EmpusaeGirl

Words were her plague and words were her redemption. - H.D.

[empusaegirl]

Well, my short fiction for cyanstarlight is finally here: "Voices in the Cyan Deep." It's inspired by the solo playthrough I did last year. It's PWYW, so consider dropping me and the great publishing team at Adept Icarus a few dollars to read it. :)

[empusaegirl]

Is it weird that I'm grading papers to this soundtrack today?

[empusaegirl]

Today, I'm working on The Expanse RPG, but I'm sick of sci-fi synth and dubstep, so I'm here listening to something with a little more whim and wonder. Reminds me of floating down a gravity well to approach an alien world.

[pocketss]

mmm soob

[empusaegirl]

Been eating convention food for three days. I want chicken noodle soup made by exhilarated goblins...

[empusaegirl]

Today's Writing Music

I just needed something with lilting melodies, fun beats, and a distracting bass to tickle my ADHD into a flow. I'm basically sprinting like a madwoman over the last hurdles of edits. In the last few days, I've got ~160 pages rewritten and edited down to ~80 pages, and I've got about 98 pages of editing to go! Friday, Friday, stay away. Mari's got a deadline to delay. ;D

[empusaegirl]

Today's writing mix is this "Midnight Pulse" from Darkvine Music. I'm working on the last few sections and the intro of a cosmic horror campaign book for a TTRPG. If all goes well today/this weekend, I'll be editing the 90k manuscript down to 70k next week. Looks like my cowriter and I went overboard in 2024—too many good horrible ideas. ;)

[empusaegirl]

I'm working on a game that involves on Mexican history, and as I was researching, Bing sent me this gem: "human settlement." As if there are non-humans that have also settled somewhere in the city. Or maybe, Bing's AI just felt the need to tell me, "This is one of yours, human."

[gallusrostromegalus]

Are you the "I have strong feelings about parchment" Tumblr user? If not, I feel like I saw you might know who they are. I was going to put parchment in a fic, but then I was like "no, I can't do that without asking the Parchment Person first because I don't want to get it Wrong."

...no, but I know the post you're talking about, and I too have strong feelings about parchment, esp because I've worked on it before.

I took an illumination course while getting my illustration degree and did an "H.M." in the style of a medieval manuscript on a small piece of the stuff.

Parchment is not paper. It's cured calf or pig skin.

It's thick, and HARD like non-corrugated cardboard. If it's been stored in a roll, it does not want to unroll. If it's been stored flat, it does not want to roll. It's got the same texture as skin, because it IS skin, and you have to account for that while working on it. It smells like rawhide. It actually takes ink in a really interesting way- there's a half-second to blend of fix something before it actually sinks into the parchment, but it doesn't bleed once it's in there. It also never comes back out. It's not bright white like paper, almost a buff color, and white stands out on it.

Fascinating stuff. Actually pretty fun to work on, but it's definitely a medium for highly polished and important pieces (like illuminated manuscripts), not for casual note-taking (because it's MAD EXPENSIVE to make)

I should go hit up the local art stores and get different paper-and-other-art-media samples to demo for everyone for fanfic purposes because they are VERY different things that have different purposes, prices, origins, and societal connotations, all of which can be used in your writing.

[zhongluong]

That sort of demo would be incredibly useful to people aiming for accuracy in their writing, and not just for fanfic!

[gallusrostromegalus]

Well, there seems to be a lot of interest, so I think I'll do a broad demo for Tumblr and some more detailed demos for patreon, sound good?

[momkat]

One of the things that pisses me off most in fiction is people using parchment to do homework on, or crumbling up a piece of parchment because of a mistake. You could get AT MOST 8 pieces of parchment, similar to a standard piece of paper, out of one sheep. More likely 6. One sixth of a sheep. That then has to be processed. It would be analogous to throwing away an old iPad because it has a typo on it.

The very word, palimpsest, shows you that parchment was valuable enough to scrape off and reuse, sometimes until it was worn thin.

You would use slate or a wood panel or even write on stone and wipe it off for anything that was practice. Parchment is for more permanent work.

The world CHANGED when paper became readily available. An entire type of government was created because of paper. (Chinese bureaucracies arose because of their early development of paper. Bureaucracies that kept the wheels turning regardless of the regime changes of the higher echelons. Records and commerce rolled on because of paper.)

Parchment is not paper. We live in a world of paper and cannot imagine how valuable its predecessor was.

[beatrice-otter]

Enough parchment to write a book on would cost about enough to buy a house.

[empusaegirl]

What I'm doing instead of writing... Thinking about writing implements...

[empusaegirl]

Saw this tonight. Bloody adorable. Go see it.

[talonabraxas]

“God sleeps in the rock, dreams in the plant, stirs in the animal, and awakens in man.” --Ibn Arabi

“All In” “Star Network” art by Shinya SUZUKI

[empusaegirl]

I don't always reward myself for finishing writing contracts, but sometimes I do, and sometimes I do it well. 🧛🩸🏰

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A post shared by Mari Murdock (@marimurdock)

[empusaegirl]

Today, I'm playing Cyan Starlight, a solo RPG about being the last human in space.

I'm doing this as part of a freelance contract to write a short story for the publisher Adept Icarus, who is going to distribute it to the Kickstarter backers as a how-to on turning the game's narrative into fiction. I've got some really good material so far, boosted by the ♪♪ music ♪♪ that the game tools come with. Give it a listen to feel lost in space, ~~alone~~!

Cyan Sounds

The sounds of cyan starlight, the lonely scifi solo roleplaying game by Alan Bahr brought to you by the Adept Icarus game design and publish

[empusaegirl]

I finally got my contributor copy today! While writing this, I read the whole series, watched the show, and researched a ton about living in space, making this my most technical project to date. Who knew space laundry could be so thrilling? ;) So happy to have been given the chance to work on this book with so many vastly intelligent and talented people. Thanks for giving me the easy chapter. ;D #theexpanse #theexpanserpg #rpgs #greenroninpublishing #shipsoftheexpanse https://www.instagram.com/p/CTVQbA-FArz/?utm_medium=tumblr

[empusaegirl]

We took a break from 😫BUSYLIFE🥺 to go get some 💥comics💥! #fcbd (at Black Cat Comics) https://www.instagram.com/p/CSkuztOM-7O/?utm_medium=tumblr

[empusaegirl]

My birthday was fun and full of sugar! Thank you so much! ♥️ ♥️ ♥️ https://www.instagram.com/p/CLPfL1WBsjQ/?igshid=1hwo0qqj8r00

[empusaegirl]

#GiveThanks On day six of my week of gratitude, I'm grateful for books.  I never feel lost inside of a book, mainly because I have a strange knack for them, where I can find exactly what I'm looking for, even if I'm not sure what that is. The pages just open to the exact right spot or the quote I need jumps out immediately.  This "talent" made writing papers on books very easy back in school, but the price for such a skill is that I have a very bad long-term memory for things I have read. I can't quote back portions. I often forget plots to my favorite stories. I really can't recall lessons or philosophies or abstract ideas unless I have a key passage or phrase in front of me to remind me it exists. For this reason, I've always considered books part of myself: they act as extensions of my heart and brain, touchstones of my identity, though ones that I literally need to touch to reconjure those portions of me that seem to fade over time. One of my favorite authors is Ray Bradbury because his words remind me of how much I love life because he loved it so much too. It's a beautiful lesson to remember, and I'm glad to remember it every time I read his work. https://www.instagram.com/p/CIBxbw9h4yI/?igshid=mnrz67ewk2m

[empusaegirl]

#GiveThanks I almost missed today because I was busy with TypeCast, so I guess it's only fitting if I mention today that I'm so glad for my creativity. While in lock down, I've been doodling, writing, teaching, sewing, cooking, gaming, graphic designing, and gardening. I noticed that this time being creative while alone has also forced me to relearn what I enjoy as an individual. So much of my free time as an adolescent had been structured or heavily controlled, so when I became an adult, it was hard to make my own choices about what to do with my time. I still tend to fill too much of my time with "productive" activities, much to Scott's dismay, so I'm grateful for the chance to find what I like to do and seek ways to use my creativity for fun and fulfillment. This pic is just a set of stickers I'm attempting to make. It's been a slow process of trial and error since digital art is so not my thing, but it's been so cool pick up a new skill. https://www.instagram.com/p/CIAH-4UBRur/?igshid=1xal6n8v4zv1j