#really any nd keeper character is excellent

[bookwyrminspiration]

okay so I think you mentioned neurodivergent Fitz with sensory issues and I would absolutely love if you could talk about that more??? or just neurodivergent Fitz in general?

I did mention that! For anyone who didn't see it, here's a link to the post where it's first brought up. In that post my primary argument was that perhaps one of the reasons he has multiple pairs of the same thing is because he has sensory issues and those pajamas were a safe texture, so he bought a lot of them. However! There's a lot more we can discuss in this vein, regardless of if it's canon

I am going to propose: safe foods are why he bakes. He's picky about how things are prepared, so he starts learning how to make things that have more finicky textures (a lot of sweets) so he can make them how he likes--the bonus is that he can also now make sweets for his friends and share them to show how much he loves them!!

That's another thing: the way he expresses love. We see this most with Sophie (you know, cause she's the main character, but anyways). His gifts show that he pays attention, and that's how he tells people that. He gives Sophie a charm for her bracelet because he's trying to pay attention to what she already has and what she likes. I know that it's not strictly a nd thing, but I know that when it comes to gifts for me making sure it relates specifically to the person is very important to show that I pay attention to their interests and who they are, and that they know that.

He also has very straightforward thinking at times, just like "this is how things work." Which isn't meant to exclude others' concerns, he just...doesn't understand how they don't see it the way he does and has to try harder to see it. For example, in his short story at the end of Flashback he says something akin to "and when Sophie told him she was registering for the match--which of course she would, because nobody chooses to be a bad match." He doesn't say that to be mean to her or anyone else's situation, but it's an example of how he can get stuck in one way of thinking regardless of whether it's true, which shows rigid thinking, something autistic (and maybe others I'm forgetting rn) people can struggle with.

back to the sensory issues for a moment though! This is less canon, but maybe Fitz is more sensitive to noises than the rest of his friends. being a telepath, he's more attuned to mental noise, but it made his hearing more sensitive too. Maybe others claim it's just a telepath thing, but really it's sensory issues made worse by telepathy. He holds his hands over his ears, blasts music to focus, wears noise dulling earbuds when he goes to loud places with Atlantis.

and because he has those earbuds, it makes his struggle to control his volume even worse. Like he'd accidentally raise his voice a lot before, but now it's so much harder to gauge how loud he's being when he wears them and it's a learning curve he hasn't reached the end of. I can't decide if he could be the kind who would talk louder because he's wearing them or quieter to be safe. Either way it's....difficult to control. (yes, this is projecting. I am still trying to figure out how to talk like a normal person when I wear them)

spacial awareness? he doesn't have it. Nope. not at all. We've been fooled into thinking he's in control of his body because he can do push-ups in a handstand and goes for morning runs. But that's practiced, that's controlled. When it comes to just navigating the world? Bumps into things all the time. Door frames, corners, tables, chairs--I mean, how else do you think he got stuck in that chandelier?

one more before this gets too long: he looses things all the time. so often. Maybe the real reason he has multiple pairs of the same generic pajamas are because he's going to find a way to misplace at least one of them for several weeks and he needs to have the others as backup. It's such a good thing that he didn't manifest as a conjurer, because he'd never be able to use the ability because he'd never know where anything is. I feel like it would be the kind of annoying loosing things where he just knows that it's somewhere nearby, he just can't find it!! Like the kind of "lost" where he has to tear things apart for 15 minutes because he can't remember where he set it down. Or he put it in a pocket it wasn't supposed to be in and that could be anywhere and now he's stuck going through all of them to find where him 20 minutes ago thought would be a good place to put it.

I just think neurodivergent (this one was more focused on autism and adhd) keeper characters are precious and should be cherished. I would like to make them all nd because I love them very much. So many of the characters would fit so well being nd and would be so!! much fun!! an excellent topic!!

[earl-grey-love]

🌻 - @nonesenseships

new ask game send me a 🌻 and ill just tell you whatever the fuck i want

Hi, Red! Thank you for the ask 💕 I know its late but I've been busy. I hope thats okay!

I'm gonna talk abt one of books I just read. They're in a series and they are about queer men in 1870s london. The books take turns focusing on individuals from a group of friends who frequent a safe social club for lgbtq+ people at the time, their love lives and a mystery that surrounds them. They're written by KJ Charles.

The first book is "An Unseen Attraction", which sounds way hornier than it was. The book focused around the romance between Clem, a boarding house keeper, and Rowley, a taxidermist who lives in the boarding house. They've been friends for several months, with both men being on the quiet, nonconfrontational side. Naturally they harbour a crush on each other which they don't express because well, its victorian times! It's a classic friends to lovers tale. And I loved it!

(Minor Spoilers) Both characters were understandable and endearing. The more I learnt about them, the better I liked them. Clem was well-written as a neurodivergent character. While no specific condition was attributed to him, he is clearly described as ND. He has sensory issues, difficulty understanding social cues and a tendency to take things literally. This helps him to unravel the overarching mystery down the line. While he tends to be a bit naïve when it comes to trusting people, he doesn't fall into any nasty infantalizing tropes. He is a mature and capable man like any other. He just struggles with things. Also, he's half Indian, so the book does touch on period typical racism.

All around I love Clem. He's an amazing character and I enjoyed reading from his perspective the most. The gentle sweetness to him is absolutely golden. His character development and his side of the romance was beautiful too.

Rowley was written with equal care. He was a contrast to Clem with his more grounded personality. He's reserved but more socially equipped than Clem, which makes them an excellent partnership. They balance each other out. Despite being more equipped, he's got far fewer friends and trusts less. This is due to his backstory, which I won't spoil, and gives his character some interesting depth. His profession is beautifully written too. I find taxidermy super gross but the way it was covered in the book was enjoyable.

(NSFW) So ofc the book does include spicy scenes. The way it builds up tension was amazing. It had me excited for the upcoming scenes right away with the teasing way it was hinted at early on. However, these scenes are not the focus and there are few of them. They are tasteful when they happen though and include plenty of character development. They aren't sex for sex sake. The dynamic between the two in bed was surprising too, and worked incredibly well. There were relatively mild (imo) sub/dom themes that were a pleasure to read (NSFW ends)

The mystery plot was a surprise. But a welcome one. We all know I love a good mystery. Unfortunately, it was predictable for me, and I was about two steps ahead of the characters for most of the way. I pen this down to me really loving mystery solving and my understanding of law/crime tho. It was still satisfying and fun to read! The suspenseful scenes really did instill anxiety. I was afraid all the way up to the conclusion!

Overall, I rate it 10/10. I can't fault it for anything. It was the perfect pace, length and execution. The only downside is the mystery wasn't fully concluded at the end, but this is because the book is part of a series. The plot continues on from other characters' perspectives. This gives it interesting depth!

The one thing I didn't like is more of a gripe with the audiobook than the book itself. There's a transgender woman who for some reason is given a notably deeper, more masculine voice than any male character. Which is 🤨 a choice. She is written respectfully in the text though.

[feynavaley]

Pottertalia Next Gen AU – Hetalia Characters’s Sorting

There is this Hetalia/Harry Potter Crossover that I’ve been thinking about a lot, but I don’t have a clear plot in mind, mostly snippets and backstories, so I think it’s quite unlikely I’ll ever actually write a fic… but I had fun sorting the characters, so I’m going to write this down.

(This is set in 2024. It ignores completely The Cursed Child since I refused to read it…)

Gryffindor

2nd Year: 

Michelle Mancham (Seychelles)

3rd Year: 

Alfred F Jones (America): I mean, he’s, like, the living embodiment of Gryffindor. He’s brave and wants to be recognized as such (looks for glory), but at the same time he’s also helpful and with a strong (even if probably too idealistic and somehow self-entitled) sense of justice. He has a very strong magic but is only average because he doesn’t like studying or exercising properly. As the son of a muggle-born and a squib, he actually went to muggle grade school before Hogwarts as his father recognized the technological and scientific advancement that makes muggles superior. Alfred is strongly interested in that, too. In summer, he studies the muggle school program and he’s excellent at Maths. He’s the beater of Gryffindor’s Quidditch team.

Matthew Williams (Canada): Alfred’s brother, but he lived with their mother (their parents divorced) and took her surname. He’s actually one year younger than Alfred but got sent to school a year earlier because he had a very powerful magic and could only partially control it. His step-father didn’t like him using magic and lashed out at him, which is why Matthew often made himself invisible. He still has trouble controlling it. He also has a familiar, Kumajiro, given to him by a powerful winter spirit that saved him as a child, when he got lost in the woods and almost froze to death. Matthew’s very diligent, he’s a gifted student who takes the most challenging subjects. He used non-verbal charms from the very start (nobody will ever convince me of the contrary). He begged the Hat to be sorted in Gryffindor with Al (the Hat was more oriented towards Hufflepuff) but sometimes he regrets it since he ends up being completely obscured by his brother. Like Alfred, he studies muggle school subjects during summer. He’s the Seeker of Gryffindor’s Quidditch team.

Lien Nguyen (Vietnam)

Lily Luna Potter

Hugo Weasley

Roxanne Weasley

4th Year: 

Fred Weasley

Lucy Weasley

Louis Weasley

5th Year: 

Mikkel Densen (Denmark): Chaser in the Quidditch team, general troublemaker. Decent at Charms, but doesn’t really apply himself.

Rose Weasley

6th Year: 

Laura Janssens (Belgium): She might look like a sweetheart, always nice and helpful – she is, most of the times. But people who have gotten on her bad side or accidentally hurt somebody she cares for know that she’s not one to be angered. Ever. She’s also quite competitive.

Sadik Adnan (Turkey)

Carlos Machado (Cuba)

James Sirius Potter

7th Year: 

Erzsébet Héderváry (Hungary): Good grades and very strong magic. She takes Care of Magical Creatures. In spite of her proficiency with magic, she’s not the head-girl because she’s too bad-tempered and gets in trouble for lashing out at the BBT. The other beater of Gryffindor’s team – she and Alfred are amazing. People say they might be as good as the legendary Fred and George Weasley, even if they tend to be a tad overenthusiastic (read: too violent).

Slytherin

2nd Year:

Leon Wong (Hong Kong)

3rd Year: 

Natalya Arlovskaya (Belarus): Everybody is afraid of her. She doesn’t do any harm if she’s left alone, she’s just extremely cold and basically doesn’t interact with her peers, but insult her family, in particular her brother (step-brother, actually), and you should fear for your life. She knows an impressive (and frightening) variety of curses, she’s a gifted spell-caster. She has pretty good grades, in general.

5th Year: 

Ivan Braginsky (Russia): An average student, but can cast the strongest shield charm ever seen. Tries to befriend people but ends up scaring them because he tends to come across as creepy and is very self-serving. Beater in the Slytherin team – he and Alfred have a huge rivalry going on. They basically end up forgetting about the game and try to hit each other with the bludgers, if somebody doesn’t remind them that the aim of the game is actually another one. Yet, they both always end up with at least a bloody nose.

Albus Severus Potter

Scorpius Malfoy

6th Year: 

Arthur Kirkland (England): Extremely gifted student. He takes all the most difficult subjects and with never less than an ‘E’, his spells are very strong. He only has some problems with potions. He also has the Sight – basically, no magical creature can make itself invisible to him and he can see through invisibility cloaks and disillusionment charms (with the exception of the Hallow’s cloak, obviously. Matthew is an exception as well because his magic isn’t a physical kind of invisibility, it’s something more like messing with people’s perceptions and mind so they will fail to realize his presence and forget about it immediately after). Seeker in Slytherin’s Quidditch team, and pretty good, too. He’s Alfred and Matthew’s half-brother (same father, but he took his mother’s surname because she’s from an ancient family and wanted her children to carry her surname).

Vlad Popescu (Romania)

7th Year:

Julia “Julchen” Beilschmidt (Nyo!Prussia): Mostly the reason Erzsébet is in trouble. Part (and mind, actually) of the BBT, aka the biggest troublemakers of the school. She has strong magic but she prefers to spend her time coming up with new pranks. To stay true to her image of troublemaker, she pretends that she doesn’t study even if she actually applies herself quite a lot, especially when it comes to practical applications of magic. She’s in strong competition with Erzsébet, they have this frenemies thing going on that is driving all the professors crazy – literally. There’s not a moment of calm when the two of them are involved. The other beater, and the other part of the reason every Slytherin-Gryffindor match turns into a bloody fight.

Hufflepuff

 1st Year: 

Raivis Galante (Latvia)

2nd Year:

Elsa Steinsdóttir (Nyo!Iceland): A very reserved, maybe even aloof girl who doesn’t understand why she’s in her house, in denial about how loyal she is and how much importance she places in her family. She has a talking familiar (Puffin). She has the Sight as well, but it’s quite faint and nowhere near comparable to Arthur’s level.

3rd Year:

Tolys Laurinaitis (Lithuania)

4th Year: 

Ludwig Beilschmidt (Germany): Probably the most hard-working student in the entire school, and hell-bent in following the rules, too. Takes difficult subjects and is very good at them. He just needs some extra time to learn his spells (he tends to rely a bit too much on theory and technical execution, not putting himself into it), but when he does they’re perfect. He’s also good with transfiguration. Keeper in the Quidditch team.

Lorcan Scamander

5th Year:

Mei Lin (Taiwan)

6th Year: 

Lovino Vargas (Romano): aka ‘the meanest Hufflepuff ever’, but he’s nice with girls and argues with anybody who doesn’t respect them. He may seem lazy, but actually isn’t – and has a strong sense of duty. Excellent at potions, probably the best student in the school.

Timo Väinämöinen (Finland): Always nice and helpful, no matter what, but strong-willed. Won’t let people put him down. Seeker in the Quidditch team. He has a familiar.

Astrid Oxenstierna (Nyo!Sweden): a silent, broody girl, but she’s actually a softie at heart. And an extremely good tutor – people are intimidated by her at first, but as soon as she starts explaining something they get it without any difficulty. Good grades. Beater in the Quidditch team.

7th Year: 

Antonio Fernandez Carriedo (Spain): He’s extremely nice and helpful, but not without a more mischievous side… He’s part of the BBT, and this tells everything. A genius in herbology, Professor Longbottom’s favourite student. Chaser in the Quidditch team.

Iryna Braginskaya (Ukraine): Nice, motherly girl. Hopes that her siblings can be happy and make friends, everybody loves her because she’s always so helpful. Always around to diffuse tense situations.

Yao Wang (China): He’s basically the school’s mother. He’s very smart and with good grades, but also spends his time taking care of younger students and giving them instructions, as well as ensuring that they follow the rules. Head-boy. 

Ravenclaw

1st Year:

Erika Zwingli (Liechtenstein): One of the sweetest Ravenclaw ever existed, very studious. May seem a bit cold at first because she’s shy, but she’s actually really nice once you get to know her.

2nd Year: 

Eduard Von Bock (Estonia)

Henri Janssens (Luxembourg)

3rd Year:

Sylwia Łukasiewicz (Nyo!Poland): I think she has some sort of peculiar intelligence. A bit like Luna, maybe. (Not so over-the-top, though.)

4th Year: 

Felicia Vargas (Fem!Italy): she’s probably the laziest Ravenclaw to have ever existed – everybody was surprised by her sorting, but she’s way too lazy to be a Hufflepuff. She has, instead, some kind of quirky intelligence – she just ‘gets’ things. While she isn’t very good at subjects that require studying and essays, she’s excellent at the practical part. Her magic is very strong and she’s strongly in tune with it, she can cast any spell without much difficulty. She has also unconsciously learnt some healing magic and can cast wandless spells.

Yong Soo Im (Korea)

Lysander Scamander

5th Year:

Sigrid Bondevik (Nyo!Norway): Silent and aloof, very studious, prefers to stay alone but hell-bent to look after her half-sister, Elsa. She has the Sight, but not as strong as Arthur’s.

6th Year: 

Kiku Honda (Japan): Strong magic, his strong suit are non-verbal incantations. His spells are always very accurate, and he always researches on the dynamic behind them. Somehow, he became one of Felicia’s best friends. He still doesn’t understand how.

Hesper Karpusi (Nyo!Greece): Just as lazy as Felicia, but without her enthusiasm. She sleeps through most of the classes – and still, somehow, manages to turn in long and insightful essays. Not that good at spells, though, since she can’t be bothered to practice. She has somehow managed to smuggle tons of kittens inside Hogwarts.

7th Year: 

Francis Bonnefoy (France): The third member of the BBT. People think he gains his good grades thanks to his charm, but he’s smarter than he lets on, he can always read people and situations perfectly (he’s also quite gifted at legilimency) – and he’s very helpful, too. Just a bit too overdramatic and flirty, which can put people off. He’s Matthew and Alfred’s cousin from the mothers’ side.

Abel Janssens (Netherlands): Has a knack for marketing. Somehow managed to put up a delivery system for illegal goods – anything you may be looking for, he has it. Catcher in the Quidditch team.

Roderich Edelstein (Austria): Head boy. Always sticks to rules, and doesn’t want to get in trouble or be bothered. His cousin Julia takes full advantage of his short temper. Fascinated by muggle music, plays the piano. In spite of being in the last year, he still gets lost every day – every professor knows and the portraits have been alerted so they can guide him to the classroom. If he’s still not there twenty minutes into the lesson, somebody gets sent to fetch him.

Basch Zwingli (Switzerland): He and Erika are Ludwig, Julia and Roderich’s cousins too. Roderich’s and Vash and Erika’s mothers are Ludwig and Julia’s father’s younger sisters.

Then there is also Clarisse Bonnefoy (Monaco), who’s Francis cousin form his father’s side and is at her second year at Beauxbatons, and Jeanne Darc, in the sixth year of the same school.

Jones-Williams Family | Kirkland Family