I think that if a dragon were to rot it would be like a whale fall. The event is so rare that is teems with opportunist scavengers and creates a boom in the ecosystem. The flesh is uniquely rich and saturated with raw magic that will imbue the next few generations of vultures with sharper talons and bile twice as acidic. That magical energy disperses through the food web to grant small gifts to billions of different creatures. Insects are the first to find the carcass and the last to pick its flesh. Then the plants and fungi take over when there are only bones. Apothecary shelves will be overflowing for months with unique flowers, fruits, and mushrooms. Some gardeners and brewers plant trees in the exposed ribcage.

Humans also play a role in this decay, naturally. Even quite rotten, dragon meat carries no diseases or parasites. There are delicacies made from the flesh at its most rotten state, though most prefer the fresher meat. The scales, bones, teeth, and claws are valuable to jewelers, armorers, and smiths of tools and weapons. If you're lucky, it'll be your local craftsmen who get their hands on them, and you might get a nice set of bone kitchen knives for a high but reasonable price. If you're unlucky, some company will step in to strip away all the valuables from this dead angel, and the 1% will enjoy some novelties they don't appreciate the significance of. They've never seen a dragon rot, or dug through its decaying flesh with thick gloves to stave off its acidic blood.

What remains of the bones will eventually be covered in earth and lush new life. It will become a garden, perhaps tended by the humans who remember it, or perhaps only by the birds and squirrels that scatter the seeds. Someday dragons might visit this place to rear their young on its bounty, and thank the dead for what they've given back.

Translucence

I genuinely want to fight the American linguist who decided centre needs to become 'center' and 'metre' to 'meter'

Bro, honestly! I thought centre was wrong cause I was corrected one too many times!

Newly Posted Poem! Snippet:

This is a slightly altered, old poem about that specific greed of creatives. This sentiment surfaces much rarer as of late, especially with the surge of attention I've been getting and am grateful for. And despite it, I still relate to this years old poem. I crave to hear even more from people who has or shall express enjoyment upon interacting with my work. Part of me feels guilty for it.

Glad to hear it! Thank you for reading!

Forbidden Skies Ch 3

Jenny didn’t know which was currently hotter, the oven or her temper. The midsummer sun made both nearly unbearable, but she could abide the one as a source of sweet treats and nourishing bread. The latter was intolerable, and had yet to lead to anything productive.

“The Namir-da is less than a week away!”

Her mother kept calming shaping Festival cakes, an avian holiday that was also less than a week away. The market square was adorned with banners for both holidays, each side of Wyvern’s Court trying to outdo the other – and possibly fill the square with so much décor that avian eyes would be shielded from serpiente displays. It was the most tense time of year, as the heat and cultural pressures put everyone on edge.

'do you dream of the rat king?'

Description: An illustration of the Rat King from THE NUTCRACKER. He is crouched down towards the top of the illustration with his tail hanging down. Cast in pale colors, except for his red eyes and bright crown, against a black background.

If you'd like some nonbinary monsters this week you can have them half off...because I felt like it.

Enjoy.

Newly Posted Poem! Snippet:

This is a slightly altered, old poem about that specific greed of creatives. This sentiment surfaces much rarer as of late, especially with the surge of attention I've been getting and am grateful for. And despite it, I still relate to this years old poem. I crave to hear even more from people who has or shall express enjoyment upon interacting with my work. Part of me feels guilty for it.

Glad to hear it! Thank you for reading!

Newly Posted Poem! Snippet:

This is a slightly altered, old poem about that specific greed of creatives. This sentiment surfaces much rarer as of late, especially with the surge of attention I've been getting and am grateful for. And despite it, I still relate to this years old poem. I crave to hear even more from people who has or shall express enjoyment upon interacting with my work. Part of me feels guilty for it.

happy neil banging out the tunes day!

To people who are desperately asking for fundz/donations on tumblr.

USE THESE REDDIT SUBS INSTEAD PLEASE FOR GOODNESS SAKE!!!!!!!!!

Hate Reddit if you want, but using these subs are your best chance. People gather in these subs because they have charity to spare:

/r/Assistance /r/legaladvice /r/RandomKindness /r/Charity /r/care /r/Random_Acts_Of_Pizza /r/Food_Pantry https://www.reddit.com/r/RandomActsOfPetFood/ https://www.reddit.com/r/RandomActsOfChristmas/ https://www.reddit.com/r/almosthomeless/ https://www.reddit.com/r/homeless

/r/freelance  /r/povertyfinance /r/thrifty /r/borrow /r/gofundme

/r/depression /r/familysupport /r/transitions 

I never see anyone actually getting any significant donations on tumblr and to be honest, tumblr is the worst place to ask for assistance. Use it as your last resort, it frustrates me to no end seeing people begging for help, reblogging the same post over and over, the same types of posts over and over, to no avail, when people are waiting to help you on a different part of the web  GO TO WHERE THE HELP IS. IF YOU WANT DIRECT ACTION TO WORK STOP WITH TUMBLR AND USE REDDIT.

PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF SATAN REBLOG THIS SO WE CAN START REDUCING THE AMOUNT OF DONATION POSTS THAT GET STUCK FLOATING AROUND THIS WEBSITE

Hot take: Actual literary analysis requires at least as much skill as writing itself, with less obvious measures of whether or not you’re shit at it, and nobody is allowed to do any more god damn litcrit until they learn what the terms “show, don’t tell” and “pacing” mean.

Pacing

The “pacing” of a piece of media comes down to one thing, and one thing only, and it has nothing to do with your personal level of interest. It comes down to this question alone: Is the piece of media making effective use of the time it has?

That’s it.

So, for example, things which are NOT a example of bad pacing include a piece of media that is:

Bad pacing IS when a piece of media has

Another note on pacing: There are, except arguably in standalone movies, at least two levels of pacing going on at any given time. There’s the pacing within the installment, and the pacing within the series. Generally, there’s three levels of pacing–within the installment (a chapter, an episode, a level), within the volume (a season, a novel, a game), and within the series as a whole. Sometimes, in fact FREQUENTLY, a piece of media will work on one of these levels but not on all of them. (Usually the ideal is that it works on all three, but that’s not always important! Not every individual chapter of a novel needs to be actively relevant to the entire overarching series.)

Honestly, the best possible masterclass in how to recognize good, bad, and “they tried their best but needed more space” pacing? If you want to learn this skill, and get better at recognizing it?

Doctor Who.

ESPECIALLY Classic Who, which has clearly-delineated “serials” within their seasons. You can pretty much pick any serial at random, and once you’ve seen a few of them, you get a REALLY good feel for things like, for example…

If you’re not actively trying to learn pacing, either for literary analysis or your own writing…honestly? Just learn to differentiate between whether the pacing is bad or if it just doesn’t appeal to you. There’s a WORLD of difference between “The pacing is too slow” and “the pacing is too slow for me.” 

“I really prefer a slower build into a universe; the fact that it opens in medias res and you piece together where you are and how the magic system works over the next several chapters from context is way too fast-paced for me and makes me feel lost, so I bounced off it” is, usually, a much more constructive commentary than “the pacing is bad”. 

And when the pacing really is bad, you’ll be doing everyone a favor by being able to actually articulate why.

Show, Don’t Tell

This is a very specific rule that has been taken dramatically out of context and is almost always used incorrectly.

“Show, don’t tell” applies to character traits and worldbuilding, not information in the plot.

It may be easier to “get” this rule if you forget the specific phrasing for a minute. This is a mnemonic device to avoid Informed Attributes, nothing more and nothing less. 

Character traits like a character being funny, smart, kind, annoying, badass, etc, should be established by their behavior in-universe and the reactions of others to them–if you just SAY they’re X thing but never show it, then you’re just telling the audience these things. Similarly you can’t just tell the audience that a setting has brutal winters and expect to be believed, when the clothing, architecture, preparations, etc shown as common in that setting do not match those that brutal winters would necessitate. 

To recap:

Violations of Show Don’t Tell:

NOT Violations of Show Don’t Tell:

Keep in mind that “Show, don’t tell” is meant to be advice for beginning authors. Because “telling” is easier and requires less skill than “showing,” inexperienced authors need to focus on getting as much “show” in as possible. 

However, “telling” is also extremely important. Sometimes, especially in written formats, the most appropriate way to deliver information to the audience is to just say it and move on.

Keep in mind that a viewpoint character in anything but…a portal fantasy, essentially…is going to be familiar with the world they’re in. Not every protagonist needs to be a raw newcomer with zero knowledge of their new world! In most cases, a viewpoint character is going to know things that the audience doesn’t. Generally, the ONLY natural way to introduce worldbuilding in this situation is to just have the narration point them out. (It makes sense for Obi-Wan to have to explain the Force; it would make no sense for Han to explain the concept of space travel to Luke, who grew up in this universe and knows what the hell a starship is. So, if you’re writing the novelization of A New Hope, you need to just say “and so they jumped into hyperspace, the strange blue-white plane that allowed faster-than-light travel” and move the hell on.)

For that matter, in some media (ie, children’s cartoons) where teaching a moral lesson is the clear intent, a certain level of “telling” is not only appropriate but necessary!

The actual goal of “showing” and “telling” is to maintain a balance, and make sure everything feels natural. Show things that need to be shown, and…don’t waste everyone’s time showing things that would feel much more natural if they were just told.

But that’s not nearly as pithy a slogan.

(Reblog this version y’all I fixed some really serious typos)

Quick addition: When you Show, you Slow.

Taking the time to Show something rather than simply Telling it slows the moment down–and that can be a good thing! When you want a moment to have real emotional impact, when you want the audience to linger and really connect with the scene, use Show to slow them down and really make them live in it. Use descriptive language, engage the senses, and make your audience spend some time with it.

This is Not always desirable. If you’re heavily Showing in moments that aren’t truly important, your audience will disengage and get impatient and then bored. I always err on the side of over showing in a first draft, over trimming to lots of telling in a second draft, then marrying them together in a third once I’ve gotten a better understanding of the pacing with the second Telling draft.

Our Disney Prince <3

Lingers

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