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lonelyvheart · 2 years

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angel of death

anime: death note

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lonelyvheart · 3 years

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I am reduced to a thing that wants Virginia. I composed a beautiful letter to you in the sleepless nightmare hours of the night, and it has all gone: I just miss you, in a quite simple desperate human way. You, with all your un-dumb letters, would never write so elementary a phrase as that; perhaps you wouldn’t even feel it. And yet I believe you’ll be sensible of a little gap. But you’d clothe it in so exquisite a phrase that it would lose a little of its reality. Whereas with me it is quite stark: I miss you even more than I could have believed; and I was prepared to miss you a good deal. So this letter is just really a squeal of pain. It is incredible how essential to me you have become. I suppose you are accustomed to people saying these things. Damn you, spoilt creature; I shan’t make you love me any the more by giving myself away like this –But oh my dear, I can’t be clever and stand-offish with you: I love you too much for that. Too truly. You have no idea how stand-offish I can be with people I don’t love. I have brought it to a fine art. But you have broken down my defences. And I don’t really resent it. - Vita Sackville West to Virginia Woolf

Look here Vita — throw over your man, and we’ll go to Hampton Court and dine on the river together and walk in the garden in the moonlight and come home late and have a bottle of wine and get tipsy, and I’ll tell you all the things I have in my head, millions, myriads — They won’t stir by day, only by dark on the river. Think of that. Throw over your man, I say, and come.--Virginia Woolf to Vita Sackville West

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lonelyvheart · 3 years

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powerful women | writers | england

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lonelyvheart · 3 years

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literature → gothic

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lonelyvheart · 3 years

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Monsters of Halloween: The Creatures of Victorian London

Last post I talked about Sweeney Todd, so now I will change things a little bit and talk about a setting and a time period. It makes total sense for me to talk about the time and place where Sweeney along many other criminals, villains and monsters seemed to haunt the alleys of the capital city of the proud British Empire.

The Victorian Era is the name given to Queen Victoria's reign over Britain, from 1837 to 1901, and it was a time for great cultural and social change, especially in London.

The Second Industrial Revolution brought a wave of new work in London, that became increasingly more urbanized. While the factories grew and spread through the city, so did explotation and poverty. Crime skyrocketed, while the factories literally covered the city in smoke and ashes.

It was also a time of logic and reason, with the old social order crumbling and the religion losing ground to science.

In this climate of class warfare, rapid urbanization and cultural change, creatures and villains started to emerge on the british imagination, representing their greatest fears and desires.

Crime became sensationalized in the newspapers, who exaggerated the crimes as much as possible to draw audience. Cheap serialized stories started to circulate, such as story papers and booklet "libraries", containing the exploits of detectives, criminals, or supernatural entities. They were the Penny Dreadfuls, "Britain’s first taste of mass-produced popular culture for the young." Urban legends about ghosts that stalked the streets of London were also common, describing pale humanoid figures stalking and preying on lone pedestrians.

To me Victorian London in fiction should be understood as a place of conflict, were the old order crumbled and a new one raise was about to emerge.

Science vs. Superstition, the Rich vs. the Poor, Men vs. the Machine, Men vs. the Beasts. All of these battles occured daily in an urban setting that continued to change.

The Common Man and Woman projected their fears and their anguish in unspeakable horror that laid never too far. In a way this symbolized their constant distress, on the dark and foggy streets of Victorian London, danger was always real and near.

So to a scared individual in a world in rapid change, danger could be always present, in any place, in any form, from the hands of man or from the claws of a monster

Bellow a list of some famous londonian monsters and the period were they were "active"

Spring-heeled Jack (1837 - 1904)

Sweeney Todd (1846)

Edward Hyde, Mr. Hyde (1886)

Jack the Ripper (1888 - 1891 ?) - I think this is the only here that really existed. And he never was caught.

Griffin, the Invisible Man (1897)

Dracula (1897)

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lonelyvheart · 3 years

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The Evening News, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, November 13, 1930

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lonelyvheart · 3 years

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Victorian Witch.

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lonelyvheart · 4 years

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Tfw you get inspiration to work on an angsty wip

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lonelyvheart · 4 years

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lonelyvheart · 4 years

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lonelyvheart · 4 years

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To have people in the same position as you is very comforting. And to know that however you are feeling, someone else and three other people have felt the same way. I don’t know how else to say this without getting too emotional. This is my whole life. These are my brothers.

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lonelyvheart · 4 years

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Good luck to everyone doing NaNoWriMo!!! 💖

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lonelyvheart · 4 years

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25 African Sci-fi & Fantasy Books

I had so much fun last year putting together my list of 25 Asian-inspired fantasy books for the launch of The Sword of Kaigen that I’ve been looking for an excuse to post a similar list of African sci-fi and fantasy ever since. While I don’t have a new African-inspired book coming out (yet), I did just start releasing my new West African-inspired serial, Rage and Whisper for free and figured that was a good enough excuse to go ahead with this list!

Below, you’ll find new releases and classics, adult fiction and YA, Afrofuturism and sword and sorcery. From Angola to Morocco, there should be an African SFF story here for everyone!

1. The Rage of Dragons by Evan Winter

In a South African-inspired fantasy world where gifted women have the power to call down dragons and gifted men can transform into fighting machines, a swordsman with no magical gifts seeks revenge on the people who betrayed him.

2. Daughters of Nri by Reni K. Amayo

This YA fantasy follows a pair of identical twin girls, separated at birth, both unwittingly bearing the power of lost gods.

3. The Kishi by Antoine Bandele

A monk in search of redemption is the only one who can save a village beset by a demon in this dark fantasy inspired by Angolan mythology.

4. Kingdom of Souls by Rena Barron

This dark fantasy follows a young witch doctor trying to come into her power in a West African-inspired world where magic comes at a price and ambition can wake demons.

5. Acacia by David Anthony Durham

Compared to George R. R. Martin’s work, this high fantasy follows the four children of a king on a quest to avenge their father’s death and restore their lost empire.

6. A Taste of Honey by Kai Ashante Wilson

A menagerie owner’s son falls in love with a soldier from across the sea in this romantic fantasy novella, which takes influence from the Yoruba of West Africa and the North African Roman Empire. (See also: Kai Ashante Wilson’s Sorcerer of the Wildeeps)

7. David Mogo Godhunter by Suyi Davies Okungbowa

Described as Nigerian God-punk, this urban fantasy follows a freelance godhunter on adventures through the streets of a futuristic Lagos.

8. War Girls by Tochi Onyebuchi

This dystopian sci-fi adventure follows a pair of sisters through a war-torn Nigeria full of flying mecha and cyborgs. (See also: Tochi Onyebuchi’s Beasts Made of Night and Crown of Thunder)

9. Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi

A young heroine embarks on a quest to restore magic to a world inspired by the Yoruba mythology of Nigeria. YA fantasy. (See also: Tomi Adeyemi’s Children of Virtue and Vengeance)

10. Imaro by Charles R. Saunders

This heroic fantasy chronicles the adventures of a larger-than-life warrior struggling to overcome adversity and find acceptance in a sprawling world based on pre-colonial Africa.

11. The Queen of Zazzau by J. S. Emuakpor

The heir to a crumbling kingdom seeks the help of a god of war in this historical fantasy, based on the true story of the Hausa warrior queen, Amina of Zazzau.

12. Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James

Marlon James’ dark fantasy follows a mercenary hired to find a mysterious missing child.

13. A River of Royal Blood by Amanda Joy

A pair of sisters vie for the throne of a kingdom of fey and magic in this North African-inspired YA fantasy.

14. Zoo City by Lauren Beukes

Beukes’ wild urban fantasy follows a young heroine through the seedy underbelly of a city teeming with crime and magical animals.

15. Everfair by Nisi Shawl

This Afrofuturistic steampunk story explores an alternate history in which the Congo developed steam technology ahead of Europe.

16. The Gilded Ones by Namina Forna

A girl with supernatural powers finds new purpose as a warrior after being cast out by her community in this West African-inspired YA fantasy (slated for release May 2020).

17. The Ear, The Eye, and The Arm by Nancy Farmer

Set in 2194 Zimbabwe, this YA adventure follows three kidnapped children trying to find their way home and the three magical detectives hired to find them. (See also: Nancy Farmer’s A Girl Named Disaster)

18. Temper by Nicky Drayden

This Afrofuturistic fantasy tells a tale of demons, temptation, and the relationship between brothers. (See also: Nicky Drayden’s The Prey of Gods and Escaping Exodus).

19. The Dreamblood Duology by N. K. Jemisin

Jemisin’s Egyptian-inspired epic fantasy includes The Killing Moon and The Shadowed Sun.

20. Kintu by Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi

Set in a reimagined Uganda, this historical fantasy tells the story of several generations of a single family trying to break an old curse.

21. Lost Gods by Micah Yongo

A teenage assassin finds himself hunted by fellow assassins he once considered family in this epic fantasy inspired by Africa and the Middle East.

22. Mirage by Somaiya Daud

A young poet is kidnapped into a world of danger and court intrigue this Moroccan-inspired space fantasy.

23. Rosewater by Tade Thompson

The first book in Thompson’s Wormwood Trilogy, this science fiction thriller follows a rogue government agent through a Nigeria under threat of alien invasion.

24. The Wolf Queen by Cerece Rennie Murphy

A young heroine sets out to reclaim her past and restore an ancient magic in this romantic action fantasy.

25. Binti by Nnedi Okorafor

The first ever Himba student at an interstellar university has to strike a balance between her new life among the stars and the traditions of her people in the midst of a war with an alien race. Science fiction novella. (See also: Nnedi Okorafor’s Akata Witch, Who Fears Death, and Zahara the Windseeker)

26. Lion’s Blood by Steven Barnes

I really didn’t mean for this list to exceed 25 books, but I belatedly realized that I wanted to include Lion’s Blood because it’s the only African-inspired speculative fiction work that asks the same question as my own books: what if historical Africa had not only avoided colonization but was itself a colonial power? The similarities pretty much end there, as Lion’s Blood and its sequel, Zulu Heart, take place in 1863 rather than modern-day, and explore their African-dominated alternate history through the eyes of a Celtic slave.

As I mentioned above, I’ve started releasing an African-inspired serial called Rage and Whisper. This standalone sci-fi/fantasy follows five teenage prodigies through a school-wide fighting tournament in the West African dominated world of Duna. If you want to read that free, you can start here. The first book of my Theonite Series is also available for free through my newsletter.

If you’re a super nerd and want to know all about my West African world-building, you can check out my source bibliography here (and if you pick up any of the listed sources, please, please get in touch so we can talk about them! You have no idea how happy that would make me).

My Books / Website / Twitter / Instagram / Goodreads

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lonelyvheart · 4 years

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