Sophie

I'm writing a novella now, it's called Bookio atm.

I queried an agent a few weeks back. She likes my writing but wants a novella/novel from me. I have an open invitation to query again! Very exciting. So, I'm writing a novel or a novella... we'll see how it goes.

I also applied to my union for a mentorship microgrant to study with a Canadian speculative fiction writer I'm very much looking forward to working with!

I'm tempted to post the chapters up on my writing journal for comments/revisions but that's probably a bad idea. Yeah.

This last... two months or so have been a wild ride. I'm still taking care of mom, who is still not leaving her bed. She gets PSWs each day. Our landlord is being a total butt. I had a string of panic attacks in November bc of his nonsense.

On the other hand, I've just finished a little publishing bump. I'm officially a Goodreads author now, which was unexpected! No one tells you how much WAITING you do when you're a writer. So much waiting... I couldn't tell anyone about the projects I was involved in for a long time, and then suddenly they all came out within a week!

My sapphic story inspired by Palestinian folk religion and djinn lore made it into FIYAH's Palestinian issue.

And this came out on Wednesday:



I'm close to my next submission: a gothic story, my first attempt at horror. It's surprisingly difficult to find a market to send it to. It's an odd length, and some open markets don't want some of the themes or images. It's a strange little critter. I want to find a paying market, if I can. I might release it as a fundraiser later, if I can't find a good home for it. My beta readers are really liking it so far.

Oh, yeah. I also applied for the Clarion workshop. I had a kind benefactor pay my application fee, and ...it's a real long shot, I know. I'll have to get respite care for mom if I went- unless they decide to run the workshop remotely.

ALSO, I have a new tarot deck. Comment with a question, or with ? for a general vibe check tarot reading! No charge. I just feel the need to read :D

Things continue to go goingly. I've done a lot of work this month to rebuild my sacred space. I had established it as preparation for trauma work with my therapist but I've let it get a bit unfocused lately. I intend to do a clean sweep of it and then remake it only with the things I really have a reason to include. I recognize that I have some things there just because I don't have anywhere else to put them, which is not good.

I've been reading Tarot and the Tree of Life which is blowing my mind. I've been wanting to learn more about Qabbalah and the Tarot for a while and this book just nails it for me. I don't normally like to turn to books whenever I meditate with cards but this one is the exception. So good.

My therapist actually wanted me to stop researching Palestinian folklore for a bit since the books are all really racist. It was wearing me down. But then being Palestinian has become such a topic of conversation now, with Rashida Tlaib's whole thing going on. My friends sometimes wish I wouldn't engage with it but I literally can't avoid it even when I want to. I've also been banned from entering Israel- I was 6 years old. My dad was banned since he was 10, and he was born there. We're Palestinian, so we're de facto "demographic threats" to Israel.

I will say for now is I'm waiting for folks to see how all of the fascist, neo-nazi forces in the US are aligned with Israel and sit with that, and consider what Palestinians are and have been saying about their lived experiences. The Stern Gang, the Zionist gang that hunted down my family in Palestine, had written to the Nazis proposing an alliance. They went on to evolve into the IDF- the Israeli military, and are seen as heroes of "the war of independence."  So while many are perplexed at, for example, a radio host in Israel dubbing Trump "King of Israel" today, for how loved he is there, it makes absolute sense to me. Ethnonationalists gonna love ethnonationalists.

Speaking of Zionism, and of rebuilding sacred space, I've been thinking about the immense spiritual damage Christian Zionism did, and how I can rebuild. I suppose it's something I can talk to my therapist about while we do the trauma work. How to reestablish a healthy spiritual life. I can start by meditating on what was nourishing about my faith in God, and go from there. Something like that.

My copy of Palestine +100 from Comma Press arrived. It's the first ever anthology of Palestinian science fiction. I'm excited to dive in. I'm also in a book club where we'll be reading Belonging by Toko-pa Turner. I also picked up Living Revision: A Writer's Craft of Spiritual Practice. That's really good so far, and just what I needed re: the Palestinian folktale manuscript.

kIvier on Twitter originally posted this and I can't get over how much it amuses me. I normally don't like horror but I am really enjoying the Magnus Archives, especially all of the archival staff (what nobleplatypus  calls 'the good stuff.').

[ Jonathan Sims of the Magnus Archives be like: ]








( Spoilery explanation of the joke here )

The doctor and I are still working out the best combo of meds for my condition but things are improving. I'm on four drugs now- more than I'd like but what can you do? It's helping, and that's the important thing. I'm sleeping better and am just more capable of doing what I want than before and I'm seldom properly depressed anymore (yay!). Mostly, it's just good not to be exhausted all of the time.

I've been listening to The Magnus Archives podcast. I don't usually like horror but this was alright, and I really like the frame story of the archivists.I'm into season two where there's much more story about them rather than the monster of the week style 'statements' the archivist reads out.

I've started a writing group online! It's called Wind-Blown Rose, as an oblique reference to my hometown (known as 'the Dirty Windy' and 'City of Roses'). It's a supportive, community-focused group with some book club and workshopping on the side. It's on a Discord server. If anyone is interested in chatting about writing with some nice folks, let me know and I will send you an invite.

We will start the book club bit up in September with Steering the Craft by Ursula LeGuin (the book club is for writer's craft books and is a casual sort of thing; you don't need to participate to be in Wind-Blown Rose).

Much later, I think I'd like to do some publishing with the group, maybe an anthology or a literary magazine, but we'll see how things go.

Sorry about the radio silence, it's been a busy week or so. But this time a good busy, for sure.

So, the antidepressant seems to be kicking in properly now and it feels... great. It's strange, and great. Mostly, by contrast to how I felt before I now realize the truly monumental antagonist I've been up against all this time, battling it every day for *years* and managing to hold my ground against it. Honestly, it feels really shocking to... feel *well* for a change. To be rested, to just have energy to do things again. I still have anxiety but it's receeding- plus the full effects of the prozac won't kick in for a few more weeks. But I've been having my little morning panic attacks and such. Otherwise, it's like... it's so much easier to employ all of those coping tactics I've been using all this time.

The most noticeable thing, though, is how my body feels. It's like I've been holding something for over a decade now and I can finally relax, physically. Most of the tension in my body has gone, all but a bit in my feet.

Anyway, it was my birthday this week. I went to a salon to get my hair cut which I never do. Mom and I had a great time there. AND I got myself a tonne of Ace Attorney manga... which brings me to narumitsu.

( LONG and spoilery Narumitsu stuff goes here. )

...Oops. Urgh. I thought I could drabble for the hc_bingo . >.> Welp... At least I got two drabbles in for the Wright-a-Thon?

They're all gen. No warnings. Only the first one is overtly shippy although I endorse readings that are asexually romantic as well. The rest can work as shippy too, if you'd like, especially the last one.

He Sees With New Eyes
Borrowing Phoenix Wright's magatama changes how Miles Edgeworth sees the world.

It's the Little Things
They can really add up if you're not careful.

When in Khura'in
Wow, Nick really liked provoking the queen, huh?

The Letter
Years later, Franziska von Karma sets the record straight in one case where her father presented false evidence to Miles Edgeworth.

My best friend requested a fic for her AU where Diego Armando married Mia and that Pearl Fey is their daughter. She wanted a scene where he holds her for the first time. I'll just quote from the email:

You know what he's like though...

Diego: ...Wow. Are you sure she's done cooking? Maybe she should go back in.

Well, I have most of my Wright-a-Thon fic done... Unfortunately I've had a terrible migraine for the last two days. I can't really tell atm if this is working out at all; I'm too fussy and irritable from the pain. So I'm letting it sit until the weather clears- which will undoubtedly clear up the migraine too.

I read a review of the AA musicals, on a whim. It was a glowing review, but it does not sound appealing at all. Could I just be out of step with things- since all I see is praise for it, but... yikes. The synopses just ... are not my thing at all. I wouldn't really get into any of this if it were fan fic, you know?

It all sounds... very boring.

It has come to my attention that the 2018 Wright-a-Thon starts this Saturday. I haven't participated in a fic-a-thon since ... 2013, iirc, when I wrote a ton of fics for a 6th Doctor community on Livejournal... But that was so much fun, I can't wait to see what this will be like. It's different because the Sixathon involved members of the comm leaving a few prompts that you'd fill specifically for that person, more like some of the bigger fic exchanges whereas the Wright-a-Thon, if I'm getting this right, is simply a sprint. There are 10 years of writing prompts to choose from, so they close down acceptance of new prompts for the duration and participants write as many fills as they like.

So I've been reading.. trying to read through the prompts (there are so many, I've only managed to get through two parts of it. There are more than 30 parts...). I shouldn't be surprised that Gourdy/Phoenix Wright tentacle sex is on the second page and yet... I mean, it's odd to look back in time, as it were, and see how the fandom was already "well, we're done here" in 2007. I thought I knew what crack fic looked like until I read that. I... I don't know if I can write crack fic ever again. I doubt my capacity to match that, honestly.

Thankfully there are a lot of gen prompts, so I won't be writing about Phoenix' aquatic love babby with a sea monster anytime soon.

Actually, I had started work on a new fill just before I realized the Wright-a-Thon was coming up. The prompt was very detailed, and the fill will likely take several chapters but the idea interested me. They wanted a deep dive character study for Franziska von Karma, in the form of a story spanning her childhood up to roughly her introduction to the game. She was to find one of the letters that Phoenix Wright wrote to her "little brother" Edgeworth (who is 7 years older than her) -- letters her father was secretly disposing of. She takes it out of curiosity, but becomes fixated on it, keeping it for years and then feeling conflicted when Edgeworth did the whole "prosecutor Edgeworth chooses death" thing.

She's a fascinating character, very conflicted... I think I'll enjoy this.

Author: philosophercat
Fandoms: Ace Attorney (Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations, et al.).
Prompt: Written for this pw_kink_meme  prompt.
Title: Tailor Made
Rating: G
Warnings: None.
Summary: Prosecutor Franziska von Karma, the prodigy, has an admirer.

Ao3 Link.

x-posted @ aceattorney