Thorn Wilde

Actually, it's legal for first cousins to marry in loads of countries. It only harms the gene pool if it happens for generation after generation. If it's just the once, it makes very little difference.

I think that what we have here is a case of culture clash. Not that fuck isn't a bad word on this side of the pond as well, but it isn't, perhaps, AS bad. People are a bit more... pragmatic about swearing over here. I've made a very conscious choice to write in an extremely limited third person point of view. That is to say that I use the narrative to describe my characters' thoughts just shy of going into first person. In a sense, you've jumped in at the middle. Chronologically, these are the earliest meetings with Jacob and Marcus, but they're part five of a series of which four stories have yet to be published. I began this whole thing as an exercise in creative swearing. That's what it was for. But before I knew it, these two had me by the proverbials and what was supposed to be one very sweary short story became one very sweary trilogy of short stories, and then there came an epilogue, and then these prequels, and now four sequel shorts (three of which are mostly finished). As for author traditions... I'm not much one for traditions in general. I suppose one might call me a bit of an anarchist, or a subversive artist, if you will. I will break the rules, and I will pull people out of their comfort zones because that is, in my opinion, what art is for.

Never expect 'nice' when it comes to these two, my dear. Thanks for reading, and for reviewing! <3

I'm glad it made you laugh. I shan't apologise for the swearing, as I state clearly in more places than one that this story (and indeed this entire series of stories) contains gratuitous amounts of it, but thank you so much for taking the time to review and let me know what you thought.

I live in the biggest city in Norway. We're 600,000 people. If you count all the suburbs, we just about make it to 1 mill.

There aren’t many things in his life that Marcus can control, but he can control this. ‘Go on, then!’ he tells the boy before him. ‘Big, fat fucker like you shouldn’t have any trouble beating down a skinny twerp like me, eh? Get on with it!’ He smirks. ‘Or haven’t you got the bollocks for it?’ The kid is two years older than Marcus and twice his size, but now he looks uncertain. A schoolyard predator, he’s obviously not used to prey that talks back. ‘I know what you are,’ Marcus continues. ‘

I cannot even begin to express how incredibly true this is. Well said! All people can benefit from stepping outside their comfort zone every once in a while.

My dad played bass and soprano sax in a big band when I was a kid. Always loved hearing them play. These days I prefer more experimental and fusion-y stuff, but then I've never been a genre purist with any of the music I love.

Ex-gay ministries and anti-LGBTQ groups have criticised the organisers of Banned Books Week for NOT using it to promote ex-gay literature in equal measure as other controversial titles. What these people seem to fail to understand is that no one's trying to ban their books, their side is generally the one doing the banning.

Indeed it would be, and you raised several very valid points. That particular argument just sort of reminded me of anti-gay marriage proponents who say, 'Gays can't have kids, so why would they need to marry?' to which the only logical response is, 'Should we also ban marriage for straight couples who don't want children or are unable to conceive?'

In an age when books are still being banned for LGBTQ content all over the world, I thought this might be relevant. Here are some quotes by authors about book banning: 11 Quotes From Authors on Censorship and Banned Books

Can I just point out that heterosexual sibling incest does not have to result in inbreeding? There is such a thing as birth control, condoms, and some people are sterile. So, I have to admit I see that as a double standard, to be honest.

I have lived in so many different places, oh my god, let me think... I was born in a town in Finland, lived there for the first year of my life. Then my mum and I moved to Norway to live with my dad. We lived in a suburb to Oslo called Rykkin. Then we moved to a big old house in a small town called Hølen when I was 4. When I was 8, my parents broke up, so my mum and I moved to Oslo, where I stayed for a good while, though we kept moving around. First, we lived in a small flat in the borough of Grünerløkka. My dad sold the house and moved to a flat smack-dab in the middle of town. When my dad passed away, when I was 11, I inherited a third of that flat, so my mum bought out my brothers and we moved again. When I was 14, my mum got married, and when I was 15 we moved to a bigger place again, on the posh side of town. We had a rather horrible neighbour who sabotaged for us in everything we wanted to do with the place, so we moved again when I was 19, to a really nice old house from 1850 where my parents live still. I moved out at 21, and moved in with some friends in a flatshare, still in Oslo. We lived there for a year. Then I went off to uni in England for a year. I lived in Walsall, which is in the Black Country, West Midlands. About 20 minutes by bus from Birmingham. Miserable shit town. Uni was okay. Back to Oslo a year later, moved in with Magpie. I stayed for a year, then I went to Sweden, to go to school in Kungälv, near Gothenburg. Came back in May, and now I'm living with Magpie in Oslo again. Hopefully, I won't be moving for a little while...

Not in Oslo, dear. We have no guns. Zombie's point, I assume, was about the terror of two years ago. Even with that taken into consideration, this would go down fine today as well. Norwegians are very pragmatic. We won't let some gun-toting, racist, extremist, terrorist arsehole ruin our fun!

I was in what was probably the first flashmob in Oslo, before everyone had heard of it and thought it had to entail complicated dance routines. It was a so-called Mexican Stand-Off. We all gathered in a place at an appointed time, pretending to mind out own business. Then someone started pointing their fingers at people, like guns, and then everyone did the same. Someone said 'bang', and we all pretended to die. Then we got up and walked our separate ways like nothing had happened. It was pretty cool. I think I was 17 or 18 at the time. I'm wearing a leather coat somewhere on the far side of the group.

Weird. I accidentally made an empty post. No idea how that happened... Is there any way to delete this?

He did, when he was older, because he romanticised the Greek ideal of a young man and his mentor. But in 1882, Oscar was a young man himself, so the romance would have been in being with an older man.

It's kind of like a flashmob. Surprise people, make them stop their boring, mundane goings-on and just look at something for once, notice something. Very cool, I like it.

Just thought I'd leave this here. Read full article here.

Is this where I try to smooth things over by telling you that I find older men really very attractive and that one of the sexiest men I can think of at the moment is 55?

We haven't really got a dating culture in this country... Magpie and I had known of each other's existence for a few years, found ourselves at some of the same parties for a few months, and then we hooked up at one of them. The next day he took me out to dinner to make up for me having paid the taxi bill to his place the night before as he was too drunk to find his wallet. Cue a couple of weeks of hanging out at his place (I was still living at home), watching movies and quite a bit of shagging, before we, at 4 in the morning on the 1st of April, decided that it would be hilarious to change our relationship statuses on Facebook to 'in a relationship' with each other and see how many of our friends thought we were kidding. And that's the closest I've come to ever being in a 'dating' phase with anyone.

Woo! Happy Birthday!!!

I thought physics was lots of fun. It was the maths I got bored with... Sadly, physics without maths doesn't really work.

Well said, Zombie. Also, I would like to add that there's a HUGE difference between kids involved in situations of sexual exploration and kids outright having sex. Not the same thing at all, IMO. And there's no tag for it either way. There's the under-18 tag, but that involves perfectly legal, perfectly socially acceptable situations between kids above the age of consent in almost any given country in Europe. I sometimes think the tags can be a bit extensive. I mean, yes, one should definitely use them for sensitive content, but sometimes tags can be spoilers and ruin the surprise, which can be a little bit sad from a storytelling perspective. Other times, I think 6 tags is way too little, and I wish there was an option for adding freeform tags, like on AO3 for instance.

Really loved the form of this poem. Well chosen words, too. Well done!