#usually its me feeling the need to reread art and obligation

[senxitive]

It's 2023 and I'm still hoping my favorite Beatles fan fics get surprise updates this year 😭

[a-tehta]

Thank you for the ask!

2. If you had to give up your keyboard and write your stories exclusively by hand, could you do it? If you already write everything by hand, a) are you a wizard and b) pen or pencil?

I would find this very, very hard, because I change and erase a lot as I write. I would probably still try to write if inspiration really stuck, though. It would mean making endless clean drafts. Ugh. I would get such cramps.

3. What is your writing ritual and why is it cursed?

I am not sure I have any. I am currently nomadic (as in, I have no real home base) so my writing setup changes frequently. I write when I both 1. want to and 2. know I will have at least 15 mins of uninterrupted time.

I usually tend to begin by rereading/redrafting what I have already written, does that count? It is cursed because it means the longer the story, the more time I need to even begin adding to it. (I guess I wouldn’t go back > 5k words, but still.)

5. Do you have any writing superstitions? What are they and why are they 100% true?

It’s not a superstition because it is true, but I write better when I have a high fever. And I get inspired and plot best when running or hiking. And I agree with the people who have said that just forcing myself to churn out words even if I do not like them gets me nowhere – those words just need to be thrown out and rewritten. (Ideas are not my problem, the phrasing is.)

6. What is your darkest fear about writing?

That a story that makes perfect emotional sense to me will make no sense to anyone else, thereby revealing that I am not an actual human being but, like, a bunch of weasels in a trenchcoat or something.

9. Do you believe in ghosts? This isn’t about writing I just wanna know

No. I accept that I do not know everything, and am open to changing my worldview, but I do not currently believe in ghosts.

11. Do you believe in the old advice to “kill your darlings?” Are you a ruthless darling assassin? What happens to the darlings you murder? Do you have a darling graveyard? Do you grieve?

I definitely believe in editing ruthlessly in the service of any story I am currently writing, but if I love a character/scene/description so much that I hate to see them go then they probably deserve their own story, don’t they? (I kind of write for myself, mostly.) My recent story about Glorfindel’s art therapy was actually an idea I had in a WIP that I ended up cutting for being too much of a digression, and then developing on its own.

39. What keeps you writing when you feel like giving up?

Nothing! When I feel like giving up I give up. And leave the fandom for ten years. (Not entirely true. A social contract–like, having signed up for an exchange–would keep me writing as long as I needed to fulfill the contract. Because I am just Like That. But without that, well, I do not feel any obligation to keep writing?)

Weird Questions for Writers (because writers are weird)

1. What font do you write in? Do you actually care or is that just the default setting?

2. If you had to give up your keyboard and write your stories exclusively by hand, could you do it? If you already write everything by hand, a) are you a wizard and b) pen or pencil?

3. What is your writing ritual and why is it cursed?

4. What’s a word that makes you go absolutely feral?

5. Do you have any writing superstitions? What are they and why are they 100% true?

6. What is your darkest fear about writing?

7. What is your deepest joy about writing?

8. If you had to write an entire story without either action or dialogue, which would you choose and how would it go?

9. Do you believe in ghosts? This isn’t about writing I just wanna know

10. Has a piece of writing ever “haunted” you? Has your own writing haunted you? What does that mean to you?

11. Do you believe in the old advice to “kill your darlings?” Are you a ruthless darling assassin? What happens to the darlings you murder? Do you have a darling graveyard? Do you grieve?

12. If a genie offered you three writing wishes, what would they be? Btw if you wish for more wishes the genie turns all your current WIPs into Lorem Ipsum, I don’t make the rules

13. What is a subject matter that is incredibly difficult for you write about? What is easy?

14. Do you lend your books to people? Are people scared to borrow books from you? Do you know exactly where all your “lost” books are and which specific friend from school you haven’t seen in twelve years still possesses them? Will you ever get them back?

15. Do you write in the margins of your books? Dog-ear your pages? Read in the bath? Why or why not? Do you judge people who do these things? Can we still be friends?

16. What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever used as a bookmark?

17. Talk to me about the minutiae of your current WIP. Tell me about the lore, the history, the detail, the things that won’t make it in the text.

18. Choose a passage from your writing. Tell me about the backstory of this moment. How you came up with it, how it changed from start to end. Spicy addition: Questioner provides the passage.

19. Tell me a story about your writing journey. When did you start? Why did you start? Were there bumps along the way? Where are you now and where are you going?

20. If a witch offered you the choice between eternal happiness with your one true love and the ability to finally finish, perfect, and publish your dearest, darlingest, most precious WIP in exactly the way you've always imagined it — which would you choose? You can’t have both sorry, life’s a bitch

21. Could you ever quit writing? Do you ever wish you could? Why or why not?

22. How organized are you with your writing? Describe to me your organization method, if it exists. What tools do you use? Notebooks? Binders? Apps? The Cloud?

23. Describe the physical environment in which you write. Be as detailed as possible. Tell me what’s around you as you work. Paint me a picture.

24. How much prep work do you put into your stories? What does that look like for you? Do you enjoy this part or do you just want to get on with it?

25. What is a weird, hyper-specific detail you know about one of your characters that is completely irrelevant to the story?

26. How do you get into your character’s head? How do you get out? Do you ever regret going in there in the first place?

27. Who is the most stressful character you’ve ever written? Why?

28. Who is the most delightful character you’ve ever written? Why?

29. Where do you draw your inspiration? What do you do when the inspiration well runs dry?

30. Talk to me about the role dreams play in your writing life. Have you ever used material from your dreams in your writing? Have you ever written in a dream? Did you remember it when you woke up?

31. Write a short love letter to your readers.

32. What is a line from a poem/novel/fanfic etc that you return to from time and time again? How did you find it? What does it mean to you?

33. Do you practice any other art besides writing? Does that art ever tie into your writing, or is it entirely separate?

34. Thoughts on the Oxford comma, Go:

35. What’s your favorite writing rule to smash into smithereens?

36. They say to Write What You Know. Setting aside for a moment the fact that this is terrible advice...what do you Know?

37. If you were to be remembered only by the words you’ve put on the page, what would future historians think of you?

38. What is something about your writing process YOU think is Really Weird? If you are comfortable, please share. If you’re not comfortable, what do you think cats say about us?

39. What keeps you writing when you feel like giving up?

40. Please share a poem with me, I need it.

[tethered-heartstrings]

i read the first five chapters and i love it! i know you've said the writing is not quite to the same level of how you write now but i see a really wonderful start :) also be warned, i am not great at giving compliments because i know *why* i like something but it's hard to explain most of the time, but i will try my best

-🐞

nsbffjshfewnf I feel seen.

Honestly, I go back and read some of my earlier chapters and I'm like "how the fuck did I publish this." Part of me wishes I just... waited so I could go back and make everything better. But I feel going back at this point and improving it feels like cheating? I can't explain it. I do wonder how many people get turned off by the quality before getting to the better writing? Not that I can tell you when it gets better, its probably really gradual and more noticeable when you either binge or go back to reread it. I suspected it got better and some comments confirmed it for me so I feel a bit more justified in that statement. "Better" is subjective anyway so who the fuck knows haha.

I will say, some of my favorite stuff comes a lot later. I usually put in a post-note a comment about if its among my favorites or not. It's all blurred together at this point. Just some were conceptually very fun to put on paper.

And thank you!!! I feel the story has good bones, just the good meaty bits come later than I'd like. Still probably a mediocre to decent stew overall. May need seasoning. I think the beginning is just a bit rushed because I didn't intend for it to be so fucking long, ya know?

And dude, I totally get it. I am so bad at complimenting works or art I enjoy. I just think "it tickled the part of my brain that signaled serotonin" and that's all I got. It is hard to compliment, so, please don't feel obligated to say anything haha.

At least you came to it late so all the cliffhangers hold less weight for you now. I've had people since the beginning that are still there (incredible of them honestly) and I made some of those cliffhangers fucking wild.

And thanks for even reading it at all, honestly. <3 I know my tag rant was weird as fuck and probably made no sense. I can write a fic about two feral men in love but I can't coherently talk about my own stupid feelings.

[tearlessrain]

30 questions tag game

Tagged by: @mercurypilgrim (thanks!)

Rules: Answer 30 questions and tag 5 blogs you are contractually obligated to know better.

Name/nickname: I’ve been going by tearless/tearlessrain for so long that a friend once called me that in person and I did not notice that it wasn’t my name until they said something. but I also have a lot of other names, only two of which have legal relevance.

Gender: male

Star sign: virgo, but I’ve been told by the local astrology gays that I’m also an aquarius moon and that it “explains a lot”

Height: 5′2

Birthday: a secret. I do not like being the center of attention.

Time: it’s like 3:40am. I will experience deep regret tomorrow, and I will learn nothing from this.

Favorite bands: queen feels like a cop out but like I’m never really not in the mood to listen to queen. linkin park, unironically. and all the different permutations of the crosby/stills/nash/young/simon/garfunkle cloud.

A few I am currently listening to, though: I can’t really call out specific bands/artists because I’m mostly listening to my oc playlists lately (I literally can’t stay in a bad mood listening to riska’s playlist and that’s just the energy I need in my life right now).

Favorite solo artists: (all together now) david bowie. also hozier and joni mitchell.

Song stuck in my head: O Come All Ye Faithful, in latin, for some fucking reason. it’s been there for days. send help.

Last movie: Kung Fu Panda, discord server was having a movie night.

Last show: WandaVision but I’m behind on it (loved the first two episodes but now I can feel the Marvel-ness looming again and I dread it)

When did I create this blog: god I don’t even remember, I’ve been here since the first age and never changed accounts/urls so like. around ten years now I think.

What do I post: whatever the hell passes through my brain from moment to moment, I can’t believe anyone follows me. lately a lot of rambling about my swtor ocs, sometimes it’s tolkien/silmarillion content, sometimes I liveblog terrible movies on purpose, sometimes it’s isaac asimov hours, sometimes just shitposting or unsolicited opinions about completely random things I’m not qualified to talk about. the only thing I can be relied on to provide is reblogs of ocean and horse photos, but not on any kind of consistent schedule.

Last thing googled: celtic invasion of portugal. I got slightly sidetracked from something else I was doing.

Other blogs: I’ve got art over at @tearlessrainart, horny art over at @a-world-of-osha-violations, and a little pile of extremely specific sideblogs I rarely use.

Do I get asks: not often, but those I do get are appreciated. except you, ray bans bot. I don’t appreciate you.

Why I chose my url: I originally used it as a deviantart handle (still there) because it wasn’t taken and I liked the overall way it sounded, and kept it because it’s rarely taken anywhere. and now it’s been ten years so like it’s stuck at this point.

Following: 305

Followers: 1392 which is far more than I deserve given my wildly inaccessible blogging style

Average hours of sleep: 7-8 hours usually but my actual sleep schedule skews late. I’ve never been one of those people who can skate by on 5 hours and be functional, if I get less than 6 hours I am absolutely useless and was that way even in high school/college when everyone else was pulling all nighters and shit.

Lucky number: I honestly have never understood lucky numbers, and how much I like any given number is solely dependent on how appealing its colors are according to my synesthesia. if anyone’s wondering, 420 is a hideously tacky blue/orange clusterfuck, but 69 is pleasantly greyscale.

Instruments: I play the flute, in that I own a flute that I was pretty good at playing in high school and can, if I choose, still play notes on it. I also own a melodica but I cannot play it, which to be clear does not stop me from playing it.

What am I wearing: pajama pants and a sith cloak. which sounds like a joke but I do actually own a set of sith robes and the cloak happens to be warm and very comfortable so I just kinda. wear it around the house sometimes in the winter.

Dream job: ornamental lighthouse hermit who may or may not be a wizard.

more realistically though I’m hoping to go into sfx makeup and cosmetology (I was like a week away from getting my license when the apocalypse hit)

Dream trip: I’d love to visit australia and new zealand, would also very much like to go back to scotland and possibly just not leave scotland.

Favorite food: sushi, specifically good salmon nigiri. god it’s so good. smeagol was right.

Nationality: regrettably, american.

Favorite song: god I have no idea. uh. I really like the boy in the bubble by paul simon. something about the visuals in that song speak to me.

Last book read: rereading The Robots of Dawn by Isaac Asimov, which is a terrible book that I nonetheless subject myself to periodically because I like all the books around it a lot. I need to start on Robots and Empire but shit’s been going down recently so I haven’t been reading much.

Top three fictional universes I’d like to live in:  

okay LIVE IN is a very different question from “universes I think are neat” because like. I love the whole thing firefly has going on but I wouldn’t survive it for more than five minutes. so with that in mind:

1. middle earth but like, the shire during the third age specifically.

2. I think I would enjoy being a legend of zelda npc. I could just be a weird little potion seller who lives in a tree or something. or maybe an inexplicably sexy fish man. or better yet, the inexplicably sexy fish man’s husband, who sells potions. yeah I’ve got my fictional life here completely figured out now, this is good. I would also own an extremely chonky horse.

3. one of the ones I made up, specifically the one that involves a lot of gryphons and interdimensional bullshit. more specifically the origin universe of said gryphons, which exists at the heart of an extremely complicated multiverse that includes both earth and at least one fantasy world but is part of neither. anyway it’s a nice place.

Tagging: @raemanzu @sith-nb @vampiraptor @nyriad @crypticspren

(only if you want to of course)

[erenaeoth]

2, 4, 7, 18, 23-30, 48 👀

woah. sure thing.

2) What fandoms do you write for and do you have a particular favourite if you write for more than one?

To date, I’ve done The Silmarillion, Mortal Kombat, Overwatch, Tekken, and Naruto. The Naruto one is small and not online yet because I’m not sure if its consistent with stuff in the later billion episodes of Shippuden. At the moment I’m enjoying Tekken the most - the setting is a lot of fun, and the characters have seized my heart.

4) What is your favourite genre to write for?

Gangster Dramas? I guess? About 40% thriller 60% angst is my ratio I think.

7) When is your preferred time to write?

11pm-1am. The world is quieter then. Also I feel less guilty about writing instead of doing work if I write late at night.

18) Do you have any abandoned WIP’s? What made you abandon them?

Yeah some. Three MK sequels that never took off. One was a sequel to Katharsis called Netherrealm Guardian, I’ve just opened up a file on it and apparently I did have extensive notes for it. Don’t know why I never did that one. I think maybe the Sub bros dynamic appealed to me more than another Kuai and Hanzo one. Another dropped WIP was a sequel to Feud From Beyond the Grave, when Noob Saibot was calling on Hanzo to fulfil an obligation. The plot was ropey and it was clearly an attempt at a ship fic before I knew how to write them. The last WIP I dropped was a sequel to A Stone Most Rare, which I had to drop because I kept screwing up my Edenian lore and having to rewrite large swathes of it. It was about Jade, Kitana, and Rain and involved insurgencies and class war and gay stuff- you know, the usual.

23) Do you prefer listening to music when you’re writing or do you need silence?

Music. I’ve got different playlists for the different atmospheres or genres I want to be writing. Only time I’ll write without music is if it’s raining, so that I can listen to the rain instead.

24) How do you feel about writing smutty scenes?

Very embaressed. My romance scenes are always part of a larger story to convey developments in how characters respect each other and never just smut on their own, but I am definitely going to have to be a little more detailed than usual in my current WIP (Zen Gardens of the Heart) and I’m sort of dreading it. It’s going to be fine. There’s just going to be a steep learning curve and a lot of rewriting.

25) Have you ever cried whilst writing a story?

During the actual writing, no, I don’t think so. When I’m thinking the scene up or rereading the complete scene, yes. The actual writing happens at a slower place and my head is in so many different places - thinking things like: is it still raining? wtf colour suit is that dude wearing? are you limping on your left side or your right? is she hungry? when did she last eat? oh atmosphere how do I convey that when this scene clearly needs to be a silent stand off like the end of good the bad and the ugly? so the finished event might be a heart-tugging thing, but whilst writing it Im idk trying to conduct an orchestra of amateurs to do the music justice.

26) Which part of your xxx fic was the hardest to write?

Not sure what the xxx here is meant to convey, but in general the hardest parts for me to write are romance which I don’t want to sound too gesture heavy, and fight scenes with new characters, because I have to do a lot of research on a new martial arts style. A scene I probably rewrote the most was Clarence fixing Julius’ tie just before the climax of Black Ice - it was a simple bit but it had to be done right otherwise none of their romantic relationship would be apparent and a key part of the story would have been lost. The hardest fight scene to write… probably the first one I wrote in Katharsis, because MK characters have moves from lots of different styles, where as Tekken tends to just model irl martial arts styles (Fortified by Hate has Kazuya vs Bruce in it - I did a karate similar to Kaz’s and my partner did some Muay Thai, so I can basically just draw straight on experience for that.)

27) Do you make a general outline for your stories or do you just go with the flow?

Make a general outline. I usually have a vague idea of the kind of ending I want, and the first few scenes down in detail. And I know the genre - that’s something I’ve found really helpful that I’ve been doing a lot more recently. Pinning down the genre early is super important. I keep outlines of scenes I want to come, along with my notes tracking what’s happened to far. Some of my notes for old stories are on a thread on my twitter.

28) What is something you wished you’d known before you started posting fanfiction?

Release things slowly. Multi-chapter fics need time to find their audience. A chapter a week is a good model. Don’t worry about jumping into a new fandom. People are happy to have new content, they’re not there to hunt you down for not being a true fan.Stop worrying about the possibility of negative comments. Most people don’t read a fic only to flame it. I used to dread getting bad comments. I’ve written at least 15 fics and only got about 3 unpleasant comments, and most of them are by weirdos with suspect race politics or people desparate to point out an error to make themselves appear erudite. Most fanfic readers are super kind and supportive. Just go for it.

29) Do you have a story that you feel doesn’t get as much love as you’d like?

Not really. I write stories because I love it. If other people love it too, that’s a bonus. Tekken is a very small fandom, so it doesn’t reach as many people and there are less faves/kudos/comments, but that’s made up for by the fact that those who do comment are writing essays in the comments. So I definitely don’t feel like those fics are going unloved even if there is less attention on them.

30) In contrast to 29 is there a story which gets lots of love which you kinda eye roll at?

I did a Noob/Sareena fic called The Wheel of Necessity that’s mostly just them talking about how it’s too late for them to ever be a couple, but I don’t really like the pairing and always felt it was a cheap option for NRS to pull (although they’ve got even weirder with their random Sareena/Kabal content) so whenever I see that fic get love I feel pretty indifferent.

48) What’s your favourite trope to write?

Brothers who hate each other but secretly know that they’re the only ones looking out for one other. They’re always mean to each other’s faces whilst secretly caring and making sacrifices for each other. There, you don’t need to read any of my fics now, that’s them all summed up in one trope.

[backtodc]

As fun as it is to throw salt at Gosho I think this could be a good time to talk about some good DC cases. So, which are your top ten cases so far?

Hmmm, this took some thought–presented chronologically because I couldn’t pick preferential order XP

Billion Yen Robbery (013-016): Even disregarding its long-term impact on the plot, this case on its own had a good twist in how Akemi disguised herself and the lies she told to track down her robbery partners. I’m always a fan of people, rather than going for big heavy-duty disguises, just using little details of makeup and presentation to completely change their appearance. Ran’s big heart was evident in this case and how strongly she felt about “Masami”‘s safety after just meeting her twice, and this one also what is still one of my favourite ninja-Ran moments to date. Potential kidnapper/murderer across the street? Maybe we should call the police, or run down the stairs OR I GUESS WE COULD JUMP OUT OF A FIRST FLOOR WINDOW AND CHASE HIM ACROSS THE STREET AND DO A FLYING KICK TO DESTROY HIS CAR WINDOW AND ALSO HIS NOSE

Akemi’s death opens up a shitton of plot, and, despite how it gets slightly overused later on (not quite to “did you know Bruce Wayne’s parents got murdered” levels but definitely a biiiiit overused) it’s still one of the most genuinely tragic deaths, especially since Shinichi admitted his real name to her to try and offer her some comfort as she died. TEARS Q_Q

A Haunted Mansion Murder Case (017-019): The case that introduced the Ayumi, Mitsuhiko and Genta. I always think of this one quite fondly. It had a genuinely creepy atmosphere–the “haunted” mansion looks the right side of cliche-creepy, especially once it turns out there’s actually someone around, and honestly I can forgive the incidents of the kids wandering off alone and vanishing because they’re six, of course they’re gonna do silly shit like wander off alone in a haunted mansion. And the truth of the matter is something that’s vanishingly rare in Detective Conan, something I wish we saw more often: a crime of passion. 

There’s no clever trick to the murder: the son, Akio, just loses the rag under a torrent of verbal abuse and smashes his father’s head in with a candlestick. There’s no clever trick to the cover-up, either; his mother messed with the crime scene a bit and reported it as a robbery, and given that the family’s obviously very wealthy, money probably changed hands if any investigating officer did think to suspect anything other than a robbery. All she’s thinking about is protecting her son from the consequences of his crime; all he can think about is his guilt and horror over the murder he committed. The case goes from genuinely creepy to honestly tragic. It’s a proper emotional story, and at no point do any six-year-olds have to witness a human corpse, which I’m always in favour of. And I like Genta, Mitsuhiko and Ayumi and I’m glad they were introduced shut the fuck up

The Hatamoto Family Case (020-025): This was another case with good creepy atmosphere, a solid closed circle situation, classic big fucked-up family situation but at the heart of it, Natsue and Takeshi are a genuinely sweet couple who really don’t deserve all this bullshit and you spend the case really hoping for them to be safe and things to turn out okay for them, the traumatic deaths of several close relatives aside. The murderer is pretty sad, though I feel like Gosho intended him to be more sympathetic than he actually was–he certainly could’ve done with less abuse from his grandfather and been allowed to emotionally invest in his art more, but the cousins thing aside, murdering multiple people over a girl you’ve never even approached marrying somebody else with whom she’s had an actual relationship and is in love with is… not sympathetic. But I’m also glad that the nice chef uncle came out alright too, and that all three of the sympathetic family members reappeared in later cases since they were all very likeable characters. 

Moonlight Sonata (062-067): This one sticks in a lot of people’s minds, and I think it’s for the same reason that the haunted mansion case sticks in mine; atmosphere. This is another one with a good, genuinely creepy atmosphere from the immediate sense of “small town with a dark secret” we get as soon as the Mouri Detective Agency arrives on the island. Gosho was very good at building these atmospheres once upon a time, I would’ve liked to see him write a horror manga. The case is deeply tragic from start to finish, from the murders of the Asoh family, to the fact that Seiji/Narumi got the idea for the “curse” from playing a funeral song for a man who’d just had a heart attack after admitting to murdering their family, to the complex nature of Dr Asai’s grief and guilt that they felt the need to avenge their family but simultaneously called for a detective in the hopes that they’d be stopped, to their suicide at the end because they can’t live with what they felt obligated to do. There are Gosho’s usual… issues… with gender, and given the bigotry that became obvious later he probably had no clue at all what he was doing with Dr Asai’s gender, but I feel like they weren’t handled unkindly for an AMAB character living as a woman? I could be wrong and I wanna open this one up to the trans folk in the audience because I’ve never found a trans fan’s commentary on Dr Asai and how they think they were handled, but goddamn I still cry thinking of their suicide at the end and I appreciate that this was a one-off case that had a visible long-term emotional impact on Conan.

Magic Lovers’ Murder Case (192-196): As well as being an interesting murder involving some quite sympathetic characters, this is a really good case for seeing what Kaitou Kid’s like under the mask (or was like; I feel like he’s lost depth since this?) as expressed through Katsuki Doito. He came along to investigate suspicious user activity, but he joined the magic-lovers’ forum because he is a nerd for stage magic and stage magicians and enjoys nerding out about stage magic and stage magicians. He gets to unapologetically fanboy over his late father with other magicians, with is pretty goddamn cute imo. He also gets to show off knowledge and fondness for other magicians, and his knowledge of magic tricks is useful in solving the case, even though, by his own admission, he’s no detective, and it led to tragedy. We don’t really see how Kid felt about being unable to prevent that murder, since he was still being played as pretty mysterious at the time, but it was a good choice for his second appearance in DC imo since it cemented him as Not A Bad Dude. Also, Conan gets to be one of Those Shonen Protagonists by running across a burning bridge, which, y’know, is always cheesy, but also always kinda cool (the artwork was particularly effective imo)

Twilight Mansion (299-302): I genuinely enjoyed the gathering of the knock-off famous detectives and was pleasantly surprised by Hakuba’s appearance (back when I still held out hope that that kind of thing meant that Kid would get more involved in the plot). The mansion itself is actually quite gorgeously designed and rendered, especially at the end when the exterior crumbles, and again, DAT CREEPY ATMOSPHERE. I guess it’s officially plot-important now, too, which I just wanna say, I officially called nine years ago, but also I was hardly the only one calling BO involvement with Karasuma. 

Most of all, in general, I just really like watching and reading things involving skilled people being very competent at what they do, so the fact that ALL of the gathered detectives (save that one dead one) figured out what was up and were able to communicate and come up with a plan without revealing themselves to the brilliant detective BEHIND the whole thing, and the execution of that plan, were all very, very good and I liked it. I might reread this one right now, actually, while I’m thinking about it, I really do enjoy it top to bottom.

Golden Apple Case (350-354): PEAK interesting backstory on the part of Vermouth and Yukiko, a reasonably interesting murder, Yukiko’s RAD driving scene, and one of my favourite Ran moments ever. The confrontation with the serial killer/Vermouth is tense as hell, and the fact that Ran reacts instinctively to save his life and just can’t bring herself to drop him and let him die, to be responsible for a death, no matter whose, is a very powerful statement on the integrity of her character. She’s just to her core, and Shinichi does steal the moment a bit by helping her pull the serial killer up and getting the really good “you might need a reason to kill, but you don’t need a reason to save a life” line, but this still feels entirely like a Ran moment for me. We find out later that this incident had a profound effect on Vermouth, too, and is possibly the entire reason she’s hiding Shinichi’s secret from the BO and explicitly the reason she doesn’t want Ran to come to harm. Shame we haven’t had much Vermouth character development in a while because this stuff was JUICY.

Two Cases Under One Moon (429-434): An ICONICALLY good Bo-fightin’ case where everybody involved is putting in Maximum Effort. Heiji puts on an extremely good show as a fake Shinichi (the boy’s an extreme drama queen and Heiji does that very well), Yukiko’s disguise skills are valuable and well-used, we finally get the revelation that Vermouth has been Dr Araide for a while AND that she’s maybe immortal (…not… that we’ve gotten ANYTHING on that since..) AND we get the VERY interesting nature of her feelings concerning Shinichi and Ran. Also, we get Ran so concerned about Ai’s wellbeing that she hides in a car boot and then jumps into gunfire in order to protect her, GOD that’s SUCH a good Ran moment. Shinichi, Jodie and Akai all also get to be very brave and very smart and very badass, and ugh really I just wanna go back to everything about Vermouth in this case and explore more of that forever. Please. Also more Jodie, whose backstory we finally got in this case after revealing that she’s not Vermouth. What is it with interesting women disappearing as soon as their backstory is out MOVING ALONG 

Clash of Red and Black (595-609): This case is a cracking case. This one was long and complicated and many-layered and everybody involved was on their highest gears and it was great. Akai and Conan work as a fantastic team and Conan gets free reign to do some very good detective work for the FBI (I still believe he told Akai who he was during this case, it would make sense and undercuts how concerned I am with all of these grown adults letting a six-year-old run all around an active incident). We get a good look at the incredible power and cruelty of the Black Organization when they cause immense collateral damage just to flush the FBI out. We get the story on both Akemi and Akai’s relationship AND the Hondo family, and OH BOY THE HONDO FAMILY.

It’s also one of the most interesting Eisuke cases, imo, where not only does he do some solid investigation to find Mizunashi Rena, we get a glimpse of some real deep trauma over losing his last family member that’s driven him to be willing to attack Rena with scissors out of desperation to get answers about what happened to his father and sister. I mean, I am most definitely not advocating stabbing coma patients, but for Eisuke a lot of the trauma of your whole beloved family dying or disappearing was just implied and not explored, and then he got booted from the series immediately after things got interesting with him, so bleh. We also barely see Hidemi after this, and ?????????? because she’s a CIA agent who’s in DEEP to the BO after surviving a HORRIFYING situation where she has to proudly boast of murdering a man who was secretly her FATHER, who SACRIFICED HIS LIFE TO PROTECT HER… why are we dicking around so much with Mystery Family instead of exploring this one??? This case is kind of the last hurrah for anything interesting happening with the Hondos so I love it for that.

And I love the complicated counter-bluff involved in delivering Kir back to the Black Organization without looking like they were delivering her. Again, this was apparently in exchange for her assisting the FBI and she barely appears after this…? Nope this isn’t about salting at Gosho moving on

The Life-Threatening Broadcast of Love (804-808): I love this one solely and 300% for the part where Miwako Sato jumps out of a helicopter, shoots a noose off of her boyfriend’s neck, grabs him, wraps her coat around him to protect them and knocks both of them out of the range of a bomb blast at the last second, like the goddamn action hero that she is.

So in no particular order, those are my top ten: how about the rest of you?

[discordantwords]

writing meme

Thanks so much for the tag, @a-candle-for-sherlock!

Reblog with your answers and tag ten of your favorite fanfic authors!

How many fics have you written?

I have 28 works on AO3: 18 X-Files and 10 Sherlock. One of those Sherlock works is just a roundup of assorted Tumblr ficlets and snippets that don't fit anywhere else.

Where do you share your writing?  

Currently only on AO3 and Tumblr.

What is your pseud?

DiscordantWords on AO3, same as here.

Where/when do you usually write?

I'm a morning person, so I do my best writing with a cup of coffee shortly after rolling out of bed, before work and other obligations have sapped my energy away. It's been a bit challenging trying to make time to write, lately, as I've been transferred to a new location at work and now need to leave the house much earlier than I used to.

I tend to lunge for a notebook or the nearest scrap of paper when something occurs to me, though. I've pieced together large parts of my fics from tiny scribblings on post-its.

I wish I could write in the evenings, but I tend to be tired and not particularly creative by the time I get home. Weekends are a little better.

What is your favorite fanfic that you’ve read?

Oh my gosh, it's impossible for me to choose!

What is your fave fic that you’ve written?

I have a really, really, really hard time reading my own writing. It just makes me cringe so hard. I'm unable to turn off the part of my brain that immediately hones in on everything I could have done better.

That said, I am fond of Lethe, a short Samantha-centric X-Files story that plays with unreliable memories and has sort of a dreamy, surreal feeling.

And for Sherlock, I am probably most pleased with (Never) Turn Your Back to the Sea, because writing it enabled me to work out so many of my own conflicting emotions surrounding S4. I cry while reading fanfic all the time, but the scene with Sherlock panicking in the bathroom in the last chapter is the first and only time I've actually cried while writing it.

What inspired you to start writing fanfic?

I discovered fic in 1997 through the X-Files AOL message boards. I was thirteen. I was far too shy and intimidated to participate at the time, but I read EVERYTHING. I was always thinking about the characters, about different situations, about things that could unfold. Writing stories in my head. But I only started writing and sharing fic much later, probably around 2005 or 2006, when I had a brief resurgence in my X-Files interest.

What is your favorite trope to read?

It really varies!

I don't read much XF fic these days, but when I do I tend to prefer casefics or things that feel like they could either be an episode of the show or fit in alongside one. I don't care for AUs or alternate meetings between Mulder and Scully.

For Sherlock, which is where I'm focusing the bulk of my fannish activity lately, I can't get enough of AUs and alternate meetings. I LOVE them. Particularly sports AUs. I also like casefics, anything funny or witty or where I can really feel the characters' personalities come through.

Hmm... what else... I've always been a fan of the oh-no-it's-freezing-and-we-only-have-one-blanket trope, or characters forced to shelter together in close quarters while a storm rages outside.

What is your fave trope to write?

I don't know if I have one! I like dialogue and banter a lot. Sometimes my characters get very talky and try to run away with a scene and I need to rein them back in.

What is the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever read/heard/would like to share?

I've found Stephen King's On Writing to be incredibly helpful, and something I've returned to again and again over the years. Not every bit of advice will apply to everyone, of course, but I appreciate his insight into the process.

What is your favorite feedback you’ve received as an author?

I get the biggest, goofiest, most ridiculous smile on my face whenever I get a comment notification from AO3. It all just makes me so happy. And it completely bowls me over when someone takes the time to let me know that they're rereading my story. @khorazir made some jaw-droppingly beautiful art inspired by a few of my stories, which is so incredible.

I'm not sure who out there has already been tagged in this meme and who hasn't, so please consider yourself tagged if you'd like to join in on the fun! And be sure to tag me back so I can read your responses!

[ancient-trees]

Reading Meme

(Sorry for taking forever on these, guys...!  I got tagged for a lot of memes at once, and this one is long. I apparently have a lot of things to say about books... who knew?) 

Tagged by @theticklishpear​. Thank you again!

(Tag-ees, btw, don’t feel obligated to read my long rambly answers if you just want to copy/paste the questions.)

1. Which book has been on your shelves the longest?

I have a picture book of St George and the Dragon whose illustrations are BEAUTIFUL (it’s this one). Technically hasn’t been on MY shelves longest - a while ago I found it in our shelves of books from when my brother and I were kids and repossessed it because I love the art so much.

2. What is your current read, your last read and the book you’ll read next?

Currently in the middle of Rosemary and Rue by Seanan McGuire. Also in the pile are The Edge of the Sea by Rachel Carson (whom I love) and Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea: Why the Greeks Matter by Thomas Cahill (which is ...okay, but more of a slightly-more-opinionated refresher on what I learned in college than anything new). I’m also most of the way through a reread of Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman (one of my favorite books). 

Last thing I finished was Shadowheart, the last book in Tad Williams’s Shadowmarch series. (It’s not without its problems, but overall I really enjoyed that series. It’s got the ensemble-cast-and-unlikely-heroes thing going on.)

I’m not sure what’s next. Fiction might be American Gods by Neil Gaiman or Aftermath by Chuck Wendig... or I might need to keep going with the series and track down the second October Daye book. We’ll see when I get there.  Nonfiction - been meaning to start The Rise and Fall of Ancient Egypt by Toby Wilkinson or Writings from Ancient Egypt (translations from original sources, by the same). But I also have a book about pirates off the coast of Virginia my mom got on a recent trip to Jamestown... and a book about the Silk Road I happened upon in Barnes and Noble the other week, which MIGHT have edged its way to the top of the list... (this is why I’m all for brick-and-mortar bookstores. Search algorithms are great, but they don’t accomplish quite the same thing as wandering the shelves.)

3. Which book does everyone like and you hated?

Ehh, I’m not sure what “everyone” likes, but a lot of the series my high school friends loved I could never get into. I remember really liking the first Wheel of Time book, but got bored of the series pretty quickly after the first one. Same with Terry Goodkind’s Sword of Truth. I tried to like Dragonriders of Pern, but didn’t get far with that one either. And I hear the series gets better after the overenthusiastic-Tolkien-fanboying of the first book, but I really didn’t enjoy The Sword of Shannara.

Oh.. and I never read any Discworld JUST because in high school I knew a guy who EXTOLLED ITS VIRTUES TO THE HEAVENS. Constantly. Now that I’ve learned more about the series and the author I will definitely have to read some someday, though.

(I’m not a big fan of most “~Literature~” either, Pear.)

4. Which book do you keep telling yourself you’ll read, but you probably won’t?

I don’t know. My TBR list is pretty ridiculous, and anything’s possible, so I hate to relegate anything to “probably won’t read” status. Finishing A Song of Ice and Fire might be close. I received the whole series as a birthday gift from a friend (long before the TV show existed), read the first two back-to-back at a time when I really wasn’t in a great place, and got burned out on the grimdark rocksfalleveryonedies of it all. I did enjoy the books, and I’ll probably dive back into it someday, but it’s not really high on my Fun Things to Read list right now.

I also come home with an armload of unexpected finds every time the local college has a charity used book fair... most of which end up sitting on my shelves for a long time, still unread...

5. Which book are you saving for “retirement?”

Nothing really, but I’ve got a big stack of novels from Japan that I’ve been saving for “once I’ve brushed up on my kanji” - since reading is excruciatingly slow when I have to look up every other word. I’m being optimistic and not putting them under the “probably won’t read” heading, though.

6. Last page: read it first or wait till the end?

noo, wait till the end! I will confess that sometimes I’ll flip ahead if I’m at a really slow point, or I know I don’t have time for another chapter but can’t quite bring myself to put the book down yet... but I’m trying to get better about it. I always regret it when I accidentally spoil the book for myself.

7. Acknowledgements: waste of ink and paper or interesting aside?

There should ABSOLUTELY be acknowledgements. The ones that involve stories or interesting background info are cool, but even the ones that are just lists of names 110% should be there - they’re for those people, not the reader, and after all the sweat and tears that go into putting a book together they deserve that place of honor.

8. Which book character would you switch places with?

When I was a kid this question would always trip me up - it would be so cool to be a character in the books I read and have awesome adventures... but at the same time, being in a book-world would mean giving up all the other book-worlds... unless you had access to an interdimensional library and spare time for reading while you weren’t busy saving the world...

If I’m being honest, though, I’d probably end up being Ged from A Wizard of Earthsea. I can relate pretty intensely to a lot of his journey.

9. Do you have a book that reminds you of something specific in your life (a person, a place, a time)?

Quite a few books remind me of a certain school librarian who was always ready with a recommendation and frequently asked the student library aides what books the library should add to their shelves. She was really cool.

10. Name a book you acquired in some interesting way.

My copy of the first Harry Potter book was given to me (right after it was first published in the US) by a good friend whose last name happened to be Potter.. along with a message that said “Wow, Harry Potter has such a cool name! I wish I had a cool name like that! OH WAIT...!”

I also seem to inherit a lot of manga from friends who want to free up shelf space.

11. Have you ever given away a book for a special reason to a special person?

I give books as presents a lot, so nothing specific really stands out. For some reason I keep losing copies of The Silmarillion to people I lend it to who never return it...

Come to think of it, I gave a copy of Howl’s Moving Castle to one of my students in Japan before I left - since she’d been doing extra English language work just for fun, and she was a fan of the Ghibli movie.

12. Which book has been with you to the most places?

I don’t know, offhand. This might be more a Question #9 story, but I remember reading Shadowmarch during downtime between classes in the teachers’ room of my schools in Japan. The other teachers kept exclaiming over how HUGE the book was (~800 pages in mass-market paperback). In Japan novels are pocket-sized - words in Japanese take up less space to print than English, they use thinner paper, and they separate books into Part 1/Part 2 etc if they’re too long.

13. Any “required reading” you hated in high school that wasn’t so bad ten years later?

The Hobbit, actually. I’d read it probably in middle school/jr high or so and thought it was kind of silly and childish. Then when it was assigned representing the fantasy genre in high school lit class, I was annoyed enough that I didn’t bother rereading it - just skimmed it well enough to answer test questions. Once I’d read The Lord of the Rings and gotten into the Tolkien mythos I could appreciate The Hobbit a lot more.

14. What is the strangest item you’ve ever found in a book?

In used books and library books I’ve found bookmarks, old receipts, the usual stuff... I think I found a pressed flower once or twice. A friend of mine used to hide money in her books (to be found as a surprise for herself later, after she’d forgotten about it), so once in a while I’d borrow one and find a random $10 bill or so in it. (I left them there, of course!)

15. Used or brand new?

Either one. New is good for supporting authors, but my town has a really good used book store that I’ll check for older series.

And Book Off (huge Japanese used book chain) is a thing of beauty. So much manga is published so quickly over there that people don’t tend to hang onto their tankobon copies once they’ve finished reading them (they don’t have the space to keep them all), so you can get a ton of books for really cheap. I spent way more shipping them home than I did buying the actual books.

16. Stephen King: Literary genius or opiate of the masses?

I haven’t read much Stephen King, apart from The Gunslinger (which I wasn’t really a fan of at the time) and his On Writing.  I admire his work ethic, at any rate.

17. Have you ever seen a movie you liked better than the book?

I think there have been a few, but I can’t think of them now. I grew up with the Neverending Story movie, so I was a little thrown off when the second half of the book continued in such a different direction, but I liked them both. The book doesn’t have quite the same place in my heart that the movie does, though. And I enjoyed the Shannara Chronicles TV show a lot more than the first book in the series (see #3 above), but I haven’t read the specific books the show was based on, so I can’t really say there. (Though “Elessedil” still makes me cringe every time I hear it...)

18. Conversely, which book should NEVER have been introduced to celluloid?

oh god. The Scifi Channel Earthsea miniseries had me laughing-slash-crying within the first five minutes, it was such a garbage fire and breathtaking masterpiece of missing the point. I remember having a similar reaction to Disney’s version of The Black Cauldron, though that was a much longer time ago, and that was less bewildered rage and more a disappointed “what did you do to my Prydain?? And what is this talking schnauzer?”

19. Have you ever read a book that’s made you hungry, cookbooks being excluded from this question?

Not that I can recall. For some reason reading about Tom Bombadil’s always makes me want bread and honey, though.

20. Who is the person whose book advice you’ll always take?

Hah, I don’t know. The friend who gave me the Harry Potter book was a huge influence on what I read as a kid, but I lost touch with her a long time ago, so I don’t know what she’s reading these days.

Tagging: @possiblyelven, @taskitron, @whitherling, @arionwind, @december-soulstice, @byjillianmaria, @eggletine if you guys want to do it!