Hello! This is Chicory over at AO3, the authoress currently writing Incandescent Snow. I don’t know how many clicked on the link but this here is where you shall find me if need ever rises! So do not be afraid to leave a comment if there is something you wish to ask.
I shall keep this as a sticky post until I, hopefully, finish Incandescent Snow. And who knows, perhaps I will find some other use for this blog as well.
Other than that, I really hope you enjoyed the latest chapter. And thank you for stopping by if you did!
Especially that last one. At its most basic, all writing has to be is readable. Forget compulsive descriptions, forget purple prose, forget everything else, all it needs to be isreadable.
I’m going to pin this one until I internalise this and something improves.
I had this idea and I figured might as well try it out. I know people aren’t very tech-savvy these days or they just don’t want to expend the effort so here’s an easily accessible post of my let’s read and let’s play master lists (of which there aren’t many yet, ha ha). This one should stay relatively short, particularly if I stop talking so without further ado~.
I wasn’t sure if I should do this or not but then I figured this person probably does not deserve my politeness so whatever. If I want to laugh at anonymous paper police on my blog, I can and I will, ha ha.
So recently, I finished re-reading Harry Potters. While I was re-reading them, I was writing these short chapter codas as writing exercises. They were basically missing scenes, headcanons, pointing out what’s wrong with Harry Potters and whatever else that amused me.
One of these headcanons was a pre-canon friendship between Neville and Draco, which started from this bit in canon:
As Harry stepped down, a drawling, delighted voice sounded in his ear.
‘You fainted, Potter? Is Longbottom telling the truth? You actually fainted?’
Malfoy elbowed past Hermione to block Harry’s way up the stone steps to the castle, his face gleeful and his pale eyes glinting maliciously.
And the fact that Neville was basically the only character Draco didn’t bother being polite to in Book One, which made me wonder if they knew each other before Hogwarts.
So yours truly was writing chapter codas which featured this tumultuous friendship between them that started before Hogwarts and which they tentatively rekindled throughout the years. In the last coda, Lost and Found, I used this friendship as a symbol of the wizarding world’s healing and true coming together with Neville and Draco declaring each other as friends and Neville shaking the Malfoys’ hands. I also like to think I did this a lot better than Rowling with whatever nonsense she was writing in the epilogue. Or the chapter before that, for that matter.
This evidently triggered a very brave anonymous internet paper police and she (or he) decided it was a brilliant idea to bother me with it instead of going on her merry way to read something that’s more to her tastes.
Here’s the brilliant insight this person decided to inflict me with:
Neville is literally associating with Nazis at least one of which who worked with another Nazi who tortured his parents into insanity. This is Neville bashing and I don’t think I’ve encountered it before.
Honestly, I’ve had a headache since morning and this isn’t exactly what I meant when I said I’d like more comments on my scribblings, ha ha.
I especially like that “literally”. Neville is literally a fictionalcharacter. Neville is not literally associating with anyone and least of all nazis. I can’t believe I even need to type that out.
The Malfoys and least of all Draco weren’t responsible for the Longbottom torture. That was Bellatrix, Bartemius Jr, and the Lestranges (a year after Tommy killed himself on Harry and Lucius had already jumped ship). The Malfoys did very little actual death eater activity before or during Book Seven. Even Rowling — with all of her harebrained ideas, pettiness and mean-spiritedness — didn’t see them as irredeemable, seeing as the Malfoys were practically the only “death eaters” who made it out alive in Book Seven and Draco went on to have a child of his own who epitextually became friends with the Potter Spawn 3.0. Or 4.0 if I count James 2.0.
So imagine reading a short fic where Neville is so kind that he realises that Draco — who was his friend before Hogwarts — wasn’t responsible for what happened to his parents and that the Malfoys aren’t responsible for what happened to his parents; a fic where Neville is a symbol of the wizarding world’s healing, unification and hope, and thinking that this is Neville bashing.
To be totally honest, the fans of these books still aren’t impressing me with their intelligence, ha ha.1
1 Except for my nephew. He knows the books are extremely flawed (at a technical level) and he still likes them. He finds my rants about them really funny, ha ha.
Probably not worth its own post but eh, I guess it’s fine?
One of the central conflicts in Harry Potters was Tommy’s inability and unwillingness to accept his own death. (As an aside, Japanese authors write this conflict a lot better.)
And yet it was Dumbles with all the associations and references to immortality, such as the phoenix.
And it was Harry who was worshipped not because of anything the brat actually did but because he constantly failed to die even when he should’ve.
I don’t know how to word my thoughts exactly but I feel that this is one more self-contradicting thing that shouldn’t have existed in the books. Or if it must exist, Rowling should’ve done something more with it.
Though, to be fair, I might feel this way just because of my inherent and abiding dislike of those books.
As it so happens, I’ve slipped into laziness again for the past two weeks. Well, okay, not quite since I’ve been busy with other things but I have definitely been lazy about the blog and I can’t say writing has been going exactly well either.
The yokai exercises halted on taka onna this time because I’m just not that familiar with Japanese prostitution? I’ve been wondering if I can do a twist on it because it’s not as if the prompt exercise has to be about historical prostitution? I mean, it’s my prompt and I guess I could make it about enjo kousai?
I also finally started on Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets bookmarks and notes buuuut I’ve only done two chapters so it’s slow, ha ha. Since I started doing that, I figured I might as well edit the chapter breakdowns while I’m at it. Nothing major, I’m just pruning off the excessive cussing and adding a few thoughts here and there where fitting, and I thought I might as well add pictures to the early breakdowns too so they’re not a monotonous wall of text. The only problem is that my ebook reader really doesn’t like all of those bookmarks and notes. I was going through chapter two of Book Two last night and my reader kept crashing so I stayed up later than I meant to out of sheer stubbornness.
So yours truly feels tired today.
Moreover, I’ve slowly but surely been writing that Harry Potter post-canon horror fic. I have four new scenes and the deeper I wade into this fic, the more I realise I’m — going to have to re-write it, ha ha. *a despairing laugh*
I guess it’s okay in a way because I need to practise that “first draft” thing but on the other hand, I’m incorrigibly lazy and I don’t want to. *totally unreasonable*
So I figured I’d share another snippet in the hopes that it’ll help me get back into the groove of things and let those it may interest to know that I’m still alive.
There’s some implied Ron/Ginny in this snippet because I think of this as a continuation to my chapter coda series. I already ended that with all of these characters miserable but, as they say, if you can make something worse then do it, ha ha. Though, I am hoping that I can write this in a way that it’s readable as a stand-alone too.
∞
“She’s going to be fine.”
Ron looked up as Hermione sat next to him, holding out a cup of coffee. He tried to smile but it felt more like a grimace and he quickly dropped it.
“St Mungo’s Hospital has the best healers. Ginny will be fine,” Hermione went on in the confident sensible way she had. For a fleeting terrible second, Ron couldn’t stand it. Not when Ginny had been in labour for going on twenty-six hours and she might not make it.
The pregnancy had been bad too. She’d spent most of it bedridden, growing increasingly pale and exhausted and thin as if the baby had been — fucking sapping the life out of her.
Ron was careful not to look at Harry, sitting off to the side and scowling grimly at the wall, afraid that his anger and resentment might show on his face. It wasn’t Harry’s fault, it wasn’t anyone’s fault, but the sheer thought of losing Ginny was enough to make Ron violent and sick with desperation.
He looked down into the cup of watered-down coffee. Ron hated coffee, and then he drained the cup, crushing it in his fist. He stooped down to stop himself from getting up and punching the walls. Hermione placed her hand lightly on his back; Ron stamped down on the knee-jerk impulse to shrug her off.
After another indefinite stretch of time, the door of Ginny’s room opened and one of the healers stepped out. Harry stood and immediately strode up to her.
“The baby?” he demanded.
“What about Ginny?” Ron asked as he jerked up. “Is she okay?”
The healer smiled with placating professionalism. “They’re both fine and sleeping. You may go see them–” she started but Harry already brushed past her into the room.
Ron put his face in his hands, groaning with indescribable relief. He felt Hermione touch his back, almost humouring. “See, I told you she’ll be fine,” she said, almost smug.
“Right,” Ron muttered. “Right. Thanks,” he added distractedly to the healer, and followed Harry into the room with Hermione.
The first thing he saw was Ginny, curled up on her side the way she had when they’d been kids and she’d sneaked into his bed after nightmares. Ron’s chest went impossibly tight as he stopped by her bed, looking at the exhausted shadows under her eyes, the gaunt lines of her face. Without thought, he took Ginny’s hand in his and brushed his thumb over the delicate skin of her wrist. Her skin was disconcertingly clammy but the taut knot of dread in the pit of Ron’s stomach uncoiled all the same at the feel of her faint heartbeat.
Ron wished, desperately and pathetically, that he could’ve held her.
He was vaguely aware of Harry and Hermione standing by the crib on the other side of the bed. Hermione was cooing, her voice low.
“Have you decided what to call him?” she asked after a while.
“James Sirius,” Harry said, immediate.
Ron frowned, something about the answer bothering him. Maybe the one-sided abruptness of it when Ginny was still unconscious. He squeezed her hand and glanced reluctantly away from her — and then he paused at the look on Harry’s face.
There was no reason for the shiver that went through Ron or the way he instinctively averted his eyes. He stared sightlessly at Ginny’s exhausted face, the lank hair, and couldn’t explain the sudden knot of apprehension in his stomach.
Ron squeezed her hand tighter.
fin (for now)
You know… I think I need to practise adding more adjectives and adverbs and the like. Lovecraft had a knack for describing the emotion of horror. Should I re-read a few of his works? Because I don’t think I’m getting the feeling of increasing unease right?
I’m so going to have to re-write this when I’m done. *sighs*
I’ve been meaning to do a review of sorts about this manga for a while actually. I’m really bad at writing reviews of sorts and summaries so I usually save these when I have stuff I actually want to say. It’s also late so I hope I can do this quick, ha ha.
Basically, My Love Mix-Up! is a romantic comedy about dumb but good-hearted high school students.
Aoki has a crush on Hashimoto, a girl in his class, who lends him an eraser during an exam. Aoki happens to see the name Ida ❤ carved on it, and when he accidentally drops it, the eraser is picked up by Ida himself. Aoki lies that the eraser is his so he won’t accidentally expose Hashimoto’s crush.
All sorts of romantic comedy shenanigans ensue with Aoki thinking Hashimoto is in love with Ida and Ida thinking Aoki is in love with him. Aoki tries to set them up while falling in love with Ida himself, and then at the end of volume one, he finds out that Hashimoto had actually written Aida ❤ on her eraser who is Aoki’s friend.
My summary probably doesn’t sound as funny as the manga actually is but that’s not really what I wanted to talk about anyway.
This is basically the only BL manga I’ve come across so far that has a main girl character who has an actual romantic character arc of her own. So I honestly don’t even know if I can call this BL, ha ha.
In most BL, girls are either utterly nonexistent, faceless and nameless girlfriends who are in the way of the superior love between boys, cheerleaders or fujoshi self-inserts who exist to be creepily involved in the main characters’ love and sex lives. Which is pretty ironic when you consider that most BL is, in fact, written by women for other women. Like, say what you will about shounen authors but shounen authors seriously treat female characters better than most BL authors.
I’m not sure how many people read my blog or my reviews of sorts but I can imagine an extreme BL fan stumbling on this post and thinking “Ew. Female characters? In my BL?” which is exactly why I find this manga so important and unique, ha ha.
The dumb and loveable characters and cute storylines also helped. Ida’s volleyball teammates were adorable as well. And when I think about it, I tend to feel fond of manga where the main character makes the silliest faces and Aoki’s faces were really something, ha ha.
So yeah, it was a fun and fluffy read.
Oh, as a content warning, I guess, the manga also contained a high school girl who was in love with her teacher and another high school girl in love with the engaged manager at her job. Nothing comes off of these since they’re all minor characters but they do exist. So if just their existence makes you uncomfortable, you may want to skip this one.
I was feeling petty and I think this is hilarious. If you just look at the names of the kids, which of the parents do you think had a more equal marriage?
Because I assure you, it’s not Harry/Ginny, ha ha.
Oh, Harry Potter. The terrible gift that keeps on giving.
I thought about making a brief review of sorts at the beginning of this post but I honestly don’t know what to say other than I loved almost everything about this game?
Bramble: The Mountain King tells of two siblings, Olle and Lillemor. One night, Olle wakes up from a nightmare after his mother’s frightening bedtime story. He finds his sister gone and goes to look for her in the nearby forest. …..is it nearby if they basically live in the forest?
As he falls through the roof of a decrepit house, he stumbles on a statue of Tuva who is holding a luminous stone.
When he eventually finds his sister on top of a summit, singing into the night, they play with the stone for a bit and then fall through the ruins to a fairy tale forest. They explore around until Lollimor gets captured by a troll and Olle sets out to save his sister.
This game was basically everything I’ve wanted in a story and what I want to do in a story. I have a fondness for well-written stories about siblings because I think they’re kind of rare and I want to do fairytalesque horror or horroresque fairytales myself.
This is a very narrative-based game and I loved the narrative so I don’t really have much to say about the gameplay. It was intuitive and easy aside from a few dark spots and careless mistakes. I liked the fixed camera angles because they create a true cinematic experience, and I don’t really understand why people have such hostility to fixed camera.
And I guess that’s it? (I just bet I’ll come up with all sorts of things to add and edit right after posting this, ha ha.)
The epilogue is really short and nothing happens in it. It just kind of brings the story full circle? I’m not sure if this has a word?
In the first chapter, Olle was eight and Lillemor eleven according to the notches of their heights on the wall. In the epilogue, Olle has turned nine and Lillemor is still eleven. This doesn’t exactly give an accurate estimation of how much time has passed since their unwitting and often horrifying adventure in the fairy realm but at most about a year.
A nightmare woke her up.Frightened by her memoriesShe searched for her brother’s comfortBut he was nowhere to be found…
You know, Lillemor looks really pretty.
Also, this is a direct parallel to the first chapter when Olle woke up from a nightmare and went looking for his sister. Ha ha, he was too scared to be alone but not too scared to go find Lillemor in the forest in the middle of the night. ❤
The picture is again kind of small because yours truly didn’t invest in a good picture blog, but her pyjamas look really cute. I wish I could find old-fashioned clothes in a reasonably priced, easily found shop.
Hee, my beautiful full collection. ❤
However, the darkness outside did not scare her.Because she knew she had her brother.
Aww, they’re so precious. *hugs them*
I hope Olle was going to go see Lemus because Lemus deserves all the good things in the world, too.
And that was that for this game and my badly done let’s play of my second playthrough, ha ha. And I guess now I need to finish that Tomb Raider II let’s play which I haven’t updated since — November. *dies*
Hiiii! I managed to play another chapter of Bramble: The Mountain King. Technically, this is the last chapter and the next chapter is just a short epilogue.
By the way, everyone knows that I have a total blanket statement on spoilers, right?
Regardless, last time on Bramble: The Mountain King, Olle finally reached the mountain. The mountain is actually King Nils’ castle but we’ll get to that in a bit.
He had reached the end that Tuva had pointed him towards. Now, entering the halls of the mountain, Olle was ready to find his sister.
At the end of this hallway, there’s King Nils’ mural, that little egoist. Well, he’s a king so it’s to be expected.
Well, he isn’t exactly visible in the close-up either. On the right side of the screen, there’s this secret stone door that leads to the library.
I’m kind of confused how we got from the swamp to the library and from the library to Skogsrå’s grove and Nilshult. Then across the lake to the summit and mountain, and back to the library. I mean… couldn’t Lyktgubbe have opened the door to Ulrik’s bedchamber the first time I got there?
Best not to think about that, I guess.
It’s not exactly visible in the screenshot but poor Olle is still covered in blood.
Also, I feel that I should be allowed to kick Lyktgubbe just for the principle of the thing.
Anywho~ on the table in front of Olle is finally wooden figure nine. I honestly don’t know why I didn’t find these on my first playthrough but, to be fair to myself, by that time I had been playing this game six or seven hours straight.
On the podium in the middle of the room is the seventh book. This one is a sequel to what happened to King Nils, Ulrik and this kingdom.
Basically, King Nils eventually found himself a real witch who looked suspiciously like Tuva. The witch gave him a bramble flower and Nils used it to cure his son but because his whole witch hunt murder campaign, people had got so sick of him and his reign that someone assassinated Ulrik as soon as he woke up. Nils then turned to the bramble and used it to kill everything, becoming a giant in the process? The witch dropped by for a visit, saw what had happened, and raised a mountain on top of him to contain him and the bramble.
And then… the best part.
“And to this day, the trolls still feed him as punishment for his evil deed…”
And I’m just, what kind of punishment is that? *wheezes with laughter*
Nils becomes basically an immortal giant who feeds on humans, small baby gnomes and trolls, and this is punishment for Nils? What about the innocent creatures he eats?
The Mummy (1999) did this too. Like, the ancient Egyptians punished the Egyptian priest by basically making him immortal and giving him magical powers that could end the world. And all I’m really thinking of is that these fictional people should really work on their punishments.
Oh, by the way, the other book is the one Olle found in Chapter Eleven – The Library.
So through the library, we get to Ulrik’s bedchamber. The door closes behind Olle and becomes a bookshelf that you can look at.
On the bookshelf, there are typical toys for boys: a knife, a wooden sword, a whittled horse, a bark boat, and on the top right corner is the last wooden figure. I found them all! Yay! *gives myself applause*
Now that’s out of the way, next Olle changes clothes by interacting with the closet on the right side of the bookshelves. After getting out of his bloody clothes and magically cleaning himself up, he finally cheers up. He’s so cute, ha ha.
He finds a clock hand in the pocket and next is a really easy puzzle.
On the left side of the room, there are three paintings. They’re kind of small but you need to pick a silver goblet, a silver box and the wooden sword, check the numbers on them and then pick them on the clock. This opens a mirror on the right side of the room and you get a key to unlock the door that leads out of the room.
This leads to a hallway overgrown with bramble. At the end and to the right, Olle falls down to the smithy, I guess?
He needs to get across the worktables without the sound killing him. It’s not difficult even though I did die two times because of careless mistakes.
After the smithy is finally the hallway to the final boss, King Nils. *insert dramatic music*
The door’s really fancy even though it isn’t exactly visible. There are a few bramble flowers that Olle needs to shoot with light before the doors open and he gets to the king’s hall.
The gate that was meant to be closed forever, now opened.The Mountain King who was meant to be hidden forever, was now revealed.He just had to reach the sack, before Lillemor ended up as the giant’s dinner.
Olle goes around the… thing in the middle of the screenshots. Behind them is King Nils’ sword that he needs to climb.
He gets up on the pommel and then jumps down on the bramble. He walks along until he reaches a bramble flower that he needs to shoot with light and this takes him to the other side of the throne where Lillemor is.
He doesn’t have time to open the sack. The door opens and a troll steps in. Olle hides as the troll climbs on the… stone table(?), picks up the sack, and then gets up on Nils’ shoulder to feed him.
Lillemor meets Olle’s eyes before she gets swallowed. It’s a good thing that King Nils’ is a giant who doesn’t need to chew tiny humans or otherwise, this game would have an unhappy ending.
It’s okay, Olle. *hugs him* Your sister is tougher than that, getting swallowed doesn’t even faze her.
King Nils then kills and eats the troll (being a henchman isn’t easy). He notices Olle and picks up the rock he’s hiding behind, and then he takes out the knife and fork. Even if he’s a cannibalistic giant, he’s still civilised, okay?
You know, when he whipped out the fork on my first playthrough, I laughed. I’m pretty sure this was another instance of macabre humour.
And yes, those tiny dots are bramble flowers. And yes, Olle needs to shoot them all.
King Nils has three phases, I think. (I have a three-second memory.) The third phase is just a direct continuation of the second after you’ve shot enough bramble flowers. In the first phase, he tries to stab Olle with the knife or the fork. I think it’s easier to dodge if you keep track of the shadow of his weapons.
After shooting the brambles on his shoulders, King Nils gets serious and takes out his sword and his ceremonial mace? I’m not exactly sure if that’s the word I’m looking for.
In this phase, he slams the mace on the table, which shakes loose some rocks. You need to watch out for both but just keep an eye on the shadows and it should be easy. His other attack is sweeping his sword across the table and Olle just needs to jump over it.
After shooting enough brambles, he changes attacks. He sweeps the sword twice and he slams both the sword and the mace on the table, which causes a sound that kills Olle if it hits him. You just need to hide behind the rocks that drop from the ceiling when he slams the mace on the table.
With the bramble weakened, the Mountain King saw clearly for the first time in centuries.And what he saw reminded him of his beloved son.He would not lose him again.This time King Nils would overcome the darkness.
He thinks, and then pushes away the table that makes Olle drop to the floor, ha ha. It’s a miracle he didn’t die, Nils. Olle is tiny, he dies easily. I should know. I would like to work up to a no death run but to be honest, I have a feeling this is never going to happen.
The source of the curse blossomed.King Nils tore the bramble rooted in his back, and brought it all to an end.The only way to get to Lillemor was now up, and in.
After Nils shoves the table away, he reveals the mother of all bramble flowers. He stabs through it and Olle needs to climb the sword again and jump off on his beard.
Before Olle can reach his mouth, Nils lifts his head, puts on his crown, and then dies as a king instead of a monster.
Unfortunately, Lillemor is still in his stomach and Olle is still clinging to his beard.
Olle throws the stone in King Nils’ mouth and falls to the floor with him. The screen goes black and after a few seconds, Lillemor cuts her way out of his stomach. She sees Olle on the floor, dead, and just curls up on him and cries.
Tuva had one last gift to give to Olle.
Tuva. ❤
It’s not exactly visible but I love the detail of Lillemor pressing her face into Olle’s shoulder.
And with the Mountain King dead, his prison started to crumble.
After Tuva brings Olle back to life, Lillemor picks him up on her back and tries to carry him out as the castle crumbles around them. It seems hopeless as they’re both exhausted and slow but then the door opens again.
The Lemus would always look after his friend.
Lemuuuus. ❤ He deserves all the good things in the world.
And that’s the chapter’s end.
You know, the first time I played this chapter and got to the part where Olle falls with Nils, my eyes just started leaking tears. It wasn’t much better this time even though I knew he was going to survive, ha ha. The power of good writing.
The next chapter is the epilogue, and now I need to write a fic where Olle and Lillemor hug each other for an entire day.
I did another… well, not really a nostalgia re-watch but a re-watch nevertheless. This isn’t going to be a review of sorts because I can’t bothered so I’ll just kind of post my random thoughts.
Honestly, I get why this show was just three and a half seasons because basically nothing happens in this aside from relationship drama. It would’ve been nice if the friendships had gotten more focus.
It did make a few bold choices such as making one of the main characters bisexual and killing her off.
Marissa was genuinely the most tiresome character on the show. Someone described Serena from Gossip Girl as “all hair and no personality” but seriously, Marissa was also just all hair and teenage angst even if it was understandable. It’s really ironic that this girl hated her mother so much considering how much she was like Julie: completely and utterly incapable of not clinging to a guy. At least Julie did it consciously — never mind that Julie also had an actual personality that surprisingly grew on you like a shameless red fungus (I enjoyed her friendship with Kirsten) — but I doubt Marissa was even aware of putting on that “I’m so delicate, someone please save me” act.
It was also tiresome how Marissa was all “I wish Ryan would just be there for me” when it’s like, girl, have you ever thought of being there for Ryan? Nope, instead she basically supported and emotionally bonded with every other guy than her boyfriend.
Well, she certainly got a fitting end, I guess, though I disliked that whole alternative universe episode of “she was always meant to die”.
It was also really curious that as soon as she died, the drama dropped like 90% and instead the show turned into a romantic comedy.
Season Four was a bit surreal and there were episodes I didn’t particularly like (such as the earthquake and the final episode). But Taylor and Ryan were honestly stupid cute together. They were one of those couples who are basically so different that they come out the other side and balance each other out. Never mind that Season Four Taylor was a delight because she was so quirky and unhinged, ha ha.
Also, there’s this episode in which Ryan’s having insomnia because he basically lost his reason to get up in the mornings so why go to sleep. Then Taylor kissed him, Ryan was all “whoa” and had to sit down because his legs went weak, and then immediately fell asleep, implying that from that moment on Taylor became his reason to get up in the mornings. That was a genuinely well-written and cute moment.
The final episode wasn’t that great either. It had a lot of unnecessary writing choices such as several characters breaking up between episodes in a time skip and then getting back together at the last minute.
So overall I’d say that this show wasn’t worth a re-watch. But to be honest, I just really don’t like most american media.
If you’re going to do a dynamic that may or may not be complex, you might as well go all in.
Though, I guess Damo (2003) sort of did that already. I mean, even though the main characters were siblings and fell in love, they did kind of stay as enemies until the end when they both died together.
You know, it’s a shame I didn’t like that drama because it did have a lot of interesting ideas in it. I just didn’t really like the writing and presentation.
Recently, I got this comment about the witch hunts in Harry Potters and it made me realise that I didn’t ever really talk about them from a world-building perspective. But to be fair to myself, I’m just one person so I can’t possibly remember or know everything. Regardless, I guess it’s worth its own post?
I’m honestly really hesitant about doing this because I don’t want this to even accidentally sound like a callout or rude or anything. So I’m trying to think of how to phrase this as vaguely as possible.
Basically, the gist of the comment was the slight historical inaccuracy of fourteenth-century witch hunts in Harry Potters and how the world-building thus needs a little bit of patching up. And it really highlighted the differences in our perspectives and approaches. Personally, I think the bigger problem in Harry Potters is the world-building and plot segregation, and the world-building needs a lot more than just a little bit of patching up.
Book Three, I’m looking at you.
But I think Arthur Conan Doyle put this difference of perspectives really well in The Sign of Four:
“What seems strange to you is only so because you do not follow my train of thought or observe the small facts upon which large inferences may depend.”
This kind of goes without saying but Harry Potters aren’t non-fiction. They’re not historical fiction. They’re not even slice-of-life fiction — well, not that slice-of-life can’t have fantastical elements such as blonde blue-eyed Japanese girls who have super strength. They’re a shoddy hodgepodge of urban fantasy, adventure, detective mystery, and children’s fiction that tried to upgrade into young adult fiction, and failed at both. Or well, if you ask me it failed at everything, ha ha.
So this… how to put this… expectation or assumption of historical accuracy is kind of a false equivalency. Especially when Rowling didn’t even get biological accuracy right so what on earth do you expect from her in regards to historical accuracy, ha ha?
I’ve talked about my problems with people conflating real life or realism with fiction before: Fiction Meta, Pet Peeve of Literary Discussion and Fiction Isn’t Reality. Basically, in my experience people more often than not talk about real life or realism when they want to either excuse, dismiss or moralise something in fiction. I’ve also talked about my problems with urban fantasy before: Plot Bunny, Urban Fantasy and Urban Fantasy. Basically, I don’t like the genre. Most of the stories I dislike belong to it. I’ve yet to see an urban fantasy that’s actually good. Well… unless I count Lovecraft’s tales or original Tomb Raiders as urban fantasy since some of it happens in urban environments?
The problem in the context of Harry Potters is that witches, magic and magical creatures are an actual physical reality in the story. So there’s really no reason to think that the witch hunts in the world of Harry Potter couldn’t have started as early as 3000 BCE, especially when you consider how all wizards treat muggles and how absolutely pants they are at keeping themselves hidden and how even in the real world laws against harmful magic existed around the ancient world. And most likely the wizards’ behaviour would’ve been worse in 3000 BCE since every people’s behaviour was worse in 3000 BCE.1
In fact, witches, magic and magical creatures being an actual physical reality in the world of Harry Potter should’ve rewritten basically the entire human history. And let’s be real, the only reason why the entire human history wasn’t rewritten is that Rowling didn’t think about it and she couldn’t be bothered to expend the effort. After all, she was far too lofty for such things as — oh, I don’t know — world-building, plots and coherency.
So because the wizards in Harry Potters are so completely separate of — well, everything2 — they’re superficially reminiscent of fairies, which I actually mentioned in one of my posts already. In fairy tales, fairies don’t really live in the “real world”. They live in the fairy realm that you can access from certain places and that kind of exists in its own dimension. I guess a good and well-known example of this is the film Spirited Away in which Chihiro inadvertently enters the world of kami.
Rowling’s wizards are also superficially reminiscent of the different strata of British aristocrats, right down to the non-magical subjects that they study. Bizarrely, the wizarding world is also superficially reminiscent of jewish conspiracy theories, of all things, but I’m pretty sure this was totally unintentional on Rowling’s part.
Rowling also used her wizards to make Points™ about some real-life issues — such as slavery and government — while at the same time she wanted her impressionable readers to believe that her wizards are just the most wunderfull quirky little things who ever wunderfully quirked. The problem with slavery is that her Point™ basically boiled down to “bad slave masters are bad”. Not to mention that slavery doesn’t make sense in the context of the books anyway since the wizards basically have magical automation which would make slavery irrelevant. The problem with the wizarding ministry workers flushing themselves down a public toilet is that Rowling, in true Rowling fashion, did not once stop to think what her Point™ actually says about the wizards. Though, I have to admit that the idea of Hermione, Harry and Ron becoming ministry workers and flushing themselves down a public toilet for the rest of their lives is absolutely hilarious. But I suspect Rowling didn’t exactly stop to think about that either. On the other hand, she did have that irrepressible thing for faeces, snot and other bodily waste so who knows. Maybe she enjoyed the idea.
The root problem in the context of HarryPotter, though, is that Rowling, in true Rowling fashion, never really got into what the wizards are or who got magic first and why. They’re not fairies, they’re not British aristocrats, they’re not jewish conspiracy theories. So none of it works in the context of itself. None of it is coherent. Because ultimately, the books are just a badly written dim-witted hodgepodge of Rowling’s whimsies, wish fulfilment, obsession with death and midlife crisis of faith. Like, they’re just so badly written and self-contradicting that I can’t even completely convince myself that they were written by a singular person.
But TLDR: urban fantasy still isn’t impressing itself as a genre to me.
Also, the books are bad. People can like them for what they are but people liking them does not magically make them good.
Okay?
Okay!
1 Well, to rephrase, it’s not so much that people’s behaviour was worse in the past as it’s that people express those bad behaviours differently in specific intervals of civilisational collapse. After all, time is a flat circle.
2 Aside from when they inexplicably aren’t. I mean, jeans? The pureblood kid didn’t even recognise mugglemoney, where the hell did they get jeans, oh my god rage building.
I was free-writing Ron/Ginny, as you do. I’m not going to share it since, well, they’re older and the dialogue is a bit more explicit than the platonic childhood scenes I’ve posted here.
…..okay, I’ll share just a short bit because it’s funny. As a warning, Ron is canonically a total guttermouth and I can’t deny him in fan fiction so there are a few curse words. Also, I seriously couldn’t care less about Hermione and making fun of Harry and Harry/Ginny gives me life. I can’t help it, it’s like a compulsion! So what I mean is, that kind of colours how I write this ship, ha ha.
∞
Ron couldn’t sleep.
He stared at the ceiling of his room, listening to Harry mutter incomprehensible, vaguely disturbing things in his sleep the way he did. He kept thinking back to earlier that day, about Harry in Ginny’s room, what Ginny had been trying to do. He knew he shouldn’t and he hated himself for it but he just — he couldn’t.
Ron glanced at Harry from the corner of his eyes. He was fast asleep, curled up underneath the blanket, his back to Ron. He hesitated for a moment and then he eased himself up, holding his breath as he snuck out of his room and downstairs.
He shuffled into the kitchen to get a glass of water when he noticed the door to the back garden was ajar, a mild wind drifting inside. Ron saw a glimpse of long red hair through the crack and paused abruptly, his chest going tight with too many conflicting emotions to name. And then, because he never could stop himself when it came to Ginny, he went to the door and stepped out.
She was sitting on the step, staring at the small dots of light floating in the air over the hedge. She looked small and unhappy and exhausted.
After a minute or two, she lowered her head and sighed. “What do you want from me, Ron?” She tilted her head, looking up at him. “I’m — I’m trying. I’m dating Harry like you wanted. I’m trying to make it work. And you just—”
“What, by trying to fuck him while everyone is in the house,” Ron blurted out angrily, reminded of that moment in the afternoon again, and immediately wished he could learn not to put his foot in his mouth.
Ginny flushed, embarrassed and guilty, but her eyes flashed dangerously. “That still doesn’t give you the right to butt in,” she said coldly. “And if you hadn’t—” She snapped her mouth shut before she could say more and looked away, her jaw clenched.
“It’s my fault now?” said Ron incredulously. “What did I do? I don’t remember telling you to fuck Harry when you’re not even together and everyone is in the fucking house.”
Ginny jerked up, pacing back and forth the cobblestoned path in whatever frustrated anger she’d been holding in. “What,” she snapped back. “So you can do whatever you want, you can have Hermione all over yourself, but I can’t even kiss the boy you wanted me to date?” she hissed, her voice shaking.
Ron felt himself go red, vaguely recalling Hermione throwing herself at him on the night they went to get Harry. Ginny stopped and looked at him, her eyes wide and pleading and desperate.
“What do you want, Ron? What… what am I supposed to do? What more can I do?”
Ron stared back at her, torn and pained and terrified. Ginny waited for him to say something but he couldn’t, at least not anything that wouldn’t be either damning or lying, his throat closed off. After a while, she huffed out a humourless laugh and put her face in her hands, her shoulders slumped.
“Forget it,” she said when she dropped her hands, sounding hollow, and moved to get past Ron inside.
Ron’s hand darted out without thought and grasped her wrist, holding on too tight. She frowned but before she could say anything, he started pulling her towards the gate and out to the grove by the river.
He let go of her wrist and paced back and forth before he stopped, his head tipped back to look up at the clear star-strewn sky. He took a few deep breaths and dragged both hands through his hair, all the while Ginny eyed him warily as if he’d gone mad. Ron felt mad, on the verge of something terrifying. “Okay,” he declared abruptly, and looked at her. “I’m gonna do something really selfish now. You can punch me or hex me if you want to.”
∞
I’m not sharing the awkward first/second kiss, though, ha ha. To be honest, I have way too much fun writing this little crackship for various reasons. Which is probably why free-writing it is so easy.
But anywhoo~ The important bit isn’t that I was free-writing Ron/Ginny, as you do. The important bit is this sentence, particularly the bolded part:
He hesitated for a moment and then he eased himself up, holding his breath as he snuck out of his room and downstairs.
This is a little embarrassing but I’ve tried writing this exact same sentence in that Tom/Hagrid fic that I will get to any day now. I tried writing it in a million different ways because I started doing that inner self-loathing thing until I had to stop lest I go mad.
But this time I just wrote it and kept going, and I — I honestly feel so happy. The magic of Ron/Ginny perhaps? My hilarious crackship, I have much fondness for you.
You know, there’s this poet who’s internet (in)famous for having written wincest (Sam/Dean from Supernatural). It would be hilarious if someday I’ll become the writer famous for writing Ron/Ginny, ha ha. Or I guess Cassandra Clare is already (in)famous for that but to be honest, I think this is a lie from people who dislike her and do that “oh my god, look at what a morally reprehensible ~sexual deviant~ she is for *checks notes* shipping fictional siblings fictionally!”
Because what you write and read sure determines what kind of person you are. I guess we should all just enjoy being terrorists, serial killers, genocidaires, etc too.
In other words for those who don’t get it: writing or reading about murders does not, in fact, make you a murderer. You’re welcome for this important life lesson. You can find them here for free.
The other progress I’ve made is that I finally sat down and wrote Tommy’s backstory for that Harry Potter rewrite that I will get to any day now. Well, okay, I already sort of started it and — it’s not giving me psychical damage yet? So should I feel relatively confident?
I have two problems regarding Tommy, though. The first one is that I wrote basically everything but what happened to him during the first war. Like, I honestly don’t know. I’m planning on keeping the Potters alive for this rewrite so I can’t exactly have the dude kill himself on a toddler. So I was thinking about it and then I thought, what if he just died? What if someone just got a lucky shot at him? It’s not as if it needs to be some significant thing? And then I need to figure out what happened to his corpse, ha ha. *despairs*
Another problem is that I’m planning on making that Tom/Hagrid AU a part of this rewrite. Because as far as I’m concerned, it’s practically canon, Rowling just didn’t even think to go there. But the problem is that I think the snake was stupid, okay? Like, I can’t even begin to explain how stupid the basilisk plotline was. But if there’s no snake, there’s no Tom/Hagrid AU. So I’m wondering if I can make the whole basilisk thing better somehow? Maybe Tommy just bred it himself? If the dude had ingenious dark powers, he should’ve done a bit more with them than just splitting his soul and killing himself on a moronic brat repeatedly? Or maybe he found it in the forest since there’s everything in that forest?
Or maybe I should just forgo the basilisk altogether and have Tommy attack people using his own powers? Wait, no, but then how would he frame Hagrid? No wonder I can’t get a start on this thing. *sighs*
So I guess that writing progress was one step forward and two steps backwards after all, ha ha. Whatever, I’m tagging it anyway because of ✧˖°.positive thinking.°˖✧.
Also, I’ve been thinking about those Tom/Hagrid and Ron/Ginny fics. They basically have no readers, at least readers who would comment. *side-eyes the mysterious 2000 hits on my only mature Ron/Ginny fic*
The thing is, with fan fiction you can post it while it’s still a work in progress. People usually do this to get feedback and comments and to keep their motivation going. But with these two ships, it’s basically pointless. So I need to practise keeping my motivation going by my lonesome.
And I think this is even more important for original fiction I want to write since I — don’t really have any writer buddies or someone who would read my stuff for me. And I can’t exactly post my original stuff as a work in progress online in the hopes of feedback and comments. I mean, I guess I can since I’m pretty sure there are sites for that but. I don’t know. Seems weird. I don’t mind posting the short writing exercises, though.
Never mind that I don’t want a repeat of Incandescent Snow that’s still! sitting unfinished. But hey, if things keep going well, I might be able to finish that ghost too.
I’ve been meaning to do this rectification for a while now but I’ve been distracted with other things, such as reading Early English Meals and Manners. It’s half research and half sheer stubbornness because the format of that book is an absolute mess. But hey, at least I’m slowly getting used to the incomprehensible gibberish of Ye Olde English.
Anywhoo~ Here’s the important bit from Book Four:
‘You stand, Harry Potter, upon the remains of my late father,’ he hissed softly. ‘A Muggle and a fool … very like your dear mother. But they both had their uses, did they not? Your mother died to defend you as a child … and I killed my father, and see how useful he has proved himself, in death …’
‘You see that house upon the hillside, Potter? My father lived there. My mother, a witch who lived here in this village, fell in love with him. But he abandoned her when she told him what she was … he didn’t like magic, my father …
‘He left her and returned to his Muggle parents before I was even born, Potter, and she died giving birth to me, leaving me to be raised in a Muggle orphanage … but I vowed to find him … I revenged myself upon him, that fool who gave me his name … Tom Riddle …’
And here’s the thing: Peter is there. Peter is directly hearing this. Peter is directly hearing that Tommy is half-muggle, a mudblood.
To be fair to myself, at the time I was re-reading Book Four I was rather distracted with my distaste for the books and how stupid and pathetic Tommy is. But evidently, Tommy does, indeed, have a right-hand man. *snickers* It just wasn’t Bartemius Jr who was the only halfway competent death eater and fanatically loyal. Or Bellatrix who was… um… fanatically loyal and a total house-elf.
No, instead it was the loser, coward of a man who betrayed his own friends, ha ha.
Well, it’s been about a week again (where does all that time go to?) so I figured it’s time for another one of these. Not to mention that I kind of need to recharge myself from too many social interactions and the best way to do that is with something I like. ❤ And this is an interlude chapter so this shouldn’t be too long.
But first! I have news.
I’m trying out growing peas again and one of them has sprouted the tiniest beginning. Maybe this time it’ll go better.
I was also out walking with my sister’s dog and I got another picture of a baby viper and a frog. I have no idea what the frog is and internet search is very unhelpful — or maybe it’s not the search engines? Maybe I’m just bad at using them?
There’s the shadow of my phone, ha ha. My sister’s dog would’ve liked to greet it but she waited very patiently while the baby viper slithered away.
Oh, right. Some people don’t like snakes. Well, sorry about posting snake pictures for those who don’t like them?
My sister’s dog didn’t see the frog at all. She did notice a honey bee, though. Come to think of it, some people probably don’t like seeing frogs either. Um, sorry about that too?
Okay, then to the chapter!
Last time was my most disliked boss fight in this game, Pesta. She’s the personification of the plague and she was stalking Olle because she didn’t have a better use for her time. After defeating her, Olle finally arrived on the shore of the mountain which… apparently took him to the summit?
I’m just posting the pretty screenshots again because I can. ❤
Another pretty picture before things get heavy.
The place is still grey and the river is running blood, which is usually not a good sign.
Olle climbs up to the summit and the place is still overgrown with bramble.
As he reached the summit, Olle felt regret.Regret that he could not stop his sister from being taken.Regret that he could not stop the woman from drowning her child.Regret that he had killed the shapeshifter in the forest.Now the mountain stood before him, and he wished he could ask their forgiveness.
It’s not even his fault. I’m sorry, I need to cry for a while. Maybe I should re-think my comfort posts, ha ha.
With each regret, Olle untangled a bramble. After he banishes the big bramble in the doorway, he kind of summons the mountain to him and steps through the door.
I mean, at least he got to untangle his regrets? Though, I think it’ll take a while before this place regains its colours.
I often complain that no one reads my posts which is a bit of a pessimistic lie. I do have subscribers (inexplicably, ha ha) and I do get likes on my posts.
I also know that the purpose of blogs is to get mutuals and build a community, so to speak, of usually like-minded people. But I’m very much an introvert so I hardly ever venture outside of my blog unless I feel like reading about fandom drama that has absolutely nothing to do with me. I also get really fatigued from prolonged social interactions, especially with strangers. I get this vague anxiety in the middle of my chest that tells me, yes, you’ve had way too many social interactions so it’s time to hole up like a hermit crab again. (So why the blog people might ask, ha ha.)
And particularly on the internet, social interactions tend to feel claustrophobic which is kind of ironic since “global internet”. You can interact with people on the other side of the world. But that kind of doesn’t remove the claustrophobic feeling.
But the sad thing about likes is that they’re kind of one-sided, you know? So I figured, hey, I’ll just make a comprehensive thank you post for everyone who has subscribed and left a like even if they don’t see it. So thank you. ❤ I am happy for all of them even if I can’t or don’t interact back.
Sometimes I get comments too — more so in recent years, surprisingly — but whenever that happens my first reaction is always “What did I even write?” D: So that’s always a little precarious, ha ha. But I do thank everyone who has taken the time to comment too.
I wish there was a sort of thank you-like for the likes but I guess that would get too messy.
“It is strange, that in so old a world of the same continuing system always repeating the same lesson, any one should be ignorant that the dissolute vices are the destroyers of personal health, comfort, character, and permanent influence.”
I was thinking. Most stories about robots and AI seem to use them as allegories for slavery. To be truthful, I find this kind of silly because it’s like asking if your smart washing machine has rights.
Unless people actually believe that humans can create artificial life, basically elevating humans above nature or the level of gods. And I don’t know, that sounds a lot more interesting to unpack than wondering if a bunch of wire, circuits and metal can have feelings.
Or at the very least change it up and make it a story about the human disposition to anthropomorphise everything that isn’t human and the catastrophic consequences of that.
So I did mention I might share more of these little practice snippets. This time I managed to practise free writing Draco and Slytherin!Ron. I had way too much fun writing this so I figured I’d share, ha ha.
And like, let’s be real. If Rowling was even remotely serious as an author, one of those kids should’ve been sorted into a house (Slytherin) they didn’t want to be sorted into so they could start dismantling their prejudices and bring about actual unity.
This is basically a disconnected snippet without a real beginning or end because, as I said, I’m practising with free writing. But as a bit of background: Ron was sorted into Slytherin and all sorts of shenanigans ensue. Hopefully, all this practice will eventually help me write all of those long(er) fics. But before then, I’ll just share short stuff here.
∞
“I want to bully him!” Draco cried. “You don’t understand, Weasleys are made to be bullied, not — not slummed with!”
Morag gave him a level, considering stare. “You know, it’s really sweet how loyal you are to your housemates.”
Draco made a sputtering sound of pure outrage. “Take that back!” he demanded. “I’m a Malfoy! Malfoys aren’t sweet! We’re terrible and conniving and amoral!”
“Oh yes, you’re a terrible corrupt conniver,” Morag said but Draco thought she sounded unnecessarily dismissive.
He made sure to trip Weasley up the next day because he had a reputation to keep and besides Weasley’s feet were so large he might as well be tripping up on them anyway, the gangly git. Evidently, the rumours that the Weasleys didn’t have enough money to feed their litter of unfortunate accidents were a complete lie.
“Malfoy! Will you stop doing that!” Weasley raged at Draco in the common room later because clearly he had weasel rabies from that hovel he called a house.
“You are so right, Weasley, you should be more careful of your enormous feet,” Draco said agreeably, and used the leg-locker curse on him next time.
“MALFOY!” Weasley howled in the middle of the corridor, much to everyone’s alarm, and Draco cackled all the way to the Transfiguration classroom.
“You know, you’re losing Slytherin house points with your strange little feud,” Morag pointed out because she had a perverse need to kill Draco’s fun.
“Oh, hush. I’ll earn them back,” Draco said, and smirked when Weasley stomped into the classroom two minutes late, furiously red. For a kid who looked like an ugly Yule offspring with his red hair and green robes, he sure didn’t have a lot of cheer.
Professor McHarridan gave him a cold stare and took five points from him, and Weasley shot Draco a look full of hate. “I’m going to kill you, Malfoy,” he hissed under his breath as he threw himself into a seat like a lumbering bear.
“I’m shaking with terror,” Draco drawled. “How will I ever outwit the witless.”
fin (for now)
If it’s not obvious, I adore this dumb dork, ha ha. ❤
I also need to practise writing Slytherin!Ron from Ron’s point of view.
You know, I did say that I never want to build a story from disconnected snippets again but I guess even that is better than re-writing the beginning over and over until you can’t write it at all?
Hiraeth 