I Know There’s A Lot Of Tension After Tumblr’s New Policy Annouced For December 17th, But Reblog

Gunslinger Iris!! [Fan Concept Art] Iris is taking responsibility to save the peace between Maverick Hunters and Repliforce. This time, how she fight with firearms. Deviantart via http://fav.me/dbltzdr

Worldbuilding Practice Sample

So, a while ago I wrote some sample dialog for Injustice 2 interactions that will never happen, and I happen to have a great affection for DC characters in general. Unsatisfied as I am with the current state of affairs in DC, I got in the habit of writing little plots and ideas on the side, and after several years basically wound up composing my own version of the DC cosmos, an Earth-J, if you will.

This is a sample of the work I've done so far.

The Living Kingdoms

The Red -- Fauna Parliament: Limbs Representatives: Animal Masters, who can use either the physical or metaphysical aspects of animals as super powers. Much to the Red's chagrin, however, they can't manage to keep a champion like the Green's Swamp-Thing; their main choice, Bernhard Baker, doesn't really care.

Bernhard "Buddy, Animal Man" Baker Supposed Champion of the Red, much to his chagrin. Also much to the Red's chagrin, since he keeps not observing his duties. His power is to trade metaphysical qualities with animals via homologous and analogous structures. (i.e. he can give his arms the power of flight, because that's what birds do with those parts). Notes:  He occasionally has jam sessions with Garfield. Quotes: "You are a Champion of the Red! You bring fruition to thousands of years of prophecies!" "I AM A FAMILY MAN, FIRST!" -P.o.L. & Buddy Maxine Baker Even more powerful than Buddy, even less interested. She just likes her pretty animals. She thinks Tefé is awesome. Garfield “(Various)” Logan The Orphan, and Evolution-Master. Unloved by the Red and the Parliament of Limbs (individual members notwithstanding), Gar nonetheless wields impressive power and serves with the Doom Patrol (formerly with the Titans). Ironically, he gets along the best with the Green and its masters; there is some speculation that he may not even be totally wedded to the Red, given he has instantiated microscopic life, a distinctly Blue power. What significance this has remains currently unexplored. Mari "Vixen" McCabe The trickster. An Animal Master who received the Tantu Totem originally created by the malicious trickster god Ogo, and won it from him in a contest of wits.

Barbara Ann "Cheetah" Minerva Slave of Mafdet and enemy of Wonder Woman. Barbara lived a charmed life, born with a silver spoon in her mouth, charismatic, beautiful, enterprising, astonishingly lucky, but in her dissatisfaction grew to covet more. Inspired by Wonder Woman's godly power, she tried to steal Mafdet's Claw from an ancient pyramid to experiment on it and see if it had any divine power, which infuriated the goddess Mafdet, who punished her -- upon hearing the punishments for thievery was mutilation, flogging, or death by staking, Barbara chose the fourth option, penal servitude, and became Mafdet's executioner, the Cheetah, by having a portion of the Red injected into her. Now Barbara spends her time alternating between punishing the guilty for her goddess and conspiring to free herself. Notes: She has tried previously to rewrite her own body to shed her cheetah form, but analysis of her cells indicated she was still physiologically human, all evidence to the contrary.

Michael Payson "B'wana Beast" Maxwell

Dominic "Freedom Beast" Mndawe

Robert "Man-Bat" Langstrom

Ogo, Mafdet, and all other animal and animal-aspect gods like have connections to the Red.

The Green -- Flora Parliament: Trees Representatives: Plant Masters, who have authority over the growth and behavior of vegetation. The usage of their power is often accompanied by the bodily manifestation of plant life.

Dr. Alec Holland, the Swamp Thing Appointed champion of The Green. Due to his appointment by the Green, he is also possessed of some authority over the earth.

Tefe Holland, the Sprout. Beyond her powers as the second instance of the Swamp Thing, she also has magic due to her mother and celestial powers due to inheriting Constantine's blood. Despite terrible family issues, she eventually warms up to Maxine as a surrogate big sister. Notes: Has been considered for the Doom Patrol, though her current relationship with them is unknown.

Solomon Grundy The death of a gangster in Slaughter Swamp created an "incomplete" Swamp Thing, with limited, wild power over the wood and earth. Poison Ivy & The Floronic Man, Shadows of the Champion. Drs. Pamela Isley and Jason Woodrue, who gained access to The Green and its powers through mad science, which transformed them both into plant-humanoids. Woodrue, descended from dryads, taught Isley and the Hollands as their Professor ("Professor Plant-Master"), and sought to escape "the meat". Woodrue seeks to make the world less-frail by experimenting on them (as he constantly augments himself for their qualities and powers). Isley, who runs "Lily n' Rose" flower shop, was at one point his partner in crime, covets beautiful things and despises "the meat" for its ugliness, a "toxic" ugliness that ruins the beauty around it; in a perverse sense she considers herself a "defender of the innocent", much like her historic enemy Batman.

Yggdrasil, the first Wood elemental.

The Blue - Microbes (bacteria, protozoa, fungi, etc.) Parliament: Germs Representatives: Microbe Masters, who can both control all such life remotely and transform into huge masses of microbial life at will.

Samuel "Zookeeper" Register Obtained his access to the powers of the Kingdom by stealing from Garfield Logan's charged DNA, but while he initially dealt in animals like Garfield Logan, Register has been increasingly fascinated with transforming into infectious and disease-carrying life forms, which he uses to various purposes, including taking control of animal life. He's also been looking with increasing fascination to the Grey.

The Grey -- Viruses Parliament: None. While the Grey is no one's friend, it is generally closest to the Blue. Lacking any Parliament to manage it, responsibility is generally shared by the other three. Representatives: Plague Masters, who seed and control all viruses remotely. Anton Arcane A German field doctor from the Great War who did mad science on his patients. Helped convince Adolf Hitler to go to war so he'd have more dead to work with. He uses black magic for purposes of necromancy.

Note on All Kingdoms: The Kingdoms all traffic with each other in various ways, but generally maintain a balance of some kind. However, there are periods of violent imbalance in their history, where one color will consume too much of the others (typically but not always the Grey, due to poor management) and the whole system collapses in on itself, creating the Black.

This is from the forecast discussion of Major Hurricane Florence from this afternoon. As a meteorologist, when I saw this, my heart sank. They don’t use wording like this for every storm.

Florence is going to be a devastating. There will be huge amounts of flooding, both from inland rain and from costal storm surge. Winds are going to be some of the strongest you can get from a hurricane. People within the path of this storm could lose everything.

If you know anyone who lives on the North or South Carolina coast, tell them that if there’s an evacuation ordered, they need to get the hell out. Do not take chances with this one.

DC, Marvel announce Jack Kirby centenary publications, but what’s missing?

US comic publishers DC Comics and Marvel have both announced their plans to mark Jack “King” Kirby’s centenary in August. Kirby, born 29th August 1917, who died in 1994, was an Am…

Jack Kirby’s Centennial is up on us! (I’ve been looking for an affordable version of his works -- caught the Humble Bundle special about a month ago, but that only had Silver Star and some romance comics. Everything else was derivative).

Luna Shirogane is officially meganneko. I have such happiness.

“Haltmann Works confirmed in a press release earlier today that the corporation’s R&D department suffered an unfortunate accident yesterday evening after hours. It emphatically denied any official interest in cloning technology, however, and refused to answer any questions about the sudden appearance of an army of His Majesty’s genetic duplicates in the wee hours of the morning.”

Kirby: Star Allies (2018)

It’s officially Thanksgiving in the USA

Time to smell the gravy, marvel at your auntie’s pretty place-settings, and listen to the 5edgy9me once-a-year intellectuals crawling out of their local Starbucks like zombies from the damn grave, moaning

C̪̹͉͔͔̳̕h͈̼̯̥̭̗̍̒ͧ͟ṙ̠͍̹̈̄̈́͗ͥ̅͟i͎s̸̭̣̬̼͚͊̊ͨͬ̈́̅̚t͍͌̏̏͐͞o͈̐̉̓͐̅p̮̞͟h̦e̶͌ͪr̬̻̩͕̱̎̌ͩ͗ ̐̔͏͕̲͉̺͕Ċ͉̰͕̹́̊ͯ͆̓̾ͅo͇l̮̟͡ů̱͖̬͙ͣ̓͋̆̎m̧ͫb̵̠̲̗͂u͎͗s̟̤̭̼͕͈̃̉̒̔ ̖̹̗͔̮̱̯ͭ̅̋̆ͯ̽̍w̱̰͈̰̔̃͆́͋͌a͚̮̬ͮͨͤͬs̩͖͙̬̟̦ͫ̓̀ ̝̰̼͇̹̲͑̉̿̽͒͞a͔̬̮͠ͅ ͙͙͇̖͇͛͞m̠̲͖ͯͫ́̿ͤ͜u̪̪͖̮͂ͪ̎̽̚r̰̜ͪͩ̀ͫ̅d̬̹̲ͯè͖͇̦̖r̝̀è̯͙͈̻͖͓̪͌ͤ͑r̵̭͖̖̋ͥ̂ͅr̸̭͎͈͑r̞̫̀̔̅r͎̖̿̑̒͠r̬ͬ̄ͫ

@sixpenceee has already joined in the festivities of hilariously bad revisionist history with this little gem:

‘Cept Christopher Columbus never actually set foot on American soil – And Thanksgiving has nothing to do with him.

Thanksgiving in the USA was officially adopted as a holiday during the Civil War, though it had been off-again-on-again celebrated since 1621 – This is thought to be the famous ‘Pilgrims at Plymouth’ Thanksgiving.

Originally, it was celebrated because of a particularly successful harvest was managed less than a year after the Pilgrims first settled the Plymouth colony with the few surviving members of the journey from Europe. This sort of feast wouldn’t happen again until a bountiful rainfall broke a treacherous drought in 1623.

Only one or two other colonies celebrated similar days of thanks, and all of them were related to farming practices. Natives frequently attended these meals. Indeed, the first Thanksgiving saw about 90 Natives join in on the festivities.

That might not sound like a lot initially, but keep in mind that there were only 50 Pilgrims there, so the feast was almost 2:1 Native.

Now, with respect to ‘Genocide’, lemme learn  you some knowledge..

Claims of Native genocide by the Pilgrims mostly originate from happenings during the 1637 Pequot War – Also known as the Mystic Massacre.

Essentially, in the area the Plymouth Pilgrims had settled, there were a few major warring Native bands. Specifically, the Pequot, the Mohegan, the Narragansett, the Wampanoag, and the Algonquians.

Basically, the Pequot sucked. They were the most powerful tribe, and were constantly trying to expand their territory – Even before the Pilgrims had come. They regularly raided the Wampanoag and the Algonquians, and bullied the Mohegan and Narragansett. When the fur trade started up, they tried to scare all the other tribes out of competition.

This led pretty much all of the tribes in the area, with emphasis of the Mohegan and Narragansett, to ally with the Pilgrims when shit started to go down.

The Pequot seemed to have the least resistance to the foreign bacteria the Pilgrims brought in, and it weakened them a lot, leaving the other tribes and Pilgrims the ability to reclaim or take over a lot of their land.

About 700 Pequot died during the war. A great deal of them were also taken/given to the other tribes as slaves.

A great deal of the bullshittery surrounding the settlement and colonization of North America comes from people who are unwilling to admit that Natives were brutal with each other… That they were just these awesome, no-socialist hippies that just sang songs and ate berries all day.

I don’t just think that’s dishonest, I think it’s pretty derogatory.

I remember vividly a time I was on a long busride in my home of British Columbia, which has a very high Native population. I was seated next to an Aboriginal man from a Kwakwaka'wakw band and he told me, very proudly, about his tribe’s impressive archive of ancient weave records depicting a great victory over neighboring tribes leaving 600,000 of them killed by the Kwakwaka'wakw warriors, who were greatly outnumbered. I would find out later that Kwakwaka'wakw were known headhunters and cannibals. 

Once again, Thanksgiving was celebrated very sporadically, and certainly not as a consistent holiday, until the Civil War.

Thanksgiving never had anything to do with the Natives, other than their participation in a mutually-beneficial relationship with people who genuinely appreciated their help, and thus were willing to share what little food they had with them. It was about farming and harvesting, and later about peace and reconciliation.

We here in Canada celebrated Thanksgiving back in October, but I’ve always liked the story of American Thanksgiving better. To me, all of it’s incarnations have represented unity in one way or another – Different people working together to make everyone’s life better. Whether that be the Natives and the Pilgrims, or the Northern and Southern States.

People just being good to each other, if only for a little bit.

(Oneida Indian Nation has participated in the Macy’s Parade every year since 2010 in what they call ‘The True Spirit of Thanksgiving’)

Happy Thanksgiving, guys!

Mad bombers, matchmaking, magic spells—what’s a butler to do?

Meet Bostwick von Dogsbody, a sardonic door-to-door magician, and his white rabbit, Emmaline, who just happens to be a cursed human princess. The two are traveling through the goblin-run continent of Ataxia in search of the legendary Domino of Nonpareil—a mask that allows the wearer to become anything he desires—in order to return Emmaline to normal. Their journey has finally led them to Styx Castle, where they meet Millicent, a human maid who wound up in Styx due to mysterious (and embarrassing) circumstances, and Delilah, a goblin queen with a taste for the chaotic.

But Bostwick’s theft of the Domino does not go unnoticed. To avoid a harsher punishment, he agrees to be Delilah’s butler for a hundred years. Before he can escape the queen’s clutches, he’ll have to face mad bombers, an all-bugbear police force, romantic schemes gone awry, and a mysterious goblin-turned-cat named Sebastian who also has designs on the Domino. And as if that wasn’t enough, he soon learns that Millicent is also a magician—and needs him to teach her!

Read more at rosecorcoranwrites.com

VIDEO FROM THE SURFACE OF A COMET

This is truly incredible.

Details:

Remember Rosetta? That comet-chasing European Space Agency (ESA) probe that deployed (and accidentally bounced) its lander Philae on the surface of Comet 67P? This GIF is made up of images Rosetta beamed back to Earth, which have been freely available online for a while. But it took Twitter user landru79 processing and assembling them into this short, looped clip to reveal the drama they contained.

I'm hearing a lot of things about how prologues are bad and that you should never put protagonist backstory in the prologue but that causes a problem for me. My character's hatred for the antagonist is explained in the prologue along with the urgency of their rivalry. What should I do?

Take that information and weave it into the story like you would with any backstory info. Unless it’s necessary to explain something that can’t be woven in (like an event that the protag knows nothing about), scrap your prologue.

As storytelling goes, which is more intriguing?

“My sister hates this kid in her class because he teases her best friend and also stole her Fruit Roll-Up, so today during recess she punched him.” 

or 

“My sister punched some kid at recess today.”

The first one tells the whole story in one go and allows for limited response. The second one leaves the listener thinking “Oh my god, why? Tell me more.”

Likewise, the rivalry and the urgency should be included within your story, not wasted in the prologue. The reader doesn’t even know your characters yet to care that they hate each other. If you saw two strangers in the street and someone told you “Oh yeah, they hate each other because of this and that…” you’d be thinking, “That sucks, but like, who are they and why should I care?”

That’s your readers when you try to tell the story before it starts.

—

+ HEY, Writers! other social media: Wattpad - Pinterest - Goodreads

+ Support HEY, Writers! and Buy Me A Coffee