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thisdancingheart

I feel the need to resurrect this...

... for no particular reason. XOJane is gone now, so this is from an archive site.

My encounter with internet fandom, and the rise of the celebrity relationship conspiracy theory.

Obsessed Benedict Cumberbatch Fans Tried to Have Me Fired

My encounter with internet fandom, and the rise of the celebrity relationship conspiracy theory.

MEGAN C DEC 10, 2015

“You're [sic] employee is a FAKE! Getting jobs for favors. You should be ashamed. Do you know what she gets up to on twitter?”

My manager forwarded me the email, prefaced with a wry “?”.

It started, as so many online flaps do, with a thoughtless tweet. A starstruck friend and I had bumped into the popular actor Benedict Cumberbatch and his pregnant wife, and I made a faintly ironic tweet about it. Mentioning Cumberbatch would prove uneventful. Mentioning his wife would prove a mistake.

A couple of friends favorited it, as expected. Then the replies started. “How do you know it was his wife?” “What's his wife like?”

Then, “SHE'S NOT PREGNANT."

I thought it odd but shrugged it off, unaware I was slowly becoming low-level infamous on a dark corner of Tumblr.

Members of the self-named “Skeptics” (a group of exclusively female Cumberbatch fans who believe that his wife is, variously: a prostitute, a hired PR girlfriend, a blackmailer, a con artist, a domestic abuser, mentally ill, and apparently the most brilliant criminal mastermind of all time, and that the marriage, his wife's pregnancy, and very existence of their child have all been faked in a wide-ranging international conspiracy orchestrated by a 30-something British opera director in an attempt to force a naïve and helpless movie star to pretend to be married to her) had discovered me, and they were not impressed.

As a result of my tweet, I discovered my entire career and online footprint being pored over in an attempt to find evidence that I was yet another person involved in the conspiracy. Being British was a strong sign. Having tweeted about celebrities before was even more suspicious.

Intrigued, I dug deeper, and found this was not an aberration but part of a growing trend.

Robert Pattinson's girlfriend, the rapper FKA twigs, has been subject to extreme racial abuse from "Twihards," fans of the movie series Twilight who believe that Pattinson and his former co-star Kristen Stewart are secretly married with two children (in fan-land, pregnancies are easy to hide even if you're a constantly-photographed celebrity, while publicly announced pregnancies with bumps are automatically suspect). Beyonce, Kate Middleton, and Katie Holmes have all been accused of faking their pregnancies.

These hate campaigns follow the same lines: There is always a shadowy omnipresent 'PR' (run by a management company or movie studio or record company) secretly controlling everything. However the woman is the chief villain. She may be just a "hired hand" paid to play a role, but she, not management or PR, is always the true evil genius secretly controlling everything. The male star is inevitably naïve and innocent or just plain abused and in need of rescue.

There is usually a wronged true love in the background, though the true love may be a male or (or more rarely a female) co-worker, or an idealized hypothetical future love. Within each fangroup, leaders and followers emerge, sometimes with internal factions. The leaders always have anonymous and fiercely protected insider sources who confirm all their theories. Those "in the know" are superior to the sheep who buy mainstream PR, and firmly believe their brave attempts at outing the truth are being closely monitored by the star's panicked management.

You are either a friend or an enemy, with us or against us, no one is neutral, and each new photo, sighting, interview or role is quickly embroidered into the conspiracy tapestry.

The CumberSkeptics do seem to have taken it to another level, though. Where else could you see an A List celebrity being accused of walking around London carrying a plastic Tiny Tears doll, in a desperate attempt to persuade an apparently extremely gullible paparazzi that he is the father of a baby? Or a beard-girlfriend theory that has both the Queen and the Church of England participating in the conspiracy?

So why do so many seemingly normal fans – people with spouses, children and jobs – end up devoting thousands of hours to proving fantasies about celeb's love lives? Some fans fixate on their favourite celeb being available (one common theme among the Cumberbatch skeptics is the belief that he engages in casual sex with every woman who crosses his path, but he is ready to settle down and commit himself when he meets The One), presumably because they have cast themselves as that celeb's true love. Others project their romantic desire onto on-screen couples, defending the fictitious relationship.

Is it just envy? Erotomania? A desperate need for attention? The buzz of feeling important? A desperate need to equal an inherently one-sided relationship and become significant to someone important to them? These are questions psychologists and pop culture observers have been speculating on for decades. As Internet fandom continues to spread and become increasingly mainstream, we have certainly not seen the last of it. How long such things will remain in the relatively safe space of online, remains to be seen.

In October, months after my minor brush with Internet infamy ended, Benedict Cumberbatch called the police over a stalker who had been repeatedly visiting his home.

And as for me? My manager, who fortunately is a good friend with a great sense of humour, brushed off the emails. Tumblr forgot about me, as more tweeters met or saw Benedict and his family and needed to be investigated and explained away.

And as happy (and obviously, glowingly pregnant) as Sophie Hunter was when I met her – I've never been more grateful not to be famous.TAGS CELEBRITYFANDOMOBSESSION

MEGAN C

doctortwhohiddles

Always reblog this. Never let anyone forget what the septics did and still do.

clairehadenough

A conversation between a certain blogs and TMZ.

TB: You know Alba said antisemitism things on set of WN her co-star said so.

TMZ - that’s good. Whats the co-stars name?

TB:no idea

TMZ: right so how do you know? Is there evidence, a copy of a conversation, text, tweet, video?

TB: No it’s rumors

TMZ: so hearsay

TB: I guess but she’s a N**I and her grandparents fled to Brazil right after the war

TMZ: And the evidence? Has it been researched and confirmed?

TB: well no but she body shames people

TMZ: Good where is the evidence of that

TB: Her friend Justin’s IG and Tweets from 8yrs ago. And another trans gender friend KiKo made N**i comments from years ago. And Alba likes weird posts.

TMZ: yes disgusting comments from KiKo I agree. Did Alba know her then?

TB: No but they are friends now.

TMZ: Do you have any evidence of anything she has done directly?

TB: Yes these IG posts of cultural misappropriation and her soft porn movies. Also she made a white supremacy sign.

TMZ: You mean the international sign language signal for Ok each thousands use everyday. Which ordinarily people use as well so that can be argued that what she was using.

So we have some cultural misappropriation and soft porn films which she hasn’t done since 2019. That’s a start.

Anything else?

TB; She deleted stuff off her IG the bad things.

TMZ: Do you screenshots of them?

TB: Well no

TMZ: So how do you know they were bad or incriminating?

TB: 🤷🏻‍♀️

TMZ: Anything else

TB: Yes a fake marriage.

TMZ: But Chris confirmed he was married?

TB: But you haven’t produced the certificate and there are no wedding photos and Chris is been drugged to comply and wear a fake wedding ring. It’s all a coincidence that a wedding planner, photographer, his friends, RDJ, Renner,Scarlet,Hemsworth were in MA that weekend. Also that his family and friends and hers were in PT along with the wedding planner and photographer.

TMZ: Renner and Hemsworth told fans they were there for Chris’s wedding.

TB: They were lying. And DHS are looking into their fake marriage and her immigration status.

TMZ: Has she actually said anything.

TB: No but she a yacht girl and slept with her director, producer, anyone to get a part. And she’s into sugar daddies. Her friends followed a sugar daddy account.

TMZ: Again hearsay barring the sugar daddy account follow.

TB: Her FB is followed by dirty creepy man and she posts sexy pics on it for them to like.

TMZ: Proof it’s hers? Do her family and friends follow her.

TB: No and no. But we have sources like people who live in Concord, in LA, talk round the water cooler and a BUA is coming JJ is sitting on it waiting to release it.

It’s all CAA and Megan’s fault. They are drugging Chris and he has clout chaser friends and everyone he and she know breadcrumb the fandom and he sends out messages in his interviews.

TMZ: Ah weren’t some blogs involved in scammer money out of Chris’s fans.

TB: Yes but that was Candy’s fault

TMZ: 👌 don’t call us we’ll call you🤦🏻‍♀️

🫠

The thing is that’s exactly how I think it would go if they ever called them😂😂

thisdancingheart

There is nothing new under the sun. I like the name delulus for this group of "fans". I'll add it to septics, toxics, fanemies, tinhats, tinhaters, and all the others.

doctortwhohiddles

They are definitely as delusionals as all the other fandom tinhaters. And they also follow the same Tinhat Guide to Looking Like An Idiot. It's on It's 15th edition.

ts1989fanatic

Have We Reached Peak Taylor Swift? The Psychology Behind When Someone Becomes Overexposed.

Is Taylor Swift about to be in her 'overexposed' era?

Midway through the Eras Tour, Taylor Swift is everywhere.

The ongoing tour ― Swift is scheduled to resume the international leg in November ― and the subsequent concert film are certifiable cultural events that have actually boosted regional economies. (In Los Angeles, for instance, where Swift performed six shows, the California Center for Jobs and the Economy predicted a $320 million boost to the county. No wonder Canada’s prime minister Justin Trudeau practically begged the Grammy winner to visit up north.)

She’s even bolstering the NFL’s viewership: Since the “Cruel Summer”

singer started attending her boyfriend Travis Kelce’s Kansas City Chiefs games, the league has seen some Super Bowl-level numbers thanks to all the Swifties tuning in.

Meanwhile, the media coverage is breathless. While daytime talk show hosts ask Kelce’s mom about Swift, there’s play-by-play of the couple’s dates around the web: “They were in a rounded booth sitting super close to each other in deep convo the whole time,” a diner at the Waverly Inn in Greenwich, where Swift and Kelce dined on Sunday, told The Messenger. “It looked super romantic and was super intimate.”

But given Swift’s cultural dominance ― and NFL fans booing an ad for her concert doc early this month ― even her fans are a little worried that Taylor fatigue might soon set in. Is Swift due for another “overexposed” era?

“Kinda overwhelmed by how close Taylor is to overexposure,” one fan tweeted on X.

“You either die the hero or live long enough to admit that you have Taylor Swift fatigue,” another wrote on the site.

On the main Swift subreddit, fans debate if Swift will eventually go back into pop star hibernation like she did after her “1989” album.

Indeed, this isn’t Swift’s first go-around with overexposure. The success of “1989” in 2014 was followed by a heightened interest in Swift’s personal life: her famous friends (or her “squad”), her ill-fated romance with Tom Hiddleston, her drama with Kanye West and Kim Kardashian. In response, Swift made a “conscious choice to disappear” and opt for a more “lowkey” life, a source close to the singer told People at the time.

Her rollout of her next album, 2017’s “Reputation,” was relatively quiet. (“There will be no further explanation. There will just be reputation,” Swift remarked on Instagram.)

Swift seems to pay close attention to her fandom and cultivate those parasocial relationships, said Lynn Zubernis, a psychologist and professor at West Chester University who researches fan psychology.

“Who knows, she might consider withdrawing from the spotlight again at some point,” Zubernis told HuffPost.

The professor likened the “Anti-Hero” singer’s ubiquity right now to Barney in the ’90s. Parents loved the purple dinosaur initially (no one kept their kids as entertained), but that love soured by the 104th listen of the “I love you, you love me” theme song.

“Familiarity is part of what drives fandom — we’re wired to attach to familiar faces, whether they’re offline or on our screens — but there’s a limit to how much repetition we can tolerate,” Zubernis said. “Too many instances of someone popping up and behaving the same way or saying the same thing can start to grate.”

The overexposure is sometimes exacerbated by the celebrity being perceived as “trying too hard” or being inauthentic, Zubernis said: Miley Cyrus, Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spears, even Lady Gaga come to mind, she said.

“At first their ‘antics’ were popular, but people soon grew tired and cynical about them,” she said. “Justin Bieber, James Franco, Shai LaBeouf and Kanye West fall into that category too, and all have been on lists of ‘celebrities we’re tired of’ as a result.”

There’s also a common trajectory that fandom tends to take: Fans love to root for their favorite celebrity ― or sports team or TV series ― because of that vicarious sense of success they gain, but there’s also a cost to that success and visibility, Zubernis said. Some fans jump ship.

“Fans also relish feeling ‘special’ and seeing their fandom as exclusive ― as in, we are the only ones who see how truly special this person is and appreciate her,” the professor said.

“Once someone like Swift becomes beloved by everyone, even ‘normies,’ the fandom doesn’t feel as exclusive anymore,” she added. (Think how in high school, you used to say, “Yeah, I liked that band when they were still underground.”)

Jaye L. Derrick, an associate professor of psychology who studies parasocial relationships at the University of Houston, has a different take: She thinks that most of the people complaining about Swift were never fans to begin with.

“She has a very large following, but no celebrity can make 100% of the population like them,” Derrick told HuffPost.

“As Taylor Swift is shown to new markets, she is meeting some pushback from people who may have been aware of her before but never sought her out,” she said. “I suspect that most of the negative exposure is from people who had maybe consciously avoided her before and are not able to avoid her anymore.”

Tracy Gleason, the chair and professor of psychology at Wellesley College and an author of a paper on parasocial relationships, agrees with Derrick. The fans at the Giants game who booed her ad, for instance, might have done so because she’s dating a player on a rival team.

“Another possible explanation for the football game is that people who are fans of football, some of whom are likely women, are not necessarily fans of Taylor Swift,” Gleason told HuffPost. “Seeing Taylor get more attention than the game itself might have felt distracting and annoying.”

“Who knows, though,” she added. “Maybe they are Swifties but just want to keep each of the things they enjoy in their own lane: Taylor belongs on the stage and football belongs in the arena.”

Is misogyny at play when we deem someone “overexposed”?

When it comes to conversations about fame, some have pointed out that it tends to be women that get the whiplash “love-hate” treatment: They’re celebrated at first, then they’re deemed overexposed, like Anne Hathaway or Jennifer Lawrence were after their respective Oscar campaigns.

For the most part, men have more room to navigate fame: There’s a double-standard for the type of behavior that is considered appropriate for men versus for women, Derrick said.

For starters, men are expected to express their agency, so they are allowed to promote their projects.

“For women, it is harder to engage in agentic behavior without people viewing them as too in-your-face,” Derrick said. “In American society, we traditionally expect women to be more communal and less agentic.” (Swift addresses this complicated bind for women in the song “The Man” from 2019 album “Lover.”)

The professor thinks these women would probably get a pass if they were “trying too hard” to promote something communal, like a charity, but over-promoting yourself is a cardinal sin in celebritydom if you’re a woman.

With male examples of overexposure, it usually results from some publicly frowned-upon behavior: Bieber was a notoriously bratty teen (which is hardly a crime, of course, but his reputation persists), West was accused of antisemitism, Franco and LaBeouf were both accused of sexual misconduct, and Elon Musk has been accused of not only damaging Twitter (or as he’s rebranded, X) but threatening democracy itself.

Women celebrities are shamed for bad behavior, too, of course, but also for deviating from social expectations, Zubernis said.

“The culture still isn’t all that comfortable with women being very visible or powerful or successful in some way; that idea is vaguely threatening to the status quo,” she said. “I think that would apply to Swift, Hathaway and Lawrence.”

If you were a fan of any of those women to begin with, though, you probably stuck by them through and through. Fandoms tend to be ride or die until something truly cancellable happens.

“There are times when fans will turn on a celebrity, but those are usually cases where the celebrity did something out-of-character that led people to become disillusioned with their brand,” Derrick said.

In other words, when it comes to these “overexposed” claims ― or criticism from non-fans who wish Swift would take a sabbatical ― Swifties worldwide are probably just going to “shake it off.”

ts1989fanatic:

So Michael Jackson in his prime was everywhere and until he went off the deep end was beloved by fans and none fans worldwide. But Taylor Swift who has in my opinion reached MJ status is over exposed, you know this was not really a thing until she started dating Travis Kelce.

So to answer the question posed above

Is misogyny at play when we deem someone “overexposed”?

In the case of Taylor Swift damn straight misogyny is at play, all these talking heads and college professors and the rest of the media jackals and TS haters need to just FUCK THE HELL OFF.

analyzingtaylor

1) The NFL game broadcasts are not going to go as hard on her. Now, it’s just another thing that is in the background and happening and if the broadcasters overkill it beyond a good reaction shot at a key moment, they’ll lose credibility. So don’t expect too many more puns from respectable sportscasters, but they were clever and appreciated early on.

2) When she leaves the country to resume tour, social media will be aware of it, but it won’t even be something normies are aware of.

3) In hindsight, being so public this past weekend was a shock, but it was also smart, because it took away the shock factor of any future PDA from two people who now appear incapable of hiding it if they wanted to.

4) she probably will never tour quite like this again, so it may truly be the peak of everything.

1975archives

"Alright. Ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen. Okay. Unfortunately for you guys, Dallas you’ve drawn the short straw. You’ve gotten the show where I’ve genuinely just stopped caring. And - ah you see, this show has kind of bled off the stage into loads of different environments, and I don’t mind hollow shallow accusations of being racist or stuff like that, it kind of allows the show to do what it’s designed to do - expose inconsistencies and hypocrisies, I use myself to do that. But I don’t know how familiar you all are with the lore of this band, but we got banned from Malaysia this year. And it has nothing to do with you guys, but unfortunately there’s so many incredibly stupid people on the internet that I’ve just cracked. And everyone keeps telling me that you can’t talk about Malaysia, don’t talk about what happened in Malaysia, so I’m gonna talk about it at length. And unfortunately you have to listen to it. And this is long, so. You’ll be all right. But I am pissed off, to be frank. I’m gonna read from my phone what I have to say about this situation, regardless of whether you care or not because the internet needs to hear this.

The 1975 did not waltz into Malaysia unannounced, they were invited to headline a festival by a government who had full knowledge of the band with its well-publicized political views and its routine stage show. Malaysian festival organizers’ familiarity with the band was the basis of our invitation. Me kissing Ross was not a stunt simply meant to provoke the government, it was an ongoing part of The 1975 stage show which had been performed many times prior. Similarly, we did not change our set that night to play, you know, pro-freedom of speech or pro-gay songs. To eliminate any routine part of the show in an effort to appease the Malaysian authorities’ bigoted views of LGBTQ people would be a passive endorsement of those politics. As liberals are so fond of saying, “silence equals violence, use your platform”, so we did that. And that is where things got complicated. Naturally. the Malaysian authorities were irate because homosexuality is criminalized and punishable by death in their authoritarian theocracy. That is the violent reality obscured by the more friendly term “cultural customs”. But it was the liberal outrage against our band for remaining consistent with our pro-LGBTQ stage show which was the most puzzling thing. Lots of people, liberal people, contended that the performance was “an insensitive display of hostility against the cultural customs of the Malaysian government, and that the kiss was a performative gesture of allyship”. To start, the idea of calling out a performer for being performative is mind-numbingly redundant as an exercise. Performing is a performer’s job. The stage is a place for creating artists’ expressions, which are inherently dramatized. That’s why audiences go to fucking shows. Other people, other apparent liberal people, contended that the kiss was itself a form of colonialism. That The 1975, in the rich tradition of evil white men past, was forcing its Western beliefs on the Eastern world. My how the West has fallen, ladies and gentlemen. The East India Company could have saved a fortune on weaponry if they knew that all they had to do was make out with each other to forcibly subjugate the people that they exploited. To call The 1975’s performance colonialism is a complete inversion of the word’s meaning. Colonialism is the practice of forcible occupation and economic exploitation. Once again, The 1975 was INVITED into the country to headline Malaysia’s music festival in an effort to capitalize on our popularity so they could make money. Despite the band being amateur jiu-jitsu enthusiasts, we’re not very good, we have no power at all to enforce our will on anyone in Malaysia. In fact, it was the Malaysian authorities who briefly imprisoned us. So for performers like Julian Casablancas, who took to Twitter to criticize us, this bizarre mangling of colonial identity politics merely served as an expedient way to express their own disappointment with the festivals cancellation because it would be in poor taste, surely, to lament a loss of performance. So these are the types of mental gymnastics that are employed by celebrities to save face with their liberal-appearing audiences who delight in having their favorite academic catch phrases parroted back at them. I’m not waiting for applause, I’m just calming down.

Levying the accusation of colonialism against Western critics is, by now, a standard PR procedure in the authoritarian theocracy playbook. Just last summer, amidst criticism of human rights abuses against the enslaved workers who built their soccer facilities, the UAE’s representatives contended that Western journalists who highlighted this fact were guilty of enforcing their colonial games on their local, religiously-armed customers. But the fact that the UAE employs the Western consultant McKinsey to write this kind of perverted relativism is a great stroke of irony. And the fact that the UAE was the first country to kick The 1975 out for being gay is the cherry on top. There’s a contradiction at the heart of liberals’ outrage over our supposed cultural insensitivity. Their unconditional belief in inclusivity and tolerance has led them to indirectly support a government which is intolerance of their own existence. What responsibility do liberals have to be ideologically chivalrous to those who wish them death?

If you truly believe that artists have a responsibility to uphold their liberal virtues by using their massive platforms, then those artists should be judged by the danger and the inconvenience that they face for doing so, not by the rewards that they receive for parroting consensus. There’s nothing particularly stunning or brave about changing your fucking profile picture whilst you’re sat in your house in Los Angeles. I’m really fucking pissed off with this shit. Malaysia’s militarized enforcement of laws against public displays of homosexuality creates a clear line in the sand for what artists are allowed and expected to do. But elsewhere, this line isn’t so defined. Even here in America, there’s loads of states which uphold illiberal laws that restrict people’s bodily autonomy and gender expression. I don’t know why you’re cheering. But I suspect, I’ve got an inkling, that those who took to Twitter to voice their outrage over The 1975’s unwillingness to cater to Malaysian customs would find it appalling if The 1975 were to acquiesce to, let’s say, Mississippi’s respective bullshit abortion or trans laws. The idea that it’s incumbent upon artists to cater to the local cultural sensitivities of wherever they’ve been invited to perform sets a very dangerous precedent. It should be expected that if you invite dozens of Western performers into your country, they’ll bring their Western values with them. If doing the same things which made you aware of them could land them in jail in your country, you’re not actually inviting them to perform - you’re indirectly commanding them to reflect your country’s policies by omission. This kind of statement criticism goes against the very idea of a site of cultural exchange where differences are allowed to coexist. This, that, is a more valuable idea to protect than the bigoted sensitive of those that wish its demise. Yeah. Don’t forget who wrote this."

— Matty Healy before singing Love It If We Made It in Fort Worth, Texas (October 9, 2023)

bird-madgirl

“I think everything in life is art. What you do. How you dress. The way you love someone, and how you talk. Your smile and your personality. What you believe in, and all your dreams. The way you drink your tea. How you decorate your home. Or party. Your grocery list. The food you make. How your writing looks. And the way you feel. Life is art.”

— Helena Bonham Carter

heywriters

HEY, Romance Writers!

A few followers have asked for tips on writing romance into their stories or as the basis of their stories. Here’s a masterlist of sources (below cut) that may help.

General Romance:

What Defines Romantic Love?

How to Plot a Romance Novel

Slowburn Romance

When Friends Fall for Each Other (ask)

Tips for Writing a Character Who Has a Crush

Tips on Writing Unrequited Love

Writing Healthy Couples in Fiction

An Antidote to “Love at First Sight”

How Attractive Should Your Characters Be?

3 Great Ways to Show That Your Character Is In Love

6 Ways to Get Your Readers Shipping Like Crazy

Six Steps to Stronger Character Arcs in Romances

Seven Great Sources of Conflict for Romances

9 Romance Writing Mistakes to Avoid

20 Tips for Writing Lovable Romance Novel Heroes

How to Write a Kissing Scene in a Romance Novel

Types of Kisses and Kissing + This Post Is All About Kisses

List of Ideas to Keep Romantic Tension High

100 Questions for Character Couples

How Do I Make the Relationship Development Realistic?

How Do I Know If Two People Are Compatible?

Healthy Relationships Can Include Teasing

How to Write a YA Romance Without Cliché

Intercultural Romance:

How do I write an interracial couple accurately? (ask)

15 Common Stereotypes About Intercultural Relationships

Cross Cultural Relationships

14 Experiences in a Cross-Cultural Relationship

Things to Avoid When Writing Interracial Romance

writingwithcolor: Interracial Relationships (w/ links)

Bad Romance:

Things to Keep Out of Your Healthy Relationships!

Removing the Creeps From Romance

Why The Surprise Kiss Must Go

Possessiveness 101

10 Signs You May Be in an Emotionally Abusive Relationship

Edward & Bella Are In An Abusive Relationship

Red Flags, Verbal Abuse, Stalking… | Script Shrink

5 Huge Mistakes Ruining the Romantic Relationships in Your Book

How do you write a [bad] relationship without romanticising it? (ask)

General Tips for Writing Characters Love Interests:

How to Write from a Guy’s POV

Writing Awesome Male Characters: What You’re Doing Wrong

7 Point-of-View Basics Every Writer Should Know

How Do You Describe a Character?

4 Ways to Make Readers Instantly Loathe Your Character Descriptions

3 Signs Your Story’s Characters Are Too Perfect

Is a Quirk Just What Your Character Needs?

Six Types of Character Flaws

Is Your Character Optimistic Or Pessimistic?

5 Ways to Keep Characters Consistent

9 Simple and Powerful Ways to Write Body Language

10 Body Language Tricks for Deeper Characterization

Describing People Part Three: Gestures, Expressions, and Mannerisms

33 Ways To Write Stronger Characters

Conveying Character Emotion

Distinguishing Characters in Dialogue

How to Make Readers Love an Unlikable Character…

Characters: Likability Is Overrated

Relationships in General:

How to Create Powerful Character Combos

8 Secrets To Writing Strong Character Relationships

Character Relationships: 6 Tips for Crafting Real Connections

Writing Relationships: Hate to Love

Stereotypes, Archetypes, & Tropes:

Five Signs Your Story Is Sexist: Part 1, Part 2

Five Signs Your Story Is Sexist – Against Men

Always Female vs Always Male

Born Sexy Yesterday & Manic Pixie Dream Girl

7 (Overused) Female Love Interests

Other Resource Lists

Resources For Romance Writers

thewritershelpers FAQ (romance, kissing, sexuality, etc)

#romance | WordsnStuff

#romance | Hey, Writers!

—

+ If you enjoy my blog and want continued updates, please consider sending a little thank you and Buy Me A Coffee!

Columnist Vinay Khosla argues that parasocial relationships insulate public figures, such as celebrities and politicians from necessary criticism and that we must deconstruct this phenomenon.

#book rec #Annikas taste

literaticat

Would it be alright to use an adult memoir as a comp title for a YA novel if it deals with similar themes and subject matter?

I've talked about this before, but, I feel like there are two different kinds of comp and everyone kinda conflates them. Personally I use both kinds of comps in slightly different ways all the time, and I think that's fine -- it just depends who I am talking to and what I am trying to convey.

PLEASE NOTE: AFAIK, I am the ONLY person who uses these terms lol. So probably don't start bandying them about as if they are a "thing" -- this is just how I think about it, and it might be helpful for you, but I suspect nobody will know what you are talking about if you use these terms out loud. :-)

One is a sales comp: These are books that are on the shelves right now, where I think my book might appeal to the same audience, and I know you don't know ME, but you know these other books, and one can extrapolate that if they did really well exploring these themes etc for this audience, mine might too! This is likely to go in the "stats" section of the query, like "AMAZINGBOOK is a YA contemporary complete at 85,000 words; it will appeal to fans of searingly honest, ripped-from-the-headlines titles like THIS IS WHERE IT ENDS by Marieke Nijkamp and SOME KIND OF HATE by Sarah Darer Littman"

(This kind of comp also serves double duty -- it shows that YOU KNOW the audience and the market, that you are well-read in the field, that you aren't one of those jokers who are like "this will appeal to everyone from age 1 to 101!" -- (no it won't) -- or "There is nothing to compare this to because there are simply no YA books with boy main characters!" (um yes there are, you just don't read much.))

The other is a TONE comp: "Terminator meets Jane Austen." "Wes Anderson meets the Brothers Grimm." "Think Bridgerton, if it was set in Wakanda." "The cuteness of Paddington with the murderous heart of Chucky." So, these things can be books - but they can also be more like, "aesthetics", cultural touchstones, movies/TV, whatever -- something that gives you a good idea of what the book FEELS like, you know what I mean? This is more likely to go as part of a "hook", log-line, or elevator pitch.

These two kinds of comps are just accomplishing slightly different goals. So I lean toward thinking, look, fiction vs nonfiction, kids/YA vs adult -- ehhhhhhhhhhhhh it's not really a great SALES comp. I can only speak for myself, but I don't read a ton of adult nonfiction, and if somebody came to me with a comp I had never heard in a totally different category, I'd be like "uh...????"

That said, also, IF the memoir is so popular and whatever that you feel like they totally MUST have heard of it, and it really is apt, I don't see why you can't weave it through in some kind of way as a TONE comp. So like, "AWESOMEBOOK is like MOMMIE DEAREST on steroids" would be fine -- even if we haven't read Mommie Dearest or seen the movie, we are aware of that as a cultural touchstone and can imagine what "Mommie Dearest On Steroids" might feel like.

Make sense?

seaoflove

a long time ago i learned that a big part of your life needs to be undocumented and just simply enjoyed in the present. you don’t need to post a picture of the book your reading for it to be good. you don’t need to have a pic of you posing before the sea as proof that u had a good trip. there’s a very fine line between manufacturing moments for future nostalgia and honoring happy experiences by commemorating them into art. and it’s all about intention: do i want to take a picture because it would look good on ig or do i want to take a picture because i do not want to forget how insanely happy i am right now? or, preferably, do i even need to take a picture at all?

thevirgocrier-deactivated202308

I wonder if tom cares about the timdaya thing and people constantly saying z is cheating or timmy would be better for her... like I know they're friends and the majority of people love tomdaya but it has to get to you sometimes

My point exactly. I don’t think half of these stans can comprehend that they’re talking about someone’s actual, physical relationship. This isn’t some Netflix series where Tom, Z and Timothee are just characters who are only puppets to entertain us. This is their real life and they have real feelings. The louder Timdayas get, the more the rumors and speculation will negatively affect the trio and their friendship. It’s not going to end well at all and this has happened so many times throughout the course of history. Famous friendships always get divided because an overzealous group of fans like to create unwarranted drama to witness their fantasies to come to fruition, which then leads to other people gossiping and spreading false rumors until the tension grows between those celebs and they become uncomfortable associating with each other.

novelwritingtrash

Famous friendships always get divided because an overzealous group of fans like to create unwarranted drama to witness their fantasies to come to fruition, which then leads to other people gossiping and spreading false rumors until the tension grows between those celebs and they become uncomfortable associating with each other.

kdrama-leadingmen

Fandom conspiracy theories have already gotten out of hand, but the existence of tiktok has made things much much worse. We've arrived at a point that staying silent doesn't work anymore because it only allows a very vocal group to influence what the public sees and hears.

Every new iteration of social media makes things much worse it seems. So whatever the next hot thing post-Tik Tok is, it will again worsen, in my cynical opinion. And staying silent doesn't work, but, from my 6+ years on this site, saying loads about it didn't seem to make much difference either. So IDK. I'm heartened to see this matter FINALLY being addressed in the media but that focus will fade out and then the next target will emerge - some woman somewhere will associate with a (likely) white man with power or fame or wealth, or all of the above, and the cycle will begin all over again. And 10 years from now we'll get a network or major streaming service documentary about it, wringing our collective hands about our past behavior (in the vein of all the Britney docs over the last couple years) and wondering how it could possibly have gone so wrong. Wash, rinse, repeat.

ihearthes

“It’s easier to be alone than it is to constantly be misunderstood”

— Unknown (via perfectquote)

The ‘Wagatha Christie’ trial was a reminder that celebrities and photographers have a far cosier relationship than many of them would admit. Here, insiders reveal how the industry really works

#celebrity #life and style #privacy #privacy & the media #media

josieandthepussycatsofficial

At first Ratajkowski stuck by her argument, telling journalists that “female sexuality and sexiness, no matter how conditioned it may be by a patriarchal ideal, can be incredibly empowering for a woman”. But as the years went by her opinions around that video, and her empowerment, changed. “In my early twenties it had never occurred to me that the women who gained their power from beauty were indebted to the men whose desire granted them that power in the first place. Those men were the ones in control,” she writes. “Facing the reality of the dynamics at play would have meant admitting how limited my power really was.”

Emily Ratajkowski: ‘I had succeeded by commodifying my body. So why was I so unhappy?’ The Sunday Times

framboisedorleac

Françoise Dorléac in La Chasse à l'homme, 1964.

kdrama-leadingmen

In Kaitlyn Tiffany's sharp and funny 'Everything I Need I Get From You,' online fandom is serious business.

“At its best,” Tiffany writes, “fandom is a joke that never ends.” Sometimes, though, the joke is on us, the fans who exert baffling amounts of energy in order to boost our fave’s Spotify numbers, defend their artistic merits, and harass their haters. In return, we want to be let in on a secret, to witness the fruits of our screen time, to see the causes we care about championed by the celebrities we worship. But perhaps, Tiffany suggests, fandom is most meaningful as a series of signposts, a process by which we come of age — or in my case, come out — and begin to champion our enthusiasms, and ourselves. Which is all celebrities ever do, anyway.

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