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[Wrinkle Content Note: Fascism, Hypnotism, Captivity]
Wrinkle Recap: Alex Murry leads his children (and Calvin) to see IT.
A Wrinkle in Time, Chapter 9: IT
When we last left off, Alex Murry was helping "Charles Wallace" (whose brain is currently occupied and being controlled by IT) lead Meg and Calvin to IT whilst negging on about how Meg isn't prepared to meet with IT. Murry doesn't give her any pointers to resist because he's saving those for later when it will be mostly too late.
On the one hand, as an author I understand this. It's more scary for the reader when they don't know what is going on and are just thrust into a situation without introduction. On the other hand, this tactic can come across as forced and heavy-handed when it's not carefully justified--and moreso here, when it's been the entire book so far. The angels didn't stop to explain anything to Meg et. al. because after years and years of leaving Murry in captivity, apparently it was so urgent to get him right now that there was no time to explain anything or give directions which weren't uselessly cryptic.
Now we're continuing in that vein and it makes me want to pull my hair out: Alex Murry could tell his daughter what they're about to face and how he's been able to resist it for so long, but instead he's chatting with IT-in-Charles about how Meg totally isn't prepared, she won't be able to resist, et cetera ominous scary wooo. This is contrived to keep Meg and the reader in the dark for the Big Reveal, but it looks contrived, like a stage magician shouting "LOOK OVER THERE A PUPPY" because he can't think of a more natural way to distract the audience for his trick.
Shut Up!
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Welcome to August! I wasn't sure I'd make it but here I am!
July was an amazing rush for me and flew by. Some of that was bad (my hand still isn't at full mobility since the surgery, and my fallopian tube surgical scars still haven't healed up and keep weeping) and some of it was good (I wrote a whole book from scratch!).
Which, uh, did I mention I wrote a whole book from scratch? It's nonfiction and available for download now, but it'll be going up here in pieces so folks can comment and ask questions. Interactive!
♡ ♡ ♡
So let's talk about rewards this month!
LET'S TALK PATREON REWARDS.
$2+ The Lost Last Princess of Ravelin. This is a three-part story which will be going up over August, September, and (I hope!) October. I really like this one and I hope you will too. It started with an idea from a D&D campaign about a disabled wizard (Mythica fans will recognize the inspiration) and plays with myths, legends, and being propelled into the limelight by others.
$5+ Transcending Flesh, another essay for discussion and questions!
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And now let's talk projects.
TRANS PROPHECY PROJECT: Don't forget this is out as No Man of Woman Born and available to buy or download! I also have an Etsy store for people who want to buy extra signed copies!
EARTHSIDE #3 PARANORMAL ROMANCE: This is coming along! Slower than I'd like, but definite progress is being made.
FIRE MAGE FANTASY: Still in work, though I didn't get as much done on this as I wanted this month. I have high hopes for August!
HARKEN THE ACCIDENTAL HERO: I haven't forgotten Harken! My hope is to get more of his story out before the year is up.
TRANSCENDING FLESH: Remember that new book I mentioned? You can get it here! For free, or on a pay-what-you-want model at GumRoad! Some of you have already seen the first three essays up here, but I rushed to turn out the other 12 (for a total of 15) because I had someone else's deadline to meet in order to help them with a thing. Let me tell you that writing an entire book in a week was intense and I will never do that again! But it was rewarding and I'm very happy that this book exists now. I hope you enjoy!
Before I sign off, I just want to say THANK YOU. Every single one of you contributing to this blog and/or Patreon is helping me so much, and I can't thank you all enough. Thank you for comments, thank you for support, thank you for the reviews out there on book sites, thank you for everything. My brain weasels were pretty jerky this month, but knowing I had y'all at my back was amazingly good. Thank you. ♥
Shut Up!
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Note: This was previously published on my Patreon.
I knew when I decided to rewrite fairy tales from Andrew Lang's "color fairy books" what I was getting into. How did I put in in my first post? Oh, right: He 'collected' fairy tales the way Doctor Frankenstein collected body parts: stealing them in the dead of night and sewing them together in grotesque defiance of natural order. The 'fairy tales' in the color fairy tale books contain pieces of tales you've heard before in more sensible stories, now recombined in absolutely batshit ways. There's no way I'm going to be able to do a read-along-with-me deconstruction of these stories, so we'll have to settle for summaries in each case.
Today's story is "Prince Hyacinth and the Dear Little Princess", and it's really two incomplete stories smushed together in the hopes that you'll be fooled into thinking you read a full one. In the first half-story, a king is deeply in love with a princess but she can't marry anyone Because Reasons. The actual reason is "because she was under an enchantment". What kind of an enchantment? No details are given! We're just supposed to go along, come now, mustn't dwell on little details! The king seeks out a fairy for advice (he just happens to be friends with a fairy, and no, you don't get to know more about that either) and she tells him that the only way to break the enchantment is to step on the tail of the princess' cat. The king is all 'consider it done' and goes home to dig out his best stomping boots.
Shut Up!
