I've Been Using These As Illustration Warmups For The Past Five Weeks

it's funny how often, in the queen's thief books, the sad and shocking twist is that the love was there all along. there's the big obvious one, of course, but it comes up again and again: Dite with his hopeless crush, Sejanus with his mocking cruelties, Relius with his abject devotion and Teleus with his stalwart loyalty, Attolia's ladies closing ranks around her, Sophos telling all his tale and bashfully leaving out how often and how wistfully he thought of Eddis. in other cases it grows silently and catches our narrator by surprise: Costis down the well, Pol on the cliffside.

and it doesn't save everyone. love is not always a gentle thing, and it's not always enough. the minister of war nearly strangled his son to death. Sejanus committed treason. Eddis went to war. but it's always there, unobtrusive as a shadow, pervasive as the sunlight.

I think sometimes of a quote from mwt saying she front-loads the trauma: the worst thing that is going to happen to the characters, emotionally, generally happens in the first few chapters. their world ends, their life shatters, they lose everything, they are alone and afraid with no allies and no hope. and then we rebuild. over the course of slow, painstaking pages, they regain their footing in the world, carve out a new self, discover a new perspective and a new strength. further ills befall, of course, and at the great climax everything seems bleak and dire once again, but it's still not the worst thing to happen to them. they face the dire moment bravely, afraid but not alone, certain now in who they are and how they will face the end if it comes.

I'm still mulling this over, I don't have a tidy knot to tie between these points, but they feel connected. something about the compassion woven through these stories, both for the characters and for the readers. something about how they're tales of intrigue and adventure, yes, but they're also stories about building something good, and about seeing the best in people even when their worst is horrific, and about love as an act of courage in a cruel world. love as an act of faith. love as the last thing left that might be able to save you.

Reblog if you think it’s okay to platonically say “I Love You” to your friends

Fingon is the archetypical hero. He does great deeds of valor and daring, notably Maedhros’ rescue and rushing out to defeat Glaurung. He is not terribly afraid of consequences, which is wonderful when he is the only one he’s responsible for. His talent is forging ahead and inspiring everyone to follow him.

Fingolfin is the archetypical king. He is the one that holds his people together across the Helcaraxë and brokers peace with Maedhros after he’s rescued. He’s incredibly aware of every possible consequence, which is wonderful when he’s responsible for a whole kingdom. His talent is uniting everyone and inspiring them to move forward together.

When Fingolfin dies, he acts as the hero, not the king. He tries to borrow his son’s talent for incredibly inadvisable stunts, but it isn’t in his nature. He believes the Noldor are doomed, and thus dies in despair fighting Morgoth because he does not see another path forward, only defeat.

When Fingon dies, he acts as the king, not the hero. He tries to borrow his father’s talent for forging political unity, but it isn’t in his nature. The Nirnaeth’s forces are disunited from their conception to their defeat, and Fingon dies full of hope fighting Morgoth because he does not see any other path forward, only victory.

Fingolfin’s legacy was despair, though he left a lasting blow against Morgoth. Fingon’s legacy was hope, though he did not so much as touch Morgoth.

Reblog if you've found friendship because of your fandoms.

someone on twitter is trying to claim that use of an em-dash is an indication of AI-generated writing because it’s “relatively rare” for actual humans to use it. skill issue

Gotta love a guy who's consistent in his hobbies

this post is so cursed im so sorry

This reminds me of my creative writing professor's reaction. One of my friends brought a D&D book to class. This was at a Christian school where D&D was pretty popular, so he teased her about it being satanic and she teased him right back. Later while we were working on peer feedback, our professor asked if he could look at the book since he'd never really seen anything D&D related.

Several minutes later, he asked, "Why was everyone panicking about this? It's just imagination."

My friend told him yeah, it was just imagination and math rocks, and I think we actually changed his mind about it.

Found that over at mastodon

Edit: link to original post: https://mastodon.social/@senatormeow/100908678269940898

[Image ID: a Toot from User "Senator Meow":
 "when I first ran D&D, my grandmother, who had bought fully into the IT'S SATANISM hype, insisted on sitting and watching the first session. about an hour in, she threw her hands up and yelled 'THIS IS JUST MATH' and stormed off"/END ID]

average ben outfit: what if an old timey strong man was harry styles was a cabbage patch doll was a bus seat

average sam outfit: randomized sims townie using only tech bro athleisure and novelty t-shirts in poison dart frog colors. in a contest with himself to see how many patterns he can clash at one time. when he wears a bucket hat he looks like a baby in a splash pool

average adam outfit: literally a normal guy