it is written:

It's objectively hilarious that Terciel felt ill-prepared to be Abhorsen. He spent like a decade apprenticing and never had been past the 6th gate? Bruh Lirael found out she was Abhorsen-in-waiting about 15 mins before she had to walk into the 9th precinct and then go defeat Orannis. Baptisms by fire for both his daughters rip

it didn't help that terciel was apprenticed to a very old and bitter abhorsen who'd seen abhorsens-in-waiting die before him. i love tizanael but she probably said things like "my first abhorsen-in-waiting died trying that spell, you're practicing it for another 2 years". it probably did a number on his self esteem and sense of time.

It’s never addressed in-book as far as I can recall (and, in fact, I don’t think it would even get past a publisher nowadays, certainly not in YA) but something I was always curious about with Lirael was how much of Lirael’s suicidal ideation was despair and how much of it was an untrained and unknown Abhorsen feeling what was, in hindsight, a completely predictable call of the void from the perspective of someone who, on some instinctive level, knows that she can just go for a jaunt in death and come back, and whether this is a thing the family. It’d be an interesting twist on ‘btw we have these heritable habit of intrusive thoughts of death, here’s how to cope with that in a way that doesn’t cause your own permanent demise (and also without becoming the kind of necromancer the family has to hunt down).’ They can’t all get befriended by an eldritch horror/ancient god who has decided to hang out in the shape of a friendly dog who will bite you if you start feeling too sorry for yourself, after all.

(I am going to need to reread Clariel, aren’t I? I didn’t love it the first time.)

I never thought about that, but you make a good point. I also think there's an extremely intense element of fish-out-of-water which is amplified by the call of the void (which "normal" Clayr don't experience, as far as Lirael knows) and which feeds the despair. Lirael doesn't seem to have been bothered by her unusual looks as a child - she was doing all right, socially, until she hit her tweens/teens and was suddenly no longer on the regular Clayr path, at which point she was socially separated from her peers and began to have intense night terrors. (Maybe fed by the call of the void?)

I don't think it would have been nearly so bad if she had had available family or peers. Kirrith has a lot to answer for, but so do the others who are responsible for raising Clayr children, even if they were unable to overrule Kirrith's choices about raising her niece.

I also don't think it would have been nearly so bad if a lot of knowledge hadn't been lost during the Interregnum - and a lot of people. The Abhorsens have been whittled down to one immediate family holding on by their fingernails and the Clayr appear to have been operating under a state of siege. When Lirael was born, that wouldn't really have lifted yet, and Sabriel was one very young Abhorsen, her time in such extreme demand I doubt she ever slept. If there had been enough Abhorsen relatives around for a few to be going spare and hanging out in the Library, or enough safety for Clayr kids to (say) visit Belisaere or High Bridge, someone might well have noticed that Lirael was, let's say, competing in another category. As it was, she went overlooked by everyone but the Librarians, and was so exceptionally discreet about her abilities - because of the intense messaging about conformity that she got not just from her society but her only living relative, who was responsible for her upbringing - that not even the Librarians knew half of what she was capable of.

I wasn’t expecting T&E to make me angry on Lirael’s behalf, but by god I really was when it was mentioned that the Clayr had seen that Terciel would have children(! plural! And very specifically by different mothers!) among them. They had every reason to expect Lirael and expect her to be exactly as she was, and Sabriel clearly went ‘I don’t have time to have more than an heir and and heir, I’m two and done,’ in a family that often doesn’t follow a direct parent-child inheritance scheme because they tend to die prematurely in their very dangerous job, and as such tends to throw up heirs in the distant branches. They should have been looking out for her in both senses of the term, and they didn’t.

And, look, Lirael on a close read isn’t so much suicidal as intensely fascinated by death. She clearly doesn’t want to die herself, she just…can’t stop thinking about it. It’s a death sense without anyone telling her that’s what it is.

This one's also kind of on Arielle, her advanced sense of destiny, and the really strange choices it led her to make. I think that (if the vision was even common knowledge) everyone must have assumed when Terciel died without a known second child that Sabriel was it, and the vision must have been incorrect. He died a few weeks after he slept with Arielle, and Arielle had fully gone AWOL - she didn't come back to the Glacier until she was almost ready to give birth, if I'm remembering correctly. She had been gone a long time and she told no-one where she'd been or who she'd slept with. She also told no-one anything when she left for the second time, when Lirael was a child. Per Goldenhand, she had an excellent reason for leaving, which ended up being very important. But the choice which only makes sense in light of her apparent sense of herself as a fulcrum on which history turns is her choice not to tell anyone who Lirael was. She was the only one with all the pieces of the puzzle - the only one who knew the vision actually had been fulfilled.

The only way I can make this make sense is that Arielle felt it was necessary that Lirael get from A (the Halls of Youth) to B (the absolute most dangerous depths of the Library, where she found Lirael's Path and the Remembrancer's tools), and that that wouldn’t happen if Lirael grew up knowing her identity. It makes some sense: if Lirael had been more secure, she wouldn’t have made the choices that led her to the Dog, to the Skin of a Lyon, and ultimately to Lirael's Path. She might also have been in danger from Hedge and the like if her identity had been known. And Arielle seems not to have thought much of herself as a mother; she thought that Lirael would be safe with her family, as Arielle herself had been. But still. It was a choice that let Lirael in for a tremendous amount of pain, and it doesn't erase the catastrophic failure committed by the Clayr as a body. Lirael was brought up at a table where everyone else got to feast and all she got was crumbs.

Mirelle absolutely would have kicked her own ass from here to kingdom come for not noticing Lirael in the right way. And possibly also kicked the asses of everyone who did know about that vision (which, I think, included Lirael’s great-something grandmother? Who might be forgiven on account of her very, very great age and also for being the one and only person who Lirael felt openly and uncomplicatedly loved by, however briefly). It’s what Elinor would have wanted — she has very strong opinions on how damaging the lack of familial love is, and she’s a very loving character herself. I’m a little disappointed that the book didn’t go far enough in exploring how she felt about her (presumably planned and wanted, because she explicitly learns about contraception) own baby — did she hope that her vision had been wrong, or that she might have more than one baby and that it would only be the youngest who she’d die having? Did she tell Terciel? Did Terciel (or Mirelle) tell her that he’d been seen to have a child with another Clayr? Did she rationalise it as loaning him out, because the Clayr have a philosophy of not being overly possessive about nuclear family units? What? Happened? Either way, I can’t see her as characterised having anything but sympathy and righteous anger on Lirael’s behalf, and even on Sabriel and Sabriel’s children’s behalf for not knowing about the existence of their baby sister/same-age aunt.

Arielle is such a strange character, and although I vaguely recall her being redeemed to some degree in Goldenhand, I simply don’t like her. She’s the sort of archetypal Clayr, completely emotionally removed from the human consequences of the chess pieces she’s envisioning moving around. Maybe that made it easier for Terciel to accept her reasoning, because he himself grew into a dutiful archetype, and maybe he thought she had the whole thing in hand — but it’s so cold.

(Poor Lirael, little duty baby that she was.)

I do think Arielle genuinely thought Lirael would have a loving and happy upbringing among the Clayr! I think she didn't understand the effect Lirael's different talents would have on her, or how the Clayr en masse would cope with her - or how badly Kirrith would fail her. Lirael seems to have been a happy little girl for a long time, so I don't think Arielle was entirely wrong. The wheels fell off when a) it became clear how different Lirael was and b) Lirael didn’t have the cushioning a loving and supportive immediate family would have provided. If Filris had known about her before, that would probably have helped, but Filris was effectively suffering from magical dementia and almost completely unmoored from the present day. The consequences were disastrous for Lirael as a teenager, but I don’t think Arielle necessarily knew that when she acted as she did.

I agree with you about Elinor, and no, I have no idea what happened there either.

What strikes me in T&E is the number of Clayr runaways we meet. Which is, okay, two, but that seems like a lot. The Clayr are better located than most in terms of surviving the Interregnum — there’s a lot of them, their family duties mostly don’t take them into direct danger, their city is fortified. There’s always going to be some unhappy people in any given situation, but I suspect the Clayr are not great with dealing with nonconformity. Lirael has a happy childhood, up until she realises and then makes it obvious to everyone else that she can’t be neatly slotted into the family business.

Although Kirrith does make things worse by being obvious that she’s a reluctant guardian. Come to think of it, Arielle’s behaviour must come across as very strange to the Clayr, who do everything deliberately, in terms of (presumably and in fact) deliberately having a baby and then deliberately abandoning her.

I think the most likely explanation is imbalance. Most of the Clayr have some visions, and most of the visions they have are shared. They live in each other’s pockets, literally, physically and mentally. They share babydaddies. It’s all a bit claustrophobic. So I think that those those who veer strongly to either side of the ‘very little sight’ or ‘too much sight’ end of the spectrum are always a bit out of step and maybe find that hard enough that they leave.

Oh, I 100% agree with you there. It's an extremely conformist society, right down to the clothes most people wear. Although I do think there were probably also a fair few who just wanted to live somewhere else - not necessarily permanently, either. I kind of wonder if part of the reason Elinor's grandmother was shut up was that she attempted to return to the Kingdom, ominous thought though that is.

I’m fascinated by why Elinor’s mother was taken from her mother. Was it that the whole vision thing was assumed to be mental instability? A disagreement with the father? Some malicious combination of the two? As you say, wanting to return to the Old Kingdom — a custody dispute? So many juicy options.

Yes! This is so intriguing to me. Perhaps the father thought the visions were romantic in the mother, but in his supposedly Ancelstierran daughter who hadn't yet learned to live with them they were embarrassing or inappropriate, and he felt the need to eradicate the Old Kingdom influence? If the marriage broke down when Elinor's mother was in her early teens and experiencing her first visions it would make a lot of sense timeline-wise. Since Elinor would clearly have Awakened if she were on the right side of the Wall, Elinor's grandmother might have realised her own daughter couldn't if not taken to the Kingdom, and her husband might have objected and had her put away.

I've been absolutely LIVING for the Old Kingdom discourse running across my dash today. I did have a thought, and please someone correct me if I'm misremembering, I haven't picked up my copy of Lirael for a while now. But isn't Mirelle also the Clayr that literally mindwipes Lirael when she's up on the paperwing flight, after seeing Sabriel and Touchstone? Or at least is the one to bring it up, and then Sanar or Ryelle actually does it. I can't recall if that ever gets addressed, but the combination 'the adults have finally noticed one of the problems, so lets give her a job' and also 'this preteen overheard state secrets after contempalting suicide, let's mess with her memories', strikes me as very.... cold.

On one hand I get the operational security they're trying to maintain. But most of me is just absolutely furious that they did that to her, and from what I recall no one ever apologizes or owns up to it. Does she ever get those memories back? Or does she have to live with tampered memories of the day she almost jumped into the Rift. One more incident, to top off the entire Glacier full of incidents, where Lirael was not treated well by the people who were supposed to have care of her I suppose.

Anyway, I could be entirely wrong, and this does get addressed at some point, but I genuinely can't remember 😅

Finally posting my art nouveau style take on the Voices of the Nine Day Watch, the Clayr twins Sanar and Ryelle.  Photoshop kept having a hissy and not letting me save them in the format I wanted (why does it do this sometimes?) and I had to be sneaky in my saving method.  Next up, I think I might start on the boys…

Sanar and Ryelle from the Old Kingdom series. 

I’ve always absolutely loved the visual idea of the Clayr, dark skin, platinum hair and bright eyes, so this piece was long over due.

Couldnt quickly find any descriptions of Sanar and Ryelle other than their basic Clayr-ness so I just had fun with their hair, I thought the curly would be a bit different. 

The charter marks in the background were something I just sketched up at the last minute but I liked the effect. 

Sanar and Ryelle the Clayr twins. ‘The Sight’ © Laura Tolton 2017

Inspired by the Old Kingdom series by Garth Nix.

Okay but hear me out

Logan sees the way Wade looks at Vanessa and immediately starts trying to help Wade get back together with her. Cute and sweet bro stuff, right?

But, consider: Vanessa seeing the way Wade looks at Logan and immediately trying to help Wade hook up with him.

Both of these coexisting at the exact same time, so Wade is being wing(wo)manned by the two people he’s being encouraged to flirt with.

It’s so weird talking to people who’s view of “here’s the way life is for everyone” is shattered as soon as they talk to someone with disabilities (physical, mental illness, any). Like you’ll say you’ll have a problem and instead of helping you they’ll argue with you about how you’re not actually facing that problem. Like,

Me: Hey, I’m really struggling to find a job and a part of it is my resume. I was depressed & psychotic during highschool so I didn’t do anything to gain skills or achievements to put on my resume. I also don’t have anyone to put as a reference. What can I do?

Them: You can add your skills, hobbies, clubs you’re in, and different volunteer work you’ve done! You can also get your teacher as a reference.

Me: I already know what to put on a resume, my issue is that I don’t have things that I can use. Also, I’m in my mid 20s so I don’t know if I can put my highschool teacher as a reference.

Them: Well if you’re a part of a church or an activity group, you could add that. Also, think of any projects you’ve worked on in the past.

Me: I already know you can put these things on a resume. I’m not looking for suggests of things I’ve already done, I’m looking for what I can do now if I haven’t done anything.

Them: There’s no way you didn’t do anything during highschool?? What about some odd jobs you definitely did for extra money, like babysitting or mowing the lawn?

Me: I spent all of highschool either in modified classes or in bed doing nothing - not even hobbies, what about that do you not understand?

And then you talk to someone who’s also disabled and they’re like “Here’s a bunch of jobs you can do from home that don’t pay much but look good on a resume, here’s some free online courses that also look good on a resume, here’s how you can be making small amounts of money in the meantime, here’s some things you can put besides a professional reference, and here are your rights if your future employer tries to take advantage of your disability - which you probably shouldn’t tell them about unless you need accommodations.”

And suddenly my will to continue trying returns!

c…can we maybe get some of those ideas in full? Pls?

Two other people asked as well so okay! Though this post will be rather long.

Freelance Jobs You Do From Home That Look Cool On A Future Resume

Please research any company before sign up with then. So many companies are scams and pay you way less than you deserve for your work. Go to r/freelancers and search to make sure nobody has had some horrid experiences. There’s also usually reviews of a company on YouTube as well.

Small Amounts Of Money

If You Don’t Have Anyone To Put On Your Resume As References

Once you have some, this is how you would format your references.

None of these are long term solutions and not everything will work out for everybody. These are just helpful suggestions I’ve received over the years!

Thinking fondly about the entire genre of victorian hauntings that were "everybody who stayed in the house after dark saw weird shit going on for months until the entire structure suddenly combusted of its own ghostly accord" which abruptly ended as soon as we stopped lighting our homes with vast quantities of odorless gas

if I recall right, we also stopped putting opium and cocaine in everything

hey! so basically: my mother accidentally hit someone’s car and broke their tail light and our right mirror. i know this is on her but we are currently homeless and poor and we literally cannot afford this. our car is the only home we have right now. my mom’s car insurance doesn’t cover this so we really really need help. i don’t know how much anything is going to cost but i want to try to raise $300 right now. i’m so sorry but i have no idea what else to do. any amount helps and reblogging would mean a lot to me. thank you so much for reading.

p*ypal v*nmo c*shapp 

50 / 300 (thank you so much!!)

Picture this, you're stressed out because Covid and climate change finds you out of a job and now you can't pay for dental work so as you listen to the hold music to the dental clinic to cancel your wisdom teeth surgery you log into tumblr to calm your nerves only to be greeted by a Destiel meme informing you that the word flashing is banned and you realise fellow tumblr users can't use a warning for post that could trigger your epilepsy. Imagine this, you're now afraid and there's nothing you can do, no tag to filter out, no warning to safe you.

the phrase ‘pulsing lights’ has been suggested as a workaround.  I know I will be using it. Your safety is important to me.

!!!!! I don't care if you've already rebloged this, reblog again and get the phrase 'pulsing lights' on blast to save an epileptic's life. This is a serious matter and should be brought to staff and apples attention !!!!!

as much as the concept of Jesus being a fairly normal lad has its charms, im personally very intrigued by the idea of him being just… extremely weird. not even in a mystical sense, just…….staggeringly BIZZARRE. 

you go to the well to get some water, and here’s Miriam’s boy, staring at the sky, completely still. his expression is unreadable. you hazard a hello and ask how he’s doing, and he slowly, unblinkingly, lowers his gaze on you (he’s 8 and is missing his frontal teeth, not that this is making you any less uncomfortable) and says “I cannot speak of the state of my being, Nathan son of Saul, my brother, but rejoice for the water you shall take today will be as pure as the soul of the children of Heaven”

…you start sweating

normal person in 1st century Nazareth: making my way downtown, walking fast

*sees J boy, 8 yo, staring at you from across the street*

normal person: walking faster 

even funnier, the only person 100% on board with his Prophetic Kid Talk is his mother Miriam, an otherwise placid, absolutely normal woman around 25 or so

kid JC, coming home at twilight, a single white dove following him and chirping with weirdly human-like precision:

 moth̫́er,̦͌ ̮̉i h͙̉av͔̽e ͓͗b̘̃r̞̓o̮͘u̲̒gh̟͒t̺́ you a do̗͐ṽ͙e̢͘ ͈̾m͒͢a͈̽dē̝ ỏ̘f ͈̓c̆͜l͔̂aỷ͇ aṋ̑d̳̿ g͢͞i̹̾fted̖͡ ̻͐it ͓͂w̖̿it̎͜h t̥̃h͙͒e ̨̒m̧̂i̡̍ŗ͒â̫cḷ̔è̤ ̛̻of̞̅ l̘̈i̛̦fè̳

Miriam: ! that’s my little boy :) now let’s go get ready for dinner :) 

her husband Yosef, a carpenter who only marginally got signed up for this: 

This post is so Christian, but it’s the spicy kind of Christian that gets you murdered by other Christians for heresy, so I’m torn.

literally biggest form of compliment i’ve ever gotten

that means the angels are babysitters then

here have more

You guys really need to read Christopher Moore’s Lamb, if you haven’t.

Always reblog Cryptid Jesus

I made more. cause it’s fun

I love that you guys used their actual names

I did not consider Eldritch Baby Jesus.

God I know you have a sense of humor because otherwise there’s no explanation for the platypus and I hope it extends to comics about baby cryptid Jesus

so im trying to decipher this chart on wikipedia that has common vampire weaknesses in it and

a ‘green/yes’ is a weakness, a ‘red/no’ is something that isnt a weakness, and a ‘?’ is something that has never been addressed but fucking riddle me this

in what lore are vampires weak to getting soggy in milk

i scrolled over to check to see what this could possibly be and

places a hand on me cheek

happy halloween month time for my favourite post of all time

saw a post a while back about Sophie making increasingly gaudy hats for Howl for every birthday and him absolutely loving them