Cloak and Candle

I'm too nice to play Skyrim.

2011-11-22T13:52:00.001-08:00

For a while I had heard about Skyrim coming out, eventually it did and I was happy. I had played Morrowind, I had played Oblivion and so I was content to download this and play to my heart's content. I forgot however the horrible sickness I got with the other two games. I remember in Morrowind, the game used to scare me shitless, maybe it was the fact that, it's a first person perspective, I don't know but I hated it, my god how I hated that game, I'd quickly rush through dungeons using tcl, I didn't even play the end boss properly. Somehow I had forgotten about that and all I had in my memories were rosy happy times, reading books in Vivec's library. Then out came Oblivion, boy I was happy! I thought yay, another game. I enjoyed it... until the Oblivion gates opened up. How I HATED them, I wouldn't go through them unless it was plot related and even when I had to oh how I hated it. I'd tcl them too, just to get to the end.

So I realised... I hate this franchise, I hate it so much. I hate doing dungeons, I hate the darkness of it, I hate the monsters, I hate the first person view.

Of course I forgot about that with Skyrim, I even remember thinking "oh these dungeons are ace, why did I hate them before" of course now I remember -_-, I remember like a fox. I hate the Daedra, I hate how evil they are, I hate how when i'm playing the dark brotherhood, I actually feel the guilt of an assassin. I hate how death was treated. I hate the undead, oh how I hate them, they scare me, i'm petrified. I hate doing bad things, I hate the darkness of it. There's a daedra that's a ruler of rape... enough said. But I still forced myself through the whole of the dark brotherhood quests, I forced myself to do the Daedra quests... at one point you met a cannaibal and she invites you to trick someone to her lair and eat them. She insinuates that as a child, I may have eaten a sibling out of fear of starvation. At that point I think I had reached my limit.

I give kudos to Bethesda, your world is too real for me and that world scares me. I don't know if i'll go back. I think I need some nice nancy drew games to ease my nerves. I feel i've let my gender down in hating skyrim and being such a wimp but i'm sorry, i'm just too soft and too good hearted.

Little Red

2011-10-25T14:58:00.000-07:00

From this short story easy we discern

What conduct all young people ought to learn.
But above all, young, growing misses fair,
Whose orient rosy blooms begin t'appear:
Who, beauties in the fragrant spring of age,
With pretty airs young hearts are apt t'engage.
Ill do they listen to all sorts of tongues,
Since some inchant and lure like Syrens' songs
No wonder therefore 'tis, if over-power'd,
So many of them has the Wolf devour'd.
The Wolf, I say, for Wolves too sure there are
Of every sort, and every character.
Some of them mild and gentle-humour'd be,
Of noise and gall, and rancour wholly free;
Who tame, familiar, full of complaisance
Ogle and leer, languish, cajole and glance;
With luring tongues, and language wond'rous sweet,
Follow young ladies as they walk the street,
Ev'n to their very houses, nay, bedside,
And, artful, tho' their true designs they hide;
Yet ah! these simpering Wolves!
Who does not see
Most dangerous of Wolves indeed they be?

~Source

Review: The Dwelling Place

2011-09-11T15:54:00.000-07:00

It had happened one day at university. I finally managed to get the tv working. Only one channel worked, and on this channel was a film "The Dwelling Place" me and my flatemate both love costume dramas so we were happy to watch. We only caught the end. A young girl standing on the moors, suddenly a weedy blonde young man arrives, he askes her if another man truly had claim on her, she smiles, in a way that I had never seen, it's a refreshing smile and says that that other man loved the mill more than her. The man asks for her hand in marriage and she agrees. I'm set here, for one: the girls smile and secondly the young man, the hero, doesn't look like an ordinary hero, he's weedy, he looks like a kind guy. The kind of heroes I like lol.

Therefore I decided to get the book. Or rather my mother bought it for me because I had no money.

It turned out to be a Catherine Cookson. When I told my mother this she burst out laughing and I was a little petrubed, she told me all the plots were the same, a poor girl managing to come out on top with lots of money. I however stood by it and she got me a copy.

At first I was rather bored, a typical set up, a young girl loses her parents, she had to look after the children. They can't live in the house so they have to live in a cave on the moor. Of course there's this farmer guy, who instantly loves her because of her beauty and because she's so self-sacrificing (this will be a trope throughout the rest of the book). He helps her to building a sort of shack thing and survive for the first few months

Now I didn't mind it so much I was happy to go along with it. Anyway it started to get interesting when the twins from the manor appear. I wrote my university thesis on gender role swapping and so I was happy when she described the boy and girl twin as having their genders switched. I love that kind of hero, a beta hero, I hate alphas. In fact I prefer the woman in be in charge usually :P hehe.

Anyway the two twins have a lot to drink and go rambling when they come upon Cissie (the girl) anyway some point early on the sister (I can't remember her name so i'll call her Jo) had caught Cissie's little brother poaching and Cissie had fought her off and humilated her. So she has a go at her again when she sees her, tries to attack her, the brother gets inbetween and in some sort of Shoujo-esq trope ends up falling on top of Cissie.

This is where the shoujo-esq stops. Because he starts groping her and his sister eggs him on, because of course he's a virgin and he's scared etc. etc. Then he apparently rapes her. It wasn't explicit in the text, it was only later on when her brother tells Matt (the farmer) that I realised that he had actually copulated. Anyway, their father comes along and stops then and sends both of them away. This is the part where I stopped liking Clive. I liked him when he was sensitive and painted all day and all night. Then he does this to Cissie and I was trying to get my head around it.

I know people are weak and I know it was different back then but... I dunno. Then to add insult to injury, he goes on a ship as punishment and comes back as a jerk ass. Yeah, he comes back and sees Cissie's child who his father has taken and is all "oh well, I probably have other bastards in all the brothels i've been in herrr durrr"

The thing I like about CC as an author is that she had realistic characters with weaknesses. It's a lot for me to ask that he wasn't whoring it up while at sea, since every sailor and his dog did it (if the historians are to be believed) but he had so much potential and then he gets "hardened". I don't know how I feel about characters being "hardened". This was a huge problem for me, with Twelve Kingdoms, because Yuko stops being a sympathetic school girl and starts being a very cold, calculated and strong individual. I liked that she became strong but there was nothing left in her that was human. Coming from our era and going into a medieval type world, she has no qualms about killing other humans which she does at the beginning. In fact she becomes very boring after she has her buddhist type purifying of the mind.

Later on even after he admits he loves Cissie he still has mistresses and in this case, this book is the complete and utter opposite of Jane Eyre. It's ok that the mr. whatsisface had mistresses before Jane because he was all messed up and stuff, but after, oh no that's a big no no. I mean yes it's realistic... but is that really what I want? realism?

The ending is not at all like the movie. She marries Matt (wtf) and they have a crappy marriage (which I liked because yeah again realism) but then he dies and she mets up with the brother and he asks her to marry him. Oh and the son never loves her, ever (her son I mean) that she had with Clive. So in that respects it's kind of like Vanity Fair, except I kind of liked Amelia, despite her naivity and Dobbin <3. The thing that horrified me was the line at the end of the book however that:
"she'd been nobodies except that man's since he'd mated her"

Throughout the book I was in two minds about the rape, on the one hand it was rape on the other hand CC states several times that Cissie sort of enjoyed it. Does the sort of count? really?? I mean as a staunch Feminist can I accept this? So although I really liked this book. I feel very... confused over it.

Also If I had been Cissie I would have a) given my son away to stop my brothers and sisters from starving b)locked matthew out and never let him in again the effing tease c)never would have given my son back d) taken clive's offer of the house but refused to be his mistress and demanded marriage even if I was of lower class and needed to be "educated".

I am therefore... concerned but I read the book in two days, so I did enjoy it. I'll watch the film now and hopefully, that will smooth out the edges and make it into my favourite films list.

Stand Up

2011-09-06T15:42:00.001-07:00

A blogger writes about how the Globalization effect is changing our media and making us brain dead, to American tropes. I couldn't agree with her more.

I’m tired of plots that value individualism and egotism above all else; of heroes that always have to be the masters of their own fates, to be active and not take anything that life deals at them lying down (whereas most of the time, we lie down, we accept, we deal with what we have been given); of heroes that have to be strong and only take marginal help from others to solve their own problems; of heroes that have a destiny, and of movies and books in which breaking up with all traditions is good so long as one finds and follow one’s own path (there are a lot of cultures where breaking up with traditions isn’t necessarily a good thing, and no, this doesn’t mean that they’re evil and backward). I’m tired of how genre(s) put(s) a disproportionate value on heroes who are active and not passive (and, by extension, belittles and dismisses every use of passive voice, and always asks for sentences to be frenetically punchy); of how the most important thing that can happen to a person is to be “given their own story”, as stories weren’t made up of a mosaic of people all interacting together; of how teams exist only either as a background and foil for a single hero, or as a compendium of individuals, each fighting to be outdo each other in stupid displays of heroism

Thankyou~

Now i'll return to my Chinese novel, my Japanese tv show and my European books.

Ponderings

2011-08-14T10:02:00.000-07:00

Man I loooove geeking out about Berserk! it's one of the few things that can make me talk for a long time LOL. Me and an old friend recently got in touch and what brought us back together was us geeking out together about Berserk. I usually like to remain on the outer fringes of a fandom, so I didn't know apparently there's going to be a film??? and even maybe a second season. I was like what? but yeah I was happy.

ONE DAY.

Right now i'm researching my own novel about the nature of leadership and king hood. I downloaded the Leviathan off Librevox and have been listening to that. Once again I need to re-listen to the Prince (narrated by Chip from tampa florida LOL) and check my Analects of Confucius. I'm going to type virtue and kingship into google books and see what comes up.

Secondly, somewhat berserk related, i've been thinking about dark fantasy and masculinity. I recently bought the Witcher 2 game (however guess what I can't play it because of the LAG). I think that these sort of medieval worlds devoid of morality is interesting. Is this based upon a warlike world? where masculinity must be exaggerated and rape is used as a weapon? So the differences between the sexes must be exaggerated? I think of the differing versions of femininity in Beserk, with Casca and Charlotte, both of whom are destroyed by male sexual desire and vengeance. About how the lower classes are portrayed in the Witcher, drunken, lewd and bigoted, whereas the nobility are again epitomes of masculinity, killing and sexing and killing and sexing. I need to research this!

Hard Times

2011-07-03T11:28:00.001-07:00

My flatmate just texted me from America. She told me that she got an email from our university, telling her she had failed her degree. I sat for a few seconds in shock. Of all people, she shouldn't have failed. She's smart, really smart. I know she fudged up in the last few months but still. Sometimes i'm so mad at my uni, I failed my first year, and my other friend Alex also failed in the second year. My university is a bitch.

Another thing I want to complain about. Though I love said flatmate very much, for a long time she started going on about her body to me. She'd keep going on about how she hated her thighs and her tummy, how she had all these spots, dark circles, the way her hips were too fat and how she had to get rid of that horrid cellulite. I love my body but for some reason all her negativity got to me, I started looking in the mirror picking out my own flaws, when I went swimming yesterday, a past-time I usually enjoyed all I could think about was judging my body and being jealous of other girls there. I was horrified at myself, this isn't me. I have a very positive view of my body, I don't base my worth upon what men want, I don't judge myself based on my sexual experiences and beauty, I base myself on my morale acts and personality.

In order to remind myself of this I joined a tumblr group called "hellyeahdangerouscurves" and it was great, pictures of beautiful curvy girls. However I then started to judge myself based on them! and so many girls on this tumblr were sending in pictures of themselves (beautiful pictures) and writing underneath how much they hated their body and were trying to lose weight. I couldn't bear that negativity, so I deleted it from my feed.

I feel bad about this, bad that I let my flatmate get to me. I see that women who are insecure in their bodies also judge other women based on their weight. That's what I did and I refuse to do it anymore. I love my body and it makes me mad, to live in a world like this.

Thank goodness for fatshion chic and skorch, for all the bloggers I follow. For the magazine Kickback, for my own mother who never criticise herself, for everyone who feels content in their own skin.

Oh me

2011-07-02T12:21:00.000-07:00

Man Odo and Nerys's relationship is getting tre complicated and that's the complicated I like. Odo is really a liquid so he doesn't do "human" well and Dax was all to Nerys "you care way too much about appearances" *Hint hint* but Nerys is all "Whuuu???" She's completely blinded to the affection they obviously share.

When she starts dating that monk dude from Bajour, she's tells Odo she loves this guy and Odo is all:
I was also mighty pissed off, I was like Nerys Y U NO love Odo? He's like the best. However I know that their friendship had taken a nose dive when Odo found out that Nerys had killed this guy, whose murder he had investigated ages ago. Also Odo is such a weird creature, as he says to that woman with the wig *who I loved by the way* his mouth is only an imitation of a mouth, so I get why Nerys is all "I don't see it" or "I don't want to see it"

But she's always there! Like with him all the time. This isn't friendship dudette!! This guy can't take a break in his bucket without her being there to check he's ok. Nerys is so blind it's like she switched places with that guy from Saint Seiya who gouged his own eyes out (yeah we got to that part... OH MAN). Its like a big mix up of the elephant man and Cyrano and etc. lol BUT I LOVE IT!
In the last episode I watched, Odo finds out his people are like tre evil and of course Nerys is there cockblocking every other woman who wants Odo as usual (lol) and then when he's all upset she takes his hand and he's all surprised.

OMG SQUEEEEE!
So cute <3

What's up with Saint Seiya? Episode 24

2011-07-01T04:20:00.000-07:00

Yeah I got the episodes mixed up... doesn't matter though LOL.

For some reason this episode starts with a really long re-cap of what's been happening so far, I don't mind coz I can skip and also we get to see Shun <3 ah Shun

And it seems like it's the end for girly guy, even though before that we have this:
which leads to this:
No no he's not a lady, he's got "Griffiths" syndrome, where his penis is detachable apparently. YAH... that or Japan had strict censorship laws but instead of doing an waist up shot, gives us THIS. Thankfully later on it's a sunbeam that censors him. YAH needs more sunbeam:
Of course eventually we're spared any more of this, some sexual puns
Seiya replies with "I've got past your defences" and "We're both going down together" OOOH YEAAAH. Eventually however, Seiya KILLS him (Yeah I know), because that's what REAL men do, kill ambigiously gay men... OH saint seiya, you and your crazy masculinity!!

Oh and Marin gets a punch to the head.... like for real, just look at that picture!! Because this guy has some weird Moby Dick attack. Anyway.... she's not quite dead but to add insult to injury they decide to dig up Seiya's cross and stick it in the sea and tie her to it until the sea rises and she drowns, the way Japanese people used to do to Christians back in the day. At least they tied her upside down....... -_-.... my poor religion.

Anyway. Seiya's gotta save her OH and it's revealed that she IS his sister (big whoop) so yeah that's it for now.

What's up with Saint Seiya? Episode 28

2011-06-30T12:01:00.000-07:00

Anyway. Episode 28. Not much has happened since last time, some people died, something shiny was stolen and then retaken, Saori threw her jewellry into the sea Titanic style and that was that. Anyway time for this episode... with SCREENSHOTS!

Shania (the best female character in this thing) of course wants to kill Seiya, but for some reason the Holy Father (??) chooses Marin, who was Seiya's teacher and also probably his not very !secret sister. Shania is pissed but she figures Marin will kill Seiya off for her.

Shun after saving Saori's life gets told off for not being masculine enough, coz you know he's like Andromeda and Andromeda is a GIRL and GIRLS CRY. LOL. Of course this cues for MANLY TEARS to be had by all:

Even by Saori:

*Le sniff* ANYWAY, back in Japan, this is happening:

Don't you just love his eyebrows? I mean seriously... they so happy.

Of course that brat that's the little brother of the hot pink haired guy cheats, CHEATING in football?? well I never!! Of course since Seiya is a Gary Stu he managed to catch this pass. Yeah.

Seiya goes on a sort of "date" with this pig haired girl who I can never remember the name of, this is what is happening: "Oh Seiya I love how you abandon me to go and fight overseas! you know i'll always be here waiting for you.... ALWAYS...." Seiya: "Hell YEAH"

Then suddenly this guy crashes their date. Yes it's a guy. I mean I am the Queen of loving girly looking men but this is too far! Look at those sumptous lips! geez! Turns out he's some sort of Silver Saint, while everyone else is a bronze (huh) and of course he's here to kill, guess who, Seiya.

Oh and Marin is there too, to introduce us to this guy and yes... that's his name LIZARD. LIZ_ARD.... so yeah. Lizard.... Anyway. He and Seiya fight and this happens:

Doh! But then Marin gets in and the action and dum dum dum.... Saint Seiya pulls it's patented move, where it "kills" off a character.

What kind of villain gives you a grave?? on a beach? I mean that's gonna wash away pretty quick and Seiya didn't leave a pretty corpse ya know, I mean this is where children play! Anyway, never fear, turns out it was some weird romeo/juliet punch that Marin did and he's ALIVE huzzah. Not before, in some weird way, his friends sense a disturbance in the force:

Hyoga at this time, is taunting a polar bear. Yeah that's what saints do in their free time, taunt wild animals at zoos... what a jerk LOL

Of course it ends with a cliff hanger, will Seiya defeat this girly guy?

YES... he's the main character... duh.

Love

2011-06-26T17:42:00.001-07:00

(Pic not related LOL)

I am so in love with the Odo X Nerys pairing in ST:Deep Space Nine. It's like everything I ever wanted in a romance and more! I even have a massive crush on that shape-shifter!! Yes I am squeeing again LOL.

Ah ST first Seven and Chakotay and now this, I love you <3

Inspiration

2011-06-14T13:39:00.001-07:00

Just some notes i'm jotting down here for future reference.

Black kimono type dress-> sheer material. Black hair-> striking green eyes -> jade reference. Chrysanthemum Baochai -> nickname Chry. Chry Baochai. Love conflict -> duty vs. passion. His duty -> hero, her duty -> career. Add Claudia as conflict? Alien child? Fahima robots again?? Star stories reference??

Last Night

2011-06-13T10:20:00.000-07:00

Last night I dreamt on and off again about Griffths from Berserk for some reason. Suffice to say, it was a nice dream for me! LOL. I dreamt somehow that I was back as a teenager again, attempting unwisely to win the affections of a man away from another girl. I woke up in the middle of the night with a raging nosebleed, finding two huge drops on my pillow. What does that say about me?? LOL.

Despite the fact that I love the anime, I find the manga too sickly for me. Too male adolescent but I guess that's what he was going for. It is a SHONEN manga after all. Something about it has always drawn me in however... I don't know what. Some sort of strange affinity in my mind. As if it was a dream I had, as in dreams our inhibitions are severed. It has that kind of feeling for me. There's something dangerous about it, I am indeed a "Charlotte" type, easily drawn in. The gothic heroine in a white dress, lost in the castle of horrors.
I'd like to meet the author, just because it's so weird. On second thought... maybe not... He's probably like the anons on 4chan on /b/... and even they don't go that FAR!

The end.

2011-06-08T19:22:00.001-07:00

I finished my final exams. Hopefully uni for me is over.

These four years have been increasingly difficult to cope with.
1) I find it hard to do nothing all day. I need purpose, drive. I need routine, without it I wither
2) I don't have a sexual body or mind. I'm a swan, I only mate with one person :D. Therefore university social life is hard on me.
3) I find it hard to be around others who have very little ambition, who seek enjoyment through pure hedonism. For whom, their bible and word of God is television.
4) I was diagnosed with depression and OCD in the third year.
5) I am a family person, being away from my family was very hard on me. I lost most of my "Uni family" to boyfriends and changes.

On a lighter note. I fell out of talking about Star Trek: Voyager. There was just so many episodes!! I am however very near the end. I can't bear to watch the last few episodes!

Seven has had a huge impact on me. The same she did when I was child. She and I are so similar it is almost scary. Both of us find it difficult to understand other human beings and their actions, find many things "irrelevant" and have difficulty in fitting in. in the episode where she mets her old lover, and he calls her by her human name, I was thinking "she should get angry and say that her name is Seven" and that's just what she did. I was very happy LOL.

The episode "Human Error" was a very touching episode, and my favourite of any tv episode ever. Chakotay was so smokin hot, mmmmm yeah LOL but seriously, I can understand Seven so much here. She and I find it hard to accept the all emcompassing power of love. We find it difficult to accept anything less than perfection and that is why it's so hard.

I am really loving her and Chakotay's beginnings of their relationship. At the end of "Natural Law" when both of them are so shy together. It was beautiful. I just wish they had gotten together sooner. Not just in the last six episodes LOL. They will always be my top OTP.

Skyrim

2011-06-06T19:08:00.001-07:00

So yeah, I remember back when I first played Morrowind. Such a strange feeling, being so free in that world. Like a dream... and a game that never ended. So strange. I remember seeing the silt riders and feeling so completely out of my depth. Vivec, the city, was so beautiful, something I had never seen in any RPG before, whereas other found it caustrophobic I loved it. The books that you could read, the real books! I read all of Vivec verses, some Benegaria, it was all amazing. The story based on Hindu theology was completely unique, something I had yet to see. The look of the gods and the Daedra... the Golden Saints even. The way that the statues spoke through you. The haunting tapestry pictures of the Saint.

Oblivion came out afterwards. I was somewhat less in awe. I hated Oblivion (the place) hated going into the gates, the sooner I could get out the better. It was the start of Melisande's beginning though, the character I will keep for Skyrim. Her crime (the one that led her to be in prison and then to be executed, was drowning her uncle while they were on a boat together, for crimes he had commited to her and others). Of course i'll keep my tradition of being a firebolt mage, the fighting seems intresting.

Within these games however was always a profound loneliness, as I stated before. Your character completely alone in the world. Maybe it will change in Skyrim.

I have my problems with Skyrim. I fear it might only be for Xbox, the graphics are wonderful, so I fear that most PC's won't be able to run it. Also problems with moving the controls from xbox to pc. We had such problems with Oblivion before. We shall have to see.

More SHODAN

2011-05-17T13:24:00.000-07:00

It's so creepy, her laugh, her voice. I love it. It's like a sci-fi gothic horror. It inspires me to write better villains So here's some more:

I am SHODAN

2011-05-16T13:22:00.000-07:00

Whoop whoop, Borg episode, loved them since I was a kid LOL. In celebration, let's have some evil SHODAN. Best female villain ever.

HELL YES! 0324

2011-05-16T12:24:00.000-07:00

Finally a decent episode. I was beginning to get annoyed with this season, first off Kes does a complete heel turn or "matures" I suppose and ends up breaking up with Neelix. I mean what? why? I loved that couple so much and Neelix deserved better than that. She ends up running around and sleeping with other men!! *SHOCK*. Plus they wreck the whole canon by doing a going into the future episode, where Kes and Paris have a baby and then Kim marries that baby and has another baby. I was just like WTF??? Although it is established that Paris only ends up with Kes after B'Elanna dies, I was still feeling a little cheated.

Of course when she comes back everything changes. B'Elanna doesn't die and Kes seems in no hurry to try and change the future so that what happens (A happy family life and a loving spouse for Kim) comes to past. Not only that but she's stealing my hairstyle LOL.

Before this episode, we had the Doctor having a family which didn't turn out so good for him, another crummy filler episode. Also In my most hated trope, the "love potion" trope, B'Elanna comes onto Paris which in turns starts their relationship, because some Vulcan mindraped her and she had the "bloodfever" basically the DO ME or die illness. Ugh. Of course he CANNOT resist her, because he's a "man" and men can't control their "sexual urges" but is all noble and doesn't want to do anything to her while she's under the influence. Eventually C-man and Mr.T are all like, just go do it already, and they end up nearly having very rough sex. Before the crazed Vulcan interrupts them.
The whole "i wanna do Chakotay" on her part seems to be left as an loose end and we have to assume she merely got over it in the past three years.

Speaking of which, C-man gets some action with some borg woman he meets on some planet. They share their minds so of course to heal him, now they have to have hot sex because they can feel what the other is feeling (squick). Course C-man's feelings for C'pn J are explained away because this woman is so much like her apparently.

Now finally after all these crummy filler episodes, we've got a decent one. B'Elanna finds a holodeck simulation where the Marquis take over V-cruise. A hark back to season 1 is just what I need right now. Then it turns out that the holographic Sezka, becomes sentient and starts changing things, including making C-man all over her. I was like YES, finally we're getting back to the original plot which seemed to get lost in all the filler.

I hope it gets better, I need me some more Borg episodes.

The Next few eps

2011-05-15T16:54:00.001-07:00

Right ok, lemme try and remember what's been happening.

So Kes turning into a manly man whens she was taken over by Machiavelli (no not really lol), Harry fell in love with a holodeck woman who turned out to be a real woman but who really had a thing for vulcans instead. Q tried to get C'pn J to have a baby with him and Chakotay was all JEALOUS and cute. Oh yeah, there was this crazy two part episode with SARAH silvermen of ALL people about that guy with the BIG ass from sabrina wanting to go forwards in time and steal technology but then dooming earth. Where C-man is all "she has your legs" about some skater woman who bumps into C'pn J WTF chakotay WTF????

Oh yeah and then C'pn J almost died and started having some crazy visions and it was all deep thinking and what happens after we die? and all that kinda bullshit. But again C-man was all "DON'T DIE ON ME" and "You're tearing me apart C'pn J!!" well not that last part but still. He was all cradling her in his arms and shiz and i'm just like WANT.

Oh and right now, some vulcan is trying to mindrape Torres. Intriguing....

The Last Few EPS.

2011-05-14T08:27:00.001-07:00

From basics I forwards.

So yaaaaaaaah. Here we go.

Shockingly V-cruise gets taken over by the slavic aliens and all the crew are put on some planet is order to survive without technology *Shockshock* of course, they handle it pretty well except that Nix gets some guy killed, the same one who was all up in C'pn J's grill about having Torres as the head engineer person. Of course there's also some native species that kidnaps Nix and Kes, coz they're the weakest of course.

Anywho. C-man goes to get em back and of course because he's so amazing, they try to fob off one of their women on him but he's like no deal and they end up running for their lives into the same cave where the guy got killed.

Then C'pn J comes to their rescue just as the volcano erupts, and one of the native women gets stranded in a river of lava. Of course C-man LIKE A BOSS just jumps down and gets her, and everyone is now happy and that blonde lady's inter-species baby is cured YAY.

MEANDWHILE... the DR who saves everyone's asses all the time, along with the convict turned good guy, manage to overthrow the Slavic clothed aliens with Paris, who of course, managed to escape and has an AMAZING plan which works. Of course, convict turned good guy dies in classic pose from battlestar gallactica BEST DEATH EVER (NO NO I kid LOL) but he does die.

Oh YEAH, turns out Sezca wasn't having C-man's baby after all, it was just her's and that Marsh guys's. But C-man was all EMO over it and his dad was like "eeeer... I had to do something to concive you" and C-man was all "noooo I didn't DO HER, she stole my DNA" and then his DAD was like "our women loved our rape babies" (obviously this guy has never watched LAw and order: SVU) "so you better love your rape baby too".

In Tom's AMAZING plan, Sezca gets hurt and hearing her baby crying runs to it only to die. Marsh guy takes the baby and that's what happens.

Everyone gets back on board all is well.

Then we have some random filler episodes, Tuvok gets a virus, Paris and Kim have homoerotic tendencies down in a space prison and something else I can't remember.

Then we get a Torres heavy episode, of course since she hasn't been going at it like rabbits with every other member of the crew like Tom, she's obviously repressed and has a sex dream. Of course C-man is there to be all "oooh did you dream about anyone is particular" oh C-man, you so smooooth. Of course why you would tell anyone about your own wet dreams is beyond me. TMI torres TMI!!. Anyway turns out it's some sickly sweet love story about two star-crossed kids, in some sort of holocaust inspired story. Torres is sure that like the Japanese, the country is trying to cover up it's past and goes all bitchslap on the head guy.

Of course nothing can be proved and in my experience, I'm more likely to side with the evil people in this, you can't just blame a society just because of some old lady's dying memories without proof.

Then we get a C'pn J episode, all about spirtuality which was great coz after that horrible Torres episode, I was beginning to lose faith in this series, but NO this was EPIC. I was like YAY, at least in the 1990s they loved spirtuality and didn't have something as HORRID as HOUSE on... eeuugugghgh.... I don't want to live on a planet that thinks that a mysognistic man is laudable.

BUT YEAH. I hope we get less filler episodes. I can't wait for Seven to turn up TEE HEE.

Star Trek: Voyager S02E25

2011-05-11T17:02:00.000-07:00

oooooooooooooooooooh yeah, finally we get some Chakotay action. Whoot whoot!

So yah, C'pn J and him of course get stranded on some planet because if they leave they'll die because of some mumbo jumbo about a virus. Of course it's all an excuse for Chakotay to show how manly he is and how no woman can resist him. I mean seriously, every single female in this show is all over this guy LOL, can't blame 'em! He's the male equivalent of Kes LOL.

So yeah, they soon start acting like it's little house on the prairie time, with the C-man, dressed like a medieval peasant, sans stinkiness and ugliness. C'pn J starts reminiscing bout her childhood and the C-man is like, i'm gonna build you a bath, coz bitches love baths. So then there's naked naked naked time all around the forest and of course C'pn J sees something in the forest and C-man has to go out and see what it is and it's all OMG nakedness, must have.

I think that the C-man was perfectly happy to just live on that planet with C'pn J and have a bunch o' kids LOL, he gave up so easily. Of course after extended time with the C-man as per usual, C'pn J starts goin weak at the knees. THEN, as it always happens, C'pn J is all "oooh my neck hurts" and C-man is like well lemme just rub that for you. SEXUAL TENSIOOOOOON. Course no woman can resist the C-man, so C'pn J is like ahsnfaggndiaohdsa *runsaway* but then she comes back and then C-man starts tellin her one of his stories.

YAY....

I mean I love that he's spiritual and all and I want to tap that, but sometimes he acts rather like Grampa in the Simpsons LOL. Well anyway it was some crazy metaphor about how he promised to be at her side and etc. etc. it was actually very sweet and romantic but then what can you expect from the C-man??? I mean seriously, everything he says is basically translated in a woman's mind into a pick-up line.

Of course they're all having a happy time before the V-cruise comes back is like, s'up bitches, I brought you some medicine and C'pn J and C-man are all BAWL coz they liked living like peasants and the C-man was gonna make a FREAKIN' boat!

But yeah... and then everything returned to normal. I love how C-man is the red herring of shipping in this series, since I know whose going to end up with who :D.

Next one will be a heavy C-man episode. I swear though, if he goes all mushy and I forgive you on Sezca, i'm gonna be like WTF. I don't remember if he had a kid or not... we'll just see.

Star Trek: Voyager S02E22

2011-05-11T06:16:00.000-07:00

Yeeeah BITCHES. I am gonna do that thing where I state my opinions after every frickin' episode :D. Hope you enjoy.

I'm glad that the storyline seems to be going somewhere now, some of the filler episodes were beginning to bore me. I mean how many times can the crew hallucinate/hollodeck goes haywire/crew member turns evil etc. etc. This episode of course is a very Tuvok heavy episode, and yeah, s'all good, coz Tuvok is cool and all. The subtitle for this will be "Innocence: Where Tuvok gets mobbed by crazy spoiled children". Yah so it seems he's crash landed on some planet or whatever and there are these kids there. Somehow they've managed to escape turning into some sort of Lord of the Flies, wildboyZZZ and are actully really cute and eager. Course Tuvok is all I HAVE NO EMOTIONS, blah de blah, some buddhism inspired meditation later and two of the kids dissapear.

Meanwhile, on Voyager. Apparently this episode is all the attack of the net face people. They must have run outta makeup. So yah, they get all pissy and shiz because they're like Korea in the 1800s, they don't want anyone else to get on their turf and in their beeswax. However of course Cap'n J is all SCREW YOU as per usual and goes down on the planet to save Mr. T anyway.

Then of course in some sort of crazy ass twist it turns out that.... (do you really need spoiler tags right here? no? ok then) that it's some sort of Benjamin Button world and really the cute little children are old fogies who seem to die in some random cave and so the last little girl, is all "all rite, I be chillin'" and agrees to die like normal and Mr. T is there to look after her (D'AAAAWWWWWwwwwwww). Seriously sugar overload in this ep, all the children huggin Mr. T and him being a TOTAL tsundre!!

This was a very Chakotay less episode unfortunatly, but I accidentally read the synopsis for the end of season 2 and I know he gets some shit with Sezca (or whatever her name is) again. OMG, you know I thought he'd be a bit more freaked out by the fact that he's gonna have a baby, but y'know... s'all good. I'm really enjoying this side story, it's like eastenders in space, except without the london accents and ugly people :D.

My day so far

2011-05-10T05:50:00.000-07:00

I was woken up, as I am usually by Anna hammering on my door. She wanted to borrow some shampoo, so I let her in and then got back into bed. She later sat down and we talked about how crummy our lives were now that we had to work so hard, our dissertations being in on friday and our exams after that.

I decided to stay in bed after she left and put on an episode of Star Trek: Voyager. When I was about 7/8 years old. I used to watch this programme with my Dad. It is such a nice memory for me, that this show has a special place in my heart. Seven of Nine influenced me so much as a child, that she remained a favourite character of mine throughout my lifetime. Even at that young age, I remember how much I loved her. It's so strange to watch the show again through my now mature eyes. As a child, I looked up to Chakotay as a father figure, now I think he is the SEX. LOL.

I decided to get up then and get dressed. I made myself a bagel with marmite.
The kitchen is very dirty, and I can't find my cutlery. The spanish girls like to steal my things to punish me for some reason, but thankfully the left the cupboards unlocked so I just used one of their knives.

I ate it while stressing out about an essay I have to write in a day, which I am writing right now. I've nearly done half of it. Anna came in again to see me, stating that Malin had been talking to her on facebook, also stressing out about her work. She then jabbed me in the shoulder a couple of times LOL, angry because of my hair. My hair seems to be some sort of catalyst in girls, they seem to love it and want to touch it or cut bits off it! Today I put it up in a clip, because I couldn't be bothered to do anything else with it and of course this gives it some sort of new, beautiful shape. LOL.

I better get back to my work.
Amelia OUT.

The New World

2011-05-02T05:18:00.000-07:00

"A subculture of hard-nosed realism and hyper-rationality, in a world that claims as part of it's superiority its vigilant purging of all nonrational elements, and in which people carefully excise from their discourse every possible trace of soft sentimentality, as if purging dangerous nonsterile elements from a lab"

-Cohn, Defence Intellectuals.

Claudia

2011-04-24T15:24:00.000-07:00

(spoilers ahead, but who cares lol)

*caught her in an odd moment lol* My beloved Claudia, my character in Mass Effect. She's got beautiful green eyes (she loves red eyeshadow) and blonde hair (the longest I could get lol) and she's certainly not feminine in any shape or form!

She's a paragon (she won't even hit dirty prisoners) who has the survivour backstory and was born an orphan on earth (d'awww)and signed to the alliance and soon as she was able.

She's an engineer, but she doesn't put much store in special attacks. Her motto is "just shoot it already". Ever since her arrival on Citadel at 18, when she first saw other aliens, she though Turians were beautiful and believes in the rights of all species.

She was close to Ashley, both female soldiers with ties to earth and saved her life in the field, leaving Kaiden to die. She believed that Ashley had more to do to redeem herself before she could die, love for other species mainly.

She defeated Saren with the help of Garrus (whom she held a torch for) and Wrex, wearing only a skimpy light armour suit and a specialization in first aid.

Later on she became good friends with Miranda and eventually came onto Garrus (in more than one way LOL) after a make or break decision, where he almost became consumed with vengence. She took on the collectors, with both their help and managed to save everyone, except for Legion because she thought Samara could handle being in charge.

She attempted to keep some fish in her cabin but they all died. So instead she has a space hamster called Terry. In my head canon, she later grows her hair out into pigtails like this:

and she secretly has a dress like this stashed in her wardrobe:

Which of course, she wears with big black biker boots. She has an old gang tattoo on the left of her lower back, from when she was in a gang back on earth as a child. However she denies of all knowledge of this nowadays. Despite what everyone says, after the destruction of Normandy S-1, she wanted to rename it Ivanhoe, but everyone though that was stupid and renamed it Normandy S-2.

She doesn't have any plans for the future, due to her dangerous missions but she cares more for Garrus than just someone to blow off steam with LOL.

This is the woman who won't get outta my head right now, she's a huge influence on me, being a female character in a predominatly male focused game. It's so nice bioware lets us choose our genders :D i'm glad as they made such an independant free willed character such as Claudia.

Mass Effect

2011-04-22T10:30:00.000-07:00

Oh my gaaaawd. I'm so mad right now.

I hate it when I find things I enjoy immensely. I god damn hate it! Why? because they always end LOL. Sad but true (and i'm not really someone who joins a fanbase, though thinking now... maybe I should...LOL)

I get so mad when things get to me and take over my life for weeks and weeks afterwards, it happened with Berserk (albeit in the WTF?????!!! way) and now it's happening with Mass Effect guh! I bought 1 a while ago cheaply and then I instantly had to buy 2, now i'm waiting for 3 LOL but i'm so saaad. What will I do until that time lol. I'm such a fangirl!

However this usually happens to me with games and books, i'll get sadder and sadder as I realise i'm running out of pages or that we're on that *sniff* final mission. I try to put it off, I won't play/read for weeks, trying to stretch it out but then like all things it has to end and i'll be left heartbroken, like a broken beaten tramp (lol metaphors, not working today LOL). It all comes from being very loving and getting attached to things -_-, why oh why can't I have a heart of steel?

Usually, I can integrate the things I loved in my own work. Like Alix's story in DA:O, which was the inspiration for Alix in Fortuna, or that heart-wrenching love scene in interstella:5555, but I can't do that with ME? why? it's a damn sci-fi and I only write fantasy and I don't want to give up on Fortuna, though Claudia (my ME character) keeps nagging at my mind to write her a story but I won't! I must resist! Even though I already have a beginning and everything LOL. Actually it was my obsession over FFXII that started La Fortuna, I blame games for everything lol.

The Pentient Mary

2011-04-12T17:39:00.000-07:00

What's up with Saint Seiya? Episode 16

2011-04-03T10:40:00.000-07:00

So yaa, recently i've been visting a little website called 4chan, yeah I know. However you need not worry I stay away from all that porno and horrid gifs (I did wander in there by accident once, god... the memories still haunt me) and I usually stick to CM, which is an image board all about animated men, ooooh yeah (because of course animated men are the best LOL) so perfect :D

Anyway, usually there's a thread up there with some Saint Seiya pics and thus I was intrigued, so many attractive men LOL (I kid, I heard the story was good too) so I thought i'd have a gander at it. These are my first impressions up to episode 16.

First of all I must say I love the green haired woman Shaina the most, considering that all the other women in this show (except maybe for Marin) are complete and utter idiots. I thought maybe Shino might be ok, but then her "is that you? grandfather?" spirit appeared and told her to pansy up and be more womanly, or the men wouldn't like her. Oh gawwwwd *rolls eyes*. The two girls, who are so "eh" I can't even remember their names (everyone's name in this appears to start with a "s" away), are all:
So yeah. No love lost there.

Also I have to admit this show is unintentionally hilarous! The fact that Shiryu dies at least three times before the 10th episode. That guy must have some sort of Deus ex machina machine, I swear to god.

He also does it in completely stupid ways, it's as if he wants a chance to come back to life all the time, as if it somehow makes him more attractive to Shunmei or something. I mean seriously the dude loses 2/3s of his blood so he can fix his and seiya's armour, which was their fault in the first place because they were both so stubborn -_-, and Shiryu is all sorts of guillible, and then goes fighting again, where he loses MORE blood and is only saved by... a pressure point? which somehow sucks up all his blood... yaaah, i'm no fancy science person (lol) but I don't think that's how it works :P.

I worry for this guy's future, I mean what other ways is he gonna find to almost kill himself? ooooh just let me run in front of his car, let me taste that raw chicken that's been left out for a bit, no no don't worry, i'm sure it's not radioactive. uuuufffffff!

Also don't get me started on Docrates (or Socrates maybe lol, was there some sort of copyright issue?) whose super power is making socrates big ole bearded face appear with evil red eyes, yeah this face:

Oh man.........

However sometimes they all live up to their reputation for being hotties and we were treated to a fanservicy, Shun, in the shower in this latest episode, does that make up for all the ball crap?? only time will tell :D

Feeling Horrible

2011-03-20T10:41:00.000-07:00

On friday, I finally got up the nerve to go into the Doctors again. I was sitting there on the computer for hours trying to pick which doctor I wanted. Eventually I picked the name of a nice sounding woman.

When I got there, I got lost XD, but thankfully some nice doctor helped me find her room. When I got in, the doctor recognised me, however because of my mental state last year (I can't even remember my 21st birthday) I didn't recognise her, so I was a little ashamed when she said "Oh it's me XXX XXX" and I didn't remember.

However I was glad to get a doctor who knows about me. I told her that I had had some bad times with my depression coming back and that I hadn't been able to go to lectures all week. She asked me when it happened and I said around my period as I always have bad PMT, she told me to take some more medication for it, which I was happy to do. I only have to take double just before my period and afterwards i'll go back to my normal dose.

I've been struggling this week, it was very bad on wednesday and thursday, I know when my depression comes back because the same phrase will repeat over and over in my head "what's the point in living" etc. etc. However usually I just laugh at myself, and say "you know what the point is" thankfully my OCD hasn't been bad, in fact i've been OCD free for a while now.

I'm running low on funds, because I buy a lot of video games to keep me occupied, so my mind doesn't wander. It's just until I can get a job.

I've been struggling socially as well. My best friend hasn't been on skype for several weeks as she's been travelling and I know that something is upsetting her, but she won't talk to me about it. I send her several facebook messages and she promises to come on on tuesday, hopefully I can figure out what's upsetting her then. Thankfully, Terry has been a lifesaver, I talk to him whenever I can and he tells me all his woes. Terry and I are very similar, so it's wonderful to talk to someone going through the same shit.

I worry constantly about my flatmate, whom I care about so dearly. It's a problem as we only hang out with each other, in a way we are a "couple" even though both of us are girls and straight LOL. This means I often get possessive, because of all the problems i've had with friends in the past. However I am certainly working on this, I am trying my best not to feel hurt when close friends of mine get boyfriends (however this is painful for me, because I am La Pucelle, the one "who stands in the shadows, while another gets the kiss of victory") or make other close friends. My worst fear is being replaced, because of the suffering it caused me before. Silly to think of that, the past doesn't reflect the present but it's hard to let go.

It's easy for me to write these things down, as i'm not ashamed of what I feel or how I act :D.

Soviet Animation

2011-02-23T11:51:00.001-08:00

Actually I really enjoyed these :):

The Nutcracker:

The Tin Soldier:

The Little Mermaid:

Phantasmat

2011-02-05T15:02:00.000-08:00

Here I am to recommend another casual game for you. I don't recommend, unless I really enjoyed it and this I did. It's a very good ghost story, with a bit of a twist :). It starts off with you crashing your car on a dark and stormy night, and you meet a strange young woman who tells you to leave and not to check into the hotel down the way. Of course you do and things begin to get spooky, the house begins to change as do the people and as you get closer to the truth, you begin to fit the pieces together of your strange visions.

I love a good gothic ghost story and a tale of jilted love :). The drowned city is also a unique idea not seen before. The artwork is beautiful and the voice acting is great :). So go download the demo and have a go and buy it if you like it!

Vocaloid Part 1

2011-01-30T16:25:00.000-08:00

Yeah yeah, you know the saying, but really I did get into it before it was cool! A Chinese person on DA showed me and I got hooked.

This one really inspired me. If you follow all of this story, you will get to a very sad ending. It made my cry really... The second instalment is called Servant of Evil.

Dark Alice in Wonderland. Warning: extremly gothic, i.e. blood, gore, adult themes etc.

Cantarella

2010-12-30T14:16:00.000-08:00

Watching the best Ads of 2010 on tv, this advert came on as number 2:

John Lewis: Never Knowingly Undersold

Many people were stating how it described their lives, I suppose it's the most convention life one can lead :P. I however never really liked it, for me, this video was much better *WARNING: NSFW:

*check out the boy's version also it's really good.

Playing Rune Factory Frontier

2010-12-28T15:52:00.000-08:00

For long periods of time!
Oh dear, I got RFF for myself at Christmas, now all I do is play all day LOL. I think I am addicted oh dear... The girl I think i'll go for is Bianca, the lonely rich girl lol.

My favourite bachelor from the Harvest Moon series (similar games but more about farming, no RPG element) has to be the sweet and shy Cliff (from the first HM I ever played) and Vaughn, he was lovely :P. As for the others, Skye was hot, I never finished HM Tree of Tranquility lol but I liked Julious.

Actually I prefer the Rune Factory games to the HM ones, but since there has never been a "heroine" for RF (yet, Rune factory oceans apparently has one) I can't say which bachelor I liked. However RF characters are much more fleshed out, I loved Max and Ray from RF2 and for sure the storylines and "romance" in RF is what I remember, much more than any HM games. In RF2 I had a very hard time picking a lady to woo, since all were wonderful characters, I ended up playing it twice (something shocking for me) so that I could marry Dorothy the second time around :P (first was Yue :D ).

The first RF wasn't my favourite, but I married Sharron the "ghost" and I was glad that RFF was the "direct sequel" which expanded on Raguna's story. In RF3 which only just recently came out, I of course married the mermaid Pia :P, since I love mermaids, and she was so funny, on more than one occasion she called my character (Leto) "awesomesauce". lol

Really I love dating sims :p (only the fantasy ones, the real life ones creep me out -_-) and Harvest Moon and RF games are the only ones I can get in the west LOL. From time to time I keep up with Angelique and Harukanaru Toki no Nakade, even though they've never been translated into English, just because they sound intresting and have pretty artwork. Ah I love my romance~ LOL

Harvest Moon:

Angel Myth Translation

2010-12-20T13:34:00.000-08:00

Unfortunately on my old computer, I downloaded some nasty programme and deleted tonnes of my windows files. I also lost a lot of my old stuff, including all my wallpapers, my music (thankfully I managed to convert if off my ipod, but some I didn't sync and they're gone forever :( ), some of my anime videos, my huge cache of midis and some other random junk.

Also what got deleted, was all my angel myth files! thankfully however I had decided to do some scanlating on this laptop and I have volume 2 and 3 here with me phew! I just have to download 4 and 5 off some raws or if push come to shove, scan my own books. Volume 1 was already scanlated by a proper person who actually speaks chinese! not someone like me who decodes what google translate gives me LOL. I'll begin to start translating it again when I can ;).

Guin Saga

2010-12-18T13:54:00.000-08:00

I love Shino Tanno's work (at least I believe that's the correct spelling LOL) they have done the cover illustrations for a japanese saga of fantasy books (think the asian version of A song of ice and fire) which has over 100 volumes!! These illustrations have inspired me to no end! I thought I would share this one with you, the others can be found here (volume 88 onwards).

Only the first three volumes have been translated into English but there is an Anime of it, which has been licensed in English but if like me you want a more intresting, darker knock off, then of course I recommend Berserk to you (the anime not the manga, oh man not the manga!!)

Phantom of the Opera The Game

2010-10-26T08:12:00.000-07:00

Download it here

I love it, love love love, from the beautiful artwork, to the story. The phantom finally gets a love :), get the collectors edition if you want an extra scene at the end. Phantom is so hooot also :P

Sun Tzu's art of war

2010-09-17T14:50:00.000-07:00

Watch the flash here

He didn't pay to sleep with whores, it's just a rumour! lol

2010-09-10T12:46:00.000-07:00

On Sharing a Husband

Screw the fate that makes you share a man.
One cuddles under cotton blankets; the other’s cold.

Every now and then, well, maybe or maybe not.
Once or twice a month, oh, it’s like nothing.

You try to stick to it like a fly on rice
but the rice is rotten. You slave like the maid,

but without pay. If I had known how it would go
I think I would have lived alone.

In a maze of a manor

2010-09-07T15:11:00.000-07:00

In desperation for her life
she killed her destroyer
but in the end all she created
was another pursuer.

Haunting Ground, a japanese game, is one of the epitomes of the "Gothic" genre, I was so surprised to see video game which incorporated all the traits which I love, a young girl in a spooky mansion, an older anti-hero who pursues her, a white dress, the evil female housekeeper, threats to her virginity etc. etc. I love it.

Similarly Mot and Durga go searching through Avalon's secret passageways, as Mot is pre-programmed to spy on the House of Spica though he does not know it himself, Durga killed her lover when she was young, an Oxsanis nobleman who kept her as a maid and his memory and his prediction still haunt her, as she goes deeper and deeper into the dark crevasses of the palace.

Riddle

2010-09-06T14:58:00.000-07:00

Though ambition had never been part of your nature
And the call from retirement was not of your choosing
You danced in the end at anothers commandment
so you can't be surprised if we find it amusing.

The Yew Tree

2010-08-16T14:55:00.000-07:00

My bonny Yew Tree
tell me what did you
see?

And I thought as I stood
and laid hands on your wood
that it might be a kindness to fell ye
one kiss of the axe
and your free from the rest
and the set bloody tales that
we tell ye,
But a wee bird flew out of your branches
and sang out like never before
and the words of the song
were a thousand years long
and to learn them a thousand
years more.

Another Strange Dream

2010-08-02T03:35:00.001-07:00

My dream started out as me and some friends were in Korea, hanging out with some Koreans at a sort of home cinema, it was a big room with only a few people in it and we were in it right at the back. We were all having a good time, watching the film, when the film ended, they started playing some cheasy music, so we thought it would be cool to stay and have fun late into the night and goof around.

Anyway we decided to go home eventually, me and my male friend, had arrived at the cinema on some strange tram service, sort of like a steampunk machine that travels in a u curve underground. Anyway I looked at my ticket and was like, oh no, I didn't get a return, but my male friend had. The ticket office was closed because it was so late and there was only one other tram. My male friend was all, oh you can get a taxi and I was like, it's Korea, I don't speak Korean, please don't leave me here by myself but he had a return ticket and the last tram was in the station.

We stood in front of it and soem people were arguing nearby, suddenly the door opened (it was a sort of platform which came up, out and then slotted into the floor to create a sort of ramp and it was all steampunky and such) and I said to my male friend "Don't you dare get on it and leave me here on my own" but he just shrugged and said you can get a taxi and got on. I was really upset and I thought, well I hope it crashes! Then I left the tram and went walking around the shopping centre it was in, there was a weird shop that sold jewelry that looked like plants (probably because in the shop I work, the jewelry is made from plants lol).

I thought, man Koreans are weird, lol.

Anyway it turns out that the people who were arguing were the mechanics and they had forgotten to tighten one of the bolts properly so as the tram went down underground, it started sparking and then it broke down, my male friend managed to climb up the tunnel on these little prong things that stuck out, but when he got to the top, I had left so there was no one there to help him, so he fell back down.

A few years later, I was at the tram station again, and there was a news crew there who had said that they had found the survivors of the crash, my male friend's wife and his two children were there, the children had grown up, as they had been small when their dad dissapeared so didn't know what to expect. Anyway the survivors were all seen to and we were still looking for my male friend, when suddenly a cloaked figure appeared, I ran up to it (I seemed to have feelings for this friend) and saw that his face was all burned and that his hair had turned grey and long and was tied back in a ponytail.

His kids ran up to him but he started blathering about putting white meat in jars, at first I thought he had become a cannibal but as he kept blatting on I saw he was talking about burying the dead. Then he saw his wife and pulled his hood down and started acting really strange, like coquettishly flirting with her. I was upset coz I had hoped he had forgotten her (LOL).

Anyway they took him away, and I was at some place where I worked, I think it was some sort of steampunk newspaper shop and some girl there was all upset, apparently she had been my male friend's mistress, and she showed me this ring that had an eye on it to prove it, she said that when she faced the eye out, it showed him she loved him, when she turned the eye inwards it meant she hated him.

Then I woke up lol.

Beautiful Helen

2010-08-01T16:07:00.000-07:00

Szép Ilonka (English)

I.
The huntsman waits with watchful eye
in ambush, holding shaft on string,
as ever upward through the sky
the ardent sun is journeying.
He waits in vain - in coverts cool
the stag still rests by some distant pool.

Long, long he sits in ambush yet
and hopes for game at close of day;
then, as he prays the sun to set,
behold good fortune comes his way -
it is no stag, but a butterfly,
with a girl pursuing, flutters by.

"Merry flyer, fair golden moth,
rest on my finger, do not flee!
Or I will follow, by my troth,
where red sunset gilds bush and thee! "
She speaks, and nimble as a roe,
she hastens on with heart aglow.

"Gad!" says the huntsman, "is this not
most royal game?" - and up he leaps,
pursuing, all things else forgot,
the path the flying maiden keeps.
Thus man and maid, in eager flight,
each seek a vision of delight.

"I have you!" - cries the happy miss,
and pauses, butterfly in hand.
"I have you!" - cries the man with bliss,
and so the graceful couple stand.
Caught in his eye's admiring glow,
the maiden lets the insect go.

II.
Stands yet the house of old Peterdi?
Lives that old son of battle still?
That house, though in decay, I see;
the old man sits and drinks his fill.
By him the girl; their huntsman-guest
looks on with eyes of warm unrest.

For Hunyadi, their chief who died,
the men have drained their glasses deep.
For that great hero, Hungary's pride,
the veteran is forced to weep.
His blood flowed free in days of yore,
his tears in equal measure pour.

"Drink to my old chief's royal son!" -
the patriarch cries, "Long live the King!"
The blushing huntsman seems undone,
he lets his glass stand, faltering.
"Why won't you drink? What seems amiss?
Accept a father's will in this!

I could, in years, be twice your sire;
I drink, believe me, without blame -
the King's a man of faith and fire,
who will not put his blood to shame!"
Stirred by the greybeard's earnest plea,
the youth stands up in fealty.

"Long live the son of that old chief!
As long as Hungary may he live!
Yet may his days be black and brief
if e'er his best he fails to give!
Better no King than one disloyal,
who plagues the land unsound, unroyal. "

In deepening ardour and applause
the fleeting hours swiftly soar;
and still the maid's affection draws
more closely to the visitor.
"Ah, that I knew his name and home!"
Her warm heart speaks, her lips are dumb.

"Fair flower of the forest, you,
I also praise the pledge in wine!
And should God e'er direct you two
to Buda, you with me must dine.
In Buda's lofty tower I dwell,
At Matyas' court they know me well..."

The huntsman speaks, and takes his leave.
A far-off slug-horn bids him go.
Although his hosts entreat and grieve
and seek fresh kindnesses to show.
"Come back to see your friends once more,
in case we do not come before!"

Reluctant on the threshold now
she speaks in modesty polite.
He prints a kiss upon her brow,
then marches through the moonlit night.
The house is still, but not her breast,
where love won't grant a moment's rest.

III.
Peterdi and his grandchild sweet
go up to visit Buda-town.
The old man's wonder is complete
to see new mansions of renown.
The maiden waits in anxious pain
to meet her handsome youth again.

Glad crowds are thronging Buda's streets;
they watch to see their monarch ride
in triumph from the warlike feats
that humbled vile Vienna's pride.
Real subjects long to see their King -
no smiles on the maid's features cling.

"Where is our gentle friend today?
What fortunes has he followed here?
Is he at home, or far away
in shady coverts of the deer?"
She speaks to herself silently,
with cheeks now blushed, now blanched to see.

And now with warlike shouts ride by
Ujlaki and the Magyar lords;
the king himself with noble eye
surveys the escort of their swords.
Old Peterdi in wonder peers,
perceives his guest, and joins the cheers.

"God save the King! God bless his fame!"
Ten thousand throats around him shout;
ten thousand echoes greet his name,
hill, vale, and rampart ring it out.
But whiter than white marble there
Ilonka stands in mute despair.

"Shall we go on to Matyas' hall
to see our friend once more, my lass?
Methinks our forest mansion small
will give us greater peace, alas!"
The greybeard speaks in pained dismay,
and back they plod their weary way.

As droops a radiant summer flower
that withers from an inner blight,
so drooped Ilonka from that hour
and sickened towards eternal night.
Within her heart a cancer fed
on passion's hopes forever dead.

The brief but anguished life is o'er,
a girl has faded to her death,
a tender lily suffering sore
in innocence and anxious breath.
And when at last their royal guest
came back once more, she lay at rest.

Kirkconnell, Watson

The Fortuna

2010-07-15T14:18:00.000-07:00

Durga becomes Risha's Fortuna, while the relationship between them is good they say, he will be a successful King. Her headdress:

Very Strange Dream

2010-07-09T03:22:00.001-07:00

Yes it was indeed strange! and I shall tell you all about it.

It starts off normal, in a high school sort of Shoujo-manga esq. The main girl is very popular and friendly to everyone, she has about three guys after her, one of the guys she likes back, who is her best friend and looks out for her all the time, one of the other guys is however one of her old teachers, he was fired on mysterious circumstances, and now hangs out in the old junkyard behind the school, the girl always enters the school from this side so she always says hello to him.

A few years ago in the school a girl was found murdered, however that wasn't the shock, when they found her body they first thought they had found a chopped up and bloody octupus but then they realised that this "octupus" was part of the girls body. You see she had tentacles on her body lol (my mind!) this is a worry for the girl because secretly, she also has tentacles on her body! It is a generic thing in her family, that skips generations. The tentacles usually appear on the torso and so does hers, so she can hide it fairly well.

Her grandma asks her to wear a special vests so that it hides it, apparently the girl will grow out of it eventually and the tentacles will drop off. However the tentacles often have a mind of their own, wanting to do bad things so she has to keep an eye on them. The girl has heard rumours that the fired teacher was into kinky stuff and accused of liking young girls with tentacles, that was why he was fired on suspicion of the murder of the other girl.

However they never had any proof, the girl isn't worried though, she lives in the blue area on campus and so is far away from the creepy teacher except for when she sees him now and again.

However one day the girl and her boyfriend enter a magical swimming contest, where they have to turn themselves into waterbirds (don't ask) they do and are nearly winning the contest when the creepy teacher jumps out of the water and grabs both the girl and her boyfriend in their bird forms. He swims away before anyone can get him.

However a little bit later down the river, a fox is there for some reason and I think maybe he is the magically enhanced form of the girl's other male friend because he knows what is going on and saves her from the creepy teacher and hides in a tree. The creepy teacher still has the boyfriend and is angrily looking around for the girl but can't find her.

The fox swims away and comes across an old water gate (here the dream turns into a video game, trying to keep him alive). Holding onto the girl he swims through it, though its hard because the current keeps dragging him along and sometimes he has to swim into these little niches off the waterway and then the water rises and then falls so he has to hold his breathe. Eventually he comes out in the fresh air where there is a little break int he water gate. Here he sees his old love, also in fox form and tells her all about what's happened.

Around them strangely are bottles with keys sticking out of them, the girl says to him that he should change back into his fairy form and fly the girl back to safety. He agrees though not without saying he would come back for her and for the girl's boyfriend. He flies to the court of a white haired queen who he knows is good, however on the way the girl turns into some ladybugs in his hands and some escape (here I thought, oh it's just a video game, i'll pick them up later). He hands over the ladybugs to the Queen who puts them in a glass cage, and says to him because you did so you get rewarded with this match and this glue.

So he flies back to his love and tells her about saving her and then puts the glue on him and sticks one of the keys in the jars onto him because I know we'll need it later in the game. Then he and his love enter the watergate again, but suddenly the music turns to combat mode, apparently the evil agents of the game found them and now they have to fight them off.

For some reason I clicked reload in my mine lol, and went back to when the girlfriend and the boyfriend fox were sitting in the "break" area, this time I sent both of them back to the queen, and they were all lovey dovey on the way, and when we came back, the girlfriend also stuck a key to her body. Then we entered into the watergate again.

This big balck book came sailing towards the two foxes and the girlfriend opened it with the key of eldritch lore she had stuck on her, lol,it was white. However out of the book comes nothing but sand that washes over the enemies and doesn't do much. I thought to myself i'll have to read the manual about this lol. So the two foxes fight through the combatants and make it to the next part of the water gate...

and then I woke up LOL.

Hard Work

2010-06-03T11:46:00.001-07:00

I've always been envious of artists, I always was jealous of how in only a few hours they could create something so wonderful and their talent was there for all to see. I always thought artists got the best of both worlds, they could tell stories so easily by just drawing them but actually... it's quite hard work!

Looking at this I see that art is just as hard as writing, it takes an large amount of research just like writing and takes several years to get good at just like writing, also one has to continually try things out before hand to see what is good. Just like a scene, the piece of art must be built over time and the greater your skill the more beautiful the scene/piece. Truly also in both, the more detail the more beautiful :D.

Rose and Camellia

2010-06-02T13:35:00.001-07:00

My new book is fraught with family politics just like this... but without the slapping haha.

Hi

2010-05-29T13:48:00.000-07:00

Feeling marginally better, had to postpone exams however, am not happy about that :(

I am starved for inspiration *sigh*

I've nearly beaten this thing...

2010-05-17T03:35:00.000-07:00

OCD, is a horrid, horrid, mental disease. I am not ashamed however, I have what I have, it's your problem if you're judging me. Over the last three weeks I have been in battle with my mind every day from the moment I wake up to the moment I go to sleep, the meds I was given have helped alot but i've had to be the bravest i've ever been.

There is no respite with OCD, there is no where to run or hide, no where to get some rest, your mind is with you all the time and when it goes haywire it is HELL. It is literally hell. You have to face your worst fears and struggle away from the edge all the time.

Right now I can live with it, now and again I have bad episodes but I know that the thoughts aren't real, and that I won't act on them. I am going to CBT on Thursday and hopefully that will help me as well.

I haven't gotten this far without help, I want to thank all those who supported me on stuckinadoorway, OCDUK and Nomorepanic.

Larsa look-a-like

2010-05-15T04:56:00.001-07:00

It's no joke, that I love Larsa from Final Fantasy XII, and I just saw his look-a-like on the mitchell and webb *shock*, from 2.38:

A comic :D

2010-05-10T06:28:00.000-07:00

An Inspiring Comic for my as yet un-named novel:

Here

Edit: Ugh, I'm still such an English teacher, use the past tense! and if there is more than one "enemy" then use the plural!! plural!!

Questions

2010-05-08T14:35:00.000-07:00

You know how much I love to pretend i'm a real writer :D, well here's some questions I stole from an interview hahah... oh i'm so sad :P

When you aren't writing what do you like to do in your spare time?

Surf the net, I find a lot of inspiration out there and it's like my own personal library, listen and study traditional english folk music, read manga/manwha/manhua, listen to audiobooks and podcasts. I love playing video games, my platforms of choice at the PC, playstation and DS, they are a real good source for inspiration, especially anything by Squeenix, I love their twist on the traditional RPG, especially Valkyrie Profile and the Final Fantasy Games.

Who/what would you consider your influences?

Wow that's a hard question! I really look to the classics, I love the atmosphere of Gothic novels, I also get inspiration from fairytales and myths and Legends. I love Tanith's Lee's writing style and her boundless imagination. Pre-Raphaelite art, espically anything by Edward Burne-Jones.I look to history for knowledge and from my studies of the East.

Eh i'm too tired to write anymore, Also did I tell you I have OCD?? yeah apparently okies bye!

Old Novel Trailer

2010-05-04T14:13:00.000-07:00

I found this while routing around, it was a book trailer I did for an old novel of mine, the one before 'Hazards' that was my masterpiece.

The Unnamed Novel

2010-05-01T14:23:00.000-07:00

As of yet, it has no name. It does however have a semblance of a plot (note: I have only been thinking this up for two days, so don't expect much). Mot is a PRETA, a human made from the bodies of other humans and machinery, neither human nor machine, PRETAs were made to be expendable human resources, used in armies and in dangerous work they are the lowest of the low, they are also stigmatised because they are not born naturally, they are the ultimate Frankenstein's monster, they have no souls.
During the war however, most of the PRETAs were wiped out in a suicide attack to allow the human pilots to escape, some survived and rumours abound about a terrorist faction.

Mot emerged out of the Desert and meets an old Albino Chinese trader in a bar called Fang, taking a liking to Mot, he gives him a ride to the capital of the Empire, where he meets Fang's adopted daughter Durga, a pale faced girl with a withered arm. While walking the streets, Mot meets a man who he at first mistakes for a boy due to his stature, the man is singularly beautiful and finely dressed in the manner of nobility and he later learns this is the eternally young Prince, a man who has never grown fully and rumours abound that he is secretly a PRETA himself. When Mot and Durga attempt to sneak their way into the palace that night, everything changes when Durga is captured by the young Prince.

Characters:

Mot: A PRETA, about 30, brown hair in a ponytail, wistful, witty, with a sort of child-like innocence about the world.

Fang: A sleazy merchant who plays on the Confucius stereotype, has bad teeth, smokes alot, wise-cracks

Durga: A hard as nails girl with a mysterious past, red hair and dark eyes, she is an actress at the Noh theatre, her arm from the elbow is withered like a claw, she wishes more than anything to get her arm replaced with a PRETA arm but laws forbid it.

Vivien Gael XXXX : Prince, studies the Analects like a religion in order to atone for a past sin, looked down upon because of his girly face and short stature, is augustly noble and polite. Falls in love with Durga.

Dieudonne Loic XXXX : Younger brother of Vivien but is actually taller and more manly than he, is set to be the next heir as his brother is overlooked in favour of himself, vain, flamboyant, unintentionally cruel.

Mathieu XXXX XXXX: Older brother of Vivien and Dieudonne, gone missing.

Elizabet: Don't know much about her but she is a noble woman.

A funny and sweet story

2010-04-30T13:03:00.000-07:00

In order to beat my crippling Pure O O.C.D, (yeah I didn't think my mind could get any worse but yeah, apparently I had a sort of mini-breakdown due to stress and my o.c.d emerged out of this) I've been thinking up another story inspired by a city in FF XII (strange I know...), usually I wouldn't do this and try to fight to keep my intrest in 'Hazards' but if you know what Pure O, O.C.D is and what it's like to have it, then you'd understand (seriously, type it in to google) and I started reading fanfiction, I usually would abstain from fanfiction but I don't mind now if it distracts me and found this quite funny piece here

Me Reviews: The Path

2010-04-25T05:41:00.000-07:00

I had heard about the game many years ago when it was still in production and back then I was very intrigued in the premise.

The idea of the game revolves around the Red Riding Hood story, when you first start the game you are greeted by five girls, you as the mother send each one off to visit grandma with some wine and bread. The game starts out with said girl on "the path" with the words of her mother echoing in her mind "don't stray off the path" however the aim of the game is to stray off the path and enter a wood filled with psychologically imagery, if you just follow the path you receive the failure ending.

Each girl's travels through the forest is different, each will come across different items in the forest and depending on the girl can interact with them. These items including a rusty car, a television that plays nothing but static, a well, a treasure chest, a wheelchair and others, they invoke the girl to muse in her own way about the item therefore you learn more about her the more items you find.

As you travel through the forest you will encounter each girl's "wolf", in only one of the girls travels is the wolf an actual wolf, in others they are men or a mist creature or a young girl dressed in red. The wolf represents something traumatic that happened to the girl and after a cut scene with the wolf, the girls are returned to the path, lying there broken in the rain, each girl gets up and enters grandma's house where they are faced with a horrific journey through Grandma's house which reflects the traumatic experience.

I give this game a B+ because it is one of the best i've played but it also falls flat in several places.

First of all, I was a little put off by the fact that the girls were so broken by their experiences, and some of the girls for arbitrary reasons. Although each travel is vague and can be interpreted in different ways, the general consensus for one of the travels of Ginger was that it was about the trauma of menstruation and growing up, umm... I don't know why people have this idea that menstruation is "traumatic" it didn't bother me much, I just was a bit pissed that I would have to do this every month. I watched a cartoon on a site once about a girl going through menstruation who wakes up and starts rocking backwards and forwards in her bed because she's menstruated with the words "you're a woman now" eerily sung over it, I was just like... whaaat? it's not that bad... really!!

The travel I most liked was Carmen, which deals with a traumatic first time, as yes I can imagine how that would be traumatic and her rooms in grandmother's house reflect her confusion and trauma, however the others were a lot more vague in a sense that I couldn't really understand them at all. In Rose's her ending is that she gets in a boat and meets a torso dressed in a cloud, that's it... I felt as through the creators had run out of ideas and just threw this together. Also Scarlet's (which is my favourite but only because her wolf is the most handsome XD) which is where she plays the piano and the curtain closes on her. What's that about? I could only understand it as her becoming a failed musician.

I believed that though this was an amazing game with beautiful enviroments and eerie imagery, it failed on a human level. The gameplay is amazing especially the grandmother houses, which you walk through clicking to move with the shadows of the girls superimposing, but that it didn't really talk about proper traumatic issues.

The idea of the game is, that if you leave the path (i.e. conformity) and do the wrong things, like having sex with an older man, being involved in a drunk-driving crash, and failing as a muscian, then you have lived and experienced (which is mirrored by the forest girl at the end, whose white dress is smeared with the blood of experience) unlike just following all the rules.

However I wish that it had gone further, there are so many traumatic experiences that they could have done but didn't and the ones they did do, weren't really done well, such as Robin's (it was supposed to be about a young girl discovering her own mortality but I didn't get that at all), Scarlet's and Rose's. Carmen's and Ruby's were very good but they weren't the best. Themes they could have done: Death of a parent, unwanted pregnancy (which could also be about a miscarriage), being gay or lesbian or transgendered, loss of faith, sickness or illness, loneliness etc. etc.

All in all, I say play it, it's an experience which you won't regret but don't expect this to be any sort of real psychological look into the mind of a girl (just the fact that most of the wolves are male is one indicator, the girls didn't seem to have any problem with women which I find hard to believe).

Also it does get tedious after a while, since the forest is endless you can go for whole stretches without seeing anything, the girl's can also only run for a short time without getting out of breath. You can follow the white squiggles at the edge of the screen to find items but the squiggles don't dissapear once you've found the items, sometimes leading you back to the same damn bathtub every time!!

My Manga/Manhua/Manwha Keepers

2010-04-20T06:56:00.000-07:00

Inspired by this post over at Smart Bitches, I thought i'd share with you the books that mean so much to me. I don't know why they are comics, I'm not an Otaku and fell into manga just by chance. I think it's because I love art and so comics give me just what I adore, beautiful art and beautiful story telling:

1) Tale of the Moon (Japanese)

My favourite, the odd couple of Usagi and Hanzo is my favourite pairing! Love the artists artwork as well. The story is the tale of a young girl Usagi, who falls in love with Hanzo the head of some ninja clan. Though born a ninja herself, she is very bad at it! Usagi is told to marry Hanzo after he is jilted by Princess Sarah but he refuses to marry her due to her inability, how she wins him over is so sweet and endearing :D. It's also one of the funniest comics i've read!

2) The Queen's Knight (Korean)
Oh I love this comic!!! It's the tale of Yuna, who while visiting a fairytale castle in Germany (the Swan castle) falls down a cliff and ends up in a fantasy world named Phantasma. Phantasma is a world of perpetual winter until the a "Queen" is chosen, the love of the Queen then brings spring to Phantasma. However the person who picks the Queen is the dark Knight Rieno whom all the Queen's fall in love with, because of his cold heart however he always rejects them, once she loses her love, winter once again comes to Phantasma and the Queen is dragged into the forest to die. Yuna attempts to break this circle but finds herself drawn to Rieno, will she also fail?. (Tokyopop stopped licensing this series :(, so I guess i'll never know)

3) Operation Liberate Men (Korean)

Another great comic. Suha is a girl who looks like a boy, one day she meets a strange man who kidnaps her and brings her to a world where the gender roles have been reversed and women rule over men. Thinking she is a boy he begs her to help them achieve gender equality in their world because of the type of world she comes from. This mysterious stranger turns out to be Ganesha, the concubine of the Queen, what follows is an amazing piece of work about how the world would be like is the genders were flipped. (Unfortunately also, the writer stopped writing this series due to illness but she may resume it)

4) Bara no Tameni (Japanese)

I read this online as it hasn't yet been licensed and is out of print in japan. The main character (I forget her name) is a young woman who is rather fat and ugly, when the comic starts she's just been dumped by her boyfriend who used her to appear kind. Her grandmother who looked after her since she was a child, dies and she is forced to find out what happened to her birth mother. Turns out her birth mother is a famous actress, who already has three other children from her various marriages living with her, one a famous actor whom the main character has loved since she was a young girl! This is a book that should have been a sitcom, it's just about how the main character deals with living in a house of insane selfish people and when it turns out that she may not been the daughter of the woman after all, weird incestous UST between Sumire (the guy she adores) and the very girly looking Aoi (who also may be in love with Sumire!) Haha!
(I also never found out what happened in this one, she gets married but... to who??)

So there you go my favourites!

Child Ballads

2010-04-19T11:01:00.001-07:00

(no, not Children's ballads, the guy who composed them, his last name was child)

A list of some of my favourites:

The Outlandish Knight (Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight)

The Cruel Sister

Twa Corbies

Tam Lin

Sir Patrick Spence

Matty Groves

King Henry

2010-04-18T15:34:00.000-07:00

I wish I could have seen them live! I may still... but it's not the same :(. Ah why wasn't I born in the folk hey-day!

I love this ballad! This is up there with my favourites, the eerie violin and the haunting chanting. I love the story of this, a hideous female ghost demands that the King do whatever she commands, including killing all his animals and lying down to sleep with her. The opening stanza:

Let never a man a wooing/ that lacketh these things three/ a store of gold/ An open heart/ and full of charity

So true :P. This is how all relationships should be haha, the man doing everything the woman wants!

Haha I kid, Chivalry is it's own reward.

Sex!!

2010-04-13T15:10:00.000-07:00

Yes, it's what i'm going to talk about today.

I've never written a sex scene before, Sei and Cerys from my second unfinished novel, almost got there but Sei backed off because of his feelings for Heloise. However when thinking up 'Hazards' I knew instinctively that I was ready... ready to write a sex scene! However there were problems with this... mainly the fact that I myself am inexperienced, am I ashamed, no, why should I, as a Christian I only believe with sex with love (as for marriage... I'm unsure, I would have to think about that when I got a boyfriend) as for others, why judge?

Angelique and Rana are the two who I chose to do the dirty deed! In fact it was one of the reasons I wanted to write Hazards and I also wanted to write a sex scene that was filled with love and not lust (don't worry it won't be cheesy) and I did my research, I would like to thank Erotica romance :P

For Angelique it's not her first time (she is a concubine after all) but her first time was traumatic, I was reading this article and found this very interesting:

Call it the age of coyness, at least ideally. John Polidori, the first to mingle vampires and noblemen, wrote that his vampire, Lord Ruthven, in the story “The Vampyre: A Tale,” seduced women so that they were “hurled from the pinnacle of unsullied virtue, down to the lowest abyss of infamy and degradation.” In fact, so sullied were they, that they became wantons who cared nothing for their reputations or those of their families.

This is what St. Grieve percieved happened to Angelique and why he lusts after her, after losing her virginity and her power, she is forced to become Guy's concubine, she goes from the pinncile of "percieved" virtue (the sort of artemis type) to the sultry and disgraced concubine who turns away no one.

However for Angelique it is different, as a virgin and with the sacred spear that Reynadine gave her for preserving her virginity, it gave her power over men, she believed herself untouched. When she is seduced and then betrayed by her lover, she falls into seeking sexual gratification to soothe her pain and ends up being betrayed so much by her lovers that she ends up a broken bird and rejects Rana's pure if naive love.

In the end she is neither virtous, nor disgraced. She just loves and is loved and has sex because she loves. ^^

Neoromance

2010-04-09T16:09:00.000-07:00

Phew...

Anyway, I am not someone who is constrained by their intrests to what is available in my country, as you can see from my posts about Angel Myth. If there's something that I love but it's in another language that won't stop me, I have books that I bought in German even though I don't know German and books in Chinese (which cost me a lot to ship from Taiwan XD) even though I don't know Chinese. I know google Translate like the back of my hand, and used it before they even had a lot of languages to use!

I love otome games from Japan and even though they don't sell them here, I manage to get a little dose from these two places: Neoromance and NeoRomance Love, oh and Harvest moon of course :D.

I usually refrain from playing Otome in a contemporary setting, but that creeps me out a little, why play when I can just go out in real life and do it? But I set that aside when a found a very good english Otome that someone had made called Re:Alistair. It follows the story of a young girl who plays online games, when after defeating a difficult boss her loot is stolen by a rude player, intent on getting back her prize, she tells him that she can figure out who he is in real life in less than a month as by a fluke of loss of internet connection she realises they go to the same school. It's up to you then to figure it out while finding love on the way :D.

This game was really well orchestrated, not to mention, the graphics and the mystery which pulls you in. I went for Travis by the way :P.

I need a hamster wheel

2010-04-08T16:37:00.000-07:00

First before I ramble on, I'm not really crazy as that last post may imply, but let me put some ground work down for you. Imagine that for two and a half years you have done nothing, everyday you got up and you did... nothing... you saw, no-one, you life revolved around a tiny dark damp room and you only got to leave that room only for six hours every week in which you sat in a big room where no-one talked to each other, (unless, thank goodness for them, they were doing history or english). Oh, and what can you do in your spare time? MIND-NUMBINGLY BORING ESSAYS AND READING.

No I'm not in prison, this is what is called University... I am suffering from stir-crazy, usually i'm as normal a person as you or me, but right now... guh. I wish I could just drop out and get a friggin job, I feel like one of those mothers who have to spend all day with their kids! Or Bertha Mason from Jane Eyre, she wasn't mad! she was just crazy because all she could do was sit at home all day!

Man I don't know what those women did in the past, but I think I might die, can you die? from not doing anything?

The problem is my degree course has about five, friggin people on it... everyone else is best friends with each other because they have language classes together, we don't! We Eas students call them merely by whatever clique they are in. Man, I should have done a better degree -_- but no, I had to be special!

(Yeah Yeah Yeah, i'm sure you're university days were filled with booze filled bliss and joy -_-)

I Spam You

2010-04-07T04:40:00.000-07:00

With a meme!! Sorry but... I had to do it, also I'm a university student I have 24 hours off a day, I have to fill it somehow.

What’s the last thing you wrote?

Before 'Hazards' it was a novel called 'The Queen of the World's End'

Was it any good?

I stopped writing it because my writing skill had changed and the beginning no longer matched up with the end. Therefore it wasn't very well written but it still has the best plot I have ever come up with.

What’s the first thing you ever wrote that you still have?

'The Line of Peace' I wrote it just before I went to High school, it detailed the first adventure of a character who had been with me from childhood, my sort of alter-ego, Anika.

She was a portal shifter, someone who travelled from earth to distant worlds to help them out, she had a locket which was given to her by her sort of "guardian angel" whose name kept changing overtime but I know now him as Celestin. In the 'Line of Peace' she had a line on her wrist that when it dissapeared completely, the world she was trying to save would be destroyed.

I only managed like 5 pages, but Anika had many other stories in my head, including getting married and having a child. In fact she was the cornerstone of all my stories back then as her husband's family tree branched out and each one of them had different stories and her children's children had stories and her guardian married her clone *_*, really he should have married her... but she had already married Vaughn >_<, that story was the saddest one as he had to let her go to marry him *sniff*, ah nostalgia!!

Write poetry?

Of course, like all angsty teenagers, you can still find it over at DA.

Angsty poetry?

Of course!

Favourite genre of writing?

Fantasy setting, Romance at the centre of the plot.

Most fun character you ever wrote?

Anika, because she was a total Mary Sue and I never indulged myself like that ever after.

Most annoying character you ever wrote?

Annoying... huh, well if I get annoyed by a character I usually stop writing them, but I guess right now it would be Iris, Rana's servant, she loves Rana too much and will never end up with him, it's so tragic...

How often do you get writer’s block?

I'm still not sure what this means, I believe being unable to write, I suppose. So as I said before I get it all the time. My inspiration is a fickle thing. Also right now i'm not as mentally well as I would like to be so it can be hard to write or have inspiration.

How do you fix it?

Just write, write, write and edit, edit, edit until it is done.

Write fan fiction?

Once I wrote it, with a friend. Never again after that.

Do you type or write by hand?

Type, when I was younger I used to have a notebook i'd write in, with my back against the door so my parents couldn't come in XD, that led to many hilarous mistaken beliefs my parents had about what I was doing! Now however I type with my thumbs and index fingers and sometimes my third finger it depends where the keys are on the keyboard because my handwriting is so bad even I can't read it when i go back. When I type in front of people, they all go "aaaah you type so fast" my reaction is... well I've been writing novels for over seven years, of course I type fast!

Do you save everything you write?

Yes, I horde so much stuff my "My Documents" folder has to be backed up seperately.

Do you ever go back to an old idea long after you abandoned it?

No, never. Sometimes I may use an idea from a discarded novel in a new novel but it will always be different. If I stop writing something it was because something was fundamentally wrong with it, so I never look back.

What’s your favourite thing that you’ve written?

I guess it would be 'Hazards' right now :D, though as always I tustle with it.

What’s everyone else’s favourite thing that you’ve written?

According to my DA, it would be a short fairytale I wrote called "The Umbrella Man"

What’s your favourite setting for your characters?

Dark gothic castles, wide sweeping fairytale landscapes, heavenly palaces and norse settlements.

What’s one genre you have never written, and probably never will?

Anything in a contemporary setting, sorry it bores me. (Oh wait... I did write that one novel... but uh... lets not talk about that heh heh)

How many writing projects are you working on right now?

One. I can onl ever work on one.

Do you want to write for a living?

No, no way. I cannot write without doing something else. I am a passionate person, to sit at home all day with just my novel would be living hell for me. I have to go out and about and do day to day things, my novel is my hobby, not my life.

Have you ever written something for a magazine or newspaper?

No I write rather dark things... haha

Have you ever won an award for your writing?

Nope.

Ever written something in script or play format?

yes, unfortunately....

What are your five favourite words?

Love, wings, bright, heaven, blood.

What character that you’ve written most resembles yourself?

Cerys from QOWE, she was a mirror of myself in all her glorious insecurity.

Where do you get ideas for your other characters?

From other books i've read/parts of myself or people from history, like St. Grieve, he was an amalgamation of a man from revolutionary era france and Dom Claude Frollo in Hunchback.

Do you ever write based on your dreams?

I think I did once, however a scene with Naoise in 'Hazards' is based on a dream I had about a fictional computer game I was playing, where there was a cutscene with a lonesome man standing in a garden smelling a rose.

Do you favour happy endings, sad endings, or cliff-hangers?

it depends on the book, books like Hunchback, I don't mind. Books with Romance however HAVE to end happily or I get angry XD.

Are you concerned with spelling and grammar as you write?

Spelling, oh man yes, grammer not so much. If word goes all green on me, I try to figure out why. I think my grammer has (hopefully) improved.

Does music help you write?

Yes, yes yes! I listen primarily to folk music because they tell stories and therefore I get inspiration from them. Actually my use of the word "wan" has increased after listening to The Blacksmith XD. Also music does inspire me, Blind Guardian helped me get back into 'Hazards' but I can't have music on too loud, as long as it's background music I don't mind :D.

Quote something you’ve written. The first thing to pop into your mind.

Um.... from a poem, said by an oracle.

"An easy steal for someone like you, who sacrificed the power of the Peris, for a black hearted Harlot"

On Strong Women

2010-04-07T02:59:00.000-07:00

Though I disagree with Yo Su Lan's views on Christainity, I'm still a big fan of hers. I started looking into other work she had done like "the Fire King" and "Dark Princess". Since she doesn't have an English site (not yet anyway), I had to use google translate on her webpage, and hopefully you can understand this quote (here she is describing her main female character in dark princess):

This is my favorite female role, but I think a lot of female readers may be disagreement with my views on it? @@ @ @
Female personalities of the characters were said to be not a good personality (such as echo), if the point was hate tough ─ ─ woman anyway, as long as they are not pleasant, right? ="= = "=

I just hate to pretend to be in front of men on the delicate, private fierce cruel woman too!
So, I Dakelisi definitely have the capacity of self-reliance, when necessary, she will be more reliable than men!
Anyway, this is what I like women.

Really I couldn't agree more! I also hate the idea of pretending in front of men to be delicate and I can't believe that people thought that Hui Sheng (the main character of Angel Myth, here refered to as Echo, as that is the literal translation of her name) was a bad character! I liked her, she seemed a really real character and someone I myself could relate to, she had friends but was also a loner, she was quite strict with herself and others, in fact a lot like me XD. I guess she is different from usual comic heroines, I can only really relate to the manga heroines i've witnesses who are in their own way good characters, who are always eager to please, sweet and love everyone around them and who are often saved by the Hero.. huh, actually that describes western heroines quite well also XD.

I wonder then what readers will think of Angelique and Maudlin, intresting :D.

Uh.... whaat?

2010-04-06T15:39:00.000-07:00

An except from writer, talking about (what I think) is his writing process (gotten from here):

In a general sense, I write elliptically. By that I mean I open sections with some detail I want to resonate throughout the entire section, and through the course of writing that section you can imagine me tapping that bell again and again. Until with the final few lines, I ring it one last time – sometimes hard, sometimes soft, depending on the effect I want, or feel is warranted. It’s become such a habit now that I often do it without conscious thought.

On a most basic level it shows up in paragraphs (and no, there’s nothing unique to me in any of this). Look two paragraphs upward on this screen. The opening line talks about multiple points of view; the last line describes the many ways of seeing the world. But that last line isn’t just reiterating the first one. Something is added (in this case, a personal comment on my desire to experience every one of them). It’s probably the only structural lesson I learned in school that I still use on occasion – the whole introductory and concluding sentences to frame a paragraph.

uuuuh.... what?? I'm sorry but I can't understand this at all, the ringing of the bell? what? Is being completely incomprehensible a new kind of writing now? I realise that many people expect a writer to write online as they do in their novels... if this is so with that guy then... I mean I don't mind things that are hard to read if they are from another time, but this is the modern day! Write in contemporary style! dammit! However it is not as bad as this:

When buzz first began to build about Peter V. Brett, it wasn’t his debut novel, The Warded Man (REVIEW), everyone was talking about. Rather, it was about the Blackberry-like device he wrote the majority of the novel on, during his morning commute. Once readers got their hands on The Warded Man, the seriousness of Brett’s achievement became readily apparent – not only had he written a novel during his morning commute, using little more than his thumbs, he’d written a good novel during his morning commute. A damn good novel.

I'm sorry but are you f-ing kidding me (see I censor myself, oh the pain), on the communte! on a blackberry! argh this just makes me want to rage! The kind of effort you put into a novel is not something you can tap out on a dirty train, cramped against stinky passengers while simultaneously being rattle from side to side and listening to the girl two seats down chatting loudly about some guy she f***ed (see did it again) last night! Ugh, Argh... I just... argh!!!

I realised that if I ever did become famous (remember if, I said if... I am not big headed!!!) that I would make all sorts of big headed (ha!) mistakes! Like Nicholas Sparks and his "Jane Austen just did the same story over and over again" and "I am not a romance writer!" Like doing the above thing and writing like a moron -_-, I hope I never forget the fans or anything like that or become a "reclusive writer" or like that guy in that Frasier episode *shudder*

Also I decided that I may stop writing about my novel here because

1) it leads to crummy sentimental posts like the last one... which no one wants to read and diminishes my story by relating it to cliches -_-... man, did I actually write the phrase "warrior women" what was I on?

2) I get a sense of horrible insecurity that I am writing about it here and yet (here is the most big headed thing of all) people aren't flocking here in the dozens (oh man... -_-) I know that a family tree and a few posts doesn't even make a dint on the plot of my overall story but anything that makes me hesitate over the faith I have in my writing has to be eliminated or I will stop writing that novel all together (yup! I am that fragile!)

However then on the other hand, the reason I created this blog in the first place was to talk about my novel and I even named it after the dream I had where I was a published writer and had a website called Cloak and Candle, and after all this is my blog, if you don't like it then pants... you don't have to read it, but then... (ok I really shouldn't write this late at night and being lonesome from being stuck in all day -_-)

I'll think about it tomorrow... hahahah XD.

Mad Maudlin

2010-04-05T15:49:00.001-07:00

Maudlin is the main antagonist of my novel but she is in no way a villain, I do not wish for her to be seen as evil, though she does things that would consist of that. Maudlin is a mirror image of Angelique, both start out as fierce warrior women, who act like and are the equals of men in their society, both break the boundary between the sexes, Maudlin breaking the patrilineal line to become Queen of Opis and Angelique becoming a sort of Joan of Arc character. However both branch off in different directions, Maudlin becomes so strong she becomes unfeeling, and unable to feel empathy she does horrible things and remains untouchable. Angelique however allows herself to become weak and vunerable and is betrayed for it, her resolution to overcome the terrible things that happened to her make her stronger than Maudlin and in the end she prevails.

I think that this is my brains way of telling me that, after what happened to me, I chose to remain a kind and feeling person, rather than become someone cruel and unfeeling even though I knew I would be hurt again in the future.

However Maudlin's character is in no way wrong, in fact she is a vessel through which I pour out my own anger at the sexist things that have happened to me and the utter revulsion I feel about the idea that all girls are so kind and sweet. There is nothing feminine about her, nor is she the epitome of masculinity, she exists to break the female sterotype and Rana the male.

Angelique's Body

2010-04-04T15:30:00.000-07:00

I make it clear in my novel that Angelique is not thin, she like me has what I like to call a pre-raphaelite body :D (not even sure if that's correct... ah well) considering she's a concubine, you can see how i'm making a statement.

Review: Jodhaa Akbar

2010-04-04T09:17:00.000-07:00

After loving Om Shanti Om, I asked a friend of mine about some good bollywood films to watch. After poo-pooing my taste in films, (she does love the films XD) she recommended Jodhaa Akbar to me and here is my review!

Actually it was really intresting for me, I know quite a lot about ancient cultures in Europe and the Far East but nothing much about India, I also don't know much about Muslim involvement there either, so I found it intresting to watch a story about a Muslim King and a Hindu Queen.

Basic Plot:
Akbar is the heir to some kingdom or other and wants to take over the whole of Hindustan, as a boy he shows a tendancy to be lenient and kind, especially to his
prisoners whom he refuses to kill even though his regent says he must. He grows up and so does his ambition, meanwhile Jodhaa is growing up as well, she has a foster brother who she sees as her real brother and they get on well and fight together.
Jodhaa has a condition for marriage and that is her brother should inherit the throne along with her real brother (or something like that) but her father refuses and makes him subordinate (even though his father was king before Jodhaa's father) he leaves in a huff.
Jodhaa's father gets all antsy because the Muslims (that is Akbar) are winning battle after battle (oh and something else I don't remember) so he betrothes Jodhaa to Akbar and a romatic story ensues!

The costumes in this are beautiful! I especially love Jodhaa's dresses, with the beautifully coloured veils, if only I were thin enough to wear those kind of clothes! with the tight short top and all :D.

The settings are beatiful as well, I love the palaces and the shots of the landscape and as for the story, yes it's intresting, I knew immediately that this would be an Epic story, it reminded me very much of European historical movies and folklore, with the "I won't marry you until you win my heart!"

I liked the story, but then I'm a sucker for the arranged marriage turns into love theme :D but I have a low threshold for gagging romance however... I had to have the VLC media player up in the corner of the screen so I could click off whenever a romance scene got too cring worthy for me >_< aaargh...

Also it does suffer from unintentional hilarity due to low budget/bad directing a la the Merlin film haha... the flying axe :D. Also don't expect too much from the characters, they are like many legends, cut-outs of social norms... I may have talked about this before somewhere... hmm...

So if you like, pretty costumes, epic historical stories, bollywood singing (the singing was good but you might want to fastforward they get pretty long sometimes...)
then look this up :D.

More Writing Techniques

2010-04-02T12:44:00.000-07:00

As I write a learn more and more about my writing style. When I was younger, I would run out of steam after about 50 pages (even that), give up and start something new. After that I started writing full length novels, my first was Verglas which wasn't very good, I wrote that in high school (english high school, that is 11-15) the second was Queen of the World's End, which I started in College and gave up on last year. The problem I had with them was that I would just keep writing not thinking about what I was putting down, I would scoff at people who had writers block, but now I realise I have the most writers block of all!

If I don't have inspiration then my scenes fall flat, which is considering I don't plan, which is bad, I should plan but I find planning takes all the excitment out of writing. However right now i've devised a way around it, by re-writing my scenes after i've written then, kind of like shining a diamond until it's brillant, if you know what I mean but without inspiration... they really aren't as good, so i'm trying my best to re-inspire myself. The problem is also that I forgot most of the story when I went back to University *sigh* annoying...

Hopefully in the summer, I will be able to re-start where I left off, as none of my work has been as good as the work I did last summer on Hazards. So hopefully *crosses fingers*, my muses are pretty men (i'm not kidding XD) so i'll get a hunting pretty man pictures :P.

Problems of the Faith

2010-03-31T18:03:00.001-07:00

I'm taking a break from translating You Su lan's Angel myth, not because of the problems I have with google translate but it's beginning to annoy me...

I never thought of myself as a conservative Christan, I've never boycotted a movie because it had the word "damn" in or not read Harry Potter or stopped playing RPGs because they had "magic" in but sometimes I do get pissed...

And it's the wrong kind of pissed, really... I haven't got much confidence really, i'm struggling to make that transition from child to adult and I don't have much confidence in my faith. Don't get me wrong, I love my God and will always be loyal but I hadn't read the bible in a while (i'm re-reading it now) and my faith had dwindled away, after I stopped going to Church as I didn't feel welcome in a place where most of the congregation were middle class, white people who stuck their nose up at a friend of mine who wanted to take pictures of the inside of the church. So my relationship with God was and is lacking, I feel i can no longer pray with conviction and I only pray once at night when i go to sleep.

However I can't argue my faith with an atheist and I get uncomfortable around people who slag off my faith, the bible says don't be ashamed so I do speak out but then feel stupid afterwards... -_-... I always had the idea of myself as a lowly servant of the Lord, one who can't argue theologically but believes and loves with all her heart.

Even now i'm not sure however, my love has been replaced with an avid fear of don't playing by the rules, Jesus spoke badly of these kind of people, those people who follow god's rules but have no love... I do love but I fear my wish to only do the right thing has encroached on it.

Anyway back to Angel Myth, I just can't deal with some of the things it says, like God is a liar and had shown propaganda to his angels and the devil is the underdog who just - can't - catch - a - break *sniff cry cry* straying once more into dark materials/neo-paradise lost era. Sometimes I feel so dirty translating those kind of phrases... her world building is so intent on judeo-christian myth I can't get away from it. However I keep going because i've never seen a character like Gabriel before, who inspires me.

I know these things shouldn't bother me, it wouldn't have done several years ago, after all that's her opinion and she's entitled to it and it's just a story but I just don't like it, i feel personally affronted and as guilty as ever!. I think it's because I don't know much about my faith anymore, about what is really written in the Bible and as I read more and more I feel guilty less and less, the God she writes about isn't my God, neither are her angels or her world.

So I may return later, but right now, I need a break.

Another Dream

2010-03-27T04:30:00.001-07:00

I usually dream when i'm at home as I generally sleep in more and have a more comfortable bed (and it's not cold either :P) I woke up this morning thinking "I want my baby back!" Usually I have dreams about either a) being pregnant or b) having an arranged marriage. This was one of the first times where I actually dreamt I had a child.

I wasn't married, in fact I had taken a year out of university or something like that and was living at home. The father was a dark-haired skinny, somewhat emo looking kid who lived locally (I don't actually know anyone like this) and he was one of those people you would term a "bad boy", someone who I knew wouldn't be a good father or husband, so he would come visit every now and again with his girlfriend. The girlfriend was a bit miffed but I wasn't intimidated by her, he had to do his share of the responsibilty.

Anyway it turns out that we had had sex because of the peer pressure of our friends, since both of us were single at that time or something like that and we had forgotten about contraception. (our friends had also watched to make sure we did it, what's wrong with my brain??)

The baby I had had was a boy but I kept thinking it was a girl XD and I couldn't make up my mind what I wanted to call it, I kept thinking Vivec LOL! But the child never cried! not once, I kept thinking to myself, why isn't my baby crying? Whenever I left the child with my mother I couldn't hear the baby crying. It's just a quiet baby I told myself.

Anyway when I woke up and realised it wasn't real, I really wanted my baby back :(.

Pros and Cons of Games

2010-03-24T09:44:00.000-07:00

So playing Dragon age: awakenings I was thinking about how different my "must buy" games are from each other. While playing through I was thinking about how many of the quests and environs reminded me of other games I had played, named Oblivion and FFXII (the run around and collect bottles quest) So I decided... to make a COMPARISON! haha.

Bethesda.
Oblivion/Morrowind.
Ah, I love this series. I have been buying the games ever since Morrowind and have every expansion pack (I think, they may have brought out some for Oblivion I haven't seen yet)
Pros:
- Love, Love, Love the quests in this game because there are so many and for different factions, so there is always something to do. The quests aren't dry either, often they have twists I never saw coming.
-Enviroments, Bethesda are so good at creating an atmosphere among Morrowind/Oblivion. I mean I had never seen something like Vivec before, a sort of compound city, amazing. I like how people in different cities have different armour and different races, nothing is missed.
-Lore, amazing! I spent hours in Morrowind readings books in the library (not so much in Oblivion) my favourites were the one called Pelle or something like that, about a man who is in love with a statue and turns it accidentally into a monster and the Vivec verses :D.
- Culture, as I said before each place in Morrowind at least had different cultures and I really enjoyed running around Oblivion doing all the Gods quests. The depth of the world is amazing.
- Do what you want, You know you don't have to do any quests if you don't want. You can buy a house, wear a nice dress, go to the church, eat at the tavern, go home and sleep. You could just live a normal life!
-Lots of loot! You can find lots of nice weapons and armour around, you're not confined to one nasty piece of armour.
- Don't take my stuff! Yeah I like how people get angry if you take their things!
-Story, loved Morrowind's plot, especially the whole Neverine thing, it was nothing that had been done before which was shocking (but I think it was based around Hindu myths, so foreign to our culture) Oblivion... mmm....

Cons:
- Lonesome, yes I get lonely. Your character has no family or friends, you spend your days raiding tombs and dungeons and what do you come back to, an empty house :(. (However in Morrowind you did have your "servants" but hell... not the same) I get lonely especially in morrowind as everyone is so RACIST! but you know at least Martin liked you in Oblivion XD.
- Too hard, in Morrowind at least. It took forever to get past Lvl 2 (not to mention I was trying to be a healer and a fighter at the same time -_-)
- Fugly NPCs, seriously...
- You can be ANYTHING! I joined the mages and the fighters guild and the assassin guild and the thieves guild, so really I could do anything without any consequences :(.
- Killing Lucian in Oblivion :( you bastards.
- No Romance option, come on!
- You are genderless, even if I pick the female option, i'm not treated any differently then if I was a man, the real world doesn't work that way :(.
-Dungeon fatigue, I get so bored of going through the same old tunnel all the time with the creepy music, I used to get so frustrated when someone sent me to a cave. I really really hate it. Oh and then someone thought it would be fun to have Oblivion gates, I was so happy when they all got closed. Hated them so much...
- The people with Corpus whatever, ugh they creep me out.
- Really tho the main beef I have is the loneliness, it really gets on my wick!!
- Can't get through without cheats (sorry i'm not a hardcore gamer... like that bit at the end of Morrowind where you needed such and such strength to open the door, not fun)
- Not warm fuzzy feeling, it's a cold cold world out there.
- The walking corpses in Oblivion and the sound they make ugh.

Bioware/whoever else
Neverwinter Nights/Dragon Age
Ah another series I love :D. Also have all the games and all expansion packs, even though I didn't play the last expansion for NWN2 the merchant one :(.

Pros:
-Romance!! YAY!
- Not lonely, not at all. You have your little rag-tag band and I grew to love them all! World doesn't appear so cold with them.
- Really good fighting system, I loved being a Cleric so much I always picked it.
- Hilariously funny, the dialogues between your characters and between your character and NPCs especially in NWN2. I will always remember, when we came into contact with a desire demon in NWN: Sand: stand aside i'll handle this! Khelgar: One more step and you'll be kissing the paving stones! XD.
- Amazing characterisation, I'm not kidding, I have fallen in love with about two male characters from these games (neither were canon romance interests hahaha)
- Good storylines, especially Hordes of the Underdark <- my fav
- Puzzles, yep sometimes it's nice to have them pepper up the dungeon exploration.
- Linear, unlike Morrowind/Oblivion

Cons
- Same old same old, uses the cliche fantasy world, DA darkspawn = orcs. Also they stole so much from Lotr the film XD like the part where the darkspawn march out.
- Closed world, not as big as Oblivion
- not as big lore, though more in NWN, cut down in DA.
- Not continous, because these games keep getting swapped from game department to game department they won't always be the same, like that last expansion back for NWN2 (not mask) what was that about??
- Throw a massive monster at you as a boss... *yawn*
- Your friends can betray you ;_;
- I feel geeky playing it, dark elves? Am I playing D & D??
- Only one/two love intrests, let me at the older men dammit!
- DA -> got rid of all the good parts of NWN2 like, stats based on your childhood (flirt, bully etc), choosing your own God (now it's just the Maker), More classes (than just Rogue, Mage, Fighter) and most of all only the conversation choices, you now only have three (neutral, nice and dickhead) it's impossible therefore to be lawful evil or chaotic neutral, bring back that system dammit!
- Bad Camera angles, in NWN but not in DA
- Hordes of Undead (actually this is true in oblivion)
- DA <- you are asexual again, even as a girl no one treats me differently really...
- No consequences, just like in Oblivion/Morrow, this I suppose is the game creators way of not making you feel guilty, I was furious to find out my character could have killed Loghain with a smile, ugh... Don't make me feel better game FGS! you're supposed to be "dark fantasy"
- BAD sex scenes *cringe*
- Alistair... need I say more?
- Characters suddenly becoming noble so as to molly coddle you, happened in DA when my character had Loghain on the team, up till then he had been the villain then suddenly he was willing to sacrifice himself so I didn't have to... whaaa??? Same with the whole sleep with Morrigan thing, the men obviously don't have a say XD (I was glad that it gave me the option to refuse but really... it stunts my own ability to create my own story)However in NWN this wasn't the case, in Hordes, your female companion will betray you at the end because of her past. Also it's more based on how much you sweet-talked them like in NWN2 Sand and Bishop would betray you if you didn't up their affection.

Huh, there's more cons than pros there but really actually, NWN/DA are really good (NWN is better than DA in my opinion, story-wise and also no Alistair...)

JRPGs
Final Fantasy, Valkyrie Profile, Fire Emblem, uuuh... the rest.
I play a few JRPGs but not many, my Japanese quota is usually taken up by Harvest Moon but now and again I stray over.

Pros:
-Taken over from the west in terms of Folklore, they use the "evil aristocratic family"/arthurian thing really well, so I find a lot of inspiration from these games.
-Beautiful environments, especially VP
-Nice romantic stories *loving sigh*
-Good characterisation :D
-Quite dark, it's nice that not everything always goes right for the characters unlike in western games. Also more sexual I suppose... :P
-Really good fighting systems, here's looking at you FFXII
-Nice music (sometimes...)
-Good bosses which force you to have strategies rather than just hack/slash.
-Pretty men ^^

Cons:
-Boy as main character (unfortunately, unlike the others I can't choose to be a lady :( )
- Too hard and then some... I often can't beat the final boss sometimes without a guide (I fail at games :D) Also what is up with collecting 5000 of one bit of something that fell off something to get a rare weapon or stabbing a tree a thousand times until you win a shield? I don't have time! I just want to play the story!
- weird life lessons, um thanks...
- The enviroment is ALL!! Also I know nuclear war is a horrible thing, I don't need a thinly veiled aesop to tell me that.
- Stabs at Christainity, I don't mind as long as you don't completely misunderstand... like FF10, yeah I get it's supposed to the Catholic church in the past but c'mon! Sin as a big scaly thing? your dad becoming the messiah or something? (oh wait, it has Seymour and an forced marriage, my fav so I guess it wasn't all bad)
- Sexist, couldn't get through Star Ocean, ugh...
- Silly genki girls *stabs eyes out*
- Bad pairing, why do you like her/him? (FFVIII i'm looking at you)
- Make them gay for the fans

that's all I can think of right now XD hahah... I love to complain.

-

Expansion Pack!

2010-03-22T17:31:00.000-07:00

Playing Dragon Age Awakening, Not as good as Dragon age so far (and I expect better from bioware, Mask of the Betrayer in some eyes outsucceeded Neverwinter Nights 2 (I however loved NWN 2, it's still up there in my list of best games EVA!)

Suffering and Shame

2010-03-21T16:33:00.000-07:00

Right now I'm sort of lost at sea...

Being at university had exhausted me mentally and physically. I feel often that I can no longer continue, often I fall into sort of "breakdowns". It might just be a simple thing, an argument with one or both my parents, a teasing remark from a friend, an accidental embarrassment but that's enought to set me off.

When I get into these phases, I completely lose all control. I lose all my self esteem, become a pathetic wreck sobbing my heart out, believe I am alone in the world etc. etc. Often I have suicidal thoughts, but really I would never do such a thing (please don't think i'm so silly to do that), I want to live but sometimes the pain is so immense I can't bear to continue on.

I recently had one of these "breakdowns" a few days ago and i'm still reeling from it (I actually rang up the Samartians because I couldn't deal with it, I feel ashamed about that now because of the stigma (only suicidal maniacs ring them right?). My mind is completely in the air, after I got told that I might be suffering from depression.

Whatever I have, I want a name for it and if I don't have it, I want to move on with my life. It's so hard to work and have a relationship with people right now, I just don't have the energy.

So that's why I think I might leave Uni. I love my degree and my course but I just can't continue like this. Ugh...

Sunset Over Imdahl

2010-03-18T03:58:00.000-07:00

I thought I would mention this game here. I played this game sometime ago after finding it randomly on a games site. At first I didn't think it was anything special, boy was I wrong. This game though seeming simple on the surface, is amazingly told.

You follow the story of a young boy whose city has been decimated by a plague, you met a strange man who tells you you can stop it and gives you the power to travel forwards and backwards in time.

As you travel you met different people, your friends and family who in the spring and summer are happy and living their lives but come autumn and winter you increasingly see the dark side of the world.

People rob you, betray you, even those who you thought were your close friends because the need to eat has driven them to it. It's a heartwrenching scene of human desperation.

The twist is also very well done, I didn't see it coming and the end scene is fantastic. The use of the tombstone to show the future was an intresting device.

I recommend this game to all of you, even if you aren't a gamer, it's just so poignant and I'm impressed (and i'm not easily impressed.

You can download it here

Character Tree

2010-03-13T13:57:00.000-08:00

My Novel is very complex, and it will only continue to get bigger and bigger. Right now I've tried to sort out all the character ties. This is majorly spoilerific and I had doubts about putting it up here, however if I ever do publish the book, I will take it down immediately :P (you think i'm big headed again right ;D), try reading from Roscilla/Baldwin and then across, it's easier to read that way. Oh and I used Genopro for the program.

The reason I wrote this novel was to give a big "fuck you" to the sort of stories that are written today, where people in power are just, where consequences of actions don't matter and lovers live happily ever after. Also where girls are pure, beautiful things who live only for men and relationships. The characters Alys and Maudlin are rejections of this trope, Alys murders her lover for sexual gratification and asexual Maudlin uses all sorts of dirty tactics to gain political power. Really though I'm not trying to start off some "movement" I just want to write a story like the Arthur tales, you know, where Arthur is betrayed by his wife, he isn't the great king he was supposed to be, his father wasn't particularly noble in seducing Igraine. Where people are real people, who fail and have weaknesses and things don't just work out because it's fiction.

Capetian Family Tree

2010-03-13T10:00:00.000-08:00

As for the last post, huh, well... we shall see...

Now you all know i'm a Medieval History buff and I love the Capetians (I love Louis VII, my Ipod is named after him, even if he didn't really "man up"). I base a lot of my stories around the drama that happens with royal familys :D. So while doing some character charts I was searching for a nice geneology of them and found one here. The problem is, I really want a chart with bastard children and mistresses also included. I think this will be hard to find~~

....

2010-03-11T04:19:00.001-08:00

Having a major breakdown. My university life might be over forever. I don't know.

Will be back soon....

But she did not die....

2010-03-09T10:08:00.000-08:00

Dragon Age has been finished, and so another chapter has closed on my orginal character histories. It's nice to have a certain game that you always pick up as more editions come out and expansions and so can continue your own unique story.

As I had decided, my character betrayed Alistair at the Landsmeet and saved Loghain's life. I had always prefered Loghain as you can probably tell. I wanted to save Loghain in all possible ways, so I had to sacrfice my love to do it (I didn't really like Alistair very much tho... ugh...) I also refused Moriggan's proposition, for obvious reasons *GRIN* though I was sad for her to leave and it broke my heart to find out about Alistair, if only you hadn't been so much of a pussy...

So in the end, I had to decide to sacrifice myself or Loghain, the choice was obvious. Sparrow sacrificed herself...

However, there is an expansion... I wonder what will happen in that story? *wink*

Robot Unicorn Attack!

2010-03-08T04:57:00.000-08:00

Do you remember the 80s? no? Well I don't, I'm not old and crusty like you hahaha. However I do watch a lot of crazy 80's films, like Karate Kid (well I haven't ever watched that) and Legend (Love it!) remember the crazy soundtracks they had, like this and this (HOT!)

Haha, I found this game off Fandomsecrets and man does it remind me of those kind of songs, so much that i'm off in the world of nostalgia and rainbows whenever I play it. Happily making that unicorn jump and smash into things, I love it! It's so 80's!

Alice In Ponderland

2010-03-07T09:58:00.000-08:00

Dear me what a dissapointment, only ten minutes in and I already knew it wasn't for me. It was in no way mad enough and the clash of Tim Burton and Disney was horrific, like a beautiful piece of artwork censored horribly with the last minute Disney morale tacked on offensively at the end.

I watch Beauty and the Beast when I'm feeling pure, I watch sleepy Hollow when i'm feeling bad. I couldn't handle this amalgamation!!

Alice discovered China??? HO HO HO... you'll regret it when the Opium wars break out my dear.

Mad Hatter was just Jack Sparrow in crazy make-up.

One thing however... hmm, I love my twisted relationships. So glad it wasn't censored out :DDD. I love me some Gothic themes, the byronic man coming on to the sweet young girl... haha~~~~ "I like them big" Oh ho ho~

P.s. Look see, I figured out how to do links. I understands the internets!!

Reviews

2010-02-28T10:33:00.000-08:00

I was thinking somewhat that this blog must be boring to the average internet user, I mean what does reading about my writing woes influence you? So I thought what am I good at and I realised complaining. So I'm gonna start doing reviews!! Huzzah!

The review i'm going to do is "The History of the West Wing":

Now I admit I bought this for the pretty pretty artwork, searching for a desktop one day I came across Guo Guo's work and sought out this book. I managed to get it for a bargain price on Amazon of around £1 not including shipping.

Now for those of you who know little of the East Asia this story may seem a little taunt to you, as it's based off a play. The person at Tiamat's reviews says this manga would have been better if it had been placed over several volumes but I know that that would be impossible, there just wouldn't be enough story. It's the same as european fairytales, you have the sterotypical characters who revolve around cultural norms. There's not much to discuss.

First off we have the interinant main character, a young man who is not girly enough for my tastes haha, who left his family and is travelling. He hasn't passed the exams to become liable for the civil service exams (a big deal in asia back then) so being a member of the class of literati he's sort of the equivalent of a unemployed person in our society.

He mets the main female character Pianpian, a renown beauty (of course) who men line up to catch a glimpse of at a temple (women weren't really allowed to leave the house, the only place that they were allowed to go with their galpals were temples and even this was heavily debated. Being a Buddhist was a bad thing for a woman back then, as... actually I won't go into a long spiel about this haha)
They meet in the ground of the temple then with the help of her fiesty maid (whom I liked :D) they met again later that night, much sexual symbolism later, Pianpain is obviously in love and doesn't want to marry the guy who has been set up for her.

Of course there's problems in the way of their romance. Since the travelling guy hasn't passed the exams their parents don't want them to get together, of course the guy is all "if I pass with a 1st then I can have her" (of course this is Gary Stu territory, it was almost nigh impossible to get a 1st back then, only a small percentage ever got the highest honours and many men spent their lives in misery unable to pass even the regional tests. You need to be versed in Mandarin and... actually I won't go into this XD) and they readily agree.

Also in a Pride and Predjucie sort of twist, turns out the guy Pianpian is engaged to is some drunken braggart who the guy knew before because he was dating his sister who is portrayed as a villain (I however loved her! I always love these sort of bitchy women "you bought me flowers, pffft... get down on your knees and beg for my love")
So the guy warns them, goes off and passes his exams with a first. However his old girlfriend arrives and tries to pin everything on the guy but the family aren't fooled and everyone lives happily ever after!

It's a typical sort of ye olde story, with blank characters fitting into moulds (but then again I haven't read the play but I know me some Chinese opera) however I didn't dislike it. It was worth it just for the guy's pouty ex-girlfriend :D and for Guo Guo's beautiful art (though I didn't really like the guy's depiction). There was one picture with I think the bitchy ex-girlfriend, putting on her make-up provocatively which I might use as a template for a scene with Angelique some time :P.

So there you go, I didn't dislike it but I didn't love it either :D

Manga at Harlequin

2010-02-26T09:18:00.001-08:00

You know I love me some pretty pretty girls swooning over guys :D

http://www.emanga.com/

Suffering for you art

2010-02-23T07:30:00.000-08:00

Oh my my my!!! I want to thank one person very much :DD and that is this person:

http://www.advancedfictionwriting.com/art/snowflake.php

(gosh I'm sorry I can't figure out how to do the whole hyperlink thing... if anyone knows how comment XD)

I've been having problems with my novel recently, I knew that it revolved around Rana in some way but I wasn't sure what it was. It had been so much on my mind for the last few weeks, a heavy burden on me. I kept trying to figure out what it was, what was wrong. Even when I wrote I felt that I was doing it wrong... and then searching in google for help I came across this.

I did he/she's little exercise involving character motivations and I realised... that Rana had lost his motivation! After he falls in love with Angelique, it's perfectly natural that he would turn against the Emperor, but I thought, why? why would he do that? and I realise that I hadn't given him any motivation in doing so! and so I have been left with a character who didn't know whether he was coming in going in terms of his loyalty to his lord.

Gosh I realised that I had been ignoring the Emperor's backstory, in favour of Rana's and Angelique's romance so that now that the whole "omg I love you" is over, I was left with nothing to do... I realise now that when I get some time, (probably after University this year) I need to do some serious work on the other parts of the story than Rana/Ange.

However this is ok, I only started the novel seven months ago and it takes me a lot of time to figure out a novel properly, I think it took two years for QOWE, however I just kept writing and writing for that so I didn't come across that problem now.

Phew... this is a load off my mind!

Lay me low

2010-02-22T14:04:00.000-08:00

Lay me low, lay me low, lay me low

Where no-one can see me

Where no-one can find me

Where no-one can hurt me

Show me the way, help me to say

All that I need to

All that I needed you gave me

All that I wanted you made me

When I stumbled you saved me

Lay me low...

Throw me a line, help me to find

Something to cling to

When the loneliness haunts me

When the bitterness taunts me

When the emptiness eats me.

Lay me low…

Dreams

2010-02-14T07:38:00.000-08:00

Aaaah last night I had the most wonderful dream, it had seemed so real.

In the start I was in a bright meadow looking at some herbs, wondering what to make from them, what kind of medicines etc. I looked into the sea and combined some material to make more healing products. Then suddenly I get a quest calling me, asking me to go help out a certain character down in the hallways beneath the earth. I head off towards the place, I knew where it was as I had been there before.

I was a slim red head in this dream but I had curvy hips and liked wearing grey jeans for some reason. Anyway I headed in and found that there was a lecture in session, a lot of students were sitting at wooden desks in an auditorium. However it was just ending. I went up to my love but since he was a lot older than me we had to pretend that we didn't know each other. So I would walk down the desks helping to tidy up and whenever I passed him I would blush and he would touch my arm or my back in a loving, sort of secretive way (you can tell i'm repressed hahahah).

I sort of remember that in the past he had asked me to help him out for some reason, when I had been working down in the dark corridors. I had picked up the phone and during whatever I had helped him out with we had become lovers. However it was all hushed up as I said before he was older than me and had a daughter who was about my age.

I met said daughter because she wanted to talk to me about some problems she was having and that we would have to prepare because some evil people were coming to try and invade. I felt stange talking with her because I was having an affair with her father (although her mother had died a long time ago). We walked out into a big hall and she pointed to a hole in the floor, saying that her father had promised her that as long as his sword was standing in that grate, the evil forces could never enter wherever we were. However it was empty so I went over and placed my sword in the grate to reassure her.

It felt so real and my feelings for that man was so passionate. I felt happy when I woke up. I just wish I could remember more of it!!!

How embarrassing!!!!!!!!

2010-02-13T15:27:00.000-08:00

Gosh i'm such a shy person really! I won a competition at smart bitches when I didn't mean to >_<, I didn't think I would win you see and just commented about how I was writing my novel about Peris, which I am >_< and then I won something! I went back to the original post and realised it was for US only.... ha......... foolish XD.

However in another aspect I am glad, to win because of my Peri idea makes me happy!! it gives me confidence in my ideas and that my book will be a success, must keep writing :P.

Problems I have with American Novels

2010-02-13T08:12:00.000-08:00

By now you should know that i'm a literary snob but I like novels and I have expectations, is that so bad? :D.

In an attempt to get back into literature (once I grew too old for the YA literature and cultivated my own taste I lost my way) I bought some American romance books. But before I go into that, i'll write some background down.

I find it hard to find books I like, preferring graphic novels. I think this is because of several reasons, the first being that "shoujo" manga is my favourite genre of all time, in these graphic novels the men are more my "type" that is, girly. Haha I receive a lot of stick from my house mates about this but hell :) it's my choice. Secondly, the female is often rather "pure" I don't mean this in a fundamental Christian sense, I mean that often they are happy, cheerful, somewhat silly and a little naive. They are often pretty funny as well which contrasts with western heroines quite strongly. Thirdly I love art and I love male art, so graphic novels are right up my street.

I found that with novels once I left the YA section I had three genre choices, fantasy, sci-fi or general fiction (I only watch Poirot on tv so i'm not big on contemporary crime).

Fantasy would be my first choice, as I write my own books in a fantasy setting but I found that fantasy except for a few instances (such as Ursula Le Guinn) is focused towards men. I feel alienated by that genre and I can get my fantasy fix easily from computer games such as Fire Emblem instead.
Sci-fi, I don't really care for, I write books based on history, so I have no use for books based in the future.

Lastly general fiction, now I used to work in a book shop and the only general fiction books that I stocked were the ones that go along these lines
-Sister and Mother reconcile and realise how badly they treated each other, go and live in Greece and start a greek restaurant among much hoot-an-nanny
-Woman leaves husband for better life in the city, meets hunky man but is torn between him and geeky neighbour (also known as chick lit)
-Woman in 1930s lives a scandalous life on the edge, seeking lover who abandoned her during the war
and etc. etc.
Why bother then, you may ask. Well my work suffers as a result, I need to read in order to aquire skills such as decent description.

None of these things really appeal to me. However thankfully a few months ago I was rifling through my father's old books and found some books by Tanith Lee. Now Freyashawk likes these books and I loving her blog and thinking she is an interesting person, I decided to read them. I loved them. I can read through them in a week. Her books are based heavily upon fairy tales and read like fairytales, which I love and not only that but they are dark which I also love, being a lover of all things gothic. Her work follows gothic tropes such as the muddling of preconceptions, such as gender and love and I adore her description.

Now onto the crux of this argument. I love Tanith Lee's work but I need some other outlets, once i've passed on the other genres, the only genre left (except for the classics, which I do read from time to time but it's a hella hard work) is romance. This is a vastly American genre and I buy most of my romance books from American authors recommended to me via several romance review blogs.

Most of the romance books i'm reading at the moment are "angel" books, as they give me nice descriptions to use in my own work. I gave up on Sharon Shinn's last book in her Angel books, "Angel-seeker" because I couldn't stand the character Rebekah (oh i'm a wilful woman in a repressed society, -_-) and that I couldn't seperate the fact that the Jansai who are viewed in a very negative light were based upon fundamentalist Muslim customs (my house-mate is muslim and I teach english to several muslims who face this sterotype daily, so it annoys me). However getting back into my novel, I realised I needed some inspiration. So I put my pettiness aside and began to get back into it. I'm glad I did because it exceeded my expectations.

My early work resembled Sharon's quite a lot, I would sit down and write and not edit, so it came out quite sloppy and spontaneous. I realised this wasn't the way forward and started to plan and edit, I assume that she also did this for her last book as she didn't have any cardboard characters unlike in the earlier books I read, Angelica and Archangel. Each had their own motives and I found myself actively enjoying Elizabeth's part of the story, I really found her story interesting. She had gone to Cedar Hills, to have sex with an angel and bear an angel child therefore being set for life as angel children are regarded as precious. However she also has dreams of meeting her true love and therefore comes across as a sympathetic character not just a gold-digger.

She has relations with one male angel but returns home feeling used and upset, I thought this was a realistic portrayal and I liked how it was handled. However I didn't really need the sympathetic side to feel connected to her, as my own main character in my novel is a concubine and feels no remorse what-so-ever. It was a main point that I wanted to make.

However some bad points still come through but i'm not tearing into Sharon here, these are weaknesses that are natural for writers, especially me. One is the putting the character of the previous novel up on a pedestal. Rachel from Archangel is still adored by Obadiah, despite her being married happily to Gabriel. I just thought... give it up already. Also other characters often mention her and how the traits she and Gabriel have which make them perfect for each other. I have seen this is other books and if I ever wrote sequels to my own books which I don't, then I was also be tempted to have my characters think well of my previous characters.

However this is not reality. In reality people don't really care about others who are not in their immediate vicinity. For instance I don't sit at home and wax lyrical about a couple I used to know at college at every interval, or the happy marriage of my uncle or aunt. I have other things on my mind. Also I know that sometimes its necessary for those who haven't read the previous books but many other things aren't explained that should have been.

Secondly, I can't stand shortening a characters name. You are writing, not speaking it's not that hard really. Also if you would prefer give your character a shorter name, rather than giving them a nickname. I don't mind if it is a single character and their nickname is a normal name, such as Sam, for Samantha (I had one character with a nickname in my previous unfinished novel QOWE, called Margy, short for Marguerite and she and the main character were teenagers) but for every single character, no.... noooooooooo. Also I hated this about Angelica, the heroes name was Gabriel-Aaron so it was shortened to Gaaron -_-. Also if you are going to shorten it, shorten it right. After hanging out with lots of Polish people, I know that the nickname for Magdalena, is not Maga but Magda.

Anyway Sharon is a best-seller so this works for lots of people, it's just be up on my high horse and I like to complain. But there is one last thing, many American writers seem to be stuck in their college years when it comes to sex. The scene where Elizabeth waits to have sex with David in his room could have been transported to any college dorm (he comes in drunk, the room is untidy, they have really bad sex with him guttering out an orgasm and she leaves without any cuddling). I found this also in Luis Bujold's the Sharing Knife which was a wall-banger for me, I found the character of Fawn so passive and childish that I felt creepy actually reading about the much older Dag's feelings for her. In that the wardens (or whatever they are called) have rampant sex with each other in inns, just reading it reminded me of walking back to my dorm late and night and seeing random people making out and then going into their rooms.

I don't know maybe i'm being a prude here but another thing that I made sure I wrote in this novel I am writing now is that Rana and Angelique's sex is not porn but an actual loving act, so much so that the cold-hearted Angelique thinks back on it often as the only moment she ever truly felt what love was. I'm tired of these books where people have sex without love, it's just tear the shirt off, bam-wham it's over. It doesn't work for me and merely reinforces the idea of female chauvinism (buy the book "female chauvinist pig" if you are interested in knowing more) and the idea of sex purely for sex's sake.

The Betrayer

2010-02-09T04:23:00.001-08:00

Sometimes in a strange fluke my world of imagination and my gaming world cross into each other, in some sort of midsummer strangeness. Usually I keep them separate, if I am given the chance to create a main character for a game it isn't usually any character I created for a story but then sometimes that character forces its way into my story without me realising it.

It's embarrassing for me to say that games sometimes inspire me, usually the world of novels and games are so completely indistinct but that is only a stereotypical view of games as "boy" things, which only involve violence and death. Sometimes the story can touch you just as much.

I can't deny that the game "Valkyrie Profile 2" and it's beautiful environments didn't inspire me for the description of certain places or a certain scenes in my novel. Anything beautiful can inspire you, even the most menial things.

One game I had been playing has forced its way into it's mind. My character, initially took the role of the "good" character, that is every time she was given a right and wrong choice she chose the right option, she freed slaves, preserved sacred relics, saved the lives of children and gave all her money to beggars. She even romanced the somewhat silly male character, doing all the right things.

However my character, had a fatal flaw, the fact that she already had an allegiance to a certain other person, ever since she had seen them she had sworn her life for them. I knew that right from the start, despite my character appearing to be on the side of "good" all the way through, eventually she would betray her friends maybe even resulting in the death of one in order to follow her own selfish ambitions. This would result in all her past deeds being tainted, really my character would have been "evil" all along. I knew that she would do anything to preserve the life of that wicked person.

However I don't want to call her evil, there were certain aspects which led her to this decision. (You may laugh at me for creating such deep motives for just a game but really, everything I do character wise is serious). One was that under the past political regime, she had been torn from her family to live in a school. She had stated once to another character that she loved her mother but never showed her true feelings in front of the high ranking men of the school, always being respectful and obedient. Therefore she had no loyalty to the monarchy or their bloodline but does care about those marginal groups of society.

Secondly, incitially when she responded to a characters advances she did so relutantly. Eventually she felt forced into the relationship out of duty, felt for a time as if she truly loved them as well because of the dynamic of fighting together and looking out for one another. Eventually however, she grew sick of the character and wanted to escape from that relationship but felt she could not do so at the present time as all eyes of the world were on her. Her eye began to wander on other men, deperate to escape from the shackles of this relationship and her own self-loathing.

Thirdly, deposed of a father figure at a young figure, she is somewhat drawn to men of authority and this is what caused her sickness of her lover, who possesses no leadership skills or self-pride what-so-ever.

This story of my character who appears good but is at heart willing to destroy everything she has created for one person has translated itself into my work. The story is similar of that of other women of legend like Helen and Deidre, Alicia betrays her husband to allow her lover to take the throne of a certain country. He however attempts to woo someone else in order to further his ambitions, so she believes all her betrayal leds to naught. She and Naoise eventually become lovers but this eventually leds to the destruction of both countries.

Just a little view into my world at the moment.

Resources for writers

2010-02-05T12:49:00.000-08:00

I found a helpful webpage, detailing several links for writers. I was surprised at how helpful this was. Not only did they have an art section but also a video section, map section and classic book section, all resources I have used in my own work. I highly recommend you take a look if you have talent in writing and want more help:

http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/

writing a book is hard work. Every scene has to be done in such detail, it is painful sometimes and I had quite a few rough days over the past week trying to worm my way back into my work after leaving it for so long. It cannot be helped, however, I am not willing to sacrifice my education for a skill that may or may not be successful. Always I had hid my work from the eyes of others, I cannot bear criticism.

Once when I was younger my sister did a Tarot reading for me. I asked if I would ever become a writer and the tarot replied that I would have difficulties because of my level of skill. Even though it was just a silly game back then and a superstition to boot (something which as a Christian I shouldn't even believe), sometimes it rises up in my mind and I feel as though I am doomed to never make it as a writer.

The difference between a popular novelist and a great novelist is a large one. I recently moved out of my small reading circle of only classics, gothic novels and books endorsed by various reading lists and my parents into the realm of American Romance. I ordered several books which recieved A+ reviews from certain blogs which I visit daily and was sadly dissapointed. I found them lacking in scene control and all the characters except the main being flat and wooden.

I used to write like this before I became a horrid perfectionist because of the failure of my four-year old novel. It is the easy way, you sit and write, do a little editing and the novel is done. This however is not an option for me, I am ambitious so every scene must right down to the letter, I now understand why it takes George RR Martin so long to write his books (I am not comparing myself to him however). To make a great novel it must reflect reality, no a-sexual best friends, no self-sacrificing comrades, no, not even a guard must be a flat character. Everyone must live and breathe with their own pasts, their own loves, their own wishes, no one must be the "guard", the "servant", the empty stand-in to advance the plot along.

Not all of the great books are perfect by any means, Far from the Madding Crowd had too much filler for my tastes (but that's mainly because of the way it has aged), Hunchback of Notre Dame had whole chapters detailing the church (though I know this went vast ways towards restoring people's love of it), LotR is hard to read... let's face it but we slug through it for the rewards but I really want any novel I write to be a great one.

Through toiling and working so hard I have also realised something else, those people who are talented and think themselves better than the rest because of their talent are all talk. Talent is nothing compared to hard work, I know it's a cliche but it's true. Before I used to look down on other writers but I realised I couldn't talk, until you try your very hardest at something and realise the sweat and toil it takes to make something beautiful then you feel nothing but compassion for others even if their work doesn't live up to your expectations because they felt the same pain and suffering you felt.

I will strain and struggle and try and make this novel the best I can.

Why why why...

2010-02-02T14:09:00.000-08:00

*cry cry cry*

I am quite enamoured by a character in the Fire Emblem games, one that was a part inspiration for Rana. I bought Radiant Dawn but didn't realise it had a prequel, Path of Radiance.

Unfortunately it's one of those old games which no longer exist so people sell them for about £50 on Amazon... *sigh*

Tomorrow I will start writing again after my month hiatus to do my exams. I have problems attempting to get back into my novel after being absent for so long. I forget the motivations of the characters and who they are. It is like if you didn't see a friend of yours for a month and so you become out of touch. So i'll reread my novel to get back into it.

Also I will explain a little about my writing process.
How a novel starts:
- I become inspired by something, it may be:
- a story I heard or read but thought that it should have ended differently
- A picture
- Something which i've always wanted to write but didn't have time until now

- The story revolves around two characters who will end up romantically involved, so I start by deciding the details of those characters and reflecting the world around them

-How I create the world
- I draw on my studies in Medieval History
- I focus on Kingdoms I know and shape them to my own ends
- I make sure whatever I decide has already happened in human history, therefore
I can't assume something which isn't realistic.

- I make a brief overview in my mind of the plot, what happens in the end. Always the story which I present in the first few chapters is based upon mysteries which happened in the past. The past is very important.
- Who are the protaganists and who are the antagonist is decided, who wins, who loses and why that happens. These are the bones of the story. If you bones poke through and the reader can see your bones then you aren't a very good writer :( (haaha I bet that sounds funny but that's the only way I can describe it)

- All characters are decided upon and what kind of impact they have upon the two main characters and what plot points they further. Those characters who are involved in the "past" events, are often shady to begin with, blank characters upon which I can place ideas as they come to me. I call these my little ephianys because they come to me sudddenly usually, as i'm dreaming in bed or on the train or sitting in my room. But I have to have the "shades" in order to make sure that those characters in the "present" are mapped by the events in the "past" (complicated sorry...)

- I break up the story into chunks, like a tree the characters break off in different directions. I decide whose branch I will write and I break up their story in parts.

- The scenes I first think of in my head usually when I am going to sleep at night. (this is becoming hard as I get older as I begin to forget in the morning, espically if I have a stressful day ahead of me).
Then I write the scene based on the scene in my head. I then go back and painstakingly re-write the scene until I am completely happy with it (this can take days).
Then when I am happy I move onto the next scene :D.

So that's a basic to my writing process :P.

Dragon Age

2010-01-31T10:24:00.001-08:00

Is it geeky to have a family tree of characters for a game? I've been a big fan of the Neverwinter Nights franchise ever since the first one. I've played a little of Baldur's gate but found it's lack of organisation hard to master after playing the later games.

The first Neverwinter Nights where you had to deal with the plague I played my generic character Mafuane, who I usually use as my avatar and who I used for Morrowind as well. (FYI: Mafuane was the mother of Isis Fumitory, lover of Yueh who was brother of Vaughn who was married to Anika, my first and somewhat Mary-Sue character. Haha just thought I would explain :P) She had as her companion the little rogue female character. Later I played the amazing games programmed by Adam Miller for the NWN system where Mafuane had several adventures including becoming romantically involved with her female companion.

I played Hordes of the Underdark with her and was pertubed to see I couldn't romance the female companion except for Arabeth and was upset when she betrayed me at the end (the reason why my characters were all lesbians was because I was always dissapointed with the male characters that were offered but still wanted the romance option).
For Shadows of Undentride, Takius-kun was my guide and I left Mafuane behind at that point. I don't remember if Takius-kun had a romance intrest, I don't think the NWN had implemented it at that time.

NWN2 then came out and to this date I haven't played a better game (Dragon Age may changed this but I only just started playing) it made me laugh so much. The main character for this was Vada, the woman in the picture. Vada also spurned the male love intrest because she had fallen in love with her foster father Daeghun, yes that crusty old elf. I was bowled over by his back story, that after his wife had been killed in the battle where my character lost her mother he took her in. Vada therefore remained faithful to him to the very last. I cared so much for that character that when Vada returned to her home town and saw the bodies of the dead strewn around, my heart was thumping in my chest trying to find his body, wondering if he was dead. Thankfully he was not :P.

Vada was trapped when the place in the finale collapsed on her, however in my mind she did escape and was re-united with her love.

In the expansion pack Mask of the Betrayer, a piece of Vada was left in the old ruin, her memory which formed itself in Mouse, a young woman with a long dirty blonde plait. She took over as the main character in Mask of the Betrayer, and for the first time I chose the male option :D, Gannyev impressed me. I really enjoyed his back story as well, being of hagspawn.

Now playing Dragon Age, I am playing as Sparrow, a quiet very self-confident mage who is the daughter of my Mouse. She has the colourings of her parents, pale skin and greyish hair. She was taken to live in the mage's tower when she was young but still loves her parents. I wonder how Sparrow's story will progress :D.

Men of Kind and Gentle Nature

2010-01-30T11:11:00.000-08:00

Recently I have, as the bard said, "lost all my mirth". My best friend recently met a young man of whom she is quite enamoured, so much so that she doesn't have much time for me anymore. I am a caring person so I miss her very much and it calls into question my own feelings upon love.

I am a bitter person when it comes to love, having had my own self-esteem cracked by bad encounters however I still retain my innocence when it comes to matters of the heart. I believe in love and I write about it, it is the central figure of my work. I read an intresting article from a blog I visit on a daily basis, Smart Bitches Trashy Novels:

We spend a lot of time here talking about the prevalence of the alpha hero, the loud and brash warrior male who is tamed partially by the magic hoo-hoo of his lady fair. In real life, men like Dr. Parker represent a different kind of hero: the quiet gentleman of intellect and grace. Compassion is itself a form of tangible strength. And while the quiet gentlemen heroes are not as prominent in our discussions of hero archetype, they are themselves powerful. The thoughtful, intellectual hero who is a source of abiding and dedicated strength is a pleasure to read about. Heroes like Christy in Patricia Gaffney’s To Love and to Cherish, or Colin in Julia Quinn’s Romancing Mister Bridgerton, who may not stamp around and pound their chests but whose dedication is equally dominant and powerful.

I realise this is true about the hero in my novel, Rana, who while fatally flawed is essentially what she is describing. Angelique has many traits of mine, she also is scarred and hides her vunerability beneath her coquettishness. Rana's kindness towards her is also a part of me and it is something that I also look for in the people I associate with. I would like to have a man who has those traits :D.

Games II

2010-01-27T04:56:00.001-08:00

http://twofoldsecret.com/our-games/where-we-remain/

One of the best games i've played in a while. Heart thumping, fearsome, imaginative game :P, I love the monsters the most!

My Gothic Inspired Layout

2010-01-21T16:33:00.001-08:00

I hope you all enjoy the new layout, after a long time I figured out some basic html and made a skin all my own, truly this place is now my own :D.

Artwork

2010-01-19T09:23:00.000-08:00

The blog has changed layouts, I also added a gallery of some beautiful work that inspires me. The picture above is from here:

http://homepage2.nifty.com/waraizizou/KATEGORIE/JRRT.html

It's really something ~

Banks of the Nile

2010-01-15T15:09:00.000-08:00

Folk songs feature in my novel, they are a sort of magic. Love songs and sad songs like these have the most power. Rana sings a verse from this traditional folk song to heal Angelique when she is dying.

Ah...

2010-01-15T13:38:00.001-08:00

to be torn away from my novel for so long and to yearn so much to write! Only two more weeks! Only two and then I shall have my Rana and my Angelique back... *sigh*

Videos that seem like dreams...

2010-01-14T15:26:00.001-08:00

Little thoughts...

2010-01-07T07:13:00.000-08:00

I am a university student and right now I am studying for my spring exams. Studying is a two-fold experience for me. On the one hand I hate it, I hate the hours of concentration, I hate the stress, I hate the drying up of inspiration it causes. On the other hand I love it, I love learning, becoming less ignorant, understanding the subject I love so much so much more and most of all just seeing the world through different eyes.

I love my degree. I study East Asian Studies, not the language, just the culture. Why? you ask, because it is like a different world. To learn about a socialist goverment and the problems that causes for the population, wow for me that is amazing. To read poetry of women from long ago detailing their frustration in not being able to be educated as well as men, so thought provoking. Reading literature written by people suffering from occupation in their country, I couldn't even imagine that before. I am so thankful for my education, which allows me to become something so amazing...

Ah I love it.

(Image is Ban Zhao, a lady from the Han dynasty. She was a very famous female scholar at a time when many women were stunted in their education. She wrote a
classical book and was a teacher to the royal family at the time)