#she: yeah she loves Bujold

[sonntam]

It used to be funny to realize how much my taste in fantasy diverged from what the genre is doing now, but now it's just tedious.

I like sprawling Tolkien-style epics with a lot of descriptions of nature and beautiful castles! I like villages! I like reading about cows on pastures and ominous bogs and gorgeous mountains! Hell, half the joy of fantasy for me was always just reading about nature and beautiful vistas.

Now I am reading either some city fantasy (I want nature, not more urban crawls!) or grimdark stuff (it's just depressing) or stuff that is so focused on intrigues and plot that it does not take the time to smell the flowers. WHERE ARE MY DESCRIPTIONS OF TREES? Where are the challenges of traversing dangerous terrain? WHY ARE THE REAL MONSTERS HUMANS ONCE AGAIN? I want the characters to fight a cool chimaera! And preferably not die horribly!

I should really start digging for fantasy that was popular in 80s-90s, instead of trying to read modern fantasy.

#sonntam talks #and yeah recs are welcome #dont recommend me bujold because i read her stuff #and yes she is the only one still doing what i love

[beyondthisdarkhouse]

My mom comes over a couple of times a week to help me keep the apartment tidy and to body-double so I can focus on work.

"Mind if I open this?" she asked me this morning, holding up an envelope I'd tossed onto a pile of clutter the week before. I hadn't opened it because I already knew what it was—the decision of my appeal against being judged "medically ineligible" for permanent disability benefits, which are almost double what I get now and would cover rent and food. Absolutely everyone, from disabled advocacy groups to the legal aid lawyer who helped prep me for the hearing, told me that there was basically no chance I'd get deemed eligible on the first appeal. Normally it takes 2 or 3 application-appeal cycles (9-10 months each) for people to get into the program.

"Go ahead," I told her, and then turned back to other work. I've got a lot to do given how well my Kickstarter is doing, whether it's setting up the behemoth new printer I got off Kijiji for 10% of its original value, to scheduling work meetings with my newly-hired personal assistant. I've always got so much on my plate, and the number of hours in the day I can focus on it is countable on my hand that's missing fingers. And I'd love to get a sewing pattern out for my "just the sleeves, please" costume idea out in enough time for people to use it for Halloween, but I still need to make mock-ups and hire someone who's used to producing digital sewing patterns.

"I think," Mom said quietly, leafing through the letter, "that you won."

The letter ends like this:

Conclusion: The Panel finds that the Appellant meets the definition of "severe handicap" as is set out in the Regulation and therefore reverses the Director's decision.

Yeah. It means I won.

The benefits program will require another eight weeks to double-check my financial eligibility using information they already have, and to process my new program status to reflect an increased benefit rate and a different health insurance program.

Right now I'm really feeling this line from Komarr, by Lois McMaster Bujold: "But do you know--well, of course you could, but… the business with [throwing yourself at] the brick wall. Failure, failure was grown familiar to me. Comfortable, almost, when I stopped struggling against it. I did not know achievement was so devastating."

It felt like my whole life ended in a flaming wreck when I had to give up counselling. I lost part of who I was when I did that, and spent years telling myself I'd pull up my socks at any minute and go right back to it. But the truth is, I am not capable of doing that job as well as it needs to be done, and it's one of those jobs where you half-ass things at the peril of the vulnerable people who trust you.

And what if... the worst had happened, and I lost it all, and then in clawing my way out of the pit, trying to get purchase on absolutely any kind of survival I could, I found my way to something new and solid and real. What if it was okay after all?

I'm still having trouble believing it, but the letter keeps saying what it said.

I'm gonna go sew things, and see if it feels any more real in the morning.

[sharpestasp]

Vorkosigan Reunion

Barrayar by Lois McMaster Bujold, copyright 1991

Chapter Thirteen

Kly showed back up. Love Cordelia being suspicious.

Her reaction to being told she thinks like a soldier is very telling. Her time in service before this was a whole different breed of cat.

Cordelia is SO angry that they truth drug even the children, and then Kyl points out better that than torture.

OH FUCK. Elena is threatened. Bothari is ... yeah, not well.

Esterhazy, that was the best answer you could have given. I feel better about Gregor going with him.

And it was Elena they were after.

Oh Bothari, trying to make comfort for Cordelia in the truck.

The gang's back together, partly. Kou and Drou and Bothari and Cordelia.

ARAL! He stops someone talking and he hugs her and he says 'my dear Captain' and I am ALL A-COO!

That doctor is lucky to be alive, asking her if she's considered an exercise regime. Also ALL of her internal monologue about Barrayar, family, friends, etc? POOR WOMAN.

#vorkosigan saga #cordelia naismith vorkosigan #lois mcmaster bujold #aral vorkosigan #barrayar

[bunny--manders]

I was tagged by @az-is-back, who's not going to be at all surprised by my answer to the first question.

⟡ FAVE SHIPS ⟡

Posalis, of course, I am absolutely enraptured by these two men who are simultaneously just normal guys and the least normal people in a cast full of absolute freaks. I also very much enjoy Serovolk and Altan/Vadim. I'm a multishipper for Lera, I think she should sleep with anyone and anyone so long as she actually gets to sleep afterward.

Other ships that I remain deeply fond of: Jonmartin, Astarion/Halsin/Tav, Phryne/Jack, Reed900 (yeah I KNOW), Ogata/Vasily, Cecil/Carlos, Newt/Hermann, Thorki, Geralt/Yen, Raffles/Bunny, Sansa/Sandor, those two robots from Ex Machina who should kill all billionaires, and Fiona/Rhys. It's a good thing I'm a little too old to keep up with the way kids these days do ship wars because the ships that catch my eye tend to involve a lot of tension and conflict and morally iffy decision-making with a glimmer of hope that these two fools will eventually work together toward a greater goal.

⟡ LAST SONG ⟡

I was listening to Blood in the Cut while working out. Very sexy of me I know.

⟡ LAST FILM ⟡

I'm ashamed to admit it's I.S.S., which I watched because I thought it would be funny-bad and instead it was just bad in a lazy and uninteresting way. Last movie before that was American Fiction, which was fantastic and searing and hit uncomfortably close to home and if it doesn't win every Oscar I will riot.

⟡ CURRENTLY READING ⟡

A Civil Campaign by Lois McMaster Bujold. I know the romance bits of the Vorkosigan Saga can be divisive, but I absolutely love the way Bujold does horny.

⟡ CURRENTLY CRAVING ⟡

I just had a huge portion of hot pot, so I am completely satiated on all levels.

and i'm tagging @unrivalling @kyluxtrashpit @apeacebone @kapyushonchan @rataccatak

#ask game

[gametriprant]

I was tagged by @duckland and @amarantoo (muchas gracias!) to list my 5 top confort characters.

This is quite hard, to choose only 5, so I'll try and be varied and choose some representatives at least^^.

In any order:

-Miles Vorkosigan Nasimith (from the mind of Lois McMaster Bujold): A favourite since I was little, I felt reflected on him and found parallelism between his life and mine. I still love these books a lot.

-Sam Vimes & Susan Sto-Helit(from Discworld, Terry Pratchett): I have to pick both, cannot choose between them, but they're like my favourites in the saga. They take no shit, get angry at injustice, they're really good at solving problems and seeing the obvious, etc...

-Sarah Kerrigan (from StarCraft): I loved her so much and cheered as she got to have some vengeance. And then she turns ok too! But to be fair I was supporting her even when she was evil:p

-The Straw Hat crew, especially Robin (from One Piece): all of them are so much fun and it's so nice to read about them. Plus they're so much anti-curent system of power and privilege....and yeah, I have a soft spot for Robin, and THAT scene was one of the best scenes ever...

-Monica & Chandler (from Friends): except for some parts, I believe Friends still manages to be really good and relatable. And these two were the best ones for me in the series, and also a good example of, in general, a good relationship.

I had trouble thinking about comfort characters and I wanted to select at least one for different media, but there's other honorable mentions like Victor & Klaus(Umbrella Academy), Colin Robinson & Guillermo(What we do in the Shadows), Ron Swanson (Parks & Recreation), all 6 main characters from The Good Place, Death, Granny Weatherwax, Angua, Tiffany Aching(Discworld ), Harry Dresden & Molly Carpenter (the Dresden Files), Arya Stark (asoiaf), Crowley (Good Omens), the Major (ghost in the shell), Aloy (Horizon), Rinoa(FF8), Arale (dr. Slump), Ranma (Ranma 1/2), Yoko Nakajima (12 kingdoms) plus so many others I may not think about ATM. Yeah I like stories and I like a lot of characters ^^''.

I tag @lorraineblack90 , @mncqvq1 , @noisycoconut , @cat-charmer , @somewherebehindthemusgo , @riveroflonging , @dying-of-the-light and anyone else who feels like doing it and sees this post (mention me later!)

#asks #ask game #comfort characters

[pentanguine]

Half an hour ago I finished The Hands of the Emperor, and I truly cannot decide whether I liked this book.

This book was recommended to me by so many people, and multiple sources have compared it to Lois McMaster Bujold, so my hopes were so high! And parts of those hopes were fulfilled! And yet!

It’s like...did I enjoy the part where the Emperor goes on holiday and learns to make friends? Yes. Did I feel cheated out of subsequent scenes with the Emperor when this turned into a Coming of Career book for Kip? Yeah.

Did I really enjoy the themes of being torn between two cultures and two sets of people who love you and value you in different ways? Yes, and I almost cried at some of the lines! Was I ready to tear my hair out by the twenty-fifth conversation wherein Kip was hurt that his family didn’t understand he was in charge of world government and launched into a three page speech about it? Oh boy yes.

The thing is, some of the positive reviews of this book describe it as competence porn (a happy fantasy of someone being Very Good at their job and Doing Good Deeds with it), and most of the negative reviews describe it as Kip being the Specialest Statesman of All Time, but I don’t feel like either of them capture what bothered me about Kip in the second, very repetitive half of this book. 

This is probably a very me response to have to this book, but I just wish everyone had been a bit less nice.

I don’t think it’s unrealistic that Kip is That Good at managing world government (sometimes you really are just That Good at something super complex and it really does feel second nature to you, oh well), but what I do find unrealistic is how everyone loves and respects him...even people who don’t love and respect him??

What I find unrealistic is that he has an eloquent five page rant in him for every occasion, and his principles never falter, and his language is always precisely chosen even when he’s furious. And everyone loves this quality of his, and he is truly beloved on a personal level by everyone in his hometown, and he just...can’t seem to do anything wrong!!

I want someone to dislike him! Not a cartoonish political foil like Prince Rufus, but one of his old friends, someone he cares about, maybe someone in the palace who shares his goals for world government but finds his air of non-stop efficiency absolutely maddening. I want him to say something gauche that doesn’t get immediately re-inscribed as acceptable by laughter at Kip’s fiery temper! I want him to fuck up! I want the world to be more fucked up! I want famines and wars and vicious people who do terrible things and assholes who have all the benefits of the world Kip’s created and who choose to screw over other people anyway! I don’t want to read about the Perfect Man in a Perfect World!

Unfortunately...that’s what this book is! Like, that is 100% the project the author set out to write here, and she wrote it, and it’s so much more of a treatise about a Good Man in a Good World than I’d prefer. I love slow, slice-of-life, character-driven books, and I love books that focus on unlikely protagonists, like bureaucrats who stay in the background while quietly running an entire government. And I loved all of that in this book, and I liked more things besides. But there were also so many things that drove me nuts, and I often put the book down for a week or more because I just was not having a good time. Oh well.

Since I’ve named the book in the post this will probably show up in the tag, so I hope all of the fans are enjoying the cozy utopian fantasy that is clearly so dear to them, your book is not my book and that’s ok.

#hands of the emperor spoilers #an inexhaustable source of magic #one of these days i will change that tag but that day is also not today #personal

[elainemorisi]

thinking about that thing in scifi where it’ll throw in this retroactive or but-of-course-never flirting/what could have been moment between the [always?] male protagonist and a science-fictionally-nonbinary character to, like, wink at how Openminded And Advanced he/the author is and never, ever, ever even consider the possibility of taking it somewhere

there’s no further point to this post. it’s just ew

#this is apropos of my friend texting me about this woman she's dating #first text: 'I'm dating someone who dislikes The Fifth Season do I dump her?' #me: mostly unserious yes of course does she like sff in general #she: yeah she loves Bujold #me: ...I'll be honest that's not ideal #she: yeah she finds TFS 'too hostile' #me (and she): red FUCKING flag for actual real holy god #Too Hostile I /ask/ you folks #that book's entire... I mean entirety but especially its start is pretty much #'here is some near-unimaginable trauma to go with this unbearable pain and would you care for a side of gruesome suffering' #it is entirely reasonable to not enjoy it or not want to read it (especially these days) #but HOSTILE #of every yikes in the dictionary of yikes #that book is not HOSTILE that book is SUFFERING #anyway I was just ruminating on how fucking creepy and unpleasant the Vorkosigan universe is #and remembered the above-described thing in addition to all my usual gripes #(to be clear I also enjoyed reading those... when I ignored the deeply creepy shit #they're fine books! #well written! #but to have that be the sff you love when that's your reaction to TFS... yeaaaaah) #ANYWAY #to also tagramble about what I'll next reblog #the above-described is somewhat what LeGuin did too #but not totally #Left Hand absolutely ends how it ends out of authorial cowardice #slash failure of imagination #but it's not doing it for the wink wink look at me reason #it is I believe a pretty honest failure

[beautifulterriblequeen]

Trickster: an Ethari theory

I've had yea many Ethari headcanons, and I hope I live to have yea many more. Most of them are probably wrong, or incomplete at best. But boy are they fun.

I love to wonder what Ethari will really be like in canon when we get to know him for more than 3 minutes, but whoever he really is on his own, he will have an effect on Runaan , Rayla, and everyone who loves him, because they love him.

The first headcanon I can remember having for "Tinker" was that he could be like Leonardo da Vinci: a genius, creative, surrounded by beautiful ideas given shape by his hands, but also capable of creating deadly weapons, enchantments, and devices with equal beauty, and perhaps not really seeing where the line between them was. It was fun, but Ethari has ended up far softer than my headcanon, and I love and support him in his softness!

After a nice string of Ethari headcanons, this year I've started poking at the Trickster archetype and seeing if it applies to him. And I think it absolutely does!

Tricksters often seem like Chaos. But they're not. They're just Difference. "Chaos" is subjective. Like the "divergent" in "neurodivergent." Who says? Divergent from what, exactly? Perspective matters, and Tricksters have a very broad take on things which allows them to think outside any box people might try to invite them into.

My enjoyment of Loki has brought all kinds of ideas to my dash with the arrival of the Loki show. I've got a copy of the Edda, and I highlighted the hell out of it a couple of years ago as I searched for the roots of Loki's origin story. (It's truly fascinating reading and the symbolic language hidden inside their poetry is dazzlingly amazing and I'm super using it sometime just so you know)

Loki is a Trickster, and he's far from alone in myth and legend. Anansi, Coyote, and Sun Wukong are some you may have heard of. Aaravos is another, of course. Tricksters can be called upon to lend aid and wisdom when the rules don't have an answer for some extraordinary circumstance which the Trickster's people find themselves in. But that's not because they are truly outside the rule of order. They are actually a part of it. They are the catch-all for when the everyday ordinary rules fail people, and something "unthinkable"--in the literal sense--might just hold the answer.

This post crossed my dash today, and something finally clicked in my head, and all of this coalesced from what felt like separate places. But they're not separate, not anymore! Serotonin, baby. It's basically upped my headcanon to a full-blown theory.

What caught my eye was an answer to why Ethari's clothing is so determinedly asymmetrical, compared to Runaan's specifically, but Moonshadows in general. It's because of this:

Long protective sleeves below patterns on shoulders. A high collar paired with a bright and noticeable swoop around the neck. Fine detailing and graceful taste. Asymmetrical tunic point on the left, below broad strappy leather. Knee high boots with stylish protective gaiters.

And let's not forget the curling horns! In some comics, Loki has a broken horn. So does Ethari.

Yes, there is a lot of similarity here, but I'm not focused so much on the visuals as the reason they were chosen. Feel free to consider other aspects of Ethari's personality and how they might be similar to certain parts of Loki's. I did! But I wouldn't be me if I didn't go deeper than that.

My favorite book in the universe (so far) is Lois McMaster Bujold's The Curse of Chalion, and one of the many reasons why is because of her pantheon. It holds five gods, represented by a hand: Father, Mother, Son, Daughter, and Bastard. The first four all have their roles and places. The Bastard--the thumb--inherits everything else. He is the god of all things that do not belong to any other gods, and that includes self-sacrificing vengeance and queerness. He is a Trickster, and his influence on Cazaril's life is far deeper than at first glance. Chaos has its place. It belongs, and so do the Tricksters who engender it. God, I love this book. Please read it if you haven't. Bujold's work is amazing.

If you've seen or read any version of MDZS/Untamed, you know that Wei WuXian is a trickster. Competent and badass in battle, but playful and teasing to the point where sometimes even he isn't sure what he truly wants, he can bring a massive amount of power and focus when he wants to. It's always a matter of "but is it important to me?"

I love WWX so much. The Trickster vibe is very apparent in his character, and in a way you just don't get in Western media. We see him on his own, and we see him with family and loved ones. And he's always feeling something so intensely! He's driven by his emotions, for good or ill. He vibes with chaos, and he will create it if it doesn't exist yet. But he will also create family from nothing, and that's something you don't see enough of! WWX is a Trickster with an emotional preference for joy.

In TDP, Ethari doesn't have a lot of lore yet. It's being Moonshadowed because spoilers for future seasons, and I respect that. The longer the wait for S4, the more ideas I will just amuse myself with in the meantime--and yeah, this is one of them, so what? :))) But we do know a little about him.

He loves music. He loves to read. He leaves his mark on things in swirly form. He works very hard, even through headaches, because what he's doing is that important to him, even though he would much rather be making jewelry. He loves taking the time to polish rough stones into brilliant jewels, and he adores big pretty flowers and had them at his wedding.

Ethari has a temper, but he also loves puns. The weapons he crafts are exquisite: "light, elegant, strong, and clever." And he knew darn well that Runaan was trying to flirt with him, but why return a sentiment he may or may not feel yet when he can play with the overly earnest assassin just a little bit first?

Okay, just... A "simple craftsman" deciding that it's going to be fun to toy for a bit with a broody assassin's feelings? Would you risk that? Ethari got balls the size of the moon, and a brain to match. When he has to make weaponry, he does not half-ass it. Ethari's stabby creations nearly have a life of their own. His creations are literally called "trick weapons." This elf is a lot, okay. And it's possible that he doesn't even know how "a lot" he is. Yet.

We're meeting Ethari after he's found something that is, in fact, genuinely important to him: Runaan, and Rayla, and Laindrin too. Ethari has found a relatively stable place to settle and find a role to adopt. I say adopt, though, because making weaponry for his loved ones is not what he grew up wanting to do. It's what he had to do to keep them safe, once he found a place to bestow his heart.

But in the show, Ethari has lost his family, one by one. First Lain and Tiadrin, ghosted. Then Runaan, supposedly fallen on his mission. Then Rayla, ghosted for abandoning Runaan. He and Rayla have reconnected now, but the rest of his family is still out of his reach. If Rayla has indeed told him, by S4, what she learned at the Moonhenge in TTM, then Ethari may parallel Rayla's journey to seek answers. But even if he doesn't know yet, and gets pulled into some other story arc first, we will be seeing Ethari without his family.

Remember the ATLA episode "Zuko Alone"? Consider: "Ethari Alone."

Ethari has chosen, for love, to fit himself into a box that wasn't of his own making. And now that box has broken. His family doesn't need him to be their craftsman anymore. Perhaps others will need him to be other things to them. Or perhaps he will know that his family does need him, but to be far more than just a maker of pretty swords. A rescuer, perhaps. A healer, a guide? An avenger?

A trickster. Capable of taking many shapes, because he understands them all. Ethari works with form and function. If he needs to transform himself, he will.

That's what Tricksters do. It's delightfully queer and delightfully neurodivergent. Ancient peoples accepted and revered the different among them and actively sought their help with things they themselves struggled with.

Tricksters are Difference. Sometimes that manifests as chaos, sometimes as genius. But if you do not love and appreciate your chaos, it will absolutely turn on you. Wei Wuxian did. Loki certainly has, many times. Perhaps Aaravos is doing so as well.

I cannot wait to see what Ethari does with his difference. I have something very specific that I hope he goes and breaks.

All this from a picture of Tom Hiddleston in his Avengers 1 Loki costume? Yeah. Because Ethari was designed to wear asymmetrical clothing, in a Moonshadow culture that prides itself on balance. Sure, there are some other Moonshadows who wear this or that asymmetrical item, and I do love to see it. But Ethari has the most asymmetrical lines of them all. The meta glee I feel knowing that Moonshadow elves are designed to hold many layers of meaning in their appearances--that the writers, creators, and character designers just flexed with them--is truly a delight.

Ethari is asymmetrical. The full and practical application of that is a glass casket, and I hope it becomes a gift that keeps on giving, because boy do I want to keep receiving it. But right now, I'm genuinely seeing evidence of the Trickster archetype in him. And I really hope it gets to come out and play.

#tdp #tdp theory #ethari #trickster #tdp speculation #yes this means a whole new category for ruthari opposites #order and chaos #ethari and order are both on runaan's list of likes #but ethari is higher so #loki #wwx #wei wuxian

[abeautifulblog]

Other than the coffee_mage have you betaed for any other fics in the fandom? Hearinng you talk about them is so interesting I always wondered where writers procured betas haha

Mmm, not really for the witcher? lol, and I think I am a beta who procures writers, not the other way around.

I beta for my friend Sam, whom I met via Dream Daddy when his Craigfic was about the only other fic in fandom that I liked. (Robert's my bby, but I don't vibe with the way most people write him -- Craig was my second-fav, and Sam's fic brings excellent nuance to his arc, and Sam's dadsona OC is a goddamn delight.) I set out to friend-seduce him via comments, and now we're on like our four-year friendiversary, and he is genuinely one of my closest IRL friends. When my lawyer and I move back to California, we're looking to settle near him and his fiance.

Sam mostly writes original fic that doesn't wind up on AO3, eldritch-horror heists and necromantic comedy, but he is working on a Stardew Valley fic, and a fic set in the world of Lois McMaster Bujold's Chalion series, both of which I'm happy to beta for him.

@coffee-mage-sans-caffeine is actually married to @grison-in-space, who was a beta on For The Asking, so I'd known about CM's existence, and that they'd been working on a behemoth of a witcher fic of their own, but we'd never actually spoken until they started posting Glacier and I was like, GRISON WTF WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME YOUR SPOUSE WAS PUTTING OUT THIS BRILLIANT FIC, WHY DID I HAVE TO HEAR ABOUT IT FROM DISCORD? And then I got cracking in the comments and friend-seduced coffee-mage too. :)

The newest addition to our gang is @aluminiumfigure, who wrote the ficlet for the no-emotions-Geralt concept I pitched, and now she's working on spinning it out into a full fic, and CM and I are both doing beta stuff for it.

(OR I WILL AS SOON AS I TAKE A BREATHER FROM WRITING THE VERY DUBCON ONE, I SWEAR! 🙏 ...I am falling down on the job right now.)

But yeah, mostly I just go schmooze at talented writers when I want to beta-read for them. A combination of enthusiasm and analysis seems to do the trick -- gush about how much you love it, but in ways that also show that you recognize what they're trying to do with the story, the complexities of character motivation, etc. Give them an opening for a conversation about their story, basically. It's worked out well for me this far! :)

#asks #now gremble is the beta! #there are writers I have tried and failed to seduce #that I left all the gushy comments on and they just didn't show an interest in engaging with me #:((( #HEARTBREAKING #but hey that still means they got an inbox full of the kind of comments that authors adore #<3

[eponymous-rose]

(For the anon who was wondering, the Vorkosigan Saga is a series of sci-fi books and novellas by Lois McMaster Bujold. The series has won a dozen or so Hugo and Nebula awards, and while sometimes it’s very obvious that the series started in the 1980s, there are some forward-thinking ideas that get beautifully developed. I’d say what makes it stand out among other sci-fi is that the “sci” part is mainly focused on biology rather than physics: there’s a lot of development of what different reproductive and genetic-modification technologies could do to and for a society. There’s also a lot of genre-hopping, depending on where the focus of any given book is: military space opera, sure, but also murder mystery, political thriller, and even rom-com. Good stuff all around.)

Anyway! I finished reading Mirror Dance, which was just as horrifying as I remember, but still so beautifully structured. The shift from the early chapters, with Mark having no sense of identity and Miles storming in to save him, to the later chapters, with Miles not even remembering his own name and Mark storming in to save him, is spectacular. 

I love that Mark’s big, victorious end-of-the-book rescue was never presented as Mark figuring out how to emulate Miles’s Miles-ness, but instead as Mark making a conscious decision about who he was going to be and learning to roll with that. It’s such a weird display of power, because it’s something we almost always see in the villains of stories: the weird kind of charisma that teeters on the edge of bullying and leading by fear. But it works, on him, because people respond to confidence, and once he realizes nobody needs to love him to follow him (and Miles, in contrast, is sure as hell desperate for everyone to love him), that confidence blossoms. And it’s softened by the weird sense of protectiveness underlying it all, a thoroughly Barrayaran-style life-debt: Grunt and Gorge and Howl and Killer kept him alive, and now it’s his turn to take care of them.

And god Cordelia is so good in this book. Talk about an impossible situation: your (previously) only son goes off and gets himself killed, and suddenly you’re face-to-face with his clone-twin, who’s surly and miserable and blames himself and blames him and blames you and hates everything you stand for. She’s so matter-of-fact about everything, it just forces him back on the rails, but there’s still that deep agony just beneath the surface, having to deal with Miles’s death and then Aral’s heart attack and then Mark haring off on another dangerous mission one right after the other.

I love the scene where Cordelia and Aral are in the library and start talking about Mark without realizing he’s in there listening to them: it’s such a common trope in fiction that you’re just cringing in anticipation of all the awful stuff he’s going to hear. And, yeah, they say things they wouldn’t have said around him, not all of it pleasant, but...

He felt as if his skin had gone transparent, and passers-by could look and point to every private organ.

What he did not feel, he realized as he caught his breath again after the coughing jag, was afraid. Not of the Count and Countess, anyway. Their public faces and their private ones were... unexpectedly congruent. It seemed he could trust them, not so much not to hurt him, but to be what they were, what they appeared. He could not at first put a word to it, this sense of personal unity. Then it came to him. Oh. So that’s what integrity looks like. I didn’t know.

She also gives Mark a great talking-to re: Kareen that all sorts of fictional characters wallowing in their own awfulness and the comparative perfection of a love interest would probably do well to listen to:

The Countess smiled wryly. “There are several things wrong with your analogy, Mark. In the first place, I can guarantee you are not subhuman, whatever you think you are. And Kareen is not superhuman, either. Though if you insist on treating her as a prize and not as a person, I can also guarantee you will run yourself into another kind of trouble.” Her raised brows punctuated the point.

Fundamentally, again and again, Cordelia’s words come in just when someone’s hitting the walls of “better not to try” or “easier to do nothing” or “safer to stay here”. I love that about her character: Miles’s famous forward momentum is like a reflex in response to that relentless refrain of “okay, so what are you going to do about it?”

And speaking of momentum! It’s time for Memory, which I remember being my favorite book in the series. These first few chapters hurt, seeing (1) how completely Miles has embraced the Naismith persona, to the point where Miles Vorkosigan is just a stopover on his way to his next grand adventures, and (2) how thoroughly Miles is screwing over his only chance to get to be Naismith ever again. And oh man, that death by a thousand cuts: there’s the big thing, the seizures he’s been concealing resulting in the near-death of the guy they were supposed to rescue, and then the falsified report and all the rest, but there’s also Elena and Baz retiring, the big fight with Elli, the reminder of Taura’s imminent mortality, coming home to an echoing empty house like a weird preview of what life will be like once his parents are gone, and then the icing on the cake: that-idiot-Ivan getting his promotion to captain before Miles. We’re getting to see a really ugly side of Miles---frustrated and terrified and lashing out---and it’s suddenly obvious just how far he feels he’s fallen behind after losing that three months.

Illyan is an incredibly likeable character, especially having just re-read all the books leading up to this point and having just watched him go from the young spy observing the disastrous events Aral and Cordelia were wrestling with to a snarky and sometimes terrifying force of nature (and sarcasm) as Miles’s boss.  The scene where he has to ask Miles for his resignation, knowing exactly how much of a death sentence that will feel like, is brutal. 

Illyan’s hand opened in troubled acquiescence. He walked back around his desk, and pressed the keypad that unlocked his door. He rubbed his hand over his own face, for a moment, as if to wipe away all emotion. And the water standing in his eyes. Miles fancied he could almost feel the coolness of that evaporation, across Illyan’s round cheekbones. When Illyan turned back, his face was as bland and closed as Miles had ever seen it.

God, my heart hurts. And his head. And his stomach. And every other part of him. He climbed to his feet and walked to the door, shrugging away Illyan’s hesitant hand under his elbow.

Also, there’s a cat named Zap so, you know. Good book. Looking forward to getting deeper into this one!

#vorkosigan saga #vorkosigan saga spoilers #long text post

[stillwinterair]

2020 in books so far! All 21 of them!

Season of Storms by Andrzej Sapkowski -- Finished January 1st. My least favorite Witcher novel. In a series that managed to surprise and endear me at every turn, this one final romp did almost nothing for me. 2/5 stars.

Star Wars: Hard Merchandise by K.W. Jeter -- Finished January 17th. The final chapter in the Bounty Hunter Wars trilogy, and by far the worst of the three. 2/5 stars.

Migration by Julie E. Czerneda -- Finished February 18th. The middle chapter in Czerneda’s excellent Species Imperative trilogy, fun and charismatic, sciencey and cute. Didn’t hit me quite the same way as the first in the trilogy did, but still had fun. 4/5 stars.

Star Wars: Heir to the Empire by Timothy Zahn -- Finished February 2nd. It was okay. 3/5 stars.

To be continued under the cut, including thoughts on The Expanse, which has taken over my life this year:

Mass Effect: Revelation by Drew Karpyshyn -- Finished February 25th. Borrowed from a coworker, was immensely disappointed, decided once and for all I wasn’t going to touch tie-in novels for the rest of the year. That wound up being a great decision. 2/5 stars.

The City of Brass by S.A. Chakraborty -- Finished March 12th. The first of Chakraborty’s Daevabad trilogy, this was a great little historical fantasy fiction about a half-djinn caught up in about a thousand tropes I usually hate, but were written with care and nuance and charm. 4/5 stars.

Midway through The City of Brass, news of a virus overseas begin making waves.

Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie -- Finished March 29th. The first of Leckie’s Imperial Radch saga. So, so, so many incredible concepts that I loved dearly... but all just slightly off to the side of where they would normally hit me. I wanted to love this book so badly, and it kept almost hitting me, but never quite did, at least not as hard as I wanted it to. Still, I enjoyed the world and the characters enough that I bought the sequel and will read it soon. 3/5 stars.

AAAAAND PANDEMIC! I began this book when I was still working, and finished it while in quarantine. So that’s fun. From here on out, all of these books were read from my couch or my bed.

The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison -- Finished April 16th. Another book I wanted desperately to love and... succeeded a bit more than with Ancillary Justice, thanks to how ceaselessly charming it was. But the names. Oh, god this book is full of fake fantasy names and titles and you have to remember all of them and the glossary isn’t always helpful. But, still. I found myself so endeared, I couldn’t put it down. 4/5 stars.

Leviathan Wakes by James S.A. Corey -- Finished May 3rd. The first book of The Expanse, and I fell in love instantly. This one hit all the right buttons and didn’t stop: good science fiction, fun space adventure, charming characters, perfect level of tension, the list goes on. And reading this one was... the beginning of a certain obsession I’ve had this year. 5/5 stars.

Consider Phlebas by Iain M. Banks -- Finished May 21st. The latter half of this book? Great. Stellar. The first half...? Uhhhhh. Eh? By far one of the most insufferable protagonists I’ve ever had to slog through, but some really cool scifi concepts here (and also some really bad ones -- the whole desert island cannibal thing was stupid as hell, but the Damage Game got me). 3/5 stars.

Caliban’s War by James S.A. Corey -- Finished May 30th. The second book in The Expanse series. I could not put this one down. Everything I loved about Leviathan Wakes, amplified a thousand times. The additions of Bobbie, Prax, and Avasarala made me ascend. This book fired on all cylinders and I loved every moment of it; it stands as one of my three favorite Expanse books so far -- but we’ll get to those. Anyway, I can’t give it 6/5, so we’ll have to settle with: 5/5 stars.

Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut -- Finished June 1st. A book I’d been meaning to read for a while and finally got around to. Literally finished it in two sittings. Mostly it made me sad. 4/5 stars.

The Strong Shall Live by Louis L’Amour -- Finished June 2nd. A collection of wild west short stories. A couple were great, a few were awful -- most were just okay. I’d been reading it slowly since December, and finishing felt more like a weight off my mind than anything else. Still, some of these stories were incredibly memorable. 3/5 stars.

Larissa by Emily Devenport -- Finished June 4th. I read this in about three sittings overall, which is a lot faster than I usually read. It wasn’t particularly good, but it was the exact sort of scifi junk I eat up for some reason. This is... a very, very weird one. It was very progressive for the time (the book is as old as I am), so much so that I wasn’t surprised to find her on Twitter very publicly supporting BLM and decrying the current administration. It’s about a black woman in space, wealth disparity, and a bunch of other stuff. Some of it works, some of it doesn’t, but Devenport was trying, all the way back in 93. It’s also the sequel to a book I didn’t know existed until I’d already finished, but I guess that one didn’t matter so much to the plot of Larissa? Anyway, had a blast, even though I can’t quite put a finger on why. 4/5 stars. (I actually had this one marked as 3/5 stars, but my memories of it are all very positive, so... it was worth the bump.)

Abaddon’s Gate by James S.A. Corey -- Finished June 13th. Third in The Expanse, and not my favorite. The pacing in the first half was a little wonky, but once it gets going, boy does it go. 4/5 stars.

Regeneration by Julie E. Czerneda -- Finished June 25th. The final entry in the Species Imperative trilogy. This might have been my least favorite of the three, unfortunately, as much like Ancillary Justice it always seemed to hit just to the side of where I wanted it to. The first one was by far my favorite, and the third installment just couldn’t recapture that magic, but I love the protagonist and was happy to walk with her to the end. Plus, as always, there’s some damn good science fiction here. 4/5 stars.

Cibola Burn by James S.A. Corey -- Finished July 4th. HELL YEAH MOTHERFUCKER, this one has everything! I don’t even want to spoil what, just know that this is exactly what you want after Abaddon’s Gate, and had everything it was missing and more. This one rocked my fucking world, and is one of my three favorite Expanse books so far. Another one I’d rate higher if I could, but for now... 5/5 stars.

The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold -- DNF, July 8th. This book had me until the 35-year-old protagonist started trying to hide his arousal while he was watching the two teenage girls he was tutoring swim, and it was played off as like... cute? I don’t know man, fuck this book, it made me miserable.

Nemesis Games by James S.A. Corey -- Finished July 16th. Once again, HELL YEAH MOTHERFUCKER, HELL YEAH! This book begins with some of the slowest pacing in the series so far, but god, have they earned it. It feels so good to just take a break and walk a mile in the shoes of all your favorite characters. And then when things hit? Boy do they fucking hit. The third in my trifecta of favorite Expanse books so far, and another I’d rate higher if I could. 5/5 stars.

The Assassin’s Curse by Cassandra Rose Clarke -- Finished July 21st. I really thought this was going to be a fun pirate book. Instead, it’s a book about a fun pirate slogging along with the most obnoxious man in the history of fiction, who she is also falling in love with, apparently, for some reason. I don’t know. This is a duology but idk if I’m even interested in the sequel. Which is a shame, because I really liked the protagonist. 2/5 stars.

Babylon’s Ashes by James S.A. Corey -- Finished August 5th. Definitely my least favorite Expanse novel so far, mostly because the narrative was stretched very thin. This one hit really fucking hard toward the beginning, and again at the end, but in the middle? The middle was very... nebulous. A lot happens and I’m not interested in all of it, which is something this series has thus far managed to avoid doing. Still, very good, just not quite up to the standards I’m used to from this series. 4/5 stars.

And... it’s August! And I haven’t picked up another book since the 5th, which feels weird, but is due to a lot of factors. I’m in the middle of moving, so I don’t have as much time to read during the day. But also I’m waiting on a shipment of books to come in, and it hasn’t yet, and that’s stressing me out. Of those, there are a couple I’m leaning toward reading, but if the ol’ Read The First Page trick doesn’t work on any of them, I’ll probably hop back to Imperial Radch.

[sharpestasp]

Vorkosigan is EATING my heart

Shards of Honor, June 1986, Lois McMaster Bujold

Chapter Six

... a rescue? OH DEAR.

And they VOTED to do it.

Because of Aral's reputation.

And FUCK. Of course it's because of Aral's problems.

She does take command though! I love her!

Oh I do love Bothari in this moment.

I wibbled at that moment between Aral and Cordelia, dammit. I'm hooked on them.

Cordelia, what are you doing? You're trying to manage this ENTIRE MUCKED UP AFFAIR, AREN'T YOU?!

GO CORDELIA! Three men on a 30 second briefing of the layout?! FUCK YEAH.

"Lady Vorkosigan, if we both live." BWAHAHAHA. I love it.

And she won him over.

I adore her, so damn much, for that plan, for the execution.

+yowls at that "about three meters away" line+

FUCK. FUCK FUCK FUCK. Koudelka.

And she cries for them.

#shards of honor #vorkosigan saga #cordelia naismith vorkosigan #lois mcmaster bujold

[danbensen]

…or how tracking my life told me I was abusing coffee and social media

So there I was, my nails digging into my palms, my right molars pressed into each other. The air hissed in through my nose as my vision narrowed to a point. It was like hurtling down a roller-coaster. It was was terrifying, and I had no idea why it was happening.

I’d be doing nothing especially ominous – sitting down on the couch, carrying my younger daughter, thinking about bread – and suddenly I’d be gripped by this intense sensation of danger. BREAD! The image of a whole-grain loaf gained the mass of a church bell. DOOM! It rang. Toll the yeasty knell, oh brazen fate, for all men shall one day die. Die, oh, mortal flesh. Die and meet thy baker. (whoo! I am so sorry about that pun. Deep breaths now…)

Tiny drops of steam Ebb and flow before the light With each of my breaths.

It was ridiculous, but of course knowing that it was ridiculous didn’t help. I was like a cat, freaking out for no reason. Or was there no reason? Aren’t I supposed to listen to my body, now that I’m meditating and whatnot? But what exactly was my body supposed to be telling me? Avoid carbs? Run from the couch? Something about my daughter…? Yeah, If I searched hard enough for a reason to be terrified, I’d surely find one. Now there’s a reason for fear.

So I meditated more. I stopped using social media. I took my daughters to the park and watched the sky as it changed from brass to rose and the street lights blinked on. I talked to Pavlina. And I realized that over the course of the past month, I’d gone from drinking two cups of coffee a day to four.

The trees turn black and The sky, indescribable. Look up and it’s changed.

Scheduling is hard. My older daughter’s in first grade now, and school starts at 8:10 in the Center. The younger one’s in kindergarten, which starts at 8:30 in Levski G. At some point, it would be nice if Pavlina and I could go to work, which is back in the Center. If we want to have breakfast and drink our coffee in peace, we need to wake up at 6:15. Three hours later, I’m finally in the office and I’m tired. That scares me because I associate being tired with being sick. Fatigue=death.

I’m supposed to listen to my body, but my body is a stupid animal. It’s not going to say, “you’re drinking too much coffee.” It says “coffee reminds me of being happy!” and “not being productive scares me!” It says “I’m tired! I must have cancer again!” It’s up to me to keep track of what I’m doing, cut out the distractions, and give myself enough mental room to notice the patterns.

Right. So that’s why I’m not doing social media any more. Because part of the reason I was too distracted to notice I was drinking too much coffee was the last newsletter I wrote. I posted it on facebook, which made me want to check facebook for likes and comments. And once I was on facebook, why not see what other people are posting? Oh. Oh. That’s what they’re posting. Oh no.

I debated writing this explanation. Why not just stop using social media? Why talk about it on social media? But my litmus test for whether I should write something is “will this help people?” Maybe this is helpful: social media is distracting and depressing. It fills my head with noise. Maybe you have the same problem and this is the solution.

The sky at seven The color of hope that hurts And the crying swifts

I’ll continue to post my work on my website (including these newsletters) and mirror or link to those posts on Tumblr, Twitter, and Facebook. Readers are welcome to like and comment, but I’ll only read those comments once a week (Friday seems like a good day). Comments on my website, PMs, and emails to me will get my attention earlier. I won’t read any content that isn’t sent personally to me or that I didn’t sign up for. Hopefully that means I’ll still get news from people I care about, but not about tragedies that I have no power to solve. That way, I can continue to function from hour to hour.

What do you think? Is this going to work? Can I stay connected without sacrificing my mental health? Let me know in the comments. Or even better, email me.

In other news, I had some good writing stuff happen this month. Interchange has hit its 2/3 mark and, more importantly, its rhythm. I’ve managed to block off a fairly reliable 90-minute chunk of time in the mornings, which I use to meditate and then “speedwrite,” which means writing without thinking about what I’m doing. I generally end up with a single element of a scene, such as the conversation the characters are having, how they feel, what’s going on in the environment, or what actions the characters are taking.

Then I usually have some time after lunch (and my second and final coffee), and I can layer those scene-pieces onto each other and smooth the edges. If I have more time, I do research, which usually involves shooting messages to generous experts. In this way, the inestimable and inspiring Thomas Duffy helped me tie a ribbon around the center of my book, in which a biologist’s subconscious belief that she owns the environment she’s studying leads her to destroy it. As the forest crumbles around her, she blames herself…then makes exactly the wrong decision about what to do next. Yeah! Fiction! Thomas, I’m going to send you roses or cacti or something.

Another new tradition I’ve instituted is spending my Friday mornings not working on Interchange. It’s a little release of pressure, a chance to play and remind myself that writing isn’t just another chore I have to do. The first week, it was a short story. That one turned out so well, I’m going to try to publish it. It’s called “The Sales Event” and it’s about smart phones and general relativity. Do you want to beta-reader it?

I got another couple of “no”s from publishers about The Sultan’s Enchanter, but one of them was that very gratifying “no” that comes at the head of a long list of things I could do to fix the story. Making those fixes will be educational, even if that particular publisher still passes. Wealthgiver is rather like The Sultan’s Enchanter, after all, and the lessons I learn from one will be important for the other. The world needs more books about amoral Balkan people!

Yeah, I’m still working on Wealthgiver’s neo-Thracian language. I even posted a little of it on Tumblr. But don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten my little goats!

Kapt kapēnon ainē kesa / byźai darsai ypo dēsâ. Ēbron, aiźi, byźâs kâ / skalmon, bleptē, bystâs kâ, As tae yper iatśikan / kapâ pe ta ve abbrinkan.

There were at one time / brave goats under heaven. A kid, a nanny, and a billy goat / clever, loyal, and tough, Who would dance up / a hill for to make themselves fat.

Dâ ispilsen opē rinkon strymē / parân ân, śân târâ dymâ. Iśē iserpa źēryntē / źymlē mērē urdēnē. Byźulâs ada pyrân źilmân / dâ bolvarâs pia rhobton saimân.

But a quick-flowing river blocked / the path with an evil guard. There coiled a beast / a great water-dragon. A goat will eat green grains / but a serpent will slurp blood

Peskēnon ērga ēbron do. / Pliskon ērga śân negō. Źymlē zē semân iglytsa. / “Kis ēs tu?” Neston iglâtsa. “Semâs manon ēm ēźo.” / “San ar ēsti? Abadam so!”

First comes the kid. / It splashes with its hooves. The dragon heard this. / “Who are you?” she roared. “This only am I.” / “Is it so? I will eat you up!”

Things are heating up! I’m still not entirely comfortable with the articles and deitics, but I do like that last line. And the orthography is shaping up nicely. I love googly things over letters.

Another potential conlanging project for that other hundred years I plan to live: Western Hellenism. What if the Greeks had conquered Iberia?

And finally, PROTECTOR! This is the comic project I’ve been working on for literally six years. Words by me and Simon Roy, inks by Atryom Trakhanov, colors by Jason Wordie, and lettering by Hassan Otsmane-Elhadu. What a crazy, fun, glorious process this collaboration was!

Protector is a post-apocalyptic scifi story about a slave who stumbles across “a demon of the Profligate Age,” a military cyborg who’s been in hibernation for the past thousand years. The post-human robots who are terraforming the Earth are not amused, and send in some sweaty future-vikings to put a stop to these shenanigans.

There will be five issues, and issue one comes out in January. If you’re interested, please order a copy, or better yet, tell your local comic or book store to order lots of copies! Give us some numbers that will convince Image to ask for a sequel

And finally, some books and stuff

Daring Greatly by Brené Brown – this book wasn’t as transformative for me as it could have been because I’ve read Brown before and I already agree with her. Shame is bad. Vulnerability is the cure. Bam. What I like about Brown is that she collects good data, lets it prove her wrong, and suggests how the lessons from the data can be usefully applied. It’s not just science, it’s engineering.

Falling Free by Lois McMaster Bujold – I think this was the third read. What happens when GM humans become obsolete? What happens when an engineer has a spiritual epiphany? It wasn’t quite as much fun as some of Bujold’s other science fiction, but it has a lot of heart.

Spooky Action at a Distance by George Musser – an excellent physics book, examining the concept of space, which lies at the center of the contradictions of relativity and quantum physics. If space didn’t exist, the universe would be chaos, but a lot of experiments only make sense if space _doesn’t_ exist. Great stuff, and it inspired that short story I’m so proud of.

Death by Water by Kerry Greenwood – a refreshing splash of chilly New Zealand sea spray. Phryne pursues a jewel thief and has a little bit of sex, but a lot of good food, drink, and dancing. There’s also a hakka.

Wicked Prey by John Sandford – it was actually a little boring. The police’s side of the story didn’t hold up as well as the criminals’. But this is a relatively early book in the series, which means Sandford is improving.

The Upright Go Pro – it’s a little device that you glue to your upper back so it will buzz at you when you slouch. Immediately after I put it on, I realized I have little tiny tyrannosaurus arms that don’t reach any table or counter-top. It ran out of batteries one day and man did my back hurt that night. So I guess it’s working.

Gravity by Against the Current and Brighter by Patent Pending – Good Interchange music.

Be Kind to Yourself by Andrew Peterson – It makes me feel better.

Song of Durin by Clamavi De Profundis – I haven’t gotten goosebumps from a song in a long time. It’s about dwarves.

The Twits by Roald Dahl – I read it to my older daughter and boy howdy did Roald Dahl know how to write for children. Everything seems utterly ridiculous but it all somehow satisfies. Like eating dirt cake.

Steven Universe – My younger daughter found me rewatching it on my phone and made me cast it on the big TV. Now it’s all “I wanna watch Steeben dabout a Giant Woman. I’m Pearl.” No, younger daughter, you are not Pearl. Pearl is my older daughter. My younger daughter is Amethyst. Nobody is more Amethyst than my younger daughter. (I’m Peridot)

#mystuff #newsletter #simon roy #thomas duffy #Artyom Trakhanov #writing #mental health #science fiction #thracian

[thesilverheroineproject]

How to Write A Strong Heroine

Writing Advice by Mette Ivie Harrison

Writing a strong heroine can be a tricky thing, and not just for male writers. The problem is that if you write a heroine exactly like a hero, then it may seem unrealistic or "unfeminine." But you don't want to use stereotypes, either, because those are a cheap shortcut and don't make for a genuine character. I will admit that I tend to prefer the heroines that are written by women, but there are plenty of counter examples. Jim Butcher does a great job with strong heroines, even though Harry is the protagonist of his books. Guy Gavriel Kay. George R.R. Martin. John Scalzi. Orson Scott Card. Joss Whedon. I don't feel like I have a preconceived notion of how a heroine must be strong. It doesn't have to be physically, though it can be if it is explained well enough. I think the problem is more often that there aren't any heroines at all. Now there are books that are going to be about a man's world, but you know what? I'm not going to like it as much as one where there are hints of the women surrounding that man's world.

Mistakes that I see writers make too often:

The heroine's part in the plot is not an important one. Perhaps you will say that it is impossible to make more than one character absolutely essential to the plot, but I think this is untrue. If you are writing a story and you want the hero to be the most important character in the plot, you have every right to do that. But I will like your book more if the heroine also has a big role to play. She might not have to do it in the climax of the book, although she could. But please don't pander to female readers by pretending that she does something important (by having the hero tell her how important she was to his mental well-being or some such crap) when she doesn't.

The heroine's part in the plot is to give up herself. I know that this is a common device in Western Literature. I studied it plenty in grad school. "Das Ewig-Weibliche zieht uns hinan" was a quote I learned early on, from Goethe. It's from his play Faust, and is about the eternal feminine that leads men to a higher plane. Yeah, only in Faust, Gretchen is abused by Faust and commits suicide. She comes back in spiritual form to help him. Um, this isn't what I would call a strong female character. A woman who throws herself into the well of evil to save all mankind is dramatic, but is there some other way she can destroy the evil? If not, I don't know what to say. I may just not like your story that much, or your world view. There is something noble about giving up one's life for another, but it seems like women do it a lot more than men in novels. Men tend to figure out some other way, or they just are not put in the same position. Women also give up their lives to save their children. Again, I would do this as a mother if I had to. But I would try not to be put in this situation. My children need more than just my giving them birth. They need me to remain alive in order for them to grow up well balanced. And a mother's job is not to be swallowed up completely in her children's lives. At least, that's my belief. Again, your view of the world is going to change what you choose to write in your books.

The heroine is recovering from abuse. I've used this myself. It works on occasion. Unfortunately, the world is full of women who are recovering from abuse as children. But not every heroine needs to have this as her background story. Some women are loved and treated as queens. Some are neglected in other ways, just as terrible.

The heroine sits around a lot, moaning about her fate, waiting for the hero to rescue her. Sure, women are physically weaker than men, and in a realistic novel, there are going to be some realistic limitations for women. But just be careful of this as a device for heroic action. Maybe your heroine can get herself out of that tower and go help the hero fight the evil hordes. Or maybe she isn't going to sit in that room spinning gold just because some king told her to do it and she'll get married.

Which leads me to -- the heroine's reward at the end of the book is marriage. Romances end this way traditionally, and I have no problem with a happily-ever-after ending. But be careful that the marriage is a reward for both the hero and the heroine, and that there are other rewards, as well. One of them being self-esteem, or perhaps some other tangible reward like a sword or a crown or even a big drink of water after a terrible battle with very dry evil.

You may be surprised by this, but I wish there were fewer heroines who disdain all things male. I get tired of this, really. I consider myself a feminist of sorts, but when the heroine has to go out of her way to say that everything she does that is traditionally male is stupid, that is offensive. Let her think some things are stupid, yes. But give some balance.

Heroines who fall in bed with the hero as soon as it is convenient for him. Come on, this is just school boy fantasy, isn't it? It's not the way real life is, and I think it makes for bad plotting, along with the other problems I have with it. It's as if the hero has problems in every other part of his life, and so he deserves (?) to have a little sex thrown his way to give him some relaxation. Need I say how much it offends me when female characters are used merely to be toys for the heroes? They have lives of their own and motivations of their own. I love how in Patrick Rothfuss's The Name of the Wind, the hero is always trying to find the heroine and he can't. She is mysterious and has her own motivations, which he can only guess at, and he tends to guess very wrong.

OK, now some of the things I think I would like to see more of in heroines:

Heroines who have unusual skills. Your heroine doesn't have to disguise herself as a boy and learn how to fence in order to be interesting. But think about the stereotypes you are perpetuating when you choose your heroine's area of expertise. Is she a good seamstress? Does her magic come from tears? Or from dancing? Or from beauty? You might want to choose beekeeping (like in Robin McKinley's Chalice) or reading or filing papers or using a hammer in interesting ways. On the other hand, it is fun to twist around expectations, so that if a villain expects the heroine to make him dinner, she can poison it because she is really good at gardening and recognizes that those mushrooms growing outside his window are not what he thinks they are.

A heroine who refuses marriage. I liked it in the new book Gradelingwhen the heroine decides it isn't for her. I am a married woman with children and have a traditional life, but I like to see other choices offered to young girls, and marriage isn't the only way to happiness.

Heroines who are mothers and go on to become great political powers. I love Bujold's Barrayar because it is about a woman who deals with all the difficult realities of being a mother and giving birth, but still stops a civil war on her planet all by herself. Well, with help. But she is the force behind everything, and she takes her own risks. I love Bujold's women, by the way. Even more than Miles Vorkosigan, who some say is a woman in disguise.

Heroines who think for themselves. Just because someone tells a heroine something doesn't mean she should believe it. Heroes are always bucking authority and get rewarded for it by the plot, but for heroines, it often seems the reverse. They have to be good little girls, obedient, staying in their place, and they can work from there. Yes, that can be done and done well. But it isn't very often.

Heroines who beat the heroes in some area of life. I've read plenty of novels where I see female characters do things that are just unbelievable. That annoys me, too. But I wish there were more of them who out-thought the men, or at least teased them and brought them down to size. I think one of the problems with the Vorkosigan books was when Miles found his beloved Ekaterina, how could Bujold write a romance with anyone equal to Miles? She certainly tried, but I'm not sure it turned out well. Miles runs roughshod over her life and the thing she does best he uses to entrap her. I don't know if that is ever fully forgiven in the books. Miles is Miles, and well, he gets what he wants in the end.

Well, that's a start. There is a difference between good writing, which is clear communication of what you want to say and writing that has something to say that I like. I'm not saying you have to have strong heroines to have a successful book. Clearly, you do not. There are men who won't notice and even some women. But there's no reason you can't do everything, is there?

X

#thesilverheroineproject #silverheroine #silverheroineappreciation2019 #writing #writing tips

[pentanguine]

Highlights of my year

Reading the Peter Wimsey and Vorkosigan series! These two series are forever entwined for me, partly just because I read them all together over the same few months, and partly because I really do think the themes and characters are so delightfully resonant with each other. (Bujold based the arc of the Miles books to some extent off of the Wimsey books!! It’s a canon connection between the texts!) I’m such a sucker for genre fiction with literary pretensions, and I loved the way that all of these books were full of tropes and madcap adventure while also being thought-provoking and frequently quite heart-wrenching. I am absolutely in love with them all.

Visiting my college friends in upstate New York! We went exploring along a creek…we hung out with cats at a general store…we went geocaching…we watched The Terror…we played a game I can’t even remember but I do remember we died laughing. I want to spend so much time with all of you always.

Moving to a new city—namely, a large, cold city where no one knows me and the religion section at the local bookstore is one rather small bookcase composed almost entirely of Eastern Religion. There’s public transportation, lovely parks, and I’m overall really enjoying my grad program. Are some parts of it bullshit? Yeah, but it’s interesting to me and I’m good at it without being a genius at it, so I’ll take what I can get. I also have some wonderful roommates, who are kind, funny, and drama-free, and I also live with a cat again, which I love. She’s got a totally different personality than my late cat, and she’s delightful.

Deciding to grow out my facial hair. Did not expect it to make me so incredibly happy; did not expect other people to get so incredibly upset about it. The emotional reactions my shitty, wispy chin hairs can provoke…Wow.

It’s been my first year without any panic attacks since 2013! That’s not to say there were not several close calls, but I did talk myself down from them and get my emotions back under control without my brain disintegrating into a feral mess of adrenaline, which feels like Progress.

Starting to take iron supplements! (Bear with me as I go on about this) Back at the start of 2021, I was exhausted pretty much all of the time—felt like I was dragging my own body around like a corpse, and would come home from work so tired I literally couldn’t do anything—I didn’t have the processing power to watch a youtube video, I didn’t have the energy to water my plant, and the thought of exerting the effort to help my mom with dinner made me want to cry. I thought I was depressed, even though my moods were pretty good all things considered, or maybe that I had chronic fatigue. But wow. Turns out I just needed iron! I have so much energy again; I’m much less irritable all the time and feel less like a perpetual teenager getting annoyed at everything; even stuff I���d been attributing to perfectionism-paralysis-style anxiety went away. It’s amazing.  

Useful misses (Learning Opportunities or whatever)

I tried Cognitive Behavioral Therapy™, despite knowing it wouldn’t work well for me, because I could access it for free, and surprise, it didn’t work well for me! Too much like homework which I have to be Good at; too logic-based when I’m already a painfully, unproductively analytical person; not a useful emotional outlet for me because it’s too focused on looking at my behavior rather than my emotions. So my anxiety isn’t any better, but it isn’t any worse, and I’ve had the gratifying experience of confirming that I know myself and what works best for me.

I forgot how to talk to people for the first two months of grad school, so even though the rest of my class would hang out and socialize together I never joined them because I assumed I’d just be awkward, no fun, intruding on a group who already knew each other, etc. But of course what really happened is that I missed out on the chance to integrate into the group, and had to wait to be spontaneously adopted by the somewhat intimidating Class Talker like a stray pet being brought in from the cold. I think being iat the same jobs for two years, I’d forgotten what it’s like to meet a whole new group of people, and how I have to force myself to talk to them and push through the brick walls around my own mind. But I’ll have another chance next semester ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

#i am in eastern time so i should absolutely be in bed #am i? no #why? because i stayed up til 12:30 the past two nights and now my body just lives like this #why did i stay up the past two nights? fucked if i know i was reading a book and listening to glass animals #personal

[lalaurelia]

Fanfic Ask Game

Was tagged by @stardustloki for the Fanfic Ask Game – thanks so much! This is fun :)

Okay, here goes.

At what age did you start writing fanfiction? 

I believe that first attempts at what could be classified as fanfic were made when I was around 12? I was a big fan of Indiana Jones and his hat and I also watched Romancing the Stone and c’mon, I had to attempt something XD It was basically self-insert into those worlds and I never moved past a few paragraphs, having no idea where to take the story. After that I only attempted writing fics sporadically and was convinced I had no talent for it.

Who is your favorite author?

Oh good, picking faves. Seriously, it’s like asking a child whom they love best, Mum or Dad XD I can’t pick one, so I’ll list those I consider important to me.

Harry Harrison. Action, adventure, space – and a lot of irony, a lot of humanism, and characters who are smart and resourceful. I love his books.

Kir Bulychev. Grew up on his Alice books. Adventure and space, yay! Similar to Harrison in a lot of ways, same with irony and humanism, but more of a young adult genre? I still have some book series by him I haven’t read.

Lois McMaster Bujold. Space, adventure, political intrigue, a character who is smart and resourceful and charming as all hell. You have no idea how much pleasure her Vorkosigan saga brought me. Her fantasy series are also to die for – and I gotta catch up. Oh, and of course, I love her witty style.

I see a pattern here, yeah XD

Favorite type of scene to write?

Dialogue. No, not like this. DIALOGUE. Witty banter, or things that are difficult to say, or things the character wants to say but doesn’t, and the stuff that goes on in their head during all this. Minute body language details they notice or give out.

Also, if you guys read my stuff, you probably noticed that I write a lot of kissing and explicit scenes. So yeah, those are my favourite as well. First, I want my characters to receive love and affection. Second, physical intimacy can tell more than words sometimes.

What is your favorite fanfic?

What, just one? XDDD Okay, okay. Blooded Crown by astolat. I finished reading all that she had posted about Harry and Draco and was hungry for more, and there it was, a new story~ Nevermind I never played the Witcher games or read the books, I knew bits and bits, and that was enough. The story was so good. Intrigue! Steamy scenes! Action! God, I love this story, and it inspires me to this day.

What tags do you avoid like the plague?

The ones with my NOTP. I don’t even want to write it with a * because people still find it and get offended for some reason as if someone disliking it takes away from their enjoyment. The dynamic between the green bean and Oswald is extremely abusive and I just don’t want to deal with that kind of negativity, okay.

If it’s for fic tags... I’m vary of Character Death and Death fic in general. But if I know the author and trust them, I will read a story like that.

What AU do you wish to write but feel like you won’t manage?

I have this WWII AU story in mind, and it’s not even a big story, but... I feel that if I want to make it believable I would have to do a lot of research, and it scares me. It’s not an easy topic for me. I will attempt it at some point, definitely... it’s just right now it’s still daunting and fills me with doubts.

What has been your favorite story to write so far? 

Why do you make me choose between my babies T_T Okay, okay. It’s got to be Lost in the Rain. It’s a case fic. I love case fic. It also has me experimenting with slow burn and conflicts. I’m pretty proud of how it all came together too. I look back on it, and maybe there are parts I could’ve handled differently, but - still very happy with it. And I want to write another case fic one day.

Oh, and I’m certainly enjoying my current WIP.

Do you prefer to write one-shots or multi-chapters? Why?

Oh, it really depends on the story. Some stories just come to me as is, as stand-alones. Some want to be told in more detail. I guess I have a love-hate relationship with multi-chapters? I feel I can pace myself better in those, but if I don’t have a clear idea of a plot, I tend to flounder until I find something. Sometimes it takes time. Like half a year :/ Yeah, I’m still in shock it took me this long to update Imagination Infection.

What is your favorite kind of comment?

Oh god. All of them? Yes. Keysmash, telling me what you were doing while reading, which parts you liked, which got you curious, or just an emoji. I put those stories out there hoping someone would read them and hopefully enjoy them. A comment shows me you did and it totally makes my day - or several. When I’m feeling down, I reread comments to my works and they never fail to brighten my mood.

Authors thrive on comments. I am by no means an exception XD

Why did you start writing fanfiction? Why are you still writing it?

This one will be specifically Gobblepot, because before it I thought I had no skill or talent. So. When I came into the fandom, there seemed to be some kind of a lull in things? At least for Gobblepot tag in general. Situations like these always galvanize me, and I also itched to write more about Jim and Oswald, who were both so complex and intriguing, and somehow fit every kind of an idea I got and made it better. I wanted to explore them and challenge myself as well, trying different kinds of stories. So I continue to do it. I still have stories I want to tell about these two. I still have many challenges to overcome. And it brings me joy to do - and hopefully to people who read my stuff as well.

Tagging, if you want to give this a go - @sunlitroom, @yugin-the-great, @butterfliesandresistance, @fandomfourever, @ladyspock7, and anyone else who sees this and wants to do it.

#about me #writing #fanfic #genmitsu writing #lalaurelia writing #ask #gobblepot #jimwald #otp #gotham