easy to mix up with nervous tension because of a feeling of losing control of the situation. That's why if we do get romance in the new book, I am putting my money on it being very messy from his pov. The magical thing about trauma responces though, is that they're not black and white, and someone who is sex repulsed might also seek an ending to their anxieties through it. Yet, it's ts a bit of an opposite motivation to the one Andrew has. When Andrew thinks of himself as a tool, Jean is more likely to think of himself as an object. There's a difference. While Andrew wants to take control, Jean is more likely to use it as either a way to retraumatise himself - so his version of hypersexuality would include less control and more roughness and violence, actually trying to rile the partner up. It might stemm for him from low self worth or be a way of letting out his angers and frustrations. It's not that he is used to being hurt, it's that he doesn't expect anything different. I also think he is more likely to have problems with opening up in therapy. Where Andrew is active Jean is passive, and the opposite. The upside is he might actually be more likely to communicate emotionally than through rules and laws, it will take longer, but be a smoother transition, because more people understand it than Andrew's way of building relationships.

Hope this anwser satisfies you, I'm sorry if I got a bit carried away. 😅

[crownmemes]

Supernatural & Paranormal Sentences, Vol. 6

(Sentences from various sources for muses exploring the unexplained. Adjust phrasing where needed)

"There must be a rational answer for all of this."

"I have no tolerance for the unexplainable."

"Unfortunately, satanic ritual is alive and thriving. The trick is knowing how to recognise its patterns."

"You don't see ghosts. They don't exist. Is that clear?"

"You really believe this, don't you? That you're a vampire?"

"You're not scared of ghosts?"

"A cat! Don't you understand? It's the classic satanic offering! It's what they do - it's what they've always done!"

"I have a bad feeling about this..."

"Hateful things live in this house."

"I haven't seen a lot of horror movies, but this seems like exactly the kind of place they'd suggest to avoid."

"When I was a kid, I could see things. Things humans aren't supposed to see."

"You must allow that each incident in itself is capable of a more natural explanation."

"Hey, are you experiencing an ominous sense of foreboding?"

"I know only that we cannot hide from our ghosts. Whether they are real or not, we must make our peace with them."

"You haven't come all this way just to turn back now, have you?"

"They do tests. Psychological, medical. They look inside your head, and they insert a tracking device inside your brain sometimes. You wouldn't like that."

"I know that this is hard to understand, but you have to believe me that this is real!"

"You don't think that's a little paranoid?"

"For once in your life, admit that you are up against something bigger than you!"

"I'm not weird! It's just that weird things keep happening to me!"

"Nobody ever feels really safe in the dark."

"At the time she was seen, it was impossible that she could be a living person."

"If we identify a UFO, does that just mean it's an FO?"

"Don't worry, people who die in this house always come back."

"I talk to ghosts here all the time."

"You cannot make deals with the dead!"

"Normal? There's nothing normal about this!"

"To a collector of fairytales, this is no doubt fascinating - but you cannot seriously believe that."

"It is quite the feat to kill that which is already dead!"

"Please be aliens, please be aliens, please be aliens..."

"There are things happening here that you don't understand, and right now, you just need to accept that."

[haley-harrison]

Eric Kripke is the Alfred Hitchcock of our generation. In this essay I will outline the main types of horror they use, offer examples, and elaborate the genius of the said tropes.

It will come as no surprise to anyone familiar with the man's work, that Kripke loves his ✨gore✨. Now that he's no longer restrained by CW's PG rating, he gets to go full-throttle with it in The Boys. That isn't to say that Supernatural didn't get it's fair share though - I mean, just remember the "Skin" episode in season one - that scene where the skinwalker changes his skin is pure body horror. Masterful.

Okay, Haley, so what? Some of us aren't squeamish. What's the brilliant part?

Good point, my med/bio orientated reader. That gets me to the second type of horror (and my personal kryptonite): psychological horror.

Here we get to lovecraftian themes. And I don't exactly mean Cthulhu. See, lovecraftian monsters are incomprehensible to the human mind, which generates horror through the unease of being unable to understand. Similarly, certain characters that the majority of the audience cannot identify with, can be used to the same end. Lemme illustrate this with two examples: Homelander and The Deep.

I reckon it's safe to assume most people aren't sadistic psychopaths, nor zoophiles with a penchant for sea creatures. Therefore the extreme Otherness of these two makes people uneasy, disturbing on a fundamental level. Hitchcock refined that particular horror trope by sprinkling his movies with taboo-topics of his own time, such as implied homosexuality. (*gasp* 🏳️‍🌈😆)

And here we get to the now well-known horror rule: the unseen monster is the scariest monster. More broadly, what is only implied can be more impactful than having the exact scenario shown on screen. The unsaid leaves more to the imagination (which is the most powerful tool for horror), and creates and additional dread with the element of unknown. People are unsettled by what else there might be, when elipses replace a clear answer.

Now back to Kripke, and how CW's censorship actually worked in his favor in Supernatural.

Maybe you saw this coming, but the monsters aren't the lovecraftian element. (Really, with the exception of tulpas and wendigos, none of them were even remotely scary). As I said above, Homelander and The Deep are lovecraftian because they're freaks. Unsympathetic freaks, but imagine if we took that first part away...

I shan't say it.

Just. Something something, american gothic, shit's implied and that's the point.

Haley, is this an elaborate ploy to talk about shipping? Really?

No. This is about environmental storytelling, gritty noir filter, camera angles, and just how much is left unsaid. This is about trauma, and repression, and the emotional reaction of the audience when they're left to ruminate a bit on the kind of lives the Winchesters had. It's about the missing scenes, the psychology, the implications - just -

*deep breath*

Another brilliant thing is how Kripke plays around with bathos - causing contrasting feelings in quick succession to give the audience emotional whiplash. The quips sprinkled in between the violence. The unexpected gag right before a gut-punch. It accentuates the experience for the audience. Like the way Dean's relationship with food is often played for laughs, but when you mull it over it's not hard to figure out the underlying food scarcity while growing up.

And furthermore, where did the money come from when times were tough? A myriad of angst-fics went ahead to answer that, which just proves an implication is far superior to exposition.

Then there's Hell. We don't get more than a few seconds of flashes, but think about it. Wouldn't Hell use every torture method imaginable? And what's the most psychologically damaging thing you can do to a person, especially a man?

I think you know the answer.

And that realization is the dawning psychological horror.

Finally, I'll leave you with this:

Just... Kripke!!!

I'm biting stuff!

[verdantwyrm]

I'm curious on what do you think about genderbend au of mouthwashing since I see a lot of people hates it for not "getting the point" and "erases the plot"

While some genderbends of it from what i see is never intended to be a serious au all of them are just like silly fanarts

Short answer? No, I don't think it inherently takes away from the plot and misses the point and people are allowed to have fun with their psychological horror video game however they like.

Long answer? I already have some pretty stickler opinions about genderbends as is simply put: Alot of them are extraordinarily lazy by just slimming down men into big busty women with no body fat or muscles, and so on the opposite way with turning women into big buff ugly alpha chad dudes. But whatever thats not the point— I think Genderbends, for specifically Mouthwashing, are fine.

While the pregnancy does play a very huge part in the game, it can be done expertly the other way around or not at all, if thats what you're aiming for, as the actual assault and it happening is just as important. Its just one of those kind of things you need to surgically manoeuvre around to make it not seem like you're dismissive towards rape against men or that women can be rapists without it coming off as extremely misogynistic, which is where alot of people that do write this stuff tend to fall towards, even by accident.

I absolutely do think, beyond Anya, that if the situation was genderswapped, I do think it would go pretty much the same. Some very small things would be changed, and I'm not entirely sure exactly what since the themes of Toxic Masculinity, Abuse of power, etc. All rely entirely on Pony Express' treatment of their workers, it boils back to capitalism and how it directly impacts people like Jimmy and directly enables their behaviour. The actual mince meat of the story wouldn't change all that much because PE is an absolute in both circumstances, and the things that would change are miniscule compared to the overarching theme of Capitalism Is Bad and that it Enables Bad People. As much as I love a good analysis, its a beautiful thing to be able to enjoy stuff on the surface level like fun art and silly AU's. or shipping, maybe even good endings! Its what keeps us sane.

[tobiasdrake]

Now, reading your blog makes me wonder how Gohan from the Buu arc would do in a killing game. He's in the right age bracket, after all.

Assuming power levels weren't a factor because that boy could crack a planet in half with his thumb when powered up so that's a complication....

I don't think Gohan has it in him to become the Blackened. Not because he's a good guy; A lot of good guys crack under the pressure of the Mutual Killing Game. Despair driving people to do things they would never consider outside of this extreme and traumatizing environment is the name of the game.

I say this a lot but it always bears repeating: Both the killers and their victims are all victims of Junko Enoshima. It's a Whodunit series built on extreme circumstances pushing people into extreme behavior, but the answer in a big picture sense is always Junko. There's a lot of nuance with regard to personal culpability in every killing but the broadest culpability lies with Junko. She's the guiltiest party of every case.

Gohan, I think, could be pushed under Killing Game circumstances to kill someone. He has, let's say, a temper. His rage is exactly the kind of psychological weak point that a talented manipulator could exploit. I'm reminded of the way Celeste wound Hifumi up, aimed him at Taka, and pulled the trigger. "He stole the important thing and he's planning to kill you and also he... hurt me...."

Gohan would absolutely be a sucker for that kind of approach.

But that's the closest to Blackened I think Gohan could ever get: A manipulated patsy for the real Blackened. Gohan himself couldn't be the Blackened for one simple reason: He's too honest. I can imagine Gohan killing someone if given the right trigger to set off his rage. Gohan can too; It's why he didn't want to fight Cell. But I can't imagine him concealing it and going through Class Trial to consciously try to escape at the cost of everyone else's lives.

If Gohan were the Blackened, he would come clean and accept his fate. Which, to a writer, means he can't be the Blackened. That's an irreconcilable problem.

I do think, however, that Gohan would best be suited as one of the protags that makes it all the way to the end or at least gets a couple cases under his belt before someone else kills him. He's smart and he likes to solve puzzles. He got really into the redundant time machine and cicada shell mystery.

He's also. Uh. Not to put too fine a point on it, but Gohan's seen some shit. He is no stranger to brutal violence and corpses. He's even killed some people himself. He's a good pick for the character that goes straight to work investigating the body while the other characters are still gasping in horror and throwing up in the corner. A strong fit for the Kyoko archetype.

Whether he makes it all the way to the end or dies in case 3 or 4 so we have to make do without him, is a matter for the plot to decide.

[heyftinally]

Okay, I almost ranted about this on a reblog, but it can (and probably should) be it's own post.

Fiction effects reality and fiction does not effect reality are BOTH true.

Yes, I'm going to elaborate in the most unedited, covid-fueled rant I can, as tumblr intended. Hold on to your butts, grab a soda, and strap in.

First and foremost, I need all of the piss on the poor readers to stop their feral response typing - READ what I'm ACTUALLY SAYING before you start bitching about what you're pretending I said. Got it? Good.

This is going to involve nuance. Yes, I know, this website is allergic to nuance. Pop a Benadryl, you'll be okay.

Now, for real:

Fiction DOES effect reality BUT

Only in subtle ways. Absolutely nobody is going from your average normal Sarah to a cold blooded mass murderer because they played silent hill or something. People who become murderers always have some other motive, usually long term and/or severe (ie years of abuse, victim of trafficking, untreated psychological disorder usually paired with abuse, etc).

When I say fiction influences reality, I mean kids who grew up hearing Disney's Pocahontas say "you think the only people who are people are the people who look and think like you, but if you walk the footsteps of a stranger, you'll learn things you never knew you never knew" are more likely to be accepting of diversity than the kids who exclusively grew up on South Park and Family Guy.

I mean reading stories of real people's struggles with disabilities not being accommodated will make you more likely to notice inaccessibility in your daily life, and make you more likely to be accommodating to those who need it.

I mean reading about how a character was skeptical of or easily misled about something via the media can make you more critical of what you read.

Fiction effects reality because if you only consume one kind of media, we assume that's the only way things are. If we consume a vast array of media, we learn to explore different possibilities.

Fiction does NOT effect reality IN THE WAY THAT

Reading a fanfic (or even a published novel) with dubious themes is inherently going to normalize those themes in your reality.

Millions of people watched Hannibal, but cannibalism didn't surge.

Lolita is a rather famous novel, yet I've never heard of it being the sole reason someone suddenly condoned pedophilia out of nowhere.

Horror movies do not routinely make people murderers.

Fiction is not enough to make someone completely change their morals.

So where is the line?

Exactly where your critical thinking ends.

Because yes, there are people who watch shows like South Park and Family Guy and take the crass, bigoted, and otherwise truly vile jokes at face value, and find the humor in that. There are also people who watch it and see the jokes as hyperbole emphasizing just how terrible the people in the show are. Yes, some of this also has to do with the show writers, but again - your critical thinking is what tells you "is this show promoting being racist, or is it showing this character as racist to drive home what an absolute shitbag they are?"

The other aspect is your personal moral compass and ability to adapt.

Yes, I'm talking about echo chambers.

If you can NEVER accept being wrong, or if you refuse to change your mind on a specific topic (again, like racism), so instead of adapting you seek out people who are more likely to agree with you, you may find yourself starting to agree with other viewpoints that previously you wouldn't have.

And this can be good OR bad - if being friends with someone who agrees with you that racism is wrong, they may influence you to also start believing homophobia is wrong, and that's a good thing! But the reverse can also happen, and that's bad.

But media alone didn't do that - it was one of MANY contributing factors, including race, religion, disability (or lack thereof), income, how you were raised, where you live, and more.

So whenever I see people talking about "pro-ship" and "anti-proship", all I can think is

Shipping is only one tiny thing that media can influence you on - why is shipping your sticking point, but not murder?

You aren't capable or willing of engaging with the media you consume in EITHER direction.

Being anti/proship is irrelevant. If anything you're just telling me whether or not toxic purity culture is part of your specific flavor of media illiteracy. It means nothing of substance.

Instead of worrying about who ships what, worry about how your views and actions shape how you percieve and impact those around you.

[scenetocause]

FIC WRITER INTERVIEW

tagged by @glasscushion thank youuuuuu <3

How many works do you have on AO3?

currently 60 but i periodically nuke my ao3 so that's not really the total and i know i've got quite a few on anon even now

What's your total AO3 word count?

457,512. what the fuck. that's like 2/3 of the bible. (if any of the words in my fic were in the bible)

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

ok i was so certain i could predict the order of these and i literally only got the top one right because what

climb up to your lips (girloscar, multi-chapter, 719 kudos)

shoreline i see when i'm off course (a/b/o, loscar & mando, wrote in about half an hour in a fugue state, 628 kudos)

just telling it like it is (lando/maxv, stupid little 5+1 thing i increasingly dislike and might orphan, 458 kudos)

(i) just wanna get a little bit closer (mando, honestly probably not the one i would have expected to be the most popular you know? like i think i would've assumed that was no plans of staying on. not that i dislike this one massively or anything it's just definitely one of my least thought through fics. 482 kudos)

every colour illuminates (genders georg/lando, if i'm objective about it i think this is probably my best fic or at least it's the most pure love letter to queerness which is sort of what they all are. 467 kudos)

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

i would like to. i always intend to. then i get overwhelmed and avoidant. i can't handle people saying nice things about me or at least have to sort of microdose it and responding feels too difficult sometimes, at the same time as i desperately crave praise haha really hard to tell i have a failed past involving a racing license definitely no need to dig into that one. there are some comments people have left on my work that mean so, so much and i hoard them and read them again when i can manage it so if i don't respond don't think it's because i don't want comments or don't appreciate them, my head is just a bear trap.

What's the fic you've written with the angstiest ending?

i don't really write angst but it's probably one of my george/mercedes ones like don't say no or you'll have to go (george/valtteri, the horror of getting what you want) or well past the weeds (george/toto, fucked up team debrief dynamics) - lando is incredibly easy for me to project onto because my lando is just me but younger and richer and hotter but the real psychological goop gets spilled out onto george.

What's the fic you've written with the happiest ending?

definitely every colour illuminates or pick me up, no headlights (george and max accidentally acquire a baby) which are sort of intentionally good outcomes. but i actually think turn my heart into something gold, where lando sort of sorts himself out, is maybe the most optimistic.

Do you write crossovers?

not in a true sense. i'll write an au but i don't like the idea of blending characters, idk why but that feels too chaotic for the blorbo sandbox. i guess maybe every day i let go just a little bit more is a crossover in the sense f1 and fe really are totally separate worlds.

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

no. probably loads of people hate my fic but they don't tell me about it, which is exactly the way i'd like to keep it. fic is a safe little sandbox for me to play in.

Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

haha. well. all the kinds? no, that's not true - you can definitely tell when you're reading an emptyhalf production. i've got a lot of things i think are incredibly hot that don't necessarily feature as essential to other writers (which is fine obviously! these are my tics not a ticklist) from ~broader concept things~ like having really clear consent to a thing for like, thinking it's hot when someone parts their legs? idk. brains man. generally i'd say i have a courageous approach to the concept of inserting things pretty much anywhere. i don't really give a shit about blow jobs tho and that probably shows. (which is funny cus i quite like giving them and am happy to make someone suck a strap? they've just never done anything for me as something to think about for whatever reason)

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

i think i did ages ago when there was some wattpad theft thing idk

Have you ever had a fic translated?

i think i have but i can't remember which one

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

i feel like nearly all my fics are co-written bc they often come from ideas in group chats or discords or whatever. and i quite often have to ask for help with shit i don't know about because i'm stupid as hell. i wrote burn a hole as a sort of postquel part of ivycrowned's fic, which is probably the most collaborative i've ever really been in that sense. i think the only fics that have been totally my own thoughts are the daniel goes to fe one and girloscar. altho with a lot of my mando the co-creators are max and lando so 🤷🏻‍♀️

What's your all-time favorite ship?

idk man. lando x being able to be vulnerable enough to get what you want. queerness x living a life in full vibrancy and without fear.

What's a WIP that you want to finish but don't think you ever will?

god i really do actually want to finish daniel goes to fe but i haven't been able to open the document for ages because there are millions of things wrong with me.

What are your writing strengths?

when i am in the mood i can bang out a lot of words. i think i am more easily able to access lando-voice than a lot of people bc i too am a whiny goblin but idk if that's a strength per se.

What are your writing weaknesses?

lmao god how long have we got what's the character limit on a tumblr post. uh, so. i don't plan i just write. like literally nothing goes on i just switch on the word tap and words come out. i don't edit, ever which means my fics are littered with grammatical errors (how DO commas work? not like that) and repeated words and shit that annoy the hell out of me when i spot them later. i have so many weird phrasing tics. i don't understand the concept of romance. i have a very offbeat and queer interpretation of relationships that only tangentially links to "normal." my kinks are excruciatingly obvious.

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

i think i don't really give a shit? like i probably wouldn't do it unless it was a language i could write it in first time because of the aforementioned 'turning on the word tap' method but idk if i care what other people are doing. i find it mildly off-putting when people write characters speaking their second language and throw words from their first language in because that is not how anyone speaking a second language talks or at least, it tends to get done wrong. like when i'm speaking english i will use words from (original language) but only in the context of referring to eg: a relative (like an italian saying nonna not granny) or if i really can't remember the word for some food or something. but also it's like, largely harmless and far from the biggest writing sin out there.

(the biggest writing sin is obviously having an incorrect take on my blorbos and also woobification and especially incorrect woobification of my blorbos)

What was the first fandom you wrote for?

p sure i would dox myself if i said this but i have written for quite a few. i've never been as active in a fandom or for as long as with f1 rpf. (shout out to the livejournal girlies, of which loads ended up working in f1)

What's a fandom/ship you haven't written for yet but want to?

i would never exercise the self-restraint to stop myself writing something i wanted to tbh

What's your favorite fic you've written?

idk. probably girloscar, i was proud of myself for finishing that. it's difficult for me to think positively about things i've done, so i don't know that i have favourites. the ones i re-read the most myself are genders georg and genders maxy. who can say if i have something going on with genders! but yeah idk i don't think i write like defining fics or anything profound like a lot of people do, it's mostly just weird horny thoughts percolating into a gdoc like drip coffee. actually you know what, it might be has-a-pussy-with-no-real-explanation max.

tagging @saintdevote @strawcars @lost-decade @des-iderate if you haven't been tagged already and no pressure obviously!

[goosemixtapes]

max's top 10 books of 2024

past top tens in this tag! as always, these rankings are based on some unspecified combo of objective "goodness" and personal enjoyment. books beneath the cut :3

first off, as usual, our BOOKS I LOATHED category. shout-out to: i, claudius by robert graves (SHAME! SHAME! THE TV SHOW IS SO GOODBADCAMP!) and rhinoceros by eugene ionesco (very real argument about fascism; very fucking boring execution). shout-out also to king cheer and immortal longings, both of which were quite bad but which i wouldn't say i "loathed" so much as "they sent me into spirals of shakespearean madness."

my most anticipated 2025 release is the sea eternal by emery robin. also, alecto the ninth again

okay. the meat of the matter. i read SO many good books this year (and so much good short fiction), so lots of runners-up: brotherless night by v.v. ganeshanathan (absolutely gutting with some of the most gorgeous prose i've ever read), white pearl by anchuli felicia king (set in an asian beauty corporation rocked by scandal; filled the succession-shaped hole in my heart), fairview by jackie sibblies drury (this play is doing the coolest fucking things with fourth walls), luster by raven leilani (i adore the main character so much and she is NOT thriving), and the his dark materials series (i wish i had read these as kids, but i'm also glad i have miltonic context?). thank you to my professors for half of these

OKAY. THE LIST!

10. Dare Me by Megan Abbott

i expected a thriller about toxic friendships and evil cheerleaders; i was not expecting this to REWIRE ME. the DYNAMICS in this fucking book. the ugly violent homoerotics and the empty hunger of white suburbia. the tenderness of the grooming. the constant unspoken looming specter of lesbianism. the constant sense that the main characters are teetering on the edge of disaster. BETH CASSIDY YOU ARE ONE OF THE CHARACTERS OF ALL TIME YOU MAKE ME FEEL BONKERS BATSHIT CRAZY. i need to send everyone in this book the lesbian masterdoc goodbye

9. Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehesi Coates

okay i know everybody raves about ta-nehesi coates' writing so i wasn't exactly SURPRISED this was good. but i WAS still knocked off my feet by the beauty of this book. this is an extended letter to coates' son on the experience of being a black man in america, and every single page is glowing with heartbreak--for all the black people destroyed and endangered by white supremacist society--and love--for everyone who keeps living, for the world, and for coates' son. i wrote down sooooo many quotes that struck me in the chest

8. Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin

kind of no fucking idea what to say about this book because my sense memory of it is just a whirlwind of "ack augh ough." the way this book envelops you in the psychological and emotional tumult of fourteen-year-old john grimes is crazy and intense and then baldwin DOES IT AGAIN in a series of interludes from other characters. this is about one day in john's life and his experience in the church, but it's also about the exhilarating terror in/of religion and the pain of growing up and the agony of antiblackness and the quiet terror of realizing your parents are fallible and human. and also a little bit about being gay for your youth pastor. did people lose their fucking minds in 1953 when this book came out because i would've

7. Lost Places and Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea by Sarah Pinsker

favorite author i discovered this year is definitely sarah pinsker, whose short stories mostly have in common that they are strange and whimsical as hell and make me want to crawl into her brain. i can't decide between her two short story collections, so i'm putting them both on here because they were SO fucking fun to read. between the two, some of the short stories include: a horror story told through a folk music genius lyrics page! a robot arm that identified as a road! a kid yelling the lines in the 1920s movie theater! george gershwin! girl scouts! and my favorite, a batshit crazy agatha christie homage set at a convention of dozens of alternate-universe sarah pinsker selves! (which you can read online!)

6. Paradise Lost by Erin Shields

look. there are aspects of this play--a modern reworking of milton's epic poem, featuring hot middle-aged woman satan--that are too on-the-nose. but holy fucking shit, the irreversible things milf satan has done to my brainstem. maybe i'm just a fucking ex-catholic but some of the speeches in this play made me feel like i was being tumbled in a heavy-duty washing machine. also, fascinating things going on with script format here. i wrote an insane transgender satan monologue for my paradise lost class because of this play. (also shout-out shields' king lear adaptation/prequel, left off my list for space but it's REALLY fucking fantastic)

5. In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado

okay we all know in the dream house. but i'm here to sing its praises anyway, because reading it feels like walking into a woodchipper. this is a memoir about abuse and an experiment with form and a raw open organ placed directly in your hands. machado's prose is genuinely fucking crazy good; she has such a gift for scalpel-like precision in every sentence, and everything about this book is so carefully-crafted and feels like getting clocked in the teeth. there's a choose-your-own adventure section where the result is always the same. for personal reasons i read this at a weird time and it made me want to get on my knees on the carpet and hack like a sick cat

4. Nobody Knows My Name by James Baldwin

i read this essay collection two weeks into the year and i knew it was going to be one of the most stunning reading experiences of 2024. the first page knocked me flat on my ass and it never let up. he manages that thing so few authors can do, where his eloquent and precise prose is exactly as deft as his observations are perceptive and sharp. his work cuts straight to the truth of things. i finished this book grieving the fact that baldwin died before i was born--because he can't comment on current events? because i can't see him speak live? because i felt some kind of connection to him through the words despite knowing he was not writing for some random college kid in the backseat of a car? anyway i am a groupie now

3. Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

reading this and then in the dream house back to back was like self-trepanation. why did i do that. what in the name of god can i even say about this book. what IS there to say. all the best of fantasy and all the best of humanity are in here in under 300 pages and it made me cry and i have thought about it ceaselessly since and i can't say anything without spoiling the fun because you REALLY ought to go in blind. um. girls, do you like, um... the labyrinth?

2. Angels in America by Tony Kushner

ohhhhhhh my god. oh my fucking god. i mean it with my full chest when i say that this is thee defining dramatic work of modern america. play that is about jewishness and gayness and AIDS and love and sickness and the anxiety of modernity and getting boners and prophecies from reactionary angels. and roy cohn is there. this was written at the end of the 20th century and yet it still hits exactly as hard if not harder in 2024 ("in the twenty-first century we will all be insane" yeah for REAL). it's the play of all time. it's one of the most things ever written. i am going to think about it every day of my fucking life. truly impossible to overstate this one

1. The Stars Undying by Emery Robin

and yet AIA is still my #2, because my #1 is a book i think may have been written specifically for me. like, so much for me that i'm furious i didn't write it. that book being a space opera rendition of cleopatra's life story, featuring insane butch mark antony and bisexual love triangles and CICERO? CICERO IS THERE? this is a slowish character-driven story that wouldn't work if gracia's narration wasn't so stirring and self-aware, but it is, and she is, and she's fascinating and has everything wrong with her, and i am obsessed with the things this book is doing with history and legend and the reception of these figures and also ROMAN HISTORY JOKES IN SPACE!!! and i want anita decretan so bad it makes me look stupid. emery robin do you want my credit card information

if you've read this far, please pitch in with your own favorite reads of the year! what books are you excited for in 2025? :)

[the-golden-vanity]

💚 for the Terror. 💖🧡 and 📖 (but chapter(s) instead of entire book(s)) for Moby Dick

💚: What does everyone else get wrong about your favorite character?

Ooh, it's time to make some enemies.

I really, really dislike the popular fanon characterizations of James Fitzjames. Depending on what particular flavor of queer a fanwork is depicting him as, the kind of... shallow femininity that gets forced on him makes me MASSIVELY uncomfortable. It often comes across as somewhere between homophobic and misogynistic caricature, personality stripped away and replaced with a pretty dress.

I can see where this started, though—the pre-Carnivale dress scene is something that's very important to a lot of Terror fans, and perhaps something that endeared them to a character whose Empire-loving, glory-hounding, "the atrocities I've committed are fun table conversation"-believing ways are (hopefully) unsympathetic to a modern audience. Still, I'd like to see more fanworks engage with that side of James Fitzjames—the tool of an empire that can never love him back.

This isn't to say I don't love queer or trans readings of Fitzjames! I just want to see the character still be a glory-hounding veteran of an imperialist war, and someone I can still believe would shoot rockets at bears.

💖: Already answered here!

🧡: What is a popular (serious) theory you disagree with?

I had to think about this one for a bit. I'd say it's the take that I see floating around on the Internet a lot that Moby-Dick is cosmic horror. If we're taking cosmic horror to mean the horror of the incomprehensible, the impossibly alien, the Things Man Was Not Meant To Know, then there is exactly one chapter that fits the bill—"The Castaway", which includes maybe my favorite passage of the whole book.

However, almost the entire rest of the book is our narrator-protagonist making sense of the whale, as if knowing everything he can about it is his way of coping with the devastating trauma of losing everyone he spent two years of his life living with.

It's almost reverse cosmic horror—rather than a sane man going mad from coming face to face with an incomprehensible monstrosity, our mentally ill (traumatized/depressed/bipolar/open to interpretation) protagonist makes meaning for himself by learning to comprehend the monstrosity.

📖: If you had to remove one chapter from the book, which would you choose?

Ooh, that's a good question. And a hard one.

Moby-Dick is, rather famously, full of chapters upon chapters of whale facts, some of which are even true. I will not be getting rid of any of those. Those are load-bearing whale facts. You pull them out, and the book collapses into a respectable revenge tragedy, rather than the earth-shattering psychological epic that it is. The whale facts represent both the fact that for long stretches of a sea voyage, nothing particularly exciting is going on, and you have time to contemplate things like the immense scarred brow of the whale, and also that this story is being told by a traumatized man who's going off on tangents because he really doesn't want to get around to the part of the story where he loses everything and all of his friends die.

If I had to get rid of one chapter, it would probably be "The Town Ho's Story". Of all the ill omens and tales of woe that the Pequod's crew encounter on their fateful final voyage, this one drags out longest and (to me) was one of the less memorable. However, I'm sure it's probably someone's favorite chapter. Many of them are.

Thank you so much, @georges-chambers/@alienmythologist! You gave me much to think about.

Ask me for my unpopular opinions about boat stories!

[morlock-holmes]

I don't really know what messages young people in this country absorb about the Civil War these days.

When I was a kid the mainstream centrist narrative, one that I think was pushed in schools and was definitely pushed in pop culture, went something like this:

"We modern people understand that slavery was wrong. But it is a mistake to judge the people of past times based on modern psychology or morals; rather, we must understand them as people of their times, who understood their world in a way fundamentally differently then we do, so far in the future.

"During the late 18th and early 19th century, slavery was simply not a very important issue, either morally or politically, and it certainly didn't play into the civil war in any real important fashion. The idea of slavery as a moral issue is a modern-day viewpoint, and while it is morally correct, we simply cannot project those moral sensibilities back into a world where they didn't exist.

"The Civil War was a fought as the culmination of a complex, somewhat abstruse political debate about whether power should reside primarily in separate states or within the federal government, and while it is tragic that this debate caused a war, both sides of that debate had valid reasons for taking their position."

Do they still teach that kind of thing to kids these days?

Because the more I learn the more I realize what incredible horseshit that story was.

Here, for example, is John Quincy Adams, in 1838:

"Midway through the filibuster, on June 30, Adams responded to an interruption by South Carolina representative Francis Wilkinson Pickens and described a notorious incident from the previous year.

I do not doubt in the least that he is, himself, a kind and indulgent master; so, I doubt not, are all the gentlemen who represent his State on this floor. They know not the horrors that belong to the system, and attend it even in their own State; and when they are stated by those who have witnessed them, he calls the whole a tissue of misrepresentation. . . . He does not know the profligate villain who procreates children from his slaves, and then sells his own children as slaves. He does not know the crushing and destruction of all the tenderest and holiest ties of nature which that system produces, but which I have seen, with my own eyes, in this city of Washington. Twelve months have not passed since a woman, in this District, was taken with her four infant children, and separated from her husband, who was a free man, to be sent away, I know not where. That woman, in a dungeon in Alexandria, killed with her own hand two of her children, and attempted to kill the others. She was tried for murder, and, to the honor of human nature I say it, a jury was not to be found in the District who would find her guilty. . . . The woman was asked how she could perpetrate such an act, for she had been a woman of unblemished character and of pious sentiments. She replied that wrong had been done to her and to them; that she was entitled to her freedom though she had been sold to go to Georgia and that she had sent her children to a better world.

I recommend clicking through that link and reading about what Adams said about that case in his diary.

In general, that website, Story of The Week, has a number of excellent and readable primary sources about slavery and racism in America, and they particularly demonstrate that the Abolition movement objected to slavery for exactly the reasons that we now object to it today: That it was unspeakably cruel to separate children from their mothers and husbands from wives; that men should be allowed to profit from their own work, rather than having the proceeds stolen; that slave owners would rape their female slaves and sell their own children.

I'm just amazed at how much energy America has put into lying to itself about its own history.

[mouthwashingconfessions]

I feel like a lot of people forget that Jimmy is a relatively normal dude. Like he cares for Curly, has a sense of humor, and does normal things. Yeah, he’s a rapist but people have to understand that not all rapists are like… abnormal.

He’s an interesting character and is so mischaracterized. I’d also like to point out that Jimmy immediately thought of knocking Swansea out with a drink and thinking that he won’t remember what happened when he wakes up, and he believes it so it can help with his guilt.

This implies that he’s done this before and that it could be learned behavior by his father or mother, practice, or it happened to him. It isn’t exactly uncommon for a perpetrator to also be a victim.

Yeah, I do agree with you here Anon. It's very clear he is unstable and people can become mentally ill due to trauma. Even some mental disorders can be a result of trauma related.

It would make sense if Jimmy was a SA/CSA survivor who didn't get the help he deserved. Since SA survivors aren't taken seriously no matter of their gender in real life. I know there is a case where traumatised people might try to recreate their trauma. And people with mental disabilities aren't taken seriously too.

Mouthwashing is a psychological horror, Psychological horror does take elements from real studies. I think people forget that.

Of course, it doesn't justify his actions! And i'm not trying to here! He is still a criminal with unforgivable actions.

It kinda reminds me of how people was giving Stella from Helluva boss realistic headcanons and people were like "Abuser apologist" when in reality they aren't. They aren't justifying her behaviour and they are giving a realistic view of real life through the eyes of a fictional characters due that fiction can be important! and Stella being based on Beatrice Horseman (To my knowledge and Beatrice comes from a series that talks about heavy topics) so that is another reason why they would add these headcanons to her.

Of course not all survivors of any kind of abuse will become the abuser. There is sadly cases where survivors continue the cycle of abuse. That's why it is important to break that cycle of abuse in real life.

This is same with people with mental disorders, not everyone with a mental disorder is going to be like Jimmy but there are people who are going to be like Jimmy. But that's not because of their disorder, it's because they aren't a good person. (I seen people reading Jimmy having a mental disorder or multiple disorders. That's why I added this here)

A disorder or a trauma doesn't make someone a bad person end of the day, it's how the person is like. People are different, that's how humans work.

Having characters representing the survivors who broke the cycle and Characters who hasn't are important. It can open people's eyes to things that aren't talked about enough.

This can be executed right with a character who continues the cycle of abuse or commits to the dangerous mindset they were groomed into as a child by an adult or someone is older than them or even the same age due to peer pressure.

At the end of the day,

You can like a character with unforgivable actions without supporting their actions. And you can give them realistic headcanons of them without justifying their actions. And people can dislike the same character as long they aren't harassing people over that character.