#the horrific book that tormented her childhood

[cedarxwing]

Hello!!

What do you think made Will bluebeard's last wife? And how did Will understand that Hannibal was in love with him when he had the bluebeard discussion with Bedelia?

Hello! I see that someone already answered this question here, but I'll try to put my own spin on it.

Some context:

In the folktale, Bluebeard is a wealthy man whose wives keep mysteriously disappearing. He gives his seventh wife the key to all the locked doors in their house, but tells her not to open the door to the basement ("Secrets you're not to know, yet sworn to keep"). Of course, the wife goes snooping and discovers the corpses of all his former wives. It's a classic Pandora/Psyche myth with a horrific twist.

Key point: Bluebeard's seventh and final wife survives, inherits his fortune, and lives happily ever after.

The Bluebeard analogy is honestly perfect for Hannibal's character because it highlights the way he destroys everyone he loves. He brings a series of "wives" behind the veil (Miriam, Abigail, Gideon) and all of them end up maimed, mentally broken, or dead. This pattern echoes his childhood behavior, originating with the consumption of Mischa and developing with his mind games with Chiyoh. "Every family loves differently. Every love is unique." Hannibal expresses love through destruction and consumption.

Bedelia understands this. When she says she would've preferred to be Bluebeard's last wife, she means that she would've preferred to be the one who escaped Hannibal and lived happily ever after. She does not want to be on the receiving end of Hannibal's "love."

There's a deleted scene in the Antipasto script where she says the same line to Dimmond:

Basically, "Help me lock this monster up, because I'm not going to be one of his victims. I do want his money, though."

The same line, said accusingly to Will, takes on a different meaning. Hannibal is courting a new partner, and if Bedelia isn't his final wife anymore... well, she's going to end up in the basement with the rest. @genufa wrote an interesting analysis on this concept here.

Now, let's zoom out and view the whole conversation from Will's perspective:

Will can't let go of the fact that Bedelia emerged from Hannibal's influence completely unscathed, whereas Hannibal took--and continues to take--everything from Will. He's operating on his understanding of the Chesapeake Ripper: "Contrapasso. You play, you pay." So why does Hannibal make Will pay again and again and again, while Bedelia got away with mere psychological torment? According to Chesapeake Ripper logic, that would mean Bedelia is preferred, right?

Before this conversation, Will doesn't understand how Hannibal expresses love ( @suchawrathfullamb wrote a lovely post about this). He thinks that everything Hannibal did to him (encephalitis era, prison era, honeytrap codependency era, Mizumono, the Primavera human heart, the attempted brain-eating in Dolce) was out of pure sadism. If Hannibal found him more interesting than Randall, Margot, and his other violent patients, it was only because his empathy and involvement with the FBI made him a rare specimen.

[BOOK TANGENT TIME! Oh boy, my favorite!! :D]

Will's misdiagnosis of Hannibal's ability to love was inspired by this piece of hack psychoanalysis in chapter 51 of Hannibal:

^ This is clearly posed as an incorrect interpretation of Hannibal Lecter:

Yes, Hannibal is excited by distress, but he loves those who bear distress beautifully, with strength, courage, and discipline. This is how he comes to care for people like Abigail, Jack, and Bella. And, of course, Will suffers the most pornographically beautifully of all.

[END BOOK TANGENT]

"It's distress that excites him," Will thinks. So it catches his attention when Bedelia says of his forehead scar, "It excites [Hannibal] to see you marked in this particular way." Why? Why this particular way? Is it a mark of ownership (the metaphorical facial theory)? A symbol of the permanent effect Hannibal had on him? This is Bedelia's first hint that Will's distress means more to Hannibal than punishment or sadistic entertainment.

When Bedelia turns the Bluebeard analogy back on Will, it finally clicks for him that distress/destruction/consumption is the pattern of Hannibal's love, and the fact that Hannibal tortures Will more than anyone else means that Will holds a place of honor in his heart. With this context, Hannibal's attempt to eat his brain becomes an act of adoration. The mark on his forehead becomes a laurel wreath.

To answer your first question, I don't think "Bluebeard's last wife" is a great analogy for Will.

First of all, Bedelia never called him that. She implied that Will was becoming the next wife, emphasizing the threat associated with Hannibal's affection. Bluebeard's last wife would've ended up in the basement too if she hadn't been clever enough to escape, and Will doesn't seem particularly clever to Bedelia at this point. Even Will admits his surrender: "I don't know if I can save myself, and maybe that's just fine."

Second of all, Bluebeard's last wife betrays him to the authorities, and Will does the exact opposite in TWOTL. I guess you could interpret "I don't intend Hannibal to be caught a second time," as "I'm planning to kill him myself," but passionately embracing Hannibal before gently dragging him off a cliff in a failed murder-suicide doesn't read as "Bluebeard's last wife" behavior to me.

If Will is to be Bluebeard's last wife, it's because Hannibal's love for him breaks the pattern, meaning Hannibal is no longer Bluebeard. A true fairytale ending. <3

[rockislandadultreads]

September NoveList Challenge: Dark Academia

It's time to go back to school! Read a book with the theme dark academia.

Did you know NoveList is a database you can access with your library card to find reading recommendations? Find your next favorite read with this fantastic readers tool! Check it out on our website here.

Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo

Galaxy “Alex” Stern is the most unlikely member of Yale’s freshman class. Raised in the Los Angeles hinterlands by a hippie mom, Alex dropped out of school early and into a world of shady drug dealer boyfriends, dead-end jobs, and much, much worse. By age twenty, in fact, she is the sole survivor of a horrific, unsolved multiple homicide. Some might say she’s thrown her life away. But at her hospital bed, Alex is offered a second chance: to attend one of the world’s most elite universities on a full ride. What’s the catch, and why her?

Still searching for answers to this herself, Alex arrives in New Haven tasked by her mysterious benefactors with monitoring the activities of Yale’s secret societies. These eight windowless “tombs” are well-known to be haunts of the future rich and powerful, from high-ranking politicos to Wall Street and Hollywood’s biggest players. But their occult activities are revealed to be more sinister and more extraordinary than any paranoid imagination might conceive.

This is the first volume of the "Alex Stern" series.

Heaven by Mieko Kawakami

Hailed as a bold foray into new literary territory, Kawakami’s novel is told in the voice of a 14-year-old student who is subjected to relentless torment for having a lazy eye. Instead of resisting, the boy chooses to suffer in complete resignation. The only person who understands what he is going through is a female classmate who suffers similar treatment at the hands of her tormentors.

These raw and realistic portrayals of bullying are counterbalanced by textured exposition of the philosophical and religious debates concerning violence to which the weak are subjected.

Other People's Clothes by Calla Henkel

Hoping to escape the pain of the recent murder of her best friend, art student Zoe Beech finds herself studying abroad in the bohemian capital of Europe - Berlin. Zoe, rudderless, relies on the arrangements of fellow exchange student Hailey Mader, who idolizes Warhol and Britney Spears and wants nothing more than to be an art star. On Craigslist, Hailey unknowingly stumbles on an apartment sublet posted by a well-known thriller writer. Feeling as though they've won the lottery, the women move into the high-ceilinged pre-war flat. Soon they realize that their landlady, Beatrice, who is supposed to be on a residency in Vienna, is watching them - and her next book appears to be based on their lives. Taking stock of their mundane routines - Law and Order binges and nightly nachos - Hailey insists they become people worthy of a novel. As the year unravels and events spiral out of control, they begin to wonder whose story they are living, and how will it end?

Other People's Clothes is brilliant on the sometimes dangerous intensity of female friendships, on millennial life in the city, and on the lengths people will go to in order to eradicate emotional pain.

Real Life by Brandon Taylor

Almost everything about Wallace is at odds with the Midwestern university town where he is working uneasily toward a biochem degree. An introverted young man from Alabama, black and queer, he has left behind his family without escaping the long shadows of his childhood. For reasons of self-preservation, Wallace has enforced a wary distance even within his own circle of friends—some dating each other, some dating women, some feigning straightness. But over the course of a late-summer weekend, a series of confrontations with colleagues, and an unexpected encounter with an ostensibly straight, white classmate, conspire to fracture his defenses while exposing long-hidden currents of hostility and desire within their community.

[nobleriver]

So there is a book called Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell that is very good being a fictional telling of Shakespeare's son Hament dying of the plague. (I highly recommend it) It's sad but excellent dealing with grief and loss. Also, this past week I lost a friend from work and I'm thinking about how things happen so suddenly when you can still mentally play the mental tape of the last conversation you have with someone when you don't know it will be the last.

I was thinking though should we feel a bit peeved that River's story that started death had been turned into something romantic? Death of anyone is horrific (not romantic) and I've always hated stories that were more heavy-handed in the emotional manipulation of it. Will never read Nicholas Sparks. Always hated this horrible movie I still remember from childhood about this woman who was pregnant but also had cancer who died after she gave birth.

I would hate to think I fell for a melodrama. I might lose credibility for wondering if I should feel slighted since I'm asking the question of myself for the first time since The Husbands of River Song was broadcast.

My heart goes out to you and your friend's loved ones. I have lost people I cared about, and yes, it does feel sudden. The world stops. Even though in the back our heads we know life is ephemeral and fleeting, we still expect that person to be there tomorrow. It's painful when they're not. So please know, you have my sincerest condolences. May you find comfort and peace in this time.

To address your other comment about River, I don't feel peeved. You see, the thing about the Doctor and River is that technically speaking it's not a romance. It's a tragedy. The one unbreakable rule of the romance genre is that there must be a happy ending. The characters must be alive and end up together at the end of the story. If they don't, it's not a romance. It's either a tragedy or a drama.

Therefore, the Doctor and River Song are a tragedy with romantic elements. The story starts out with her death, and we witness the Doctor try to avoid her and put distance between them because he hopes to avert her death. One of the reasons I love The Day of the Doctor target novel by Moffat is that it shows us how the Doctor (10th and 11th incarnations) see River. When the Doctor looks at River, he sees a ghost. Every once in a while, she'll do something SO alive and it just makes him even more miserable because it reminds him how dead she already is. 10 explains in that book (to us the audience) that he plans to rewrite River's end by avoiding her, because he believes she deserves a happier life. In that book, the Doctor, through multiple incarnations, is still grappling with River's passing, unable to accept it. He blames himself because he failed to save her. Her death isn't romantic; it's traumatizing to him.

The Doctor and River both knew forever would be a fairy tale, but they still chose each other. They embraced the little time they had left. To me, theirs is a romance within a tragedy. The fact they still fell in love, still married, still became each other's best friends and most trusted allies, THAT is the romance. The romance is the love blossoming beneath the sorrow. Their unyielding commitment to each other was a beauty to behold laced with pain. The romance adds to the pain but also creates moments of levity, pockets of joy and laughter where they can hide from the shadows closing in.

The writing for them is stunning in its impact. We watch the death of a random character in S4 plague and torment the Doctor for the next six seasons as the Doctor wrestles with how to accept her death and move on. It's tragic, but it's real, and the tragedy doesn't take away the beauty.

Also, I skimmed a review of the book. This actually sounds like a GREAT recommendation, and the storytelling is nonlinear. Love stories like that (cough cough, doctor who). I might actually check it out! Thank you.

[babelast]

Nicolas Hyde is a character who lived in the 19th century in Blackstone, New Hampshire. Due to his traumatic upbringing by his father, Hyde developed a split personality in his childhood, and his evil alter ego, known as the Beast, took over his body for periods of time throughout his life and committed several murders (Hyde himself was unaware of these murders while being controlled by the Beast). Hyde is then admitted to a mental hospital where he stayed for ten years. Upon returning home, Hyde's memories slowly regain their place in his mind and torment him with the knowledge of what happened. The past comes back to haunt him as he comes to terms with the horrific deeds of his past, and he must attempt to redeem himself, if that is even possible.

Bella is a sweet and sensitive 22-year-old girl with long red hair and blue eyes. She has a childish and somewhat touchy personality, and is often described as sensitive and downtrodden. Bella has a tragic past and has been Alan's ward since she was 17, when he helped her through a difficult time in her life. Bella suffers from depression and OCD; she spent time in a local hospital under Alan's care.

In my story “The Curse”, Isabella purchases a portrait of Nicolas Hyde in an antique store (his character in the story closely resembles the Beast, his second personality). Soon after, Isabella begins to have strange and disturbing nightmares, and even later a voice appears in her head (as it turns out, the voice belongs to Nicholas). Buying the portrait turned out to be a bad idea, and in the story, Isabella is desperately trying to rid herself of it.

Based on story book "Curse" by author Tamara6

[alligator-dreaming]

04-29-2022: I Think About This One A Lot

Had a weird fuckin dream that might turn into a script or a short story. Weird and meta

Before it started I want to say that I think I saw a thumbnail for a video yesterday that was like “best horror movie with no jump scares” and so I had a nightmare around that

There was a single mother (sometimes she was a dad because dreams be like that but mostly she was a mom) and her middle school aged son. They lived in a small townhouse in a small town in a swamp and she ran the local drugstore. Her son loved comic books, especially horror books

So it’s obvious from the outset that the mom has problems from a childhood of domestic abuse and maybe a bad divorce, but she’s doing her best to take care of her son. She’s not very permissive though, at one point he tries to have 83 friends over for a game of hide and seek or something and she says no. When he tries to lowball it to 48 friends she also says no. This is unreasonable in the dream.

At the drugstore the mother runs, the mayor stops by and tells everyone that there is a serial killer murdering people. The mother and the mayor walk around the store to discuss it, but when they duck into a storage closet for privacy, a trap goes off that kills the mayor. She drags him out and calls for an ambulance.

(Unrelated to the scene there was an emo girl covered in marshmallow Chinese characters sitting nearby)

At first it seems like a bad coincidence, but it soon becomes obvious (to the viewer, not the characters) that the mother is in fact the killer, hunting down the important men around town, winning their confidence, and murdering them. In one case she seduces an important businessman, lures him into disrobing and getting into the bath with her, and stabbing him to death.

(I mentioned the viewer just now. I’m gonna backtrack a bit so that things make sense- in this dream, the POV is from the middle-school son, with occasional omniscient narrator status. This becomes important later.)

Continuing on, it turns out that this whole scenario with the single mother with a tragic past killing people is one of the comic books her son has.

At this point, the dream is interrupted by the arrival of a school bus full of kids from another college. On it is my friend Jet from high school and some other kids I didn’t know as well. From high school. Jet and I reconnect and watch the dream on a big screen as it unfolds.

The mother discovers her son’s comic books, specifically the one that matches her situation, and starts to use it to plot out her murders and predict plot beats.

As the mother becomes more aware of the plot, the dream story begins to bleed over into the dream reality where Jet and I are watching it. The mother’s actions cause real life and the dream to devolve into a horrific animated Hunger Games-type thing with lots of different cartoon character.

(I specifically remember the We Bare Bears forcing each other into a centrifuge and being crushed to a bloody pulp by the force) other real cartoons were there doing similar things.

When the carnage died down, the theater where we were watching the dream had become the mother’s townhouse. The mother had been taking notes on the scene, and so Jet and I decided to tamper with them for the laughs. The mother caught us and demanded an explanation. After this Jet disappeared from the dream.

By this point my role as the person witnessing the dream, the narrator, and the son had all intertwined because of the breakdown of reality.

Now the mother began reinventing the world around her to her will. She switched her and her sons lives and made herself into the novelist who wrote the original story she was based on. She (now he) made me (the son, now transfigured into the mother) incapable of fighting back or even capable of anything but adoration for him with his powers.

This is the funkiest part

At one point in the display of power and torment described above, the writer (formerly the mother who turned herself into the son) put on an obscene sexual display that will not be described here. When I, incapable of anything but love, politely described it as underwhelming, he transformed and absorbed me into himself, trapping and killing me. But because he had killed the character I was bound to, I (as the dreamer) was able to escape in bodiless form, despite the reality warper’s protests.

The writer's powers have run amok. Enraged, the giant humanoid abomination that used to be the writer (who used to be the son, who used to be the mother) goes on a rampage as I run in disembodied form. It tracks me to a nearby carnival in the town, and when I turn to confront it, the dream resets.

The dream is basically back where it was at the beginning, with the mother who runs the drugstore and the son who likes horror comics, and everyone is doing there best like the events of the dream never happened. But now there is a father in the family, and when the son looks for the one comic that aligned with his mother’s story, he can’t find it.

When he talks to his dad about it, his dad tells him that he wrote that story, his only short story. Thus ends the dream.

[sowthetide]

Before I clog up your comments on the last chapter, a few more observations from rereading:

1. Alyn and Oberyn should meet. It could go really well or really badly.

2. Baelor has been avoiding the main characters for a long time! What's he up to? He and Quen have so much in common, I really hope they get the chance to be friends.

3. Yuselen is not subtle about hinting about who his father is. Is Quen too self-absorbed to notice or so sensibly frightened of Euron that she is in denial? Both? Either way, I also hope that she acknowledges him as her cousin, preferably somewhere Jon can make a face about it.

A. Off topic, but Quen and Theon seem much more scared of Euron than Asha is. Asha could be stubbornly repressing childhood memories, but I suspect that Theon/Quen is so much like Aeron that Euron was deliberately recreating his Evillest Hits. And maybe it's more enjoyable for him to torment the most sensitive relatives.

#1: I won't spoil, but there will be some degree of overlap between the Orkwoods and Martells later on. In a non-soul-crushing context, even!

#2: Baelor has his own schemes going on with Harras- nothing nefarious per se, but Baelor & Harras are obviously going to conduct themselves differently from most other ironborn. Harras' mother was from the westerlands (House Serrett), so he'll treat Fair Isle (relatively) gently. Similarly, Baelor is probably doing the best he can to avoid going toe-to-toe with the Redwyne Fleet (given that he has a Beesbury for a mother). We haven't seen the last of either of them, though, I promise ;-)

#3: Yep! Euron's bastard & salt sons really stuck out to me in the books- how horrific their lives must be, what they think about Euron, about their mothers, about themselves, etc. Then I read dwellingondreams' Last Serving Daughter, and I was left even more fascinated by the potential of Euron's salt sons. Yuselen isn't exactly subtle about his parentage, but who pays attention to salt sons? They're basically furniture, beasts of burden, mindless foot soldiers for their lordly fathers, in that awkward/thorny limbo between common men and noblemen.

I considered having Yus be a vessel for Euron (in the same way Euron is suspected of skin-changing all of the members of his crew), but that's a big can of worms and honestly, I also liked the idea that Yus had simply been forgotten in the chaos. Euron has no regard for his salt/bastard sons:

[Victarion:] "They are of your body." [Euron:] "So are the contents of my chamber pot. None is fit to sit the Seastone Chair, much less the Iron Throne. No, to make an heir that's worthy of him, I need a different woman..."

And it's that disregard that allows Yus to escape him. It also worked out well with Wex, as Yus is really good at interpreting mute people (gee I wonder why...)

A. You noticed that, huh? 👀 I sort of buy theories about Rodrik and Maron (and even Asha) also being abused by Euron, but I think Euron is more... purposeful than that (yuck). It's not about sex, it's about fear and control, and I think you're right that Euron would probably get the most enjoyment/amusement out of recreating his dynamic with Aeron with Quen/Theon. In this fic, it was my intent to portray Euron as pursuing Quen not just because she's the most vulnerable target, but also because he wants to torment Aeron in particular. You can also imagine Quen/Theon as having received the least positive attention from Balon, so it's easier for Euron to use that to his advantage.

goddcoward is an Aeron scholar, and their thoughts about Euron-Aeron-Theon have got me climbing the walls of my enclosure tbqh. Once I get the Discord up and running, I can guarantee that they'll be chucking Aeron grenades at us.

[bbrandy2002]

A Beautiful Ending

Prologue

Pairing: Liam x MC

Book: The Royal Romance

A/N and Trigger Warning: I’ve had this one stored away in my mind for a nearly 2 years, the idea itself being based on something I’d watched a long time ago. It will only be a few chapters long. **There will be a character death in this, and it does involve a child. **  I can say though, what you think is going to happen isn’t exactly what happens, not that that makes it any better. 

Word count: 1105

--------------------------

Billowing vapors of heat and humidity rose like seas of sweltering fractals across the tarmac. The slosh of softening tar and cement could be heard as a small caravan, led by the Royal Guard in SUVs and motorcycles, drove boldly through the gates that led to the private 757 jetliner owned by the Crown.

The limo came to a complete stop with a squeal of its brakes and dulling engine, just steps away from the plane. Bastien causally departed the front passenger's side, adjusting the brim of his black woolen suit jacket, the bright yellow sun reflecting in the shaded frames of his glasses. Within only a few seconds, beads of warm sweat had already pooled at his temple and slowly crept along his hairline.

A Cordonian summer could be cruel and intense.

Pausing for just a split-second, he winced at the stiffness and throb in his knee as he took his first step -- a constant reminder of what he gave for the crown six years ago at the Costume Ball.

A constant reminder of what was always at stake.

He stepped away with an unremarkable limp to the rear of the limo and placed a firm grip on the door latch; he glanced to his left, then to his right, ensuring his men and women were in their designated positions. Confidence and precision were essential here; everyone knew their part. One wrong move, an error in judgment, or a slight mishap, could make the difference between life and an unthinkable tragedy. Nothing should ever be taken for granted.

For what they are securing inside that vehicle wasn't just royalty -- a young King and Queen of Cordonia -- but a little family, precious cargo, timeless treasures of love and devotion to one another.

A beautiful beginning.

In all of his 25 years of service, Bastien Lykel understood all too well what the King had lost: a childhood marred of its innocence, the untimely death of a beloved mother, the horrific death of an implacable father, and the plans he had prepared for his life as the spare. It was all terribly sad, really, but in the here and now, His Majesty carried on happily with the help of one woman and the two children they lovingly brought into the world. To Bastien, he would be damned if he allowed another deadly incident to take all that away from Liam.

But sometimes, those unforeseen occurrences caught up with a person — destiny and fate bowed to no one.

Nodding to the driver who stood on the opposite side of the limo from him, they simultaneously opened the doors.

Almost instantly, a powerful gust of wind swept through the vehicle, causing Riley's lustrous textured hair to become artfully messy as it hurtled wildly across her radiantly smiling face.

With knees pressed together and her grinning one-year-old son -- whose wispy blonde locks resembled the most yellowish of marigolds -- wrapped in her secure arms, the beaming Queen stepped out into the noisy haze. Her floral print sundress twisted and clashed like a dauntless flag against her thighs, and she had the presence of mind to bunch up the lower part to keep her backside from making its way onto the front pages of newspapers again.

Shifting her son higher on her hip, the Queen whirled around to see if the other half of her heart was behind her.

Across from them, the driver stepped back and lowered his head to the towering figure of the King as he made his way out of the limo. Offering a courteous wave and smile to several dozen royal watchers, all pressing themselves against a chain-length fence several yards away, calling out his name, Liam reached back inside the limo where a tiny hand clamped onto his and scooted her way across the leather seats to join him at his side. A smaller version of her mother, the five-year-old princess shot a curious glance at the boisterous crowd; she could never quite figure out why people were so interested in what her family was doing.

While staff worked diligently on loading luggage onto the plane, the family of four joined Bastien, who would follow closely behind them as they headed toward the rolling steps of the jet.

The enthusiastic crowd roared louder when they got the first glimpses of the monarchs with their small children together. Liam and Riley enjoyed a popularity that seemingly was unparallel to anything the country had ever experienced. None of which would be possible without their generosity and charismatic personalities; the press and the people clung to their comings and goings like magnets.

Liam gently tugged on his daughter's balmy hand while she sluggishly trudged alongside him. He shook his head with an amused grin, taking in her dainty curls, bouncing and bobbing with each change in the wind's direction. There's nothing quite like admiring your very own piece of artwork, whose hearty giggles or cries had the ability to break him into a withering shell of himself.

Placing his other hand on the small of Riley's back as she took the first step onto the stairs, Liam's stoic gaze turned back to acknowledge his citizens one last time with a quick wave before ascending the steps behind his wife. Thoughts of a long, exhausting work week were put behind him, and he looked forward to landing in Greece within the hour. It had been months since the family last got away together and even longer since he'd visited his brother, Leo.

As Liam's foot hit the fourth step, a thunderous commotion of sorts broke out over the blare of the jet's whirling engines. There was no time to turn and see what had caused the crowd to erupt. No time to even process whether their gasps were something nonsensical or cause for concern. It was the gentle hand that had earlier clutched his so tightly, in only the way a daughter who trusted her father's loving protection would, slipping away, that gained his attention.

He couldn't catch her -- a fact that would torment him later. It wouldn't have made much difference, but his long-held beliefs were that a daddy was supposed to be the one to catch his child, not the guard.

But this wasn't a fall or a slip.

Liam's eyes widened, a noticeable expression of worry and panic etched on his face. His Princess laid limply, motionless, outwardly void of life, in Bastien's arms. "El?" he muttered, with a shudder in his voice, before tearing her away from the clutches of his head guard and cleaving her to his breathless chest.

-----------------------

@burnsoslow @dcbbw​ @ao719 @jessiembruno @texaskitten30 @janezillow @merridithsmiscellany-blog​ @mskaneko​@callmeellabella​ @queenjilian @sirbeepsalot​ @drakexwillow​@jovialyouthmusic @forthebrokenheartedthings​ @bebepac@kingliam2019 @lovablegranny​ @cordoniaqueensworld​ @amandablink @liamxs-world​ @choiceskatie​ @iaminlovewithtrr​ @hopelessromanticmonie​ @charlotteg234​@annekebbphotography @txemrn​ @thecordoniandiaries @alyssalauren​ @cordonianroyalty @monsoonbloom12 @mom2000aggie​ @theroyalheirshadowhunter​ @princessleac1​ @kimmiedoo5 @graceful-leah @iam-the-kind-and-thoughtful​ @thegreentwin​ @gkittylove99 @neotericthemis @pink-diamond13​ @walker7519​ @natureblooms24 @yourmajesty09​ @gabesmommie1130 @sweatyrysconnoisour @kat-tia801​ @debmcg1106 @choicesstan650​ @emkay512 @royalromancer​ @queenrileyrose @cordonia-gothqueen​

[lucky-katebishop]

What I Read in July 2021

Oh, man, this is gonna be a long post. I bookmarked 33 fics, all of them Harry Potter related, with a few cross-overs.

Forget-Me-Not by Lomonaaeron *favorite*

Plot: Harry isn’t the Boy-Who-Lived, but his parents still died, and Albus Dumbledore, concerned that Death Eaters might seek the boy’s death, cast a powerful charm on him to make wizards ignore him before Harry was left with the Dursleys. Except, with the Elder Wand in play, the charm was far too powerful, and made others essentially forget Harry existed when not directly interacting with him. Sorted into Ravenclaw at Hogwarts, Harry lives a contented life with no one either loving or hating him…until the charm breaks on his seventeenth birthday, and he’s suddenly plunged directly into the middle of a living world at war.

Characters: Harry, Theo Nott, Dumbledore, Neville, Ollivander, Lupin, Rabastan Lestrange, Ron, Hermione, Draco, original non-human characters, Peter Pettigrew, Umbridge

Relationships: Harry Potter/Theo Nott

Warnings: none apply

Tags: ancient runes, socially awkward Harry Potter, Ravenclaw Harry Potter, Harry Potter is not the boy-who-lived, angst, romance, horcruxes, muggleborn registration commission, blood magic

My Notes: I inhaled this in one sitting and then cried for like 10 minutes afterwards, it’s so beautifully written, it became an instant favorite

*complete*

He Turned Around by ChipOfftheOldSoul *favorite*

Plot: When the Goblet of Fire spit out Harry's name that Halloween night, he was told to join the other champions. Instead, he turned around and walked away.

Characters: Harry, Snape, Draco, Ron, Hermione, Victor Krum, Cedric Diggory, Fleur Delacour, Pansy Parkinson, Blaise Zabini, Crabbe, Goyle, Daphne Greengrass, Fred & George, Marcus Flint, Millicent Bulstrode, Tracey Davis

Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter; Harry Potter & Severus Snape; Draco Malfoy & Severus Snape

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse, mentioned homophobia

Tags: book 4, good Severus Snape, good Draco Malfoy, good Slytherins, smart Harry Potter, Dumbledore bashing, manipulative Dumbledore, past child abuse, runes, slow burn, enemies to friends to lovers, Slytherin Harry Potter, Hogwarts House re-sort, no Ron bashing but he’s not great for a while

My Notes: I’ve already read this twice in less than a week period and I cannot wait until it’s updated (hopefully it’ll be updated) and I absolutely love the way it’s written and Harry’s characterization. I also very much appreciate that there won’t be Ron bashing, I’ve read too many Ron bashing fics, but I am here for all of the Dumbledore bashing!

*incomplete* [last updated June 2021]

Stars by LilyIsAwesomerThanYou

Plot: When Snape discovers Harry's abusive past during an Occlumency lesson, Harry panics. Snape is forced to take care of him in the aftermath. Mentor/guardian fic. As always, no slash.

Characters: Harry Potter, Severus Snape, Dumbledore, Ron, Hermione

Relationships: Gen

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse, emotional/psychological abuse, suicidal thoughts, suicide attempt, depression

Tags: Severitus, angst, drama, past abuse, hurt/comfort, mentor Snape, guardian Snape, occlumency

My Notes: Snape is a dick in this one, and so far he has not gotten any better, just a warning, but there’s some great Harry angst going on here (that’s why I bookmarked it). Yeah, Snape is pretty evil in this one, there’s some victim blaming and just straight up verbal abuse from him.

*incomplete* [last updated 2018]

violet hill by rejectedreality

Plot: Where Harriet Potter is Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes’ soulmate.

Fandoms: Harry Potter & MCU

Characters: Bucky Barnes, Harry Potter, Steve Rogers, Hermione, Ron

Relationships: Bucky Barnes/Harry Potter; Steve Rogers/Harry Potter; Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers; Bucky/Steve/Harry

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse, emotional/psychological abuse

Tags: fem!Harry Potter, soulmate-identifying marks, age difference, angst with a happy ending, it gets worse before it gets better

My Notes: this is so, so, so fucking beautiful! I am straight up in love with this fic, and I am so sad that it hasn’t been updated for a few years because there was so much potential. There are some hints at underage couples, as Harry’s 15 while Bucky and Steve are adults, but nothing actually happens.

*incomplete* [last updated 2017]

trapped in a blue haze by MourningElegance

Plot: “And in that moment, Draco knows. He knows that all his deep-rooted suspicions about Harry’s childhood are terribly, horribly true.” As their relationship grows, so do Draco’s misgivings about Harry’s past.

Rating: Explicit!!!

Characters: Harry, Draco

Relationships: Harry/Draco

Warnings: explicit sexual content, implied/referenced child abuse

Tags: established relationship, smut, porn with plot, explicit sexual content, fluff and angst, hurt/comfort, cuddling, post-war, post-Hogwarts, auror Harry Potter, POV Draco, character study, sickfic, epilogue what epilogue, injury

*complete*

From the Dungeons by huntersg1rl

Plot: One conversation goes slightly differently. How much does it change? Features a caring Snape, supportive Malfoys, strong friendships, and Slytherin Harry.

Characters: Harry, Draco, Blaise, Pansy, Daphne, Snape, Narcissa, Lucius, Sirius, Remus, Pomfrey, Dumbledore

Relationships: pre-Harry/Draco; Severus Snape & Harry Potter

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse

Tags: Slytherin Harry Potter, Good Severus Snape, good Lucius Malfoy, good Narcissa Malfoy, manipulative Dumbledore, POC Harry, animagus transformation, wizengamot, politics and culture

My Notes: YA’LL! This one is so cool! It’s going under some major maintenance at the moment, so it’ll be a bit of a wait until it gets going again but I recommend reading it immediately before the changes get enacted. I don’t want to spoil anything, but Harry’s a BAMF in this series, especially when we get to book 3

*incomplete* [this is a series, first three parts are completed, last updated February 2021]

Fighting for Freedom by dreamsofmermaids

Plot: At the end of a horrific fourth year, Harry overhears something on the train back to London that sets in motion a series of events that will reveal truths, change decisions, and send Harry on a path to true freedom. But nothing comes without a fight.

Fandoms: Harry Potter & Criminal Minds

Characters: Harry, Snape, Aaron Hotchner, Spencer Reid, Jason Gideon, Emily Prentiss, Sirius Black, Voldemort

Relationships: to be announced (I know, I’m sorry, I hate this too)

Warnings: graphic depictions of violence, major character death, attempted sexual assault, implied/referenced child abuse, suicide attempt, kidnapping

Tags: Dumbledore bashing, Weasley bashing, Hermione bashing, Harry runs away, Snape bashing, not so evil Voldemort, trouble magnet!Harry

My Notes: this one is really good and it features a Harry and Dobby friendship. I’m gonna spoil it right now, Hotchner is Harry’s dad, I hate it when it doesn’t state it in the tags

*incomplete* [last updated February 2021]

From Grace by silver_fish *favorite*

Plot: From the top of the Astronomy Tower, the stars always look brighter. Funny, how Harry can’t seem to find them at all anymore.

Characters: Harry, Snape, Hermione, Ron

Relationships: Harry & Snape

Warnings: suicidal thoughts, implied/referenced child abuse, attempted suicide

Tags: set during Ootp, insomnia, nightmares, teenage angst, emotional hurt/comfort

*complete*

A Beautiful Lie by Panis_fluvium

Plot: Harry receives his letter while the Dursley's are on vacation. Harry takes it upon himself to find out if the letters he receives are true or if someone is playing a massive joke on him. What happens when he journey's to Diagon Alley alone? What happens when he finally gets to school? Will he finally fit in? Will he finally escape the abuse?

Characters: Harry, Draco, Snape, Dumbledore, McGonagall, Blaise, Pansy, Ron, Hermione

Relationships: Draco/Harry; Pansy/Blaise; Snape/?

Warnings: graphic depictions of violence, implied/referenced child abuse

Tags: Severitus, Slytherin Harry, bullying, shy Harry, slight Ron bashing, fairly good Voldie, misunderstood darkside, manipulative Dumbledore

*incomplete* [last updated June 2021]

The heir of something or other by diregewithoutmusic

Plot: When kids in the Slytherin Common Room tossed jeers at the pudgy feet of Millicent Bulstrode, Harry rose up to do something about it. This Harry, now one of Snape’s own, got fewer House points lost but many more detentions– it had never been the colors on his hem that Severus hated. This was not wishing Harry an easy path. This was not wishing the boy a warm House. This was Harry, three weeks in, sleep deprived and considering running away and going back to Privet Drive. This was Harry in the back of Potions class, blank-faced under Snape’s disdain the way he’d perfected under the Dursleys’s torments. When Quirrell shouted “troll in the dungeons, thought you ought to know,” and Harry overheard that there was a girl in the bathroom crying, he still ran off to make sure she got out okay. He hesitated first, at the back of the little pack of Slytherin first years (at the back so that no one could get behind him)– he hesitated. And Millicent Bulstrode, who could never quite keep her tummy tucked in enough, could never brush all the cat hair off her robes, never quite keep her temper in check, hesitated, too.

Characters: Harry, Millicent, Colin Creevey, Hermione, Dennis Creevey, Luna, Ron, Draco, Astoria, Daphne, Pansy, Neville, Susan Bones

Relationships: gen

Warnings: major character death

Tags: Slytherin Harry, canon typical violence

My Notes: this made me cry. It like actually made me cry. I don’t cry when I read fanfiction, but this one actually made me cry, it’s been two weeks and I still feel like crying thinking about this fic, but that being said it’s written so beautifully.

*complete*

Conditionally by Lomonaaeren

Plot: Harry finds out that he's Snape's son. It goes as badly as possible.

Characters: Harry, Snape, Dumbledore, Sirius, Hermione, Ron, Seamus, Umbridge, Rita, Neville, Voldemort

Relationships: minor Lily/Snape; Harry & Snape; Hermione & Ron & Harry

Warnings: graphic depictions of violence, suicidal thoughts, minor character death

Tags: Severitus, present tense, powerful Harry, Snape is Harry’s biological father, unhealthy coping mechanisms, independent Harry

My Notes: wow this one made me so mad for Harry. Sirius and Remus are not Harry’s friends, nor Dumbledore. Be warned, as good as this fic is, you will be very angry at all the adults in this fic. Snape isn’t a loving father type, and their relationship isn’t the greatest but it’s better than nothing by the end.

*complete*

Harry Potter and the Secrets Within by WhoWroteThis

Plot: Harry Potter is a very special, but very abused little boy. When a giant drags him into a world unknown, he'll need all the help he can get to understand his newfound belonging. Lucky for him, he has a snake, a dragon, and a horde of protective allies on his side.

Characters: Harry, original animal characters, Snape, Draco, Lucius and Narcissa, Portrait Salazar Slytherin, Basilisk, Blaise, Hogwarts ghosts, Quirrell, Voldemort

Relationships: Harry & Voldemort; Harry & Draco; Harry & Snape

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse, internalized homophobia, implied/referenced alcohol abuse, suicide threats and thoughts

Tags: Harry Potter needs a hug, parseltongue, Harry Potter has a pet snake, powerful Harry, metamorphmagus Harry, good Malfoy family, Slytherin Harry, slow burn, Slytherin politics, Hagrid bashing, Hermione bashing, Ron bashing, Dumbledore bashing, rituals, centaurs, dragons, cats, snakes

My Notes: I will literally never be trustworthy of the basilisk after reading Antithesis but I have to admit the basilisk in this fic is pretty great

*incomplete* [last updated August 2021]

The Tainted Blood of the Father by StarLight_Massacre *favorite*

Fandoms: Supernatural & Harry Potter

Plot: Harry has broken away from his chains after the Dursleys go too far. A simple desire to make a withdrawal from Gringotts leads to something much larger and exposes more than he ever knew about himself. A rushed, impulsive trip to America changes his entire life as he might have just found himself a true family to call his own.

Characters: Harry, John Winchester, Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester, Bobby

Relationships: Gen

Warnings: graphic depictions of violence, implied/referenced child abuse, attempted sexual assault

Tags: Awkward Winchesters trying to deal with Harry, cinnamon roll Harry

My Notes: The dynamic between Harry and the Winchesters shouldn’t work this well, but they absolutely do. Harry is a little Sam, he acts so much like him it’s so cute and everyone finds it so cute. Really great amount of angst and hurt/comfort. Doesn’t deal with the wizard side of things that much but I expect that’ll change in the upcoming chapters. Author has stated they don’t know if the Winchesters ever will find out that Harry’s a wizard, however, so keep that in mind

*incomplete* [last updated April 2021]

On a Pale Horse by Hyliian

Plot: When Dumbledore tried to summon a hero from another world to deal with their Dark Lord problem, this probably wasn't what he had in mind.

Characters: Harry, Death, Dumbledore, Hermione, Remus, Voldemort, Ron

Relationships: Gen

Warnings: none

Tags: master of death Harry, dimension travel, summoning rituals gone horribly wrong, godlike Harry, Dumbledore bashing, crack treated seriously, does major character death count as a tag when the major character is Death?

My Notes: so absolutely creepy, I love it so much, our Harry is not really all that much like Harry at all because he’s an immortal eldritch being of horror

*incomplete* [last updated 2018]

tell me whether he is dead by LullabyKnell *favorite*

Plot: Harry suffers a few side-effects of dying but not dying. “Hey, can someone help me with this? The mirror in the bedroom’s stopped working for me. “What do you mean ‘the mirror’s stopped working’?”

Characters: Harry, Ron, Hermione

Relationships: Harry/Ron/Hermione

Warnings: none

Tags: post-canon, epilogue what epilogue, post-battle of Hogwarts, post-Deathly Hallows, haunting, implied/referenced character death, gen or pre-slash, fluff and angst, oblivious Harry, master of death Harry

My Notes: so fucking brilliant, this author literally never misses, the relationship between the golden trio is so fucking cute and I love them so much

*complete*

A New Place to Stay by DebsTheSlytherinSnapeFan *favorite*

Plot: Harry Potter is called up to Dumbledore's office and told he was being moved elsewhere to keep him safe. He no longer has to stay at the Dursley's, but Dumbledore tells him he has to stay with Severus Snape. For a few days it seemed like a bad idea. Until Severus Snape uncovers the truth of who Harry Potter really is and what he's been through. Watch as Severus does as nobody else has done before him. He takes care of Harry. Watch him flourish into who he was meant to be, a boy with the heart of a Gryffindor and smarts of a Slytherin. The Dursley's, Umbridge and Dumbledore had better watch out Severus is out for revenge. Spy or no spy, Severus is not allowing anyone away with hurting Harry.

Characters: Snape, Harry, Dumbledore, Neville, Luna, Hermione, Ron

Relationships: Gen

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse

Tags: Severitus

My Notes: I’ve read so many of these types of fics that even though this is more than 300k words I can’t remember a single thing about this but it must’ve been good because I labelled it as favorite, so

*complete*

Silver Lining by BloodyRed_Queen

Plot: Harry has a disastrous Summer with the Dursleys and is brought to Hogwarts early. In order to protect him, drastic measures are taken and Harry finds himself living with one Severus Snape.

Characters: Harry, Blaise, Draco, Snape

Relationships: Harry/Blaise; Harry & Snape

Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, implied/referenced child abuse

Tags: animagus, father-son relationship, severitus, Snape adopts Harry, good Slytherins, Ron bashing, Dumbledore bashing, therapy, manipulative Dumbledore

*complete*

truth’s like blood underneath your fingernails by Choices_We_Make, questionsthemselves

Plot: "Slytherin would do well, help you on the path to greatness," the hat seems to be coaxing him, but for something that can read his mind, it sure doesn't seem to know him very well. Harry doesn't want greatness. He doesn't need his name in lights and on everyone's lips. He wants meals, hot ones, whenever he wants, with people that he likes and that like him. Friends he can have adventures with, huddle under the blankets with at night and laugh with. People who might think… think he's worth something. In which Harry is sorted into Slytherin, and Snape deals with the fallout.

Characters: Harry, Snape, Draco, Theo, Blaise

Relationships: Harry & Snape

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse

Tags: Slytherin Harry, Severitus sort of, angst with a sort of hopeful ending, Snape discovers abuse

*complete* [part of a series, incomplete but first two parts are finished, last updated 2018]

Harry Potter and the Immortal’s Playground by May_May_o_o

Fandoms: MCU & Harry Potter

Plot: Living forever isn't all it's cracked up to be. Harry Potter learns the meaning of immortality when everyone he loves dies again and again after becoming the master of death. After millennia of love lost, Death sends him to "Elsewhere" in order to give his master something new and different. Harry emerges from ash in New Asgard. What's a man like Thor to do but offer the traveler a home?

Characters: Harry, Ron, Hermione, Luna, Death, Tony Stark, Steve Rogers, Clint, Natasha, Loki, Thor, Bruce, May Parker

Relationships: Harry/Ginny; Thor/Harry; Harry & Avengers

Warnings: PTSD, suicide attempts

Tags: master of death Harry, magically powerful Harry, panic attacks, hurt/comfort, post-snap

My Notes: I don’t usually like Harry paired with any of the Avengers other than Peter, but Thor and Harry are so soft and written beautifully, I love this author so much

*incomplete* [last updated June 2021]

Another Mind Game by May_May_o_o *favorite*

Plot: Harry’s occlumency reveals his disturbing home life which sets off a chain reaction that cannot be undone. Snape finds himself begrudgingly caring about the bespectacled boy, Harry discovers what it's like to have adults who care, and Hermione finds herself becoming an accidental crime lord. Draco Malfoy is very much along for the ride, in all senses of the word. A ridiculous blend of hilarity and tragedy, Another Mind Game is the multi-faceted fanfiction you didn't know you wanted but will absolutely adore. Featuring a sassy Harry Potter, good friends, and a great deal of sarcasm.

Characters: Harry, Neville, Hermione, George, Fred, Snape, Ron, Luna, McGonagall, Dumbledore, house elves

Relationships: Draco/Harry; Hermione/Ron; Snape & Harry

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse; presumed suicidal (it makes sense when you read it)

Tags: mentor Snape, strong Harry, sassy Harry, slow burn, fluff and angst, Dumbledore bashing, crack treated seriously, Snape adopts Harry, protective Hogwarts, magically powerful Harry

My Notes: favorite, absolute favorite, read it three times already and it’s only been three weeks! The endnotes are so funny and add a lot of levity to the story

*complete* (unfortunately, I wish I could read more)

Not Just Pretty Words by LullabyKnell

Fandoms: Harry Potter & The Addams Family

Plot: On an unexpected holiday to America, Harry Potter meets a strange girl at a zoo, finds out that he's a witch, steals a snake, and is cordially invited to the Addams mansion for dinner.

Characters: Harry, Wednesday, Morticia, Gomez

Relationships: Gen; Addams Family & Harry

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse

Tags: Harry needs a hug, worldbuilding, happy ending, found family, light angst

*complete*

Bruised Words by starknjarvis

Plot: After Harry blows up Aunt Marge, Dumbledore decides it's not safe for Harry to spend the rest of the summer at the Leaky Cauldron, and instead sends him to stay at Spinner’s End with Professor Snape. It's tense, awkward, and teeming with misunderstandings...but it might be the best thing that's happened to either of them. They're both been without a family for a very long time.

Characters: Harry, Snape, Dumbledore

Relationships: Harry & Snape

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse

Tags: traumatized Harry, miscommunications, Snape adopts Harry, sickfic

*complete* [part of series, incomplete, last updated 2020]

The Freak Who Lived by DeviantHufflepuff, Zaharya

Plot: When Harry's name comes out of the Goblet of Fire, he is kicked out of Gryffindor Tower by those he thought of as friends. It isn't until Snape finds him that the truth comes out about The Boy Who Lived.

Characters: Harry, Snape, Pomfrey, McGonagall, Viktor Krum, Fleur, Cedric, Draco, Neville, Blaise

Relationships: Sirius/Remus; Harry & Snape; Harry/Blaise

Warnings: graphic depictions of violence, implied/referenced child abuse, PTSD, trauma induced age regression (not intense), suicidal thoughts

Tags: book 4, Severitus, Snape adopts Harry, panic attacks, seer Luna, Harry needs a hug, McGonagall is basically Harry’s mom, manipulative Dumbledore but he’s not evil, big brother Draco

My Notes: Snape is pretty cuddly in this one, he’s not shy with feelings and showing Harry that he’s loved which is nice and a nice change from other Severitus fics. Don’t be off-put by the age regression tag, it’s super low-key, there’s only a couple throw-away lines about it.

*incomplete* [last updated February 2021]

Dudley Dursley’s Most Unexpectedly Fortunate Flower by aTasteofCaramell

Plot: Dudley Dursley is leading a perfectly normal life, his contact with his odd cousin limited to Christmas cards and peculiar memories. Until his daughter sneezes and sets the curtains on fire.

Characters: Harry, Dudley, Dudley’s children, Petunia and Vernon Dursley

Relationships: Dudley & Harry; Harry/Ginny

Warnings: none

Tags: humor, Dudley has a magical child, redeemed Dudley, post-series, Petunia and Vernon still suck, Harry Potter Next Generation

*complete*

Unexpected Consequences by Siebenschlaefer

Plot: The Ministry letter after the Dementor attack has far greater consequences than everybody could have anticipated and at the start of his fifth year in Hogwarts Harry has to be sorted again. And this time there is no negotiating with the Sorting Hat.

Characters: Harry, Snape, Draco, Dumbledore, Hermione, Sirius, Lupin, Blaise, Ron

Relationships: Snape & Harry

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse

Tags: Slytherin Harry, resorting

*incomplete* [last updated March 2021]

Stinging Nettle and Milking Pails by Oceanbreeze7 *favorite*

Plot: Are you a witch or / Are you a fairy? / Or are you the wife / of Michael Cleary? “The fairies will do wicked things sometimes,” Harry murmured gently, “Steal the milk when they get a chance, or skim the cream off the milk crocks.” “Do they ever steal anything more?” Luna asked him rhetorically. Harry couldn’t answer.

Characters: Harry, Luna, James, Lily

Warnings: author chose not to use warnings

Tags: wrong-boy-who-lived, Harry has a twin, dark fairy tale elements, fairy tale style, druids, fae and fairies, James and Lily live

My Notes: Oceanbreeze7 should straight up be a horror writer. This is the writer who wrote Antithesis, the fic that I was literally unable to finish because I was too heartbroken, and they did not disappoint with this one! It’s so good! It’s so horrific! It’s so heartbreaking!

*complete*

Sarcasm and Slytherin by orphan_account *favorite*

Plot: After ten years of misery with the Dursleys, Harry Potter learns that he has magic. Except, in this story, it's not a surprise-the only surprise is that there are others like him. Including his twin brother, Julian Potter, the savior of the Wizarding world. This isn't the Harry you think you know.

Characters: Harry, Theo, Blaise, OMC, Hermione, Ron, Neville, James Potter, Luna, Daphne, Snape, Dumbledore

Relationships: none

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse

Tags: wrong-boy-who-lived, Slytherin Harry, Harry has a twin, Slytherin politics, no pairings before 4th year, potential Dumbledore bashing, James bashing, potential Snape bashing, Draco’s still annoying

My Notes: I’m not sure why it’s now an orphan account or if it will ever be updated, but I’ve seen a lot of people on reddit compare this with Prince of Slytherin (a series I haven’t read because I chose this one over it) so be cautious of that. I straight up want to murder James Potter, though, so that’s a nice thought. I finally finished it! I started this back in early June and I miss it a lot, I spent many hours reading this.

*incomplete* [five parts, last updated 2019]

The ones that seek and find (six years in the relationship of harry and luna) by Terapsina

Plot: By chance of fate Harry Potter meets Luna Lovegood in his second year instead of his fifth. It doesn’t really change anything for the magical world at large but it changes quite a lot for the young witch and wizard themselves. Here are six glimpses into their relationship from the moment they meet until the end of the war.

Characters: Harry, Luna, Ron, Hermione

Relationships: Luna/Harry; Harry & Ron & Hermione

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse, canonical character death

Tags: fluff and angst, blood quill, angst with a happy ending, no character bashing, epilogue what epilogue

*complete*

Blame it on the Nargles by Pixiestick_cc

Plot: One kiss under the mistletoe changes everything for Harry and Luna.

Characters: Harry, Luna, Hermione, Ron, Lavender Brown, Xenophilius Lovegood, Fred and George, Percy

Relationships: Luna/Harry

Warnings: none

Tags: fluff, romantic friendship, kissing, book 6

My Notes: this one is so cute, I’ve read it five times already, Harry’s able to see the creatures Luna can when he kisses her!

*complete*

Finders, Keepers by Magi_Silverwolf

Plot: “I’m here to kidnap you,” Luna said. “Will you be so kind as to get in this trunk, please?” “I’m fairly certain that kidnappers aren’t supposed to politely ask you to go with them.” “Duly noted,” Luna commented before gesturing to the trunk again. “Get in, Harry. We have a schedule to keep.”

Characters: Harry, Dumbledore, Luna

Relationships: Luna/Harry

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse

Tags: book 5, fairy Luna, werewolf Remus, magically powerful Harry, manipulative Dumbledore

*complete*

Not Right For Him by JJ Rust

Plot: How will Hermione react when she learns Harry and Luna are together?

Characters: Hermione, Luna, Harry

Relationships: Harry/Luna

Warnings: none apply

Tags: romance, drama

*complete*

The dreamy one by Levi Snowfractal

Plot: Harry finds himself thinking about Luna Lovegood while in detention.

Characters: Harry, Luna

Relationships: Harry/Luna

Warnings: none apply

Tags: romance

*complete*

She Made Him Feel Silly by ArtemisRoseShadow

Plot: The hero usually fell in love with the ever-so-loved princess. It still felt like that to Harry.

Characters: Harry, Luna

Relationships: Harry/Luna

Warnings: none apply

Tags: romance, drama

*complete*

Oh thank god I finished that, that took three hours. Alright check out more of my recs, I have more! Thanks for reading, let me know if you read any of them :)

[con-fection]

ASHES TO ASHES | jim moriarty x reader | part 1/13

Summary: 

Jim Moriarty has always loved fairytales. In particular, grim, macabre ones that end in bloodshed. You've been abused by your step-family for years - in every meaningful way, you embody the story of Cinderella. Except, in your version, Cinderella murders her family and burns the house down. When Sherlock Holmes is assigned to find the killers of your step-family, he inadvertently becomes obsessed with you. And when Sherlock is obsessed, Jim Moriarty becomes a man intrigued.Word Count: 4k 

Most fairy tales follow the same format. A lovely, picturesque life, subsequently followed by a tragedy, a period of hardship, all of which is solved by the power of love. The dashing prince saves the damsel in distress, and they remain happy and in love forever, having easily recovered from the trauma of the tragedy and hardship.

Originally, fairy tales did not end quite so nicely. They were macabre, morbid and horrifying. Just as real-life has a tendency to be.  They weren't an idyllic escape from everyday life. They were nightmarish stories that reflected the fears of society.

By 1815, The Brothers Grimm had compiled several stories, among them The Frog Prince, Hansel and Gretel, Little Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel... and Cinderella.

The latter had always, always been your favourite. You had memorised every line, every word, every single mark of punctuation. You could recite every single version of the story off-by-heart. All of the variations sparked a deep-rooted curiosity in you.

How could the same story end so differently?

All that changed was the person reciting the story - and they would chip away at it, changing it piece by piece, passing it down orally, until it was barely recognisable. In some versions, the characters got their happy ending. Cinderella would marry her Prince Charming with the help of her Fairy Godmother. In others, they didn't. One of her vile step-sisters will hack off parts of their feet and marry Prince Charming, and Cinderella would be left alone.

Sometimes minor aspects of the story would change. Different variations would feature doves, her dead Mother, fairies, and occasionally, the glass slipper would be golden.

Your version was entirely different to anything imagined before.

...unbeknownst to you, however, was the fact that you weren't the only person that liked grim fairytales.

---

Your mother's battle with her myriad of diseases had been one that had defined your childhood. She had been ever-so frail, perpetually in and out of hospitals, constantly deteriorating. There was more than one occasion where you had watched her drop to the floor, her body entirely limp, and you had to be the one to call the ambulance. There were always, always, blood-soaked handkerchiefs strewn around the house.

She was plagued by illness, and in some ways you were suffering just as much as she was. Most children were afforded the luxury of not having to confront the idea of death - often they simply could not even comprehend it. You weren't so lucky as to experience that naivety.

There had been no play-dates for you, there was no time to entertain any other children when each moment had the potential to be her last. Every single waking moment was occupied with the crippling, gut-wrenching fear that one day she might fall down and that the paramedics wouldn't be able to find a pulse.

Every night you would go to bed praying that she would be there in the morning, that she would get her happy ending, that she could read your favourite fairy-tale to you night after night.

"And Cinderella and Prince Charming lived happily ever after, the end!" She would say, smiling brightly as if she hadn't read this to you so many times that she was bored of it. Your mother could probably recite it by heart now, too.

"Do we get a happily ever after, Mommy?" You had asked one night, right after your mother had set the book of fairy-tales down on your bedside table.

"If you pray, God will answer."  She replied, ever-so-vaguely, fiddling with the little golden cross necklace dangling between her collarbones. Now you can recognise that she didn't look surprised by your question, rather, she was in the throes of longing for that happily ever after.

You liked 'happily ever after'. It was a comforting lie that you would willingly believe. In 'happily ever after' there was no pain - in your idea of a happy ending, your mother would recover and you wouldn't burst into tears the moment she staggered out of the room.

But 'happily ever after' had to come after years of torment and misery. It always did. There was no story in which the protagonist began happy and remained that way for all eternity. That would be dreadfully boring, and yet it was what you yearned for the most. Boring and happy would be good.

Her death was a mercy - quick and painless, in her sleep. Her funeral was equally as brief as her life, a bleak affair that you can hardly recall. You had been so, so young then, and the tears just wouldn't stop coming, rolling down your face as your chest wracked with sobs. You can't remember much about it, other than the feeling of your father's hand on your shoulder and the awful, almighty bitterness that threatened to send you to your knees.

Naturally, your mother's funeral had been one of the worst days of your life. She looked so small, so ashen in her casket. Her lips were completely unmoving, drawn into a thin line. Never again would she recite your favourite bedtime story. She didn't look like she was sleeping, not when all vibrancy had been removed from her skin, to the point where it was practically grey and she smelled like a chemical preservative that made you wrinkle your nose and sob even harder.

But, even worse than the funeral had been the wedding.

It had been horrifically easy for your father to move on, and to find comfort in your step-mother, Verona. You had only met her once before they were married.

"Honey, I want you to meet somebody." Your father had said. He looked so happy, smiling in a way that you hadn't seen him do since before your mother died, his lips curved upwards and a strange look in his eyes. "This is Verona, and she means a lot to me."

He looked at Verona the same way that you looked at your fairy-tales. They were an escape, a place where you could pretend that things were different and that you were happy. Verona, with her perfectly curled hair and pearly-white teeth, was his escape, his happy ending. You wanted so badly for her to be yours, as well. It wasn't to be.

"Hello," She cooed down at you. She could smile so sweetly, her peach-pink lips drawn upwards to reveal just a flash of white teeth. It was so saccharine, so lovely. Her voice could take on this mellow, melodic tone. It reminded you terribly of a siren's call - beautiful, and so, so alluring, but it wasn't something that you should put your trust in unless you wanted to drown. Verona always looked down at you - there never came a point where you were to be considered an equal. Never.

There was something about her that made your skin crawl. She was a vile lady, with a wicked grin, honey-blonde hair and long nails that looked like talons. To you as a child, you came to view her as practically a witch, clawing her way into your life just to destroy it for her own amusement. Your father was completely and utterly blind, incapable of seeing any flaw within her.

Now that you were older, you could see her as more than a one-dimensional figure that was simply labelled 'the villain'. She wasn't a nice person, not by your account, but she was complex. Verona was always distant from you, eternally glacial and condescending whenever nobody was watching. She wasn't like that to everybody, though.

Along with the step-mother came two of what you had assumed to be Satan's most accomplished demons. They had inherited a fascinating ability from their mother. The instant your father was in the room, all torment would cease. Whether it be pulling your hair, or vandalising your possessions, they had an innate ability to tell whenever your father was close by.

Verona loved them. It was the only time where she seemed to be genuine in her affection. She would dote on them constantly, cooing at them and reading them stories in the same way that your mother had once done for you. She could pretend to tolerate you in public, and at first, you had lapped it up, basking in her siren's call voice and gazing upon her like she could be your escape, too, like she was something to be cherished, to be worshipped.

She bombarded you with an eternal cycle of love - so much love that you couldn't even feel the pain of losing your mother. She would treat you like you were her own daughter. She would pat you on the head and speak to you so sweetly. And after, would always come the abuse. The screaming, the slapping, the hissed remarks, the threats.

It was hard to deify her after that. So, Verona became the villain, the terrible step-mother who was always there to hold you down.

The wedding itself had been hosted at the very same church your parents had been married in. Their vows were exchanged between what you remembered to be Verona's awful giggles, and you yourself had been a flower girl, along with your step-sisters.

Somehow you managed to feel even worse than you had at your mother's funeral. It wasn't really acceptable to scream and cry at a wedding, so you did your best to look at the very least neutral.

You had spent most of the day staring at the gaudy paper garlands strung from the ceiling, doing your best to avoid thinking about the three women joining the family.

Everybody seemed to adore your step-sisters. They were perfect when they had to be, blonde angels with blue eyes and the sweetest disposition. Aubrey and Alora - twins that were identical in every sense of the word. Your father loved these girls, and he loved his new wife. It was like his previous one, and his first, biological daughter had simply been discarded and pushed to the periphery.

There were no more blood-speckled handkerchiefs strewn about the house, no more pills stashed above the sink, and no more quick trips to the hospital. Instead, there were Verona's lipsticks, and your step-sisters' toys. Pictures of them dominated the mantle place. Their achievements were the ones to be celebrated.

"Well done, Alora. We're so proud of you."

"Oh, Aubrey, you're so smart!"

Any incidents of your step-family's cruelty that you did manage to complain to your father about were either dismissed as the lies of a girl acting out as a result of her grief, or as some minor sibling rivalry that you would get over in time. In fact, your father seemed delighted when he interpreted it as the latter. Sibling rivalry meant that you were coming to see each other as sisters.

"You know, one day, when you grow up, I bet you're doing to be so glad to have Aubrey and Alora. I know that you girls don't always get along, but this is a good thing. They're your sisters." Your father had said, so gently, so softly that you wished for a moment you could believe it - that it was true and you could bring yourself to be thankful.

It flooded you with some kind of resentment - that he could be so passive, so enchanted by Verona and her perfect daughters, that you could become practically irrelevant. That of all of them, your concerns were the ones to be disregarded.

That resentment didn't fade when he died.

It had been an accident - a car-crash. It hadn't even been his fault. He had been on his way home to you, and some maniac had run him off the road. It could have happened to anybody. It should have happened to somebody else. It should have been something you saw on the news and thought about briefly. Instead, you were left an orphan.

His body was far too mangled for any kind of open-casket funeral. By the age of twelve, you had been to two funerals - one for each parent. What most children would do is to hope they were happy together, reunited in heaven. That's what you should have hoped for. Instead, you would pray, over and over again, every single fucking night, that they were burning. That they were being roasted in the flames of hell, and that they were screaming out for your forgiveness.

God hadn't listened when you had asked for your mother to get well and recover from her illnesses, nor when you asked for her to come back to you. Life had been so cruel, and so, you reasoned that its creator must be cruel, too. Perhaps God would listen if you wanted to inflict pain, instead.

The resentment didn't fade - rather, it intensified. After that, you really didn't need anybody to read Cinderella to you.

You had lived it.

---

The first person to rise was always you. It had been that way for years, the beginning of your well-established daily routine.

It was so cold, down in the basement. It wasn't given the same insulation as the rest of the house - and why would it have been? Your parents had mostly used it for storage, primarily for things like your bike, tools, and those family picture albums that you couldn't even bring yourself to open. At the time, there was nothing down there that had really deserved to be kept warm.

It was in rather poor condition. The bricks that comprised the walls were all cracked, and the black paint covering them was chipped and unevenly applied, the shelves looked liable to fall down any minute, and there were piles and piles of things everywhere. There is a saw lying on the ground, next to a few planks of wood that your father had never had an opportunity to use for anything and a stack of cannisters of gasoline that you eye affectionately.

There was always a breeze blowing through the basement, too. Your parents had discarded what they didn't need and stored it in the basement, and once they were both dead and buried, your step-mother had done the same to you.

Your old bedroom, where your mother used to read you bedtime stories and you would fret over her health, had been stripped bare and subsequently turned into Verona's walk-in wardrobe. You had been relegated to the basement, left to freeze whilst fur-coats and cocktail dresses got to enjoy central heating.

To keep warm, you would bundle yourself up in whatever shoddy blankets you could find. They would scratch at your skin and you would shiver against them, grinding your teeth together and hissing at the cold, silently cursing at Verona. It wasn't entirely uncommon for you to wake up and discover your lips had turned blue. It would worry you sometimes, that if it got too cold, you would simply die in the night and there would be nobody to notice.

It was early enough that you could hear the birds cooing sweetly outside, singing to one another as they flit through the branches in the trees outside. It was such a lovely thing to watch, and even lovelier to hear. It's such a pretty sound. You're not entirely sure that your step-family have ever woken early enough to hear it. If they hadn't before, then by now they had certainly missed their chance.

This was meant to be when you would start your chores. Your step-mother had left you to take on a maid role in the house, cooking and cleaning for them, waiting on them hand and foot, scrubbing the floors and surfaces until they shined. It filled you with rage.

Of the four of you, you were by far the best in every measurable way. Verona and her daughters were harpies, beasts with perfect faces that managed to fool just about everybody they came into contact with. Your father had been just one of many that was too naive to see it. They didn't bother with the pretenses around you - you had always seen them for what they were.

By now, you should be starting to sweep the bottom floor of the house, and making breakfast. But today would be different.

You creep up the stairs, your eyes constantly darting around the house, searching for any sign of the other inhabitants. They aren't awake, and you don't expect them to be, but it's always good to check, just in case.

Verona's left her purse on the countertop, next to a wine glass with a pink smudge on its rim and a pair of black elbow-length gloves she'd worn to a dinner the night before. The mere sight of it makes your lips curve up into a sneer. It's the ugliest shade of pink lipstick - vibrant and bold in all the wrong ways, but she somehow makes it look good. Of course she does - it's a talent of hers, really, to make the worst things seem not simply palatable, but also tempting.

You leave the wine glass, there will be no need to clean it today. With a sharp intake of breath, you open the purse, snatching all the money you can from it. Fortunately, Verona likes to keep most of her money in cash, so there's a decent amount. There's enough, at the very least.

The kitchen is obsessively cleaned - every surface shines from your efforts. It's clinical, sterile even, and the smell of cleaning products still permeates the air. There's a broom in the parlour, but you won't be using it.

Never before had you done anything like this. Today was a day that you had fantasised about for years, exploring and navigating different variations of it before constructing the master plan. These steps you were taking had been carefully considered, each and every action poured over obsessively, to the point of madness. All aspects of the plan were to be treated with reverence - they had practically become holy, and you recited them more often than you would prayers.

Already, you were breathing too quickly. There was adrenaline in your system, and your hands were slightly clammy. Nerves - but you weren't nervous. Not really. This was a burning, scalding anticipation that writhed around in your gut and clawed at your insides.

You allow yourself a brief moment to try and relax, letting your eyes flutter shut and letting your shoulders drop. There is a need to be tense - everything hinges on today, on whether or not you accomplish the plan.

When your eyes open, you immediately gravitate towards the knives. Before you select one, you go for Verona's black silk gloves, putting them on and admiring the way they look against your skin, and how smooth they are. They're the kind that's awfully expensive, but they look glamorous. She had worn them just the night prior, when she went to some fancy dinner.

They're hauntingly elegant, a mark of sophistication that contrasts so nicely with what you're about to do. They're a rather lovely way of ensuring that there's no fingerprints left in the house.

It's then that you pick a knife - a weighty silver meat cleaver with dark grey indentations on the handle. They make it look almost porous, and you know that the knife had been part of a set, a gift from one of Verona's friends who was into the culinary arts.

It's heavy, and you test the weight, passing it between your hands, looking at it reverently. The birds are still singing, chirping in harmony, nature's soundtrack to what is about to become a horrific crime. Whether the birdsong will harmonise with screams has yet to be determined. It has the potential to sound like a symphony - a completely lovely cacophony of everything you enjoy.

The meat cleaver shines in the soft sunlight - simply holding it makes you feel assured.

---

You create your own version of Cinderella. One where the house burns down.

The evil step-mother and bratty step-sisters are already dead when the match hits the gasoline that's long-since soaked into the floors. They had been hacked to pieces, their throats split open, almost to the point of decapitation. The blood would seep from the gaping wounds, spilling onto the bed sheets and staining their blonde hair red. They had looked so human in their sleep, so unsuspecting.

There wasn't even any time for them to awake and feel terror, or shock. That, at the very least, is a mercy. You had never really intended for it to be - it was more of a practicality than a fantasy. In the fantasies, the executions had lasted far, far longer.

As a child, experiencing the pains of loss, you had prayed for your parents to burn, so that they may feel as much pain as you. There was no way of knowing whether or not God would come to answer your prayers, so you decide instead to burn the people you can reach.

The meat cleaver is placed back into the kitchen - there's a chance that the wooden knife block may burn and char it and obscure the fact that it was the murder weapon. You keep Verona's gloves and you keep the cash.

There's something so beautiful, so incredibly vindicating about watching it all go up in smoke.

The house burns so beautifully. Flames dance in the windows, consuming the lacey white curtains, creeping their way up the ceiling until the roof catches fire and slowly caves in on itself, the slate-grey tiles becoming charred, crumbling and sliding over one another.

The birds stop singing. They squawk in agitation, fleeing from the nearby trees and taking to the skies. They, much like you, evacuate and watch the show from afar. They start their birdsong afresh once they're out of danger, singing proudly.

Plumes of smoke take to the air, contaminating and invading the morning sky. It's so dark, so thick that it's liable to block out the sun. The smoke's descending to the ground, too, sweeping over the grass like a terrible, ominous fog, rolling over the street and barrelling towards you in waves.

Your eyes and throat burn - you can feel the heat, even from a distance. You're breathing in wisps of the smoke - it's so strong that you feel simultaneously feel like you're choking, juxtaposed with this great, overwhelming sense of freedom. It smells so horrible you want to gag - it's not like the comforting smell from whenever your father would barbeque. It's stifling, oppressive, even.

And yet, despite your eyes watering and the feeling of nausea that the smell inspires within you, you doubt there has ever been a sweeter smell.

The flames flicker so brightly, swaying in tandem in a variety of oranges, reds, yellows and even a flash of white. They're so bright you can see it reflected on your skin.

The plan has been completed. You're entirely satisfied, and yet you're left directionless. Everything has amounted to this moment - to the burning of the monsters. This is your happy ever after, you think.

You stand there, bathed in an orange hue, simply watching, for as long as you're able.

Inevitably, you have to leave. You're rather tempted to dash back across the street and take Verona's car, if only to steal away another thing she loved. Her daughters, her life, her car. But you don't, as much as you would like to. It's another whim, another fleeting fantasy that has to be sacrificed for the sake of your freedom. Perhaps the car would burn, too. It's relatively close to the house.

Getting caught would simply transfer you from one life of imprisonment to another. The inner city of London seems as good a destination as any - it's not too far, and there nobody will know your name.

[cynicalrainbows]

I love the characterisation of the queens as they are but sometimes i think it would be fascinating to do a fic where they’re all just the complete opposite to how they’re normally depicted.

So just off the top of my head: An Aragon who just cannot handle the idea of reincarnation because it completely misaligns with her religious beliefs thus far, and she ends up painfully tormented by the fact that nothing she believed in her past life fits with this. Also the knowledge that her husband left her and went on to have SIX wives and killed two of them? It just destroys her. She’s filled with guilt- she wonders if she should have done even more to keep Henry and Anne apart in order to save Anne’s life- and she’s thrown into turmoil because....well, the idea that your husband was bewitched from you by an awful turn of fate is one thing but to learn he’s....actually just not very monogamous? Brutal. So imagine an Aragon who is just really quiet and awkward, very anxious and on edge because literally none of the certainties that gave her strength in her first life exist for her any more.

An Anne who isn’t at all chaotic or gremlin-ish, she’s probably the most calm and mature and on the ball of all of them. Being given a new lease of life has filled her with a sense of purpose and seeing how well Elizabeth did makes her feel so much more at peace with how she died- she sees it as a worthy exchange and concludes that she’d do nothing differently if she could do back. Imagine Anne being the one to organise things and take charge- she was the queen always on the cutting edge of new ideas and ways of thinking in her first life so this makes her adaptable and capable. She has no one to need to flirt with or charm in this life so she doesn’t bother with it- she’s nice but serious.

A Jane who has absolutely no desire to be a mother or anything close to a mother to anyone. She had her chance with Edward and childbirth was, for her, a horrific experience. If she’d known what it would be like, much less that she’d DIE, she never would have agreed to marry. And it turns out that, although she wanted to give Henry a son out of a sense of duty, she doesn’t really LIKE babies that much. They’re too loud and sticky. She’s utterly relieved that she needn’t keep up the demure, sweet persona that was required of her an a well bred Tudor maid and revels in the freedom of the 21st century to be outspoken, loud, careless in her speech. She doesn’t have to care what people think of her any more so she doesn’t.

An Anna who is genuinely sad that the debacle with Henry left her alone all her life- she had always always always planned on marriage and children, and although her settlement with Henry left her alive, it also required that she admit to being precontracted and therefore not free to marry anyone at all. If she could, she would go back and do it all properly- she’d resolve to be wittier and to learn English more quickly, she’d try harder to end up consummating the marriage, she’d react in the expected fashion when Henry came to meet her in disguise. She considers her settlement a burden because it caused her to be constantly surrounded by opulence that she could never share or pass on to anyone- she would have given it all to be able to have a baby.

A Kitty who is incredibly independent- not in a ‘withdrawn, scared to trust’ way, she’s just not terribly affectionate. She was forced to grow up quickly by her marriage but she doesn’t regret that, only the abuse she suffered, She has absolutely no interest in reclaiming her lost childhood or teen years, she’s more than ready to embrace being an adult and the independence it brings. She’s dealt with her death- she isn’t troubled by it much, she’s come to terms with it. She also feels some responsibility towards the wives who died more easily, as if her death has given her seniority- so she helps to reassure Catalina, she reigns in Jane’s snark. She’s young in years but not in spirit.

A Cathy who has just given up intellectualism and books- she learnt her lesson in her first life and is all too aware that books lead to ideas which lead to unexpected death warrants.Like Jane, she enjoys the freedom of the new century and plans to enjoy the first time in her adult life where she isn’t married. She’s proud of her writings from her first life but now that she has the choice between study and Netflix? Yeah, she’s going to pick Netflix.

[myheartisafish]

2021 january reads roundup

it’s a new month! and a perfect time to ✨reflect✨on the month’s reads! this january, i finished 5 books:

1. Assassin’s Apprentice by Robin Hobb

2. A Skinful of Shadows by Frances Hardinge

3. Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata

4. Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie (reread) 

5. Battle Royale by Koushun Takami 

thoughts below the cut~

Assassin’s Apprentice:

This read was definitely a surprise for me- I love buying 80s and 90s fantasy paperbacks from the used bookstore and I usually don’t expect very much from them. It’s definitely a childhood book that’s setting up a huge fantasy series, which is why some people find it slow- I would go into it expecting a lot of focus on the inner world of the main character, and not a lot of focus on action-packed plotting. For me, it ended up being surprisingly emotional, and had profound themes of grief and loss. The character building of the two main characters, Fitz and his mentor-figure Burrich, was so, so impressive, as well as the character building for Fitz’s dead father, Chivalry, who is never onscreen yet still affects every plot beat of the book. Give this book a try if you like atmospheric, introspective, character focused fantasy. 

A Skinful of Shadows

I read this book because two of my friends are big fans of the author and I don’t like to be left out of things. I did enjoy it, though! The historical setting of the 1640s English Civil War is perfectly chosen and expressed, and is married so perfectly with the themes of the book that it doesn’t seem like it could take place at any other historical moment. The supernatural element of the plot is a perfect lens for discussing questions of power, control, belief, selfhood, and the afterlife. Do you believe in Puritan ideology? Do you believe in the power of the king? Or do you just believe in your own superiority? Read this if you like atmospheric, dark fantasy, ghosts, unlikeable characters, and bears. 

Convenience Store Woman

This was a different choice for me as I don’t usually stray very far out of the genre fiction world, but I’m trying to broaden my horizons. I’m also currently interested in reading translated works, so this was a good start! This book was short and sweet and absolutely dead on in its portrayal of the rigidity of society and the way that other people are hostile to people that don’t fit in to their preestablished narratives about what a person should be. Read this if you’re frustrated with the assumptions people make about you and your life based on absolutely nothing. 

Ancillary Justice (reread)

This was my fourth read of Ancillary Justice. It’s my favorite sci-fi trilogy and the urge to reread comes around about once a year in my mind. (It all goes around, the planet goes around the sun). This read I was fascinated by the way the book presents choice. We all believe that we would make the right choice in any given situation, and we judge others freely based on our assumption that we would have done better in their place. But it’s not that simple, and it’s not that simple to know in the moment when your choice will make a difference, and when it won’t. The main character Breq is tormented by her past- she initially believes that as an A.I. there were turning points in which she had no choice in her actions, but she begins to realize she may have been more complicit than she originally believed. She resolves to make things right- but is it possible to know when her actions will make a difference? Which gambles will lead her closer to her goal, and which ones could end her journey, and her life? Read this book (and reread it, and reread it) if you love character-focused sci fi with complex worldbuilding, stories about spaceships with feelings, and portrayals of evil empires from within the evil empire. 

Battle Royale

Continued my trend of translated fiction with this one! I watched the movie a few years ago and enjoyed it a lot, and since then have been courting this book every time I see it in the bookstore. Overall I’d say I had a lot of fun reading it, as a gory, fast-paced thriller. I did get a little tired of it by the end, and there was a lot of description of guns, baseball, and other sort of boring stuff that I hardcore skimmed. My biggest gripe with the book was the overall infantilizing treatment of female characters by the narration- how dare this game force a sweet, innocent girl to kill? How dare this game ruin a beautiful girl’s beautiful face! Mitsuko Souma’s backstory was also both out of left field in how over-the-top horrific it was and completely unnecessary. Of course, people who were abused become murderous sociopaths. Of course, a female character can’t just have one bad thing happen to her, it has to be violence on top of violence for the entirety of her miserable life until she dies. 

Re: The Hunger Games, after reading this book I don’t think THG was actually copping Battle Royale at all. THG is a dystopia that’s focused on the dystopia- the corruption of the rich, the element of the media in both keeping people happy and twisting their worldview, the ways in which people fall through the cracks. Battle Royale is focused more on the inner world of the characters- it wants to know what could actually drive a child to kill someone. What level of fear, what level of danger, when does someone actually snap? The author said he was inspired by Stephen King’s The Long Walk, which tracks- The Long Walk is about the limit of a human mind and body in a similar way. In what conditions could someone decide to push their body past the limit of horror? Read Battle Royale if you have a stomach for gore and like fast paced thrillers, video game plots, and seeing innocent children get mown down by a sociopath with a machine gun.

And that’s all! See you next month? And try not get kidnapped and put on an island where you are forced to kill your classmates. 

[turkleader]

Final Fantasy VII Remake Demo Spoilers Below

[ooc]

Let’s talk about something that’s been gnawing away at the back of my mind since I first got the chance to play this demo: Stamp.

For those of you who haven’t gotten the chance to play the demo yet, this is a new mascot character that has been introduced with the Remake, a little puppy that wears a round army helmet on his head. We see two posters in the demo’s areas featuring him, and we get a handful of lines of dialogue from Barret comparing Cloud to Stamp.

Now at first I wasn’t certain what Square was getting at with this new addition, but I know Square well enough to know that adding “random” content that wasn’t in the original FFVII isn’t something they’d risk if there wasn’t some reason behind it. My partner and I listened to Barret’s lines, we studied the posters, and an idea began to emerge. Because another thing that’s notably different about the opening portions of the Remake’s demo compared to the original game is... the absolute lack of any mentions of Zack Fair.

So my theory is... what if Stamp is Zack Fair?

Many people who have played Crisis Core remember the line where Angeal compares Zack to a “restless puppy” (during a DMW flashback). It’s become one of the most endearing terms given to Zack’s character. But my reasoning doesn’t stop there. Barret’s comparison of Cloud to Stamp hammers home the relationship between Cloud and this new mascot, to the point where it’s almost overwhelming. And perhaps that’s the entire point, a way to nudge the audience playing the Remake (new and old fans alike) into paying more attention to this than they initially would be inclined to.

Before Entering the Elevator that Leads Down into the Reactor Barret: SOLDIERs may attack on command, but I hear they make good guard dogs too. Bet you've seen a few reactors. So how do we get to the bridge above mako storage? Ain't holding out on me, are you? Stamp scared to bite the hand that fed him? Or is he a loyal little doggie!? [Cloud gets a flash of static and pain, and grabs his head with one hand] Have it your way, mutt. We can do this with you, or we can do this without you. Cloud: [We cannot see Cloud's eyes at any point during these lines of dialogue; is this done on purpose?] Different reactor, different layout. Depends when it was built. Never seen one like this, but I'll manage.

Right Before Planting the Bomb at the Reactor Core Barret: All right. Let's see if little Stamp really can bite the hand that feeds... [He holds out the bomb] Go on. Do the honors. Prove to me you're the man Tifa says you are. That you're one of us. Cloud: Never said I was. I'm just here for the paycheck. Barret: Then do the damn job!

What we can take away from this, at the very least, is that Square wants us to connect Stamp to Cloud, and vice versa. But how do we get from here to Stamp representing Zack?

Part of it, beyond Zack’s “puppy” nickname, and Zack’s experiences with Cloud immediately prior to the events of FFVII (experimentation at Nibelheim, their escape to Midgar, Cloud’s severe mako poisoning, Zack’s death and passing on his “legacy” to Cloud) is the knowledge that many of us (those that have played the game before) have of Cloud’s fractured mental state, his haphazardly pieced together self-identity, mingling the strongest aspects of Zack, the things Cloud admired so much about his friend and closest companion at the end, and the harsher aspects of Cloud himself, still broken and tormented in so many ways by the things done to him and those he cares about (the razing of Nibelheim by his hero, who goes on to murder his mother and horrifically injure his childhood friend, Tifa; the torture he endured for four years at the hands of Hojo; being so close to freedom, only to lose it all at the very end, with Midgar on the horizon...).

It’s fairly common knowledge that the Cloud we meet at the beginning of FFVII isn’t 100% Cloud. And we see hints of that in Cloud’s reaction when Barret yells “Or is he [Cloud] a loyal little doggie!?” at him: the static, the pain, the fact that during Cloud’s reply to Barret we never see Cloud’s eyes once... Then the static and pain returning with the hallucination of the black feather as Cloud plants the bomb at the reactor core, the moment where in the original game Zack speaks to Cloud and says, “Watch out! This isn’t just a reactor!!” Zack, deceased but still able to keep his individual sense of self in the Lifestream, has multiple instances throughout the original game where he speaks to Cloud in this manner, aiding him, nudging him closer and closer to the truth, and helping him in whatever way he can. So it’s very possible that when Barret speaks to Cloud in the Remake’s demo, he’s speaking to Zack, who is watching over Cloud, as well.

But then things get interesting. Specifically because of one poster.

It depicts Stamp on a background filled with fire, carrying another injured puppy on his back. The writing at the bottom reads, “Stamp stands up for his friends!” Now I would argue, by the familiar flaming background, that this is representing Nibelheim. Stamp is Zack, carrying an unconscious and injured puppy, who is Cloud, out of Nibelheim; a depiction of their escape from the burned-down and rebuilt town. The unnamed puppy even has bandages wrapped around the forearm of his front-left leg, much like a certain ex-SOLDIER has bandages that peek just from beneath his bracer on his left arm. The parallels are striking.

“Everyone’s Favorite Series!” -- Final Fantasy? Maybe even referencing Final Fantasy VII specifically, as one of the most popular, if not the most popular, individual game in this long running series?

“The Adventures of Stamp Book 3″ -- Perhaps a hint, that we’ll find out what really happened to Cloud or get more content regarding this scene (the truth behind Nibelheim) in the third installation of this multi-part Remake of Final Fantasy VII? It’s something we won’t know until we get there, but I can’t help but consider it.

This poster alone seems too coincidental to disregard, even if my interpretation won’t end up being completely accurate because of how little we’ve seen of the game so far. But I can’t deny the fact that I’ve made the association between Zack and Stamp, and I’ll be on the lookout for any more clues once the full game is released to see if we can find out more.

We also have this poster, which reads “Mineral Water, Clear Icicle” with Stamp at the bottom-right holding up a bottle of water, and Japanese text that I believe might be Stamp saying, “Oiishi!” or “Delicious!” (If anyone can confirm or deny what Stamp is saying, I’d appreciate it.) Are we supposed to be looking out for something about Zack after we reach Icicle Inn in the coming installations of the Remake? Icicle Inn is where we find out some of the backstory to Aerith’s birth, about what happened between her mother Ifalna and Professor Gast. Are we to expect something else now that specifically concerns Zack? Or is this just a poster to flesh out the world and not something we should be on the lookout for once we get up to that part? Time will tell.

One of the things that does incline me to think that this theory might be on the right track is that recently a video came out on the Official Playstation YouTube channel featuring two of the individuals from Square Enix’s Marketing Team, where they specifically mention to be on the lookout for more instances of Stamp in the Remake. (You can watch the video here, and the approximate time stamp for when they mention the portion I’ve quoted below is at about 10:44-11:34.)

"So interesting thing to call out there. Barret calls Cloud 'Stamp' and we never really explained what that is but he keeps referring to Cloud as a mutt or a dog or a lapdog of Shinra, and that's a new thing that's fleshed out even further. I won't spoil too much, but you can look for Stamp, for more of Stamp as you go through [the game]."

It’s a lot to take in, but it’s the little things that fascinate me. Like my realization only now, after doing all of this digging that all of Cloud’s idle animations (him adjusting his gloves, kicking his boot on the ground to make sure it’s snug, shifting the position of the Buster Sword as it sits on his back) may all be subtle indicators to the fact that Cloud isn’t used to wearing a SOLDIER’s uniform or carrying the weight of the Buster Sword. These things are still foreign to him, things he has to get used to, because he’s never worn these clothes before, never wielded the Buster Sword or worn it for long periods of time.

The tiniest things are there, giving the nod to Zack’s existence, and struggle, and sacrifice for Cloud right before this point in time. Maybe Stamp is just one of the additional ways that Square is making sure the puppy isn’t forgotten.

[livlepretre]

So what happened with the ghosts? If you want to share. 🙂

at first I thought you were asking about one of my fics and I was like ???? but now I realize you are asking me about my actual terrible time living in a haunted house in good old Dublin. 

okay. so, to begin, I’m not particularly skeptical about ghosts. New Orleans is a really haunted city and my grandfather’s house which I spent a huge amount of my childhood in was pretty haunted-- newspapers mysteriously sitting in the foyer in the morning even though the doors are all locked and the alarm is on, hearing your name being called all throughout the house and it turns out you’re there alone, a gardener who used to never go out at sunset because there was a man in a planter’s hat who would walk from the corner of the house to the pecan tree and back every night at the sun was going down-- honestly I knew A LOT of people with similar experiences growing up so I just,,,,,, accepted that ghosts were pretty much a benign part of life sometimes. (and there may have also been an incident where that same gardner pulled up an old flagstone and a woman popped out of the ground and he came inside white as a sheet, but my grandfather’s house pre-dated the civil war so it didn’t surprise anyone that it was super haunted.) 

well. when I was in college I had a JYA in Dublin, and I moved into a townhouse with a group of other Americans. something like day 3 or 4 in the townhouse, I knew for a fact I was the only one home, but I had this intense feeling standing in the upstairs hallway that there was someone standing right behind me. I can’t describe it as anything other than absolute certainty that there was another presence in the home. at the time, I was like, chill, there’s a ghost. and I went on with things and didn’t worry about it, as my own personal experiences with ghosts were pretty much that sometimes they’re just their and they’re harmless, and I kept this insight completely to myself since  I also suspected that my roommates were likely to be skeptics and I didn’t want to come off week 1 as Ghost Girl. 

Well, end of week 1, little did I know, but the gang who lived on the 3rd floor of the townhouse (I was on the 2nd) decided to make a ouija board on a lark. I have no idea where this idea came from, since I specifically did not mention the ghost to anyone... other than obviously it was on a lot of other people’s minds as well. well. they do the ouija board. the power cuts off in the middle of their fucking seance. it comes back on after a few minutes, and they decide to be done with trying to contact anything, but that night all of my roommates who were involved with the ouija board incident had.... like,,,,,, suicide fuel nightmares. like the worst most vivid nightmares they had ever had in their entire lives. 

that was also the night that the fire alarm started going off at 3 am. each floor had this old fashioned red metal bell with a mallet, and it would go off 3, 4 times a week for no reason at all... it was one of those things where at first we just chalked it up to an annoying old building. 

but there were a number of weird things that happened-- door slamming shut by themselves with no possible explanation, the fire alarm bell going off all the time, a mysterious fire that none of us could figure out, just a lot of little things that were interesting to me and which I was like ghost! I was super interested in the ghost and talked about it a lot because I was fascinated. Big mistake. 

I didn’t understand at the time that some ghosts are malevolent. I didn’t understand that there were times where it’s best to ignore the ghost and pretend it doesn’t exist rather than to talk about it where it can hear you. 

we had this big heavy mirror that hung on the wall at the top of the stairs. big sturdy thing, weighed a ton, must have been hanging there forever. 

one night I was standing under it talking to one of my roommates and the thing came off the wall and nearly landed on my head-- I was really lucky that I jumped back in time. The whole thing shattered. It probably could have killed me. I was freaked, so I went back to my bedroom, where my laptop was open and in the middle of my queen sized bed. I remember that it was in the middle specifically, because I had noticed it was sort of weirdly slipping off the edge of the bed for some reason when I had it over to the left, so I put it smack in the middle of the bed. well, I walked into the bedroom immediately after the mirror had nearly fallen on me, and honestly describing this still nearly breaks my mind. literally less than two minutes after the close call with the mirror my laptop gets hurled against the wall-- like four or five feet-- to land smashed up on the ground. 

At that point I realized that I had been talking about the ghost and it had noticed me and my only hope was to shut the fuck up right that second. 

I never talked about the ghost where the ghost could hear me again. 

Not to say there weren’t still ghost issues. The fire alarm continued to go off at the witching hour all the fucking time. There was an incident where my whole bedroom started to mysteriously v i b r a t e ??? Like, thundering. I thought that the gang was upstairs in the bedroom above mine dancing or something, but they were all on the other side of the house. (I later found out the fucking ouija board had been long-term stored directly above my bed, w o n d e r f u l ) 

There was also the time I was sitting on the floor in my friend’s room down the hall from mine, and I said to her, “why is there a pillow stuffed up your chimney???” naturally, she was like, “what the fuck” -- so, slowly, we pulled this throw pillow out from the chimney (realizing that the pillow was the one missing from the sofa upstairs??) and there, on the throw pillow, was a bird with a broken neck. 

there’s probably more that I can’t recall anymore because it’s been like a decade. I mostly remember being really afraid a lot of the time, as were like half of my roommates who were feeling similarly.... oppressed by the ghost, and being kind of helpless about it because I was a poor student and honestly that ghost wrecked me financially that semester when it wrecked my laptop so maybe it did get the upper hand at the time. idk. 

fun fact I actually met my husband because he was one of my roommates during all of this, so there were positives?? he’s a very rational person though so he just stuffed a book between the bell and the mallet on his floor so the fire alarm couldn’t torment him and ignored the ghost. 

I’ve had a couple of other ghosty experiences since then, but this is the one that stands out as the most personally harrowing. it was pretty wild to realize that some ghosts mean harm and that this one had it in for me in particular. I had a friend (actually one of my roommates who drew the fucking ouija board back in Dublin) go through something much much worse that honestly I can’t talk about, but has decently fucked me up for life just knowing about it. The funny thing is that he basically didn’t believe in the ghost back in Dublin (I think he was blacked out most of that semester though), but he reached out to me about his frankly horrific situation all because he remembered me flipping the fuck out in Dublin. 

Anyway. that’s the story of how ‘don’t talk about the ghost where the ghost can hear you’ became one of my lifelong rules to live by. 

[reginaldvonspiffington]

The Curse of Creativity by Richard V Kelly Jr

(disclaimer: This piece is edited by the author’s daughter posthumously. No new words were added, only passages deleted or rearranged)

1. The Wrong Kind Of Creativity

At the advanced age of 59 I found myself in a hospital psychiatric ward full of dejected people. I had reached the point of near catatonia, almost unable to interact with the world, unable to sleep, barely able to speak, spending all day in bed staring at the ceiling. My diagnosis was “Major depression with psychotic expressions”. 

Before this, I had composed symphonies and film scores. I had written textbooks, short stories, magazine articles, and half a dozen novels. I had sculpted in wood. I had written the code to create educational and artistic Virtual Reality and Artificial Intelligence applications. I had helped design a new school for creative kids. I had made educational films, created animations to teach Chinese, and written courses in every subject from neural networks to cryptography to architecture. 

Most of my existence had been spent in a world of ideas and imagination. My mind had been a sparkler, shooting off scintillas in every direction: fragments of music, lines of lyrical poetry, drawings, sculptures, computer programs, virtual worlds. But that life was gone. And here I was lying in bed fixated on the light of a bulb leaking in from an air vent.

I was still inventive at this point, but it was the wrong kind of inventiveness, the frightening unacceptable form. I had broken the membrane that separates playful imagination from gibbering lunacy. I still made up stories in my head, but they were all dark, bleak, lugubrious tales. The vent I was staring at obviously led to a parallel world where “they” were watching my every movement. I could feel the heat emanating from the wall, a form of thermal ray designed to cook my brain and mold my behavior. I had progressed beyond the creative person's liberation-from-the-mundane to the disturbed person's liberation-from-the-real.

There was no sense in moving from the hospital bed. Movement didn't matter. Nothing mattered. There was no future. And all the things I had created in the past seemed like a colossal waste of time. What was I thinking writing books no one would ever read and composing music no one would ever listen to? What was the point of that? Or anything else?

* 

The disease I was suffering from, depression, is astonishingly common. Almost 10% of Americans are taking anti-depressants right now. In fact, anti-depressants are the most prescribed drug in America. Almost 20% of women between the ages of 40 and 60 take them. And one in five people will eventually experience depression. So, pretty much everyone knows someone who has suffered from this illness.

But there is a level even deeper than the bottomless well of depression. 20% of people diagnosed with major depression (“major” in this case signifies acute, rather than chronic) also develop paranoia or other symptoms of psychosis including delusions and hallucinations. I was one of those people. I was terrified by my diagnosis, not because of the word “depression” – I knew there were treatments available - but because of the word “psychotic”. This was a term I had often used to describe crazy violent people for whom there was no cure. I pondered my possible future life as a babbling derelict. 

The new psychiatric resident assured me that the psychosis of depression and the psychosis of schizophrenia “are completely different disease processes originating in different parts of the brain”. And I knew intellectually that paranoia was misuse of my imagination. It was the dark side of the creativity that had sustained me my entire life. It was creativity as self-torture. But, even though I understood that my internal chemistry was creating false stories to misguide my thinking, I still felt hopeless, dejected, and persecuted. 

Staring through the fog of delusion, I realized that I had finally reached my secret goal of living in a world entirely of my own creation, but not in the way I had intended. I had hoped to spend every day reading my own novels, watching my own movies, laughing at my own animations, and listening to my own music, comforted by a sensible lyrical self-made universe. Instead, I was enwrapt in a vivid nightmare. My own creative thoughts were tormenting me. I couldn't wake up to escape them, and I couldn't sleep to avoid them.

*

The onset of depression is a slow process. One day I stopped reading. The flavor had gone from my favorite activity, so I dropped it. Then I stopped listening to music; it no longer provoked any feelings. I couldn't write anymore; creating worlds had lost its joy. I stopped watching TV and movies; they were pointless and unfulfilling. Everything I loved doing slipped away. I felt like crying all the time. The future turned black. I stopped working. And I hardly slept, so I became sleepy enough at the wheel of the car that I stopped driving for fear of hurting someone. This led to a shut-in's existence. I became what the Japanese call hikikomori – someone so tired of the world or sensitive to its vileness that they have pulled themselves inward and withdrawn from all contact, often never leaving their room.

Paranoia crept in. I thought the backyard garden was somehow being tended at night by persons unknown who were fertilizing and weeding it while I slept. I thought the morning bird calls were synthetically generated. I thought black and white cars were following me. I avoided my computer because I assumed it had been hacked by a malevolent villain who presented bad news to me in order to blame me for something I didn't entirely understand. And I all but stopped eating because I imagined that each food had a particular meaning, incriminating me in some crime. After 3 months I'd lost 30 pounds. 

As the disease progressed, I spent hours at a time in a swimmy somnambulance, as if I'd been drugged. Think of this predicament for a moment. Imagine being unable to read, write, exercise, work, garden, fix things around the house, chat with spouse or friends, eat, sleep, play cards, surf the net, or watch TV or movies. What would you do? Try it for a day. Eventually, I was reduced to pacing the living room, sitting for hours lost in rumination, or trying to sleep and being unable to. I had always thought of a person's mind as their only defense against a hostile world. Now that my mind had abandoned me, the hostile world came pouring in.

I began to develop severe cramps in my abdomen that curled me up like a baby at night. I felt as if I was giving birth. I developed headaches – a malady I'd never been bothered with before. And I became preoccupied with delusions. I imagined my wife had somehow been divided into different people: a 54 year old, a 40 year old, a 30 year old, and a 20 year old. I spent many nights awake, staring at her as she slept, waiting to see if she would switch to a different version of herself.

By summer's end, my existence consisted of getting out of bed, passing like a weary ghost through each day, void of joy or even interest, enveloped in rumination, miserable at the prospect of another excruciating night featuring nothing but heat, pain, and wakefulness. And it all felt as if it was being done to me. Eventually, I ended up just lying in bed staring at the ceiling.

I knew what was in store for me because my wife's brother had died by his own hand after a similar bout of depression. But, through the miasma of pain and woe, I insisted all was well. My family tried intervening to get me to a doctor, but I refused. And, eventually, my wife, conspiring with my doctor, cried as she urged me to go to the hospital for “just an evaluation”, which I assumed consisted of a casual chat in the emergency room followed by a prescription. I ended up in a locked ward in a hospital bed for a week having horrific nightmares as the medicine kicked in while listening to patients cry out at night for help.

I learned that there are three different psych wards in a large hospital: one for schizophrenics, one for depressives, and one for Alzheimer's/dementia patients. Because there were no spots open in the depression ward, they put me in the dementia ward with people twenty years my senior who had much bigger problems than I had. One woman had no family to look after her outside the hospital: no husband, no siblings, no kids, no living relatives, only a friend. Many people had lost all that was important to them in their lives, and were now losing the memories of their own life stories. The place was frightening, humbling, fascinating, and one enormous eye-opening lesson in appreciation for the wife, family, and friends who came to visit me every day or called me on the phone.

By studying the subject of depression, I learned that the trigger can be many years ahead of the expression, so I may never find out what provoked my downward spiral. Genetics probably had something to do with it. A difficult childhood was certainly a factor. But my guess is that trying to be a creative person in a world that consistently crushes or exploits creative people had the most to do with it.

Depression is like being anesthetized then dropped into a bathtub that slowly fills. The water rises to your back, then your sides, then your chin, then your eyes, then over your head, until all you can do is look at the surface above and blink. 

Depression is like having life peeled away from you layer by layer until nothing is left. Wake up one day and there is no literature. The next day music is gone. Then movies disappear, then working, then moving, then talking, until only breathing remains, slow, mechanical breathing.

Depression is like being overcome by an illness, as if a degenerative virus has taken control and sapped the strength of your muscles, then infected your bones, then infiltrated your nerves, and finally seeped into your head so that every part of you is diseased. 

Depression is like becoming a statue. A running animated active body slows down and finally stops. Arms, legs, and mind freeze up. The inner armature stiffens. Movement ceases. A shell forms and hardens until only an effigy remains that is gradually overgrown by vines and bramble. It starts with a slow numbing to the world, a withdrawal, a closing off to pleasure until the mind turns to marble, motion stops, the last spark of optimism is snuffed out, reason is suspended, rigid misery sets in.

Depression is like being a sun that slowly burns itself out, gradually losing the coronal fires, the heat diminishing, the plasma churning less and less every day, cooling to a smoldering ember, the flames snuffing themselves into smoke, and becoming quiet until all that is left is a burnt brown rock that gives no light or warmth, a cold stone floating in limitless space. 

It took time to recover. After the hospital, I went to a two-week out-patient group with other folks also recovering from anxiety or depression. And, a few months after the hospital visit, I was feeling much better. The two drugs they gave me – one for depression, one for psychosis - worked miraculously. The medicine and the realization that I was actually surrounded by people who cared about my welfare set me back on the road to health. The paranoia dissipated. I gained 14 pounds in two weeks. I started reading again. 

I came away with the impression that this could happen to anyone. There's nothing that separates me from the homeless people in the street except a simple exceeded threshold of neurochemicals.

And I received two great gifts from the experience. The obvious one was the realization that I had a wonderful wife, family, and friends who would help me, people I had formerly taken for granted. But the unexpected gift was the experience – because of the anti-psychosis medicine - of becoming a non-creative person for the first time in my life. That encounter with the non-creative worldview was as interesting an experience as the depression and paranoia had been. 

2. My Non-Creative Life

Within a month after starting treatment I had risen from a waking death. I was talking to people, reading, and watching movies again. But the chemical I was ingesting to stave off paranoia had the effect of preventing me from writing stories, composing music, scrawling art, scribbling computer code, building animations, or even thinking creatively. I could ingest the world again while taking the medicine – through books, movies, music, podcasts – but I could not actually produce anything. The portcullis gate had come crashing down. Access to the creative part of my mind had been blocked.

The disease of depression was about closing off inputs. I couldn't read, watch, or listen when depressed. The cure was about re-opening inputs, but closing off outputs. I could take in the world again, but I couldn't write, film, draw, program, or compose. Under the depression, I couldn't take in anything new, but I could still confabulate. Under the cure, I could absorb the world, but I couldn't create any new worlds in my head.

The mechanisms of the brain that allow someone to make up stories in order to become paranoid are the same mechanisms that allow someone to make up stories to write fiction. So, the medicament I took, designed to eliminate the alarming connections of paranoia inside my skull, also eliminated the lyrical connections of story-telling. For the first time in my life I got to feel what it was like to be non-creative.

No more five-new-ideas-before-breakfast. No need to keep a pen and an adding machine scroll of  paper beside the bed to jot down nocturnal inspirations. No more getting up in the middle of the night to write a paragraph that had evolved during the murky half-asleep state. No more days spent in animation development. No more running to the keyboard with a new melody in mind. I stopped composing music. I put aside my novels. I stopped thinking in the way a creator thinks. It was as if half of my mind had been carved away. It was as if I were grounded in the material world for the first time. I began to adopt what I imagine the life experience of most people to be. It was fascinating.

*

I've heard people say, “I don't have a creative bone in my body.” My response to that statement had always been mystification and a shocked wonder at what that must feel like. I thought turning off creativity would be like turning off hunger, joy, or reason. I had experienced exactly that - turning off hunger, joy, and reason - during the depression. But I was still creative then. With depression, I couldn't take in anything new, but I could still confabulate. With treatment, I could absorb the world again, but I couldn't create any new worlds in my head.

This was rather astonishing to me. Ordinarily, I'm only thinly connected to the palpable realm. I live so much inside my own head that the physical world is all but meaningless to me. I eat when I'm hungry. I get cold in the winter. It hurts when I step on sharp rocks in bare feet. But, beyond those links to the realm of atoms and sensation, I don't have much of a relationship to the tangible plain. All of my time is spent with ideas, words, interpretations, interconnections, the embrace of novelty, the prosody of life, everything that is above “the stuff” of existence. I usually live a sort of meta life – in the world, but not of it. For the first time, because of the medicine, I could experience only existence, only “the stuff”.

For a year, I woke up, washed, ate, evacuated, watched movies, chatted with people, watched more movies, poked around in the garden, and slept. Then I got up again the next day and did the same. I had no original thoughts. I wrote nothing. I composed nothing. I invented nothing. I began to wonder if I ever would again. I just walked through life, taking it in, but not putting the pieces together to produce anything new. I responded to the world around me as life happened, but I did nothing more than respond. I thought, “So, this is how other people feel? This is what it's like to not have a creative bone in your body?”

I figured my brain needed time to heal, so I let it heal. And I appreciated experiencing the mental life of an ordinary person. I would not want to live that way forever. But it was restful to live without layers of meaning. Everything was only what it was. I could pick up an orange and think only “orange”. There were no associations, no mental rambling, no blaze of connections, no desire to interpret experience, no wish  to create something new, only the requirement to react to what already existed.

Before I knew it, a year had gone by. I began to taper off the paranoia medicine. And then, one day, I stopped it altogether. The day after stopping, my creative mind switched back on. I returned to my usual state of entertaining 40 ideas at once, all jostling for space in a crowded little wet bone box. 

I'd pick up an orange and review in my head the discovery of sweet oranges in the New World as opposed to the sour oranges from India that Europeans had always known. I'd ponder the differences in the etymology of the word “orange” across all the European languages (many countries refer to it as a Chinese Apple). I'd consider the place the color orange fills on the visible light spectrum, the fact that cats and dogs don't eat the fruit – and don't see the color - because their bodies make their own vitamin C, the use of the peel in cleaning products, the vesicles holding liquid in pouches divided into segments to encourage sloths and mammoths to eat them in Pleistocene America. I'd dwell on the toxic coloring sprayed on the rind by growers who want all the fruit to appear ripe, the carnauba wax coating to seal out air and preserve freshness, our past family experiments with planting the seeds to grow indoor orange trees. And then thoughts would flow to kumquats and other indoor citrus plants we'd grown that were invaded by rancher ants that carried in aphids to suck the sap so the ants could drink their sweet excrement, to the plum curculios attacking the Asian pear trees outside, to the use of chickens to clean the ground of curculios, to ...

It was no longer just “orange” in my head. It was endless layer upon layer of simultaneous meaning. The word itself led in a hundred directions. The idea of the fruit led in a hundred more. The color led to yet another hundred. Everything intertwined. And I could see all the interlacing between the items. It was like looking at fabric that stretched to the horizon: the tapestry of past experiences, the rococo filigree of facts, the warp and woof of book learning, ideas knitted together by other languages, the mesh of mental images, braided databases filled with concepts. And there were countless sheets of this fabric, one of top of the other, each one interwoven with all the others.

With the medicine, an orange was a unitary experience. A thing was only a thing. An idea referred only to itself. A word had one meaning and no connection to any other words. Life was stark and simple.

Without the medicine, it was all a multi-colored rain of associations that poured, spat, gushed, spurt, surged, and inundated the landscape, tumbled, turned into braided streams, cascaded off cliffs, fed tributaries, swelled into rivers, and emptied into an ocean of sensation, memory, abstraction, fact, and imagination. And each raindrop was itself a kaleidoscope, a shifting hologram that held its own image in its separate pieces and recursed back onto itself and then out into the vastness.

Sooner or later, I'm going to long for the simplicity of “orange”. But when the medicine stopped, I leapt aboard ship and began sailing again on a sea of associations. The waves splashed me. I linked together the drops and began inventing things again, spinning stories, tying together melodies, inventing characters and worlds, re-immersing myself in the act of creation. 

Being non-creative meant holding only one thought in my head at a time. Being creative meant having an uncountable number of thoughts and tying them all together to make new thoughts that no one had ever come up with before.

Being non-creative was like listening to one radio station all day. Being creative was like listening to sixty radios at once and making up new songs by dipping into the individual songs being played and selecting out pieces that went together in new compositions.

Being non-creative was like being a lumberjack. I would wake up, see the trees, and cut them down. Being creative was like being both the gardener who plants the acorns and the furniture maker who uses the harvested wood.

Being non-creative meant engaging with the quotidian world on its terms. Being creative meant devising a new world on my own terms.

Being non-creative was like eating and sleeping. Being creative was like having children.

3. The Creative Life

Ride the bus to school and watch the kid drawing manga characters in his notebook. Visit a  grandmother's house and watch her sew a dress for her granddaughter. Observe the people who write stories their whole lives – for no other reason than to write stories. Watch the musicians alone in their rooms experimenting with new guitar riffs, new violins arpeggios, new piano chords, new vocal arrangements. Study the people who, unwilling to wait for a real-world teacher, learn from the internet how to make films, video games, and electronic art.

There are people who dance in their rooms at night, trying out new moves in the mirror. There are people who practice story-telling among friends. There are media artists who can't keep their hands off a new technology, who need to twist it to some artistic purpose as soon as they get their hands on it. There are people who make their own furniture to feel the lines of something that came from their own hands. There are people who blow and spin enough glass ornaments to fill the houses of their relatives. There are people who write the screenplays for the movies they want to act in. Creative people are everywhere. But most of us are invisible to the rest of the world.

*

I am one of millions of people who insert their art forms into the cracks of their daily life. They design and sew their own clothing at night. They compose songs to express their feelings. They draw comics and animations to make the mundane fantastical or the fantastical ordinary. They write books without any audience in mind just to create new worlds. They manipulate photographs because they have the urge to bend reality in a different direction. They fill their closets with water colors because no one will take any more of their paintings. They write fan fiction, invent electronic gadgets, build miniatures, construct robots, act in community theatres, slave over computer programs, and carve decoys, not because they see their obsession as the surest way to get rich, become famous, or entice sexual partners, but because they find a kind of joy and satisfaction in the act of creating that nothing else provides.

I am one of these people – someone who has sat at his sequencer, composing music on a Friday night after work, watching the sun set, dabbling at the keyboard, feeling joy, concentrating, and then looking up to see the sun rising again – so focused on the ecstasy of creation that no memory of time passing remains.

I am one of the people who, while getting paid to write software for financial applications at the state treasury, wrote miniature novels in the comments sections of the computer programs. I would adopt different voices – the cowboy, the cheerleader, the astronaut, the 1940s gangster – and write instructions to fellow programmers in those personae. 

I am one of the people who made up stories for his kids every night – a different story each night,  composed on the fly, weaving details of ordinary life into tales of talking animals and villains who always got their come-uppance.

I am one of the people who carved a wooden Christmas creche using penguins as models instead of people. I am one of the people who made enough money in the stock market one year to quit work and then spent his free time making animations, writing stories, and composing nocturnal jazz until the money ran out. I am one of the people who spent a lifetime choosing jobs, not for the money they brought in, but because they featured a creative element that could be explored. I'm also one of the people who got fired from jobs for being creative instead of political.

I am not famous. You have never heard of me. To the world at large I am invisible. But I am creative. In fact, the vast majority of creative people are invisible. And it's not because they are less talented or less dedicated to their craft than the famous people.

The famous people will certainly claim that talent, hard work, and persistence got them where they are, but there is an enormous amount of serendipity involved in becoming famous that no one talks about. For every famous creative person there are thousands of others with more talent and more dedication who are invisible. They are less pretty than the famous people. They are the wrong color, gender, persuasion, size, age. They live in the wrong place, in cultures that don't value their art, or among non-creatives who are mystified by anyone who spends their time having ideas or perfecting skills that do not lead to money, power, or sexual partners. Does that stop the no-names from being creative? Of course not.

These people are creative in ways that society does not value. But so what? Creativity is its own reward.

[chiseler]

Echoes

One book from my childhood has always haunted me. Cursed Be the Treasure, by H. B. Drake, didn't just get under my skin, it crawled inside and gnawed. An "adventure" tale of smugglers and pirates, of guilt and vengeance, it was a cold soak in an alternately reality that I could believe with all my heart.

My mother presented it to me at I'd guess age 10 or 11. Probably it had been in our collection all along. I assumed it was from her own teen years, so in the 1910s. I never knew where my mother came by such things, she seemed to absorb offbeat, peculiar works through some etheric transfer.

Over the years, I remembered little of the plot – just two incidents so horrific that they hung on me like literary albatrosses.

Perhaps five years back, that haunting returned and I felt the need to find that book again – the original had disappeared into the mists of yesteryear. I bought a copy online – a mere $3.50 if I remember rightly – a ratty-spined hardback. I immediately determined not to read it. I couldn't face the possibility that it would be just another "young adult" monstrosity that had overwhelmed my feeble mind. That would be a gut stab.

But with Daniel Riccuito's strong-arm encouragement, looking for an "unusual" book from the '20s or ''30s – my pick – I immediately thought of Cursed Be the Treasure... but "uh-oh, wrong decade." Yet when I flipped back the creaky cover, I found the copyright was 1928. So I committed to reading it again, with dripping trepidation.

And...? It resonates with the "now" of me as solidly as with the "then" of me; it's left an unusual sense of wonder, a "how can the universe work this way?" that I pooh-pooh in daily life.

Before getting to that: Who was H. B. Drake?

I've found minimal online biographical info on Henry Burgess Drake, who had two (at least) parallel careers. Born of British missionary parents in China in 1894, the next to last of seven children, he served in WWI, then taught English in China, Korea (at a Japanese university) and England, sometimes alongside his younger brother, Eric – this bio snippet, an aside to a longer one of Eric, does not mention Henry's writing. During (or before?) WWII, Henry served in the British Intelligence Corps, "to recruit spies to penetrate Japanese held territory" in China.

Of his alternate existence, fantasy and SF sites note him mainly as author of The Shadowy Thing, which had a strong influence on H. P. Lovecraft. You can purchase a 1928 hardback edition online for $967; I don't plan to. Beyond that and Cursed, he penned a few sea and other adventure tales (sometimes as Burgess Drake), and a five-volume Approach to English Literature for Students Abroad during the '40s and '50s. He died in 1963.

I've had little truck with adventure stories. The Conan tales bore me silly – great gnarled nonsense. I recently downloaded a humongous boulder of public-domain fantasy/SF/adventure (many of them novel-length), looking for a simple, non-challenging read. The first four I staggered through were almost malignantly bad – cumbersome slagheaps of adjectives, mostly multi-page descriptions of otherworldly scenery, including, so help me, two travels through nothing – quite literally a void interrupted by different-colored lights. They showed less imagination than an addled exterminator.

It's turned out that what I was looking for in that muck, without knowing, was Cursed Be the Treasure, which harks back to lesser-known works such as R. L. Stevenson's The Wrecker, about a ship ("The Flying Scud") in which the adventure is as much inside the narrator as mired in convoluted events wavering beyond the written horizon. I think Drake also took inspiration from Dickens, especially Nell's wanderings through the countryside with her grandfather in The Old Curiosity Shop. (Though unlike Dickens with his often black and white characters, all of Drake's emanate shades of moral grey.)

The first-person narrator of Cursed is Tommy, recalling his youth from age 6 to roughly 17, consumed in continual flight with his father from the vengeance of what his father calls Shadow-of-Fear. During their flight, they are briefly "trapped" by a witch-like figure, Bite-in-the-Dark, whom Tommy kills by accident. Then the flight continues, because... who or what is Bite-in-the-Dark, and can the greater Shadow-of-Fear be killed?

Baldly stated, this can sound silly. But it's written with a riveting intensity of isolation and unfocused fear. His father will run forever to protect Tommy, but does not feel he can, himself, escape the inevitable. And there are also the magically bright summers at the Dolphin Inn, where Tommy investigates the caves and rock ledges of the coast, the supposed refuge of smugglers, uncovering secret passageways leading to... what?

Along the way, he and his father stop at a supposed haunted house. Tommy sees a ghost (does he?) and encounters a skeleton (he does).When his father must leave on for an extended period, Tommy goes to school for the first time – his father's extensive, intensive knowledge had been enough to meet his educational needs.

Tommy makes friends with Worthing, an older, rule-bound student (who faults Tommy's adventuresome ways). Tommy invites Worthing for a stay at the house, during which Tommy finds a hidden passage and loses it again. In a later stint at the house, he meets Captain Field and his daughter. She, like Tommy, is traveling alone with her father, and like his father, the Captain is haunted by an implacable enemy.

Why no mother for either of these near-bewitched children? The word "mother" never appears in this tale. For both, the single parent and the single child have always been thus.

From here on, I'll leave the plot alone, because it's the method of telling and the near-perfect pacing that make this book, in my mind, close to a masterpiece. Reliving it, retrieving the incidents I forgot through the years, was unlike any other literary experience I've had; 70 years between readings, and it holds the same searing chill. And those two remembered incidents that I did recall – I can't talk sanely about them. The second details perhaps the worst mistake any human being could make.

There's nothing overtly supernatural in the telling, but the possibility of it hangs like a torn curtain. As Tommy slowly uncovers clues, a more enmeshed tale emerges, tying together disparate elements –almost typing them together. Certain small details don't quite fit... but not because Drake is lax. It's because nothing here can be complete, wholly true or fully whole. A "definitive" through line would only cheapen the tale. The passageways by the Dolphin Inn lead to no found end; the lost treasure is truly cursed – through the intertwined vengeance of those who fought and killed for it, and the inescapable guilt with which each must live.

That's the book, as written. But its effect on me goes beyond the words. It reaches something in me as inescapable as Shadow-of-Fear, like a reflected study of my life. Not Tommy's flight – the entire tale. I have none of Tommy's robust, adventuresome spirit... at least not externally. But something of my mind works the way this story works, with the details incomplete, the compounded feeling of guilt, the need for everything to be different, released. It was somehow like I was reading myself.

But a few details....

The novel I've been working on for the past couple years (before I reread Cursed) encapsulates a woman in her early 30s:

raised by her father, from the ages of 4 to 16

haunted by the past and her eerie effects on the present

with no direct memory of her mother, though unlike Tommy, the not knowing torments her

her name is Jenny; Captain Field's daughter's name is Jenny

This litany of congruence rattles my innards.

Did those plot details from Cursed that I thought had been lost remain hidden in the far reaches of my mind?

I don't think so. On rereading, the early chapters seemed fully new to me.

Are there cosmic associations that exhibit when we least expect them, in the least likely ways?

I think that even less.

I see the world as a grand accumulation of circumstances, ruled by laws that we can never directly experience or untangle as they apply to the minute incidents of life. Sometimes these circumstances heap in symmetrical piles that can delight or terrify, as did the Dolphin Inn and Shadow-of-Fear for Tommy.

In my case, the dovetailing of this marvelous tale with driving events in my life is an overwhelming gift.

I refuse to question it.

by Derek Davis