SHOUT OUT TO MY WRITER HOMIES WITH MUSLIM OCS/CHARACTERS;
1. WEARING A SHAWL TO BATTLE IS THE EQUIVALENT OF HAVING GIRLS FIGHT IN STILLETTOS.
Just so you know, this is what I’m talking about;
-Is it bad-ass? Abso-fucking-lutely. Is it Practical? Not a chance in hell. Especially not if it’s silk. If it’s cotton, you are skating on thin fucking ice. That bitch will NOT stay on. It barely stays on with me just walking down the street to Walmart. Wielding axes and rifles and swords and daggers? I PROMISE you it will not do the job it’s expected to-WHICH IS TO COVER THE HAIR. (Some muslim girls dont wear them-and that’s fine. But those who DO do it to completely cover the hair in public. Is it ~Aesthetic~ to see the flyaway hairs in battle? Sure, but those aren’t usually practical either. )Consider instead;
sport shawls
-For one thing, it’s actually DESIGNED to be worn to atheletic activities. Archers tuck hems into the collar of their shirts so they don’t get in the way, and track runners pins (ill get to this bit later) them down into the shirts to prevent flyaway bits and to stop them from getting slapped in the face. It’s breathable, stretchy, presentable without being attention seeking.
Bawals
In a pinch, bawals work just as well-as long as you specify that they are COTTON. Unlike the shawl, which are rectangular, bawals are SQUARE, and thus easier to manipulate, fold and pin down. If you wear it right, they carry an equal aesthetic value to shawls, and come in plenty of pretty patterns as well.
2. I’m not sure about the USA, but the girls I know wear this underneath the headscarf;
Does it kinda look like a beanie? It sort of works like a beanie too. Hair is slippery. It tucks in any extra hair you might miss just by wearing the headscarf, its harder to pull down and on the event the shawl DOES fall down, your hair is still not exposed. It protects the ears-which is important even on a daily basis, because pins, headphones and any other headgear that might pinch them. It comes in plenty of designs, including ones that has open backs to allow long hair and ponytails.
3.SPEAKING OF PINS; I’M TALKING ABOUT THESE BAD BOYS;
BROOCHES
though , i suppose most of y’all are most familiar with safety pins, right?
what’s the difference? Well, if your oc/character is an athlete, it’s actually LEAST likely they’ll be wearing SAFETY PINS. They’re cheap and super easy to buy in bulk, true, but they also SUPER easy to wear out even with the smallest amount of strenuous activity. Between the three of ‘em, I’d put the brooches as the best option to wear in battle because 1) it has a large surface area, thus hurts less when pressed on with heavy items, which includes bag straps and weapons, (pins are sharp and can poke you painfully); and 2) more secure-the latch is covered by the gaudy jewellery above, and theyre usually smaller and tighter. Stays on the stubbornnest, even when headscarf is pulled. very roughly. I’m saying that even the cheapest brooches will allow the shawl to be ripped apart before even letting it go.
3. They probably ponytail their hair. Because Come On, guys.
Anyway it’s been bothering me and I just thought if yall could bother knowing the difference between skin tones for POC you could bother with muslim practicalities too. Or something
I took some historical sword-fighting lessons to make the fights in my novel more realistic - here’s what I learned.
To make the fighting scenes in my low fantasy novel more realistic, I went to see a trainer for historical sword-fighting last week, both to barrage her with questions and to develop realistic choreographies for the fight scenes in the novel. Since I figured some of what she told me might be useful for you too, I put together a small list for you. Big thanks to Gladiatores Munich and Jeanne for making time! (Here are some more pictures if you’re interested.)
Caveat: I’m by no means a sword-fighting expert myself, so take these nuggets with a grain of salt – I might have misremembered or misinterpreted some of the things Jeanne told me. If I did, feel free to tell me.
1.) Weapon choices need to make sense
Let’s start with a truism: always ensure your character’s weapons make sense for a.) their profession, b.) their cultural background and c.) the environment they’re going to fight in. A farmer probably couldn’t afford a sword and might use a knife or threshing flail instead, and someone who doesn’t want to be noticed probably wouldn’t be milling about sporting a glaive or another large weapon. Also, soldiers native to a country with wide open plains would be more likely to carry long-range melee weapons such as spears or large swords, than those from a country consisting of mostly jungle or dense forests. The same applies to situations: if your character is going to be fighting in close quarters (even just a normal house), he’d get little value out of a spear or even a longsword, as there’d be no space to swing it effectively.
2.) Boldness often beats skill
In real swordfights, recklessness was often more important than technique. The fighter less afraid of getting injured would often push harder, allowing them to overpower even opponents with better technique.
3.) Even a skilled fighter rarely stands a chance when outnumbered
While a skilled (or lucky) fighter might win a two-versus-one, it’d be extremely unlikely for even a single master swordsman to win against superior numbers, even just three and if they’re below his skill level. The only way to plausibly pull this off would be to split the opponents up, perhaps by luring them into a confined space where you could take them on one by one. The moment you’re surrounded, you’re probably done for – because, unlike in Hollywood, they wouldn’t take turns attacking but come at you all at once.
4.) Dual-wielding was a thing
… at least in some cultures. I often heard people say that people using a weapon in each hand is an invention of fiction. And while my instructor confirmed that she knew of no European schools doing this—if they did, it’s not well-documented—she said it was a thing in other cultures. Example of this include the dual wakizashi in Japan or tomahawk and knife in North America. However, one of the biggest problems with the depiction of dual wielding in novels/movies/games are the “windmill”-type attacks where the fighter swings their weapons independently, hitting in succession rather than simultaneously. Normally you’d always try hitting with both weapons at once, as you’d otherwise lose your advantage.
5.) Longswords were amazing
Longswords might seem boring in comparison to other weapons, but they were incredibly effective, especially in combat situations outside the battlefield. The crossguard allowed for effective blocking of almost any kind of attack (well, maybe not an overhead strike of a Mordaxt, but still), the pommel was also used as a powerful “blunt” weapon of its own that could crack skulls. Though they were somewhat less effective against armored opponents, the long, two-handed hilt allowed for precise thrusts at uncovered body parts that made up for it.
6.) “Zweihänder” were only used for very specific combat situations
Zweihänder—massive two-handed swords—were only used for specific purposes and usually not in one-on-one combat as is often seen in movies or games. One of these purposes was using their reach to break up enemy formations. In fact, one type of two-handed sword even owed its name to that purpose: Gassenhauer (German, Gasse = alley, Hauer = striker)—the fighters literally used it to strike “alleys” into an enemy formation with wide, powerful swings.
7.) It’s all about distance
While I was subconsciously aware of this, it might be helpful to remember that distance was an incredibly important element in fights. The moment your opponent got past your weapons ideal range, it was common to either switch to a different weapon or just drop your weapon and resort to punching/choking. A good example of this are spears or polearms—very powerful as long as you maintain a certain range between you and your opponent, but the moment they get too close, your weapon is practically useless. That’s also why combatants almost always brought a second weapon into battle to fall back one.
8.) Real fights rarely lasted over a minute
Another truism, but still useful to remember: real fights didn’t last long. Usually, they were over within less than a minute, sometimes only seconds – the moment your opponent landed a hit (or your weapon broke or you were disarmed), you were done for. This is especially true for combatants wearing no or only light armor.
9.) Stop the pirouettes
Unfortunately, the spinning around and pirouetting that makes many fight scenes so enjoyable to watch (or read) is completely asinine. Unless it’s a showfight, fighters would never expose their backs to their opponent or even turn their weapon away from them.
10.) It still looks amazing
If your concern is that making your fight scenes realistic will make them less aesthetic, don’t worry. Apart from the fact that the blocks, swings and thrusts still look impressive when executed correctly, I personally felt that my fights get a lot more gripping and visceral if I respect the rules. To a certain extent, unrealistic and flashy combat is plot armor. If your characters can spin and somersault to their heart’s content and no one ever shoves a spear into their backs as they would have in real life, who survives and who doesn’t noticeably becomes arbitrary. If, on the other hand, even one slip-up can result in a combatant’s death, the stakes become palpable.
That’s about it! I hope this post is as helpful to some of you as the lessons were to me. Again, if anything I wrote here is bollocks, it’s probably my fault and not Jeanne’s. I’ll try to post more stuff like this in the future.
IF BORNE FROM SULLIED FLESH: wip intro (ii) and navigation guide
WARNINGS: graphic blood and gore, body horror, mental health issues, dissociation, indoctrination, toxic friendships and relationships, manipulation (this story is going to get really dark in some places, so please read with caution!)
GENRES: coming-of-age, grimdark speculative fiction, deconstruction of the mecha and superhero narratives, action-thriller
FORMAT: multi-media epistolary narrative, assembled from fragments of:
0005′s journal entires + 2nd person POV narration
interview and security cam transcripts
newspaper articles
social media posts
UPDATES: chapters posted to tumblr fortnightly on saturdays, using the tag #ibfsf updates (feel free to track this tag to keep up to date!)
SUMMARY: The Dayal Institute of Higher Learning has always asked two things of its students: to evolve into well-rounded, intelligent and thoughtful global citizens, and to be the best, most brutal Changelings they can be. For the Bramha Squad– reclusive One, protective Two, passionate Three, slippery Four, and brooding Five– the first request may come with its own set of hang-ups, but the second? Well, that a no-brainer. That is, until a routine off-campus operation brings about an unwelcome change of personnel, and a set of startling revelations. What was that saying about “he who fights monsters”…?
You think about that school trip to the greenhouse that they had taken you one once, the way the botanists would sit and gently pull at the plant bulbs until the curled, embryonic stalks would shiver out of them and unfurl into the light. You wonder if you could do the same thing– if you could dig deep into the soil of your body and pull your Change out like a fresh, trembling harvest. Instead, you drink about seven hungry gulps of water from the sink tap like a hungry dog, and then you go back to bed.
THEMES: the trials and tribulations of growing up, transformation, selfhood and identity, monstrosity, discussions of religion and theology, body politics, trauma and recovery, individual and collective responsibility
INFLUENCES: neon genesis evangelion, paradise lost, animorphs (k.a. applegate), pacific rim, the poppy wars (r.f. kuang), the broken earth trilogy (n.k. jemisin), chronicle, young justice, watchmen
(general + IBFSF taglist under the cut, please ask to be added or removed!)
(yes this meme is not 100% accurate bc at the time this excerpt takes place Jia does not consider Albie a friend in any way. however i’m lazy and idk how to make memes, this was the best I could do.)
tagging @mortallynuttyqueen for wip meme monday tags!
THE GOLDEN PRINCE | ASH AND GOLD MYTHOLOGY SERIES PART TWO
Although this was written as part of the mythology for Ash and Gold’s world, it can be read completely separately without any knowledge of that wip! Any and all feedback is welcome through any means - dms, asks, reblogs / tags, discord, whatever. I’d love to hear what you thought. It’s also worth nothing that this work contains a major trigger warning for death, so be cautious if this is a trigger for you.
Princes attract myths and legends. Castles, do, too, and kings and queens and princesses. That’s the way of royalty. They’re loved, hated, revered, and scorned, but no matter what they do, their deeds echo down the hallways of history, and in the echoing the story becomes distorted.
An example.
There was once a prince. A golden prince. A firstborn prince with golden curls and pink flushed cheeks, a prince who smiled widely and loved his people beyond all reason and tried to do the right thing, even when it wasn’t easy.
Princes like this – golden princes – can’t last very long. Oftentimes they don’t even last long enough to become golden kings.
An example. This prince, the golden one, is now a myth and a legend. They whisper that he stalks the halls of the palace, that he rights crooked paintings of his ancestors and places pieces of silver and gold in the pockets of servants, money taken from the king that means nothing to him but everything to them. They say he walks to his own portrait, fingertips ghosting over the long-dried paint. Perhaps these fingertips leave soft glimmers of gold behind, detectable only for a moment.
But back to the prince himself. At eighteen, he was glorious. He sat on horses, silhouetted by the sun, and it looked as if he would never die. He tossed arms around friends’ shoulders, laughing and carefree and happy, and it looked as if he would never die. He danced at balls, swirling around under ornate chandeliers, and it looked as if he would never die. But everything and everybody dies; it’s just that some do it slower than others.
This prince did not do things by halves. He dived headfirst into everything and excelled at whatever he tried.
Then this prince fell. Fell three times, more accurately.
At first, a literal fall. His horse, startled by a rabbit, rose into the air and the prince fell from its back, perhaps the first time the prince had ever fallen into anything.
A passerby stopped, helped him to his feet. The prince felt the boy’s hand in his, the soft grip, watched the boy’s eyes crinkle at the sides. Here – the second fall.
The prince did nothing by halves. The summer was spent by the boy’s side, trading kisses, everything tasting like sunlight. It was an inferno, a hurricane, a tsunami.
These things are doomed to be short-lived. The prince didn’t know that. He had grown up with golden armour built into his skin, but this golden armour didn’t extend to his heart. He believed himself to be invulnerable; he was not.
The boy in love with the prince did not have golden armour, or any armour at all. This lack of armour meant that, when an arrow was blown towards him by the wind, it did not glance off his skin as it might have done for the prince.
By the time the golden prince heard, it was too late. His tears slid down his face and fell on the boy’s chest, onto the shaft of the arrow. “There must be something I can do,” he said. Nobody answered.
It was the first time that anything bad had happened to the prince. He believed that there would be a solution. He believed that this armour around him would hold steady. There had always been a solution before, hadn’t there? Money and charm and power had erased problems, created solutions out of nothing.
Money and charm and power could do nothing for this. Only a certain kind of desperation could.
When he dropped a coin in the well in the centre of the city, he knew exactly what he was doing. He knew who he was calling. He knew that he shouldn’t have done it, even as he was doing it.
When the goddess of bargains rose from the water, he asked for one thing.
“Bring him back,” the prince said. “Please. I’ll give anything.”
The goddess’s lips curled into a smile. She was not known for making bargains that favoured the one who asked; sometimes the bargains didn’t favour her, either, but as long as they favoured chaos and destruction she didn’t mind. She looked at the golden prince and knew that when he offered anything, he had a lot to give. To lose.
The goddess brushed her fingers along the prince’s crown, through his golden hair, along the soft curve of his cheekbone. She could have asked for any number of things.
The prince raised his chin. His blue eyes reflected the light back at the goddess as he stared at her in silent resolution. Whatever she asked, he would give.
The goddess looked at him, and something in her shrivelled heart twitched. She knew what it was like to be young, and beautiful, and powerful, and have everything you could ever want, a grand and glorious future stretching out in front of you. She knew what it was like to love somebody beyond all reason. She knew what it was like to lose both of those things.
“Your heart is the price,” she said. “Give me your heart and, with it, your service, and the boy will live.”
“My heart,” the prince repeated. He glanced down at his chest, eyes fluttering shut. “You can take it.”
Orsa stretched a hand and took.
Time stopped. In one chest, a heart stilled. In another, a heart began to beat again.
The prince opened his eyes, and Orsa smiled.
The blue eyes were empty of any emotion. The golden prince was not a prince anymore, but instead a servant of the goddess of bargains and trickery.
“There’s a boy that needs to die,” the goddess said.
The prince blinked slowly. “Why?”
“Because I command it.”
The prince nodded. “Then it is done.”
And it was.
The boy that had been dead was still without armour. The prince slid behind him in the dark, feet silent in the shadows. Where had a prince learnt to walk like a thief?
It didn’t matter. Somewhere, somehow, he had.
The prince pressed a knife to the boy’s throat. They were close in the dark, barely a breath between them.
The boy began to say the prince’s name.
He didn’t finish it.
After, when it was done, the prince slipped back to the well and the waiting goddess.
“Is it done?” The goddess asked.
“Yes.”
The goddess sat perched on the edge of the well, her legs crossed elegantly. She snapped her fingers, once, almost in slow motion.
The prince blinked equally slowly. Understanding dawned as he clutched at his chest, as his heart began to beat once more.
“The world is balanced,” the goddess said. “The things that we lose are often things we cannot get back. You would do well to remember that.”
“You lied to me,” the prince said.
“I’m the goddess of lies. But no. I made a bargain – your heart and your servitude in return for his life. You never asked what you would do if you served me. I even cut your servitude short. I could have kept you forever, you know.”
“But-“
“Be more careful with the things you love, in the future,” the goddess warned. Then she was gone, and the golden prince was alone.
Every problem had a solution. Money and charm and power had erased problems, created solutions out of nothing.
The prince leant against the wall of the well. He was still holding the knife that the goddess had given him, the one he had held in his hands as his feet had whispered across the floor towards his target.
Wind tousled his golden hair. The goddess’s body was gone, but she was still there, watching. Waiting.
“What have I done?” The prince asked the well.
Nobody answered. There was nobody around but the prince and the wind, the last echoes of the goddess of air and bargains.
There was nobody around to witness the prince’s third fall. There was nobody to see if it had been an accident – a brick coming loose, a misplaced step – or something else. Perhaps the goddess pushed him. Mercy, or her version of it.
Now the golden prince walks the halls of the palace. His sister’s children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren don’t see him. They gaze past him as they sit on their thrones, as they walk around the palace that was once his.
They marry, and they have children, and the children wear the golden crowns that were once the prince’s. They, too, believe that their money and charm and power will erase every problem, create solutions from nothing. One at a time, in varying ways, they learn that this is not true.
Take care of what you love, the golden prince would whisper. You have armour. They do not. Take care…
They say that once a young royal learns this lesson, they can finally see the golden prince. They say the golden prince will sit with them for hours, his sister’s children and grandchildren.
But the golden prince can only be seen once the fatal mistake has been made. Never before.
Before they see him, the golden prince is simply a ghost story. They say he fell from a great height and died, a tragic accident. They say he haunts the palace because he’s angry that he died young and the princes and princesses that live in the palace do not.
The golden prince is not angry.
The golden prince walks in the palace, and he touches his portrait and leaves golden fingerprints behind, and he watches his nieces and nephews, and instead of being angry, he is afraid.
Some things you can change once they’ve been done. Other things you cannot. The prince knows that once something has fallen, you cannot reverse the fall. Once something has broken, it’s very difficult to put the pieces back together again and make it look as it once was.
And so he waits, his hands outstretched, hoping that he can catch these new golden princes and princesses in the castle before they hit the ground in a way that he himself was not caught.
Thousands of years ago, the gods came down to earth in human bodies to experience human lives and emotions. The idea was that the gods would therefore have the ‘human experience’ and become better rulers. This was not exactly what happened... each god formed relationships with those around them, and when it was time for the gods to leave earth and return, it was almost unbearable. As a gift, the gods blessed their chosen favourites with magic – limited control over the element that the god was tied to. This tradition continued every time that the gods came down to earth, and modern-day elementals are all descended from at least one person that was god-blessed at some point in time.
- Extract from Religion, Magic, and Power in Vitte by A Woods.
Try to stay away from the smart/nerdy Asian stereotype. Plenty of Asian people are very smart, just like in any other race. However, stereotypical racial representation is worse than none at all. By all means, you can have an intelligent Asian character but make sure their intelligence is not the main factor of their personality.
Write more than just East and light-skinned Asians. In most cases, if an author wants to have some Asian representation they’ll throw in a Chinese or Japanese character. And while yes, there aren’t very many Chinese and Japanese characters as opposed to white, there are even less Southeast, South, and Middle Eastern Asian representation. Not all Asians have light skin, even in East Asia. There are plenty of Korean, Chinese, and Japanese people with dark skin!
Do your research when naming Asian characters. Unless you want to end up like J.K. Rowling who’s sole Asian character was named Cho Chang. Do not just throw a last name with an ‘ong’ or an ‘ang’ at the end.
Represent plus size Asians. Asian women are stereotyped as petite, and just like white plus size women, plus size Asian women need representation in media.
Asian people don’t eat everything with chopsticks. I didn’t think that needed to be said, but here we are.
Create Asian characters with an alternative fashion sense/style. Asians with dyed hair. Asians with piercings. Asians with tattoos.
Stay away from the strict parent Asian stereotype. In fact, stay away from every stereotype, okay?
Keep in mind, stereotypes for other races aren’t the same for Asian people.
By all means, write about Asian culture. BUT MAKE SURE IT IS ACCURATE!!!
Write Asian characters who get in trouble and/or are reckless. Asians that swear. Asians that break rules. Asians that get detention.
WRITE ATHLETIC ASIANS!!!
Do not, under any circumstance, use the word ‘chinky’ to describe an Asian character. Just. Don’t.
Asian people face racism too.
Don’t fetishize or demonize Asian culture.
Asian people, feel free to add some more on! If you’re white or non-Asian POC do not comment if you reblog! (Unless it’s to say something like, oh nice tips! Or thank you, I didn’t know that!)
If you can, reblog. I haven’t seen any for Asian OCs.
(x)
Please look through the notes for important additions!!!! (Sorry I didn’t get everything!)
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