Category: Uncategorized

secularbakedgoods:

I know I’ve talked about this before, but I’m really sick of seeing writers who should know better say things like, “Tragedy is more compelling than stories where characters have a nice day and nothing bad happens!” without understanding why.

Tragedy is an effective story element when it’s a deviation from the norm. A character’s peaceful existence is disrupted by a catastrophic event that throws everything into chaos. The character now has to either develop so they can cope with the new status quo, or find a way to put things back the way they were. There’s a good story in that.

But when a character’s life is an unrelenting cavalcade of misery, another heaping dose of shit isn’t all that interesting. At that point, a compelling deviation from the norm would be said character having a nice day where nothing bad happens. And modern fiction is chock-full of misery porn, so by this logic, it’s no wonder the coffee shop AU is such a popular fanfiction trope.

Derek Hale getting a dog and putting his life back together is way more interesting than Derek Hale’s life getting worse for the 26th consecutive episode.

Creators like to hold up “everything is fine and nobody dies” as a sign that fanfic is bland and badly written, but if anything, it’s an indicator that mainstream fiction is bland and badly written. 

thefingerfuckingfemalefury:

bossubossupromode:

thefingerfuckingfemalefury:

She tries to take back her families business only to find that it’s been taken over by a cult of Evil Cowboys

are you kidding i’d watch the fuck out of this

Her love interest is an Actual Cowboy from the Old West who was the greatest gunslinger of their age and who won countless duels, but they still aren’t as good at it as she is because of Reasons

Y’all forgot the giant mystical glowing Longhorn tattoo, but aside from that, perfect.

I said I’m sorry! And I’m working on that fluffy Findis and Heledir Write Voltron fic as we speak.

Hey out of the forty or more silm fics that I have written, only a quarter of those hinge on a major character death at the end or beginning. I think. IDK my math. Hey, this is the Silmarillion fandom

💬 !!!

Bân was cold. Naked and shivering. There was no wind in the dungeon, no snow, but he was as cold as he had been back in the ice desert of the Helecaraxë. Last time he had found ways to distract himself from the freezing darkness, games and challenges and small foxes. Only memories were left to distract him now, and the dead and dying friends around him. He wanted to see the sky. Somehow, he knew if he could look up at the sky, even if it was dark, even if it was raining, he could see her.

The Doom had promised torment and grief would slay them, not sickness, and yet Fân moaned feverish and non-responsive beside him. Words haunted Bân, promises made that he would protect his friend. That they would survive this torment. The too familiar click of nails on stone. Hide behind me, Bân almost whispered to Fân, but knew it was pointless. His friend could not understand any of his words, and the chains restricted their movement. Still, to do nothing, to wait to be butchered – Bân screamed. The clicking nails paused. Twisting his shoulders, Bân angled his body to place himself between Fân and the werewolf. His bare feet scrambled against the stone. He screamed at the wolf, pain and rage, then shouted the phrase he remembered when working in Nargothrond’s kitchens. “Come get your food!” Too bad Captain Heledir was no longer here to groan at his poor attempts at humor. Fân made no sign that he noticed Bân’s attempts to shield him, just as he had not flinched at the screams or shown that he understood any of Bân’s words. Bân sighed in relief when those yellow glowing eyes focused on him.

Behind him, Fân’s hand lifted. A feeble, unseen gesture, reaching for a friend he could not touch.

💬

excerpts from the ending scene of Iron-grip and Rage Bunny Hold Fast Ere Night Comes:

Angrod’s body doubles over the hilt of his sword, the point jammed firmly between the stones of the floor while his remaining hand slips with sweat on the bound leather of the hilt.  The torrent from the gash at his hip has slowed to a sluggish pace.  He can’t feel his left leg.  Angrod needs every reservoir of strength to not collapse to the floor.  There is little left of him now.

Aegnor holds the doorway, steel sword flashing ribbons of dark blood.  Bregolas died in the final retreat to the fortress heart, throat torn out by an orc’s claws.  Few are alive, except the ever-coming orcs.

“I think it time,” Aegnor hisses, liquid both bright and dark dripping from his limbs like had he stood in a rainstorm.  The beauty of the elves, we gore-covered fiends.  Our family would recoil in horror to behold us.

Angrod breathes in one last time, the acrid stench of Morgoth’s flames and Morgoth’s creations burning down his throat and lungs.  There is a song, short and powerful, to crumble the white walls of the fortress of Barathonion, one grafted onto every stone as they were laid.  All its warriors knew of its purpose, to deny the enemy a stronghold if the central northern heights were taken.  Angrod alone holds the key.  His strong hands placed each block, his voice -not as gifted as his brother or sister- had crooned power to each stone, inciting them to stand firm.  Or now, to fall.

It is a sweet lullaby, Angrod’s song, the melody he would hum as he cradled Aegnor as his brother wept from the bitterness of unattainable love.

A gift, Angrod thinks, to dead Bregolas, to all the generations of Edain he had befriended.  A gift to save your people, using the wisdom you have taught me.

We love you.

Aegnor laughs as the blackened walls of Barathonion collapse inward and out, crushing the hordes of orc and smothering the flames of the Dagor Bragollach.

💬

Beren carried dead men’s names, the names of comrades that had left him behind. Not by choice, but what difference in the end? He alone had been there to pick up those burdens. He lived then, even though he had not desired to. He should have joined them, the names he carried in a solo dirge. The memories had driven him to his knees some days, made him curl in abandoned fox dens and weep, willed the coldness to seep into his bones and stop his thoughts, that he was singing what should have been a choir. Other days the rage and sorrow gave him the determination to climb after the enemy. His had been the only voice that remained to speak those names, to sing their deeds against the great foe and preserve their glory, to recall their joys and sorrows, and to carry on their defiance against the enemy with all his monsters and orcs. In battle Beren had called their names. In the silence of a dying forest he had whispered them. For two years Beren had carried the weight of twelve dead men: of doughty Dagnir and Ragnor, Radhruin, Dairuin and Gildor, Gorlim and Urthel, Arthad and Hathaldir, his cousins Belegund and Baragund, and his father Barahir. Kin and comrades, and all had died, leaving but Beren to survive.

Another twelve now, and this time, waiting for the last wolf to come, Beren knew he would not linger on alone. Pulling back the hand covered in Finrod’s blood, Beren waited and began to compose his song. A new list of names, ones just as dear, and like before only Beren left behind to recall their names. Of doughty Arodreth and Ethirdor, Aglar, Consael and Heledir, Tacholdir and Bân, Gadwar and Fân, Edrahil, and his king Felagund.