How Could I Pass Up The Opportunity To Do Darquesse As Well.

So the new SP cover is actually super lit??? Who would have thought. The purple colouring looks amazing and I actaully love how Skulduggery's Skul is drawn.

Only downside is how big Omen is depicted ... it suggests he'll play a big part again and I couldn't care less for his chapters

On of the less intuitive things about love, I've found, of any kind, is the importance of needing things.

I didn't realize it until recently, but I've always seen love as something requiring sacrifice, selflessness, patience, and generosity- to ask for nothing is to be the best person I can be, small and quiet and never in the way, always happy and helpful, self-sufficient and present when desired.

It's only as an adult, now, that I'm beginning to see the selfishness of wanting nothing.

I cut my friend's hair in my kitchen the other day. They wanted a trim and I had the skills, so I offered, and was genuinely excited when they stopped hesitating over "bothering me" and took me up on it. It was a peaceful afternoon, and we had tea and chatted for an hour or more.

My brother and I shared popcorn at the movies a while ago. When I came time to pay, I pulled my card out like a wild western sheriff and slapped it on the machine before he could fight me for it first. The satisfaction was delightful.

Someone called me crying on the phone the other day. Kept apologizing for disturbing me at work, talking about how they were bothering me on my lunch break. I was telling the truth when I told them that really, I was flattered and honored and relieved, knowing that if they were hurting I would know, that I didn't have to worry in silence. It felt good to hear them slowly come down, and to know that they knew it would be better soon, and to hear them laugh wetly on the other end. We're getting together for a visit next week.

It's hard to need things, if you've trained yourself not to. It's hard to want things, when you don't know how to want anymore. Trusting people is difficult, and so is relying on them, but I don't know where I'd be without the people who rely on me.

I've heard a lot of people say, "Nobody will love you unless you love yourself". I've had a lot of thoughts about it. It's not right, but it's not wrong, either, I think.

"Nobody will love you unless you love yourself"... I've always taken that to mean, "You will not be lovable until you develop a positive view of yourself as a person".

Now, I think it's sort of inside-out.

"Nobody will love you unless you love yourself"... because nobody can show their love to you in a way that you can accept until you treat yourself kindly, and learn what you need, and what you want, and how to ask for it, and then give that vulnerability away.

Love, for me, is someone I ask for a ride to the airport. Whether they end up doing this or not is irrelevant.

It's not needy, or selfish, or taking up energy. It's giving the gift of being wanted, and needed, and thought of. It's giving someone the security of being part of someone's life.

New Star Wars side blog

I read a couple of books and now I´m completely obsessed with Leia Organa again, so here´s my new Star Wars side blog: @leia-organa-fics

skulduggery pleasant but instead of saying “ah” every time something goes horribly wrong, he says “oh bother” like winnie the pooh

What do you think China’s childhood was like? Every book, her view on it seems to change..

tbh it’s actually quite interesting seeing China’s different takes on her childhood, because in a way I don’t think she’s ever really recovered from it unlike Bliss, who got out at such an early age. Indeed, often when discussing her past, China always compares herself to her brother, portraying herself as weaker, slower in escaping - but the interesting thing is, she never really mentions what it was they escaped from, rather than just the mentioned indoctrination of all believers.

But the first time she really mentions her opinion of her childhood, and not just her general experience as a worshipper, she brushes it off, saying:

It had been a happy childhood. Completely insane, but happy. - MC

What’s even more interesting is through the rest of this extract, China keeps making jokes about her questions of faith + the general situation

True, she had generally had more fun in the old days... and she didn’t have to spend half her day praying. She’d never been able to understand why the Faceless Ones weren’t praying to her. - MC

But then, what I find interesting is the subtext in any of her memories of her childhood - they’re awful and yet she almost normalises them. And even when she admits to some of her troubling memories, they’re pretty watered down:

All though her childhood she’d had trouble sleeping, plagued as she was by the stories her parents would tell her of the Faceless Ones.

Doesn’t that make you feel happy? And China had said, No, Mother, it gives me bad dreams, and her mother’s face had changed in an instant and China had spent the next three days on her knees, praying to the Faceless Ones, begging for their forgiveness. - B

It’s a pretty horrifying image, a young girl (which China is very much implied to be in this extract) being forced onto her knees for three days straight because she dared to voice her fears.

Idk if it’s a coping method or something, but in a way, I see it as China almost blocking out the trauma of her childhood - we see her mention it occasionally, but most of the time she just laughs it off (which is really worrying)

I think something people often forget is that unlike some worshippers of the Faceless ones, China didn’t choose to be one, she was born into it - she had no choice, she was practically indoctrinated and it’s clear that some traumatic things happened behind the scenes that enforced her to stay obedient

What’s even more interesting is that when China leaves the church of the Faceless Ones, she doesn’t go straight to the good guys, she isolates herself and she also has some very interesting conversations about myths/fantastical elements in the world, with this being one example:

“I’ve heard nonsense. I’ve heard something that doesn’t even deserve to be called a rumour. - SP

Seems like another one of her coping methods up until TFO is to deny the existence of these gods, these legends, because in a way China never got over the indoctrination of the Church - if she fled and the gods were real, she’s damned. So if she brushes it off, just like her childhood trauma, pretending it’s not real, then she can cope - she’s not damned, which seems to be a prominent fear of her childhood

untroubled by half-remembered visions of doom and damnation + she had hidden her fears from her parents and suffered those nightmares in silence. - B

It’s interesting to see the relapse of faith in this most recent book - I’ve discussed my predictions for China in this post but I think it’s pointing towards an unraveling mind in many ways, as we also see China having a lot of flashbacks to her past as if she’s starting to relieve a lot of her repressed trauma - that could be because of Solace’s influence or something else, who knows..

Two sides of INTJ

INTJ: *wanders around city in the night while dreaming about living the life they read in books, lays on sofa with candles all around and theater music on, stares at a painting for ages because it reminds then of something important*

Also INTJ: *has their life in an excel sheet, knows when dreams are too crazy and scale then down into achievable format, and wants to make sense all the time*

I just wanted to see if anyone else experiences this as well. So throughout my whole life i have never felt ‘understood’? I’ve never felt 100% comfortable telling anyone anything even till this day there is so much stuff i keep to myself. Even from my best friends who I’ve known for over 5 years…something in me just feels like even though they would tell me anything i feel like i can’t do the same? I’ve always had different interests as them and sometimes when i’m around them i catch myself thinking ‘what am i doing here? I’m not like them i’m just fooling myself i don’t belong here’ but then other times we’re having so much fun and i can’t believe i’d ever even think i don’t belong in our group. I just feel so alienated from people sometimes. I don’t know maybe it’s just me who is the problem maybe i just expect to get more from people because i would give them anything without thinking twice about it but i guess some people just can’t because that’s just who they are. It just sucks because they aren’t to blame they are good friends it’s just me who is looking for more, a deeper connection that i can’t seem to find with anyone.

- Seasons of war spoilers -

Tanith, Dexter and Saracen watching Skulduggery make Serpine cut his hand off

Kenobi was luminous, a transparent being, a window onto a sunlit meadow of the Force.

Skywalker was a storm cloud, flickering with dangerous lightning, building the rotation that threatens a tornado.

——Star Wars: Revenge of The Sith, Matthew Stover

I keep thinking about that tweet asking what would sp be like if one of the other dead men mentored Valkyrie and I can’t stop imagining the chaos that would have been Val and Saracen. Instead of the romantically inept straight™️ phase 1 val we could’ve had smooth talking lesbian/bisexual Val (whichever you’re preference) from the start

Just imagine how the Caelan situation would’ve played out:

Valkyrie: so there’s this vampire...

Saracen: ah, we’ve all been there Valkyrie. My best advice is to just sleep with him and get it out of your system.

Valkyrie: you’ve slept with a vampire?

Saracen: Valkyrie at this point there’s not much I haven’t slept with... except maybe the sea hag, but that’s purely because I can never seem to find her.

Valkyrie (looking horrified): what about the children of the spider?

Saracen:

Saracen: Anyway, moving on...