Krista

Slightly off-topic, but I have to get this off my chest. And, there are people who do play video games that frequent this community, I'm thinking. I do not play very many games. I have three that I've followed: Dragon Age, Mass Effect, and The Sims. Admittedly, the writing for Mass Effect 1, 2, and 3 were fantastic, I really loved it. I'm not a Sci-fi person at all, but it was easy to get into, and it progressed nicely. The Sims is something I get nostalgic with and play here and there, but it is way too riddled with bugs, some game breaking, and only working when modders and creators fix shit for the developers. But, Dragon Age was at one time my favorite franchise. It is the game that I replayed numerous times. Origins needs to be remastered. I wish they would have done that, but since it is an older game the task may be too much for them. Dragon Age 2, was a rush job, but the writing was still decently strong, it fell flat everywhere else because they didn't have time to do much within a year and a half that Electronic Arts gave them. Inquisition became more open world, very meaningless task heavy, but the writing was still on par, it felt fleshed out and the characters were decent. Now, Dragon Age: The Veilguard - sucks. They boasted about having a great Character creator, which they do, but you have to really work on making your character not look like a cookie cutter Pixar character. I've spent hours in it, then get into the game, and edit them for a couple more hours because even though they have a lighting preview, you can't see them in action. You have to be careful not to make them cross-eyed for example. The hair selections for males are limited at best. And we're just not going to talk about the Qunari's foreheads... it takes a lot to work around that. The scenery is nice to look at as well, but weapons, attire/armor, and item customization is pretty much non-existent. That's about all the good I have to say about it though. The characters are awful, none of your past progression in the series really impacts the game either. They took away your options to be 'mean,' as well. A lot of your response choices do not match the tone of the scene you're currently in. There's too much, "around the table.." talking, where every character has to self-reflect, analyze, and get validation. It sounds like a self-help group, not a group of people that are out to save the world. Speaking of, despite the world crumbling around them, a lot of their reactions are light. The story around them is mostly done with a light and breathless touch... there's no flesh, bone, or meat to any character early on, if at any. If you're expecting that to change, like I did - you're sorely mistaken. The game doesn't get good until the final act, but damn that's hundreds of hours away. The villains just suck, there's so much about them that's one-dimensional, so they become laughable at best. They're supposed to be cunning old elven gods, but they're so stereotypical villain they lose their bite. It is severely preachy on certain aspects of the game, that shouldn't be preachy in the game, with the time period it is set in and the like. It takes away from the dark fantasy element entirely, which is what the genre is about. I wouldn't even call it a Dragon Age game, since it does gut your choices from previous games, despite the storyline advancing from game to game. It should have included a lot of the past decisions on some impactful level, but it doesn't. This was a rebrand with skeletal elements to hopefully get money from people that have been waiting for this game for over 10 years. That is obvious. The fact that these people had 10 years to write the story-line, villains, main character's voice/tone, and ability to respond to the world around them is frightening. This should have been a master class in writing, especially since they have so much source material to build on. They also had 10 years to write fleshed out, multi-dimensional characters to support your Rook as well. My biggest issue is: There's no moral implications, or choices that really call into question any sort of morality. Some of your companions belongs to factions that have a rather morally questionable past. The Crows for example, an assassin guild that don't blink an eye about killing people when they get handed a contract. They conscript children for training, and do illegal trafficking, etc. You cannot learn or question that, not even when you choose the faction in the beginning. Aside from a colorful gloss over, of your character origin, you don't get a lot more. The moral choices you make, have little impact, they always work out. The choices and sides you choose end up coming back to neutral or good... It also, and I agree with a game reviewer that said: It feels like this was written by people who had HR hovering over their shoulders. - There's nothing with any depth in the writing, like I said, nothing with any meat on the bones. Every conflict is resolved in 'validating' and self-reflective conversations. You cannot make people hate you in this game... it always comes back to this group therapy session stupidity. I paid full price for this nonsense. It makes this game more laughable, because it is also in the running for Game of the Year... although, a late outside shot at it, but still. Save your money if you haven't bought it, wait for it to go on sale.

I see in my absence that we've allowed wildthing to run amok...

Don't poor Steve him, he deserves every little flake that slowly melts, with the shock of the chill landing on his wee head. I also know I couldn't write in another person's style. Authors have their own habits, sure, but to be 'that' hyper focused on something to be able to copy it, would be headache inducing. ---- I wish @Mancunian well, sad to hear about their health issues. ---- The weather here is typical for late October, the mornings are crisp and chilly, wet from the dew. Sometimes the day warms to a nice day, but if there's a breeze, it doesn't. We can have all four seasons in the same week this time of year, a few days ago it got up to 80 degrees, it was lovely. We haven't had our first hard frost yet, either. We could use a little rain though.

Yeah, as I wrote Jackson, I pictured him as a cooped up, high-energy dog. Unless you allowed him to express himself and get some exercise and some of that energy out, you might come home to shredded couch cushions. He is definitely the poster child for inconsistent parenting as well.

Really? He refused money from them twice already? lol. I didn't realize he had done that, but I'll take the happy accidents, I guess. I also didn't set out in the beginning for Grace and Craig to be read as absent, but 'most' of the readers of this story saw them as such. Which is entirely fine, I am not strict with my character structure pre-writing, Jackson, Luke, and Cindy aside - as they needed a bit of pre-planning. So, in the writing I wrote Grace and Craig reacting to Jackson's antics organically in the moment and it just built them up to be not as present as they should have been. I know a lot of the backstory, and their work schedules played a huge role with it, but they definitely did leave Jackson to his own devices a lot and didn't follow through.

Yeah, I set out to really test people's patience with him. I had just finished writing a very less flawed character with, Cory in, "Standing in Shadows," so I wanted to branch out. Thank you for leaving a comment!

Depends on the day really. Also, if I'm dealing with your cheekiness Wildthing, I am far more likely to not be cool as a cucumber. I must admit I do react with the loss of control. Is it to a fault? Maybe, but I don't really know who will ever be brave enough to tell me such a thing. I mean, we've had the discussion of Husband's tactic for dirty dishes numerous times, as it is a tactic that seems to crop up in more issues than just dirty dishes. That's also why we have one of the world's most comfiest of couches for him. *whistles* On a more serious note: It definitely depends on the projected outcome. I think, at least for me when something pops up, I can work through multiple possible outcomes. If most of those possible outcomes outside of my control, are baseline manageable or has a lot of flexibility, I can deal with them without a lot of fight to regain control. I can be relaxed in those outcomes, whether they hindered me or not. If something outside of my control has more impactful outcomes, with unfavorable outcomes, or forced acceptances of bad outcomes, I struggle a lot with those, and they tend to stick with me a lot longer. Especially, if they impact more than just me.

I'm the mean one, I'm not scared, and that's me assuming neither of you are black belts or good throat punchers. And yeah, I'm over a year on a project I posted for a one-off Secret Author, so I'm well on my way to a nursing home before I get the second chapter out. I thought you handled the subject matter really well, gender fluidity, pansexuality, the whole thing. I think nerves are good, it means you cared enough to tell the story the right way and with this story, it needed the writing to be done the right way. It is all new to me, I've not looked into or really discussed any of it, parts of your writing was informative, but it wasn't overwhelming and distracting within the parameters of the story either.

I do not do horror at all. There's two films I find myself watching this time of year and those are, "Practical Magic," and "Hocus Pocus," but entirely for nostalgia reasons and nothing else. Halloween is my least liked holiday. I was totally that girl that used it as an excuse to dress as sexy as I thought I could. We all know what happens to those girls in horror/slasher films too... those little red heels do them in, every. single. time.

Hmm, I may have to tell the husband that Levi is my new hall pass and not Joey Votto. That man down to his name was just, shew. On a serious note, this was so well written and masterfully paced. The subject matter is entirely new to me, so I didn't know how I would fare with it. I think Prisma on Amazon has been the only other form of depiction regarding it that I have watched. So, I felt you did a great job allowing the shaping of Jay to develop. To do it in a span of 14k words makes it more of a feat, truly. The only thing I maybe would have wanted from this story was about 30 - 40k more words pre-meeting Rachel. And of course, about 30 - 40k more post meeting Rachel. I'm not ashamed to say that I'm greedy. Lovely story, I'm glad it caught my eye and I had a slowed down day to sit and read, as that's rare for me these days. I'm happy with the way it ended, as I became a bit worried after the first 'date' about where you may go with it. I'm glad you chose the path you did and not the one that hung around in the periphery of my mind while I read.

Ah, I need to get to writing, so I can continue my streak of attempting to upload a chapter/story and breaking the whole system for a few hours. On a serious note: The changes listed and upgrades we're getting seems like a healthy and structurally sound list. I hope it all goes smoothly. For me personally, I'm a visual person, I have to immerse myself and learn the changes, the tools, etc, for me to know whether or not I feel something is lacking. Enhanced for Mobile users is a big one though, whilst out camping in the summer that's when I know I have a lot of time to sit and browse stories on GA. I do not take any other devices other than my phone, and GA feels very clunky as it is. So, as far as the list above, that's the one I think will help most people. As well as the font sizes and minor issues associated with Light and Dark modes. Anything that makes submitting a story/chapter easier is also a plus, if it is a bit smoother than what we have now, good.

The sooner it snows on @wildone's wee head the better off we all are. Or maybe that's just my joy in life? He brought it on himself, to be honest...

What? Angelic little ol' me? I am glad you liked the story, it is a very early work of mine for an Anthology. I wanted to do a full circle sort of relationship with two characters, in brief little parts of their lives. Also, there's a word and time limit and I truly suck with both those constraints when I go to do a writing project for anthologies... 😮 I do hope you check out my other stuff, I'll point you towards 'Ridley,' as it is smaller and newer... if you want to give my writing more of a go.

Can you please write an entire short story using just idioms like you have supplied us here.

Yikes, I can't believe it has been over a year since the first part. I knew going in that I wasn't going to post anything else, not until I was close to completing the story, had clear motivation to complete it, and had an ending in sight that I could reach before the posting caught up to me. I've decided to wait until the entire story has been finished on my end. Which, may take more time than I would want, it is already over a year. I will give you a story progress report though, for those still interested: Learned to Lie: I'm up to 12 completed parts. That will likely be more, as some of the parts are too large, the largest being 20k words. I want to make the attempt to split them down between 5k - 7k. There are a few other parts that get upwards of 15k - 18k as well. So, if I am able to do that, we're likely already on part 15 or so. The word count right now sits at: 135,142; I never expected it to be this large of a project. If it keeps up, it will be a similar word length to my larger writing projects posted here. I mean, it's already a big chunk of words, only 7k of that is posted already. If I could, I would remove it from view and just start posting it all in one go, but a lot of people have already read the first part, so I don't feel it is appropriate. It was also for a GA contest, and I don't want to mess it up. So, yeah... I'm still writing. I don't have a lot to show for it for now, but maybe I can get a few of you back here whenever a posting schedule starts. I do not know when that will be, it won't be this year. Not unless I get a lot of writing done or find a nice and easy place to end the the story.

Red, White, and Royal Blue - parts of it were far too bogged down by the political atmosphere, and since I read to escape political atmospheres (at least ones too close to the one we're in at the moment), I DNF'd it. It lost a lot of the humor and fun after about the middle of the book as well. Cassandra Clare's - Dark Artifices. I read and liked the Mortal Instruments, by the end of MI, I thought it was a big dragged out. Infernal Devices being her best trilogy. But afterwards her writing got way too predictable and one-note. So by extension, the first book of the Dark Artifices trilogy ended my run with her entirely. Call me by your Name - I did a short review on another topic. Too wordy, too bogged down in cerebral pretentiousness that I just lost all feeling while I read the thing. If it got better in the latter half of the book, fine but I'll never know. Someone attempted to get me into reading James Patterson, I gave two of his books a try and DNF'd both of them. I can't remember the titles, so I can't say much about them, other than they were just too boring to hold my attention. There are countless other little fantasy books when YA - Fantasy was really big. A series I wish I never picked up was the Twilight series, I really wanted to DNF the hell out of it, but stuck with it. Do not hold that against me, I beg.

We had bookmobiles here as well. They only came twice a school term when I was in Elementary school. I think they stopped after the fifth grade, or that's when we aged out of the program and were expected to use the school's limited Library. I do not remember earlier books, I knew we were expected to read - the classes that read the most books and submitted the most book reports got parties at the end of the year. I was reading at five, mostly little picture books with two or three sentences per page. I honestly don't count those, but even at that age a kid could speed through them if they wanted to. The first book I remember reading for fun on my own without any expectations or incentives was: My Side of the Mountain. I fell in love with it and read it twice. I was in the third grade. It didn't keep me interested in books though, I had started little league girls basketball, it was the first league for just girls that year. We had mixed teams until then, which I still played on, but the travel girls team took all of my free time. I haven't read that book since pre-middle school. The other book series I read as a kid was the Narnia series, but to be honest the only one that held my interest was The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. The others I've only read one time and never revisited, but that book I have read multiple times. Harry Potter and to be honest Nifty got me back into reading for fun. Then GA. There is a book I read every other year or so, and that's "Hunter's Horn," from Harriette Simpson Arnow, only because I was at a book store and they had a "Local Authors," section, and I took a chance and bought her book. It isn't an easy read for a lot of people, but I love it.

Oh gosh, there's a ton of them... lol. There's a topic here that lists most of them somewhere if I'm remembering correctly. I have family members that are walking examples of that entire southern slang mess and I love them for it. Where I grew up, it was rather mixed, either the person you're talking to was heavily influenced and had an accent, or there was no influence and little to no accent at all. Where I live now is vastly different, there aren't any southern accents and more northern or mid-western accents. I have heard a lot of different terms, usages, and slang that are distinctly mid-western or north eastern.

From the south I have checked myself, our spoken language is rarely grammatically correct. We use a lot of double negatives for example. It was beaten into us in school in an attempt to break such things. When most of your area speaks a certain way, it is most definitely a difficult thing to break. Growing up it damn near gave me a complex when I let something like a double negative slip. Or, when I used one of the more common southern sayings, like.. "over yonder.." or, "over the holler..." But, as it has slowly disappeared with younger generations no longer speaking like older generations - I tend to miss it. Now I'm finding myself smiling when one of my older patients speak in a way that I was taught made me sound stupid/unintelligent. If I'm a guest lecturer at a College/University, I script my entire lecture to keep myself on task and not to slip. It is a rare time now that I've grown up, that I want to sound distinctly different than how I was raised. So, I tend to stay away from all those listed above, as I also read that article or one similar, years ago and realized I was guilty of damn near all of them. The one that unnerves me from the list above is the overuse of Like. I know it is mostly a nervous habit when someone attempts to organize their thoughts while speaking. The words, "so," "but," and "um," are also in that category, but "um," and "like," are the ones that bother me when hearing it in a conversations. I also think there's nothing more adorable than a country bumpkin toddler that sounds like they came right out of the backwoods or swamps.

You also cannot 'ever' get yourself down, be afraid of failure, or feel ashamed for the words you put to paper. Nothing will come out perfect, most of us are lucky if it comes out halfway comprehensible. So, stop negative thinking, put your mind and fingers to work, and keep trying to hone your writing. Writing is like everything else, the more you do it - if you're open to learning and not just 'doing,' you will get better. A lot of the advice others have offered has been well given though. Just don't allow the negativity to creep in and you give up before you get started. It can seem overwhelming.

I had a good little cry reading this. Thank you for reaching out and leaving this comment. Also, never think it is too late, all us authors like hearing from readers no matter how old the stories are. Socks are the unsung heroes of Christmas giftings as well, your father knew this secret. You can find some really great ones for funny gifts and really nice ones for actual serious ones.

He will be punished. --- I am a cat person if the cat is cuddly, not fussy, or whiny. I am a dog person if they're lower energy, not disruptive/barky, or difficult. It depends on the animal's personality/temperament whether or not I like them. Right now I have zero cats and two dogs, I do miss my Bubbles dearly, but that is because she was just so easy, loving, and seemed to know when I needed her affection and attention. The other two are goofy idiots that my family enjoy the hell out of, and even I have laughed at their antics from time to time. I also feel they would take on a bear to save my children, so I do have love for them... but they're not 'my' type of dog. So I guess I'm neither.. or both.

I like Beautiful Thing better than Heartstoppers. Heartstoppers had one good season, the first one. After that it fell into way too many pet peeves of mine. Netflix needs to understand, or seems to fail to understand - that groups of friends with LGBTQ+ representation, doesn't have to be 100% of that representation to exist. There is not a single straight person in that show anymore - aside from the jackass bully - but I'll put 20.00 on the new season introducing his bullish behavior as a defense mechanism for his homosexual tendencies. It also is attempting unsuccessfully to fill airtime with too many subplots. Sometimes it is better for a show to end when the main plot has become too fleshed out, than to drag it along creating sub-plot after sub-plot to create small tensions. For example: We did not need to know the sexual orientations or sexual relationship of any of the faculty, yet we do and they spent numerous minutes of episodes to bring that to us.

I must admit, I was going to write this one off based on the description. If it is a refreshing take on the very over used sex worker trope in Gay film genres, I will give it a go. Especially if it foregoes the usual endings to those types of films as well.

I say Gif the same way as you, and we can't have that. During your camping trip, I found out my voodoo doll I have for you worked, best $50.00 I ever spent. I enjoy a handful of olympic sports. I watch Triathlons all year though, it is just fascinating the skill these men and women have for three disciplines and having the stamina for it. Also, there's strategy that goes into it with drafting, race dynamics, etc. If it is a warm day, it can get interesting with the suits and water... and such. Anyway! Congratulations to all the Secret Authors that took the time to participate. Hope you fooled everyone of the readers. 😮