Everything in Harry Potter is the same except he has a cool aunt like Marisa Tomei’s rendition of Aunt May in Spider-Man.
Send me some numbers and a character name and I will tell you:
What does their bedroom look like?
Do they have any daily rituals?
Do they exercise, and if so, what do they do? How often?
What would they do if they needed to make dinner but the kitchen was busy?
Cleanliness habits (personal, workspace, etc.)
Eating habits and sample daily menu
Favorite way to waste time and feelings surrounding wasting time
Favorite indulgence and feelings surrounding indulging
Makeup?
Neuroses? Do they recognize them as such?
Intellectual pursuits?
Favorite book genre?
Sexual Orientation? And, regardless of own orientation, thoughts on sexual orientation in general?
Physical abnormalities? (Both visible and not, including injuries/disabilities, long-term illnesses, food-intolerances, etc.)
Biggest and smallest short term goal?
Biggest and smallest long term goal?
Preferred mode of dress and rituals surrounding dress
Favorite beverage?
What do they think about before falling asleep at night?
Childhood illnesses? Any interesting stories behind them?
Turn-ons? Turn-offs?
Given a blank piece of paper, a pencil, and nothing to do, what would happen?
How organized are they? How does this organization/disorganization manifest in their everyday life?
Is there one subject of study that they excel at? Or do they even care about intellectual pursuits at all?
How do they see themselves 5 years from today?
Do they have any plans for the future? Any contingency plans if things don’t workout?
What is their biggest regret?
Who do they see as their best friend? Their worst enemy?
Reaction to sudden extrapersonal disaster (eg The house is on fire! What do they do?)
Reaction to sudden intrapersonal disaster (eg close family member suddenly dies)
Most prized possession?
Thoughts on material possessions in general?
Concept of home and family?
Thoughts on privacy? (Are they a private person, or are they prone to ‘TMI’?)
What activities do they enjoy, but consider to be a waste of time?
What makes them feel guilty?
Are they more analytical or more emotional in their decision-making?
Would they consider themselves a Type A or Type B personality?
What recharges them when they’re feeling drained?
Would you say that they have a superiority-complex? Inferiority-complex? Neither?
How misanthropic are they?
Hobbies?
How far did they get in formal education? What are their views on formal education vs self-education?
Religion?
Superstitions or views on the occult?
Do they express their thoughts through words or deeds?
If they were to fall in love, who (or what) is their ideal?
How do they express love?
If this person were to get into a fist fight, what is their fighting style like?
Is this person afraid of dying? Why or why not?
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..
skulduggery pleasant but instead of saying “ah” every time something goes horribly wrong, he says “oh bother” like winnie the pooh
penny, after several shots: fuck the feds! eat the rich!
jj, glancing towards emily: i’m trying pen
new powers who dis
Clarabelle: If I wore a shirt inside out, the entire universe would be wearing the shirt except me.
Kenspeckle: Congratulations, you just explained Gödel's theorem in a single sentence.
Love me some magical Russian assassin
but as someone who was actually around when the first movies came out in the seventies, the new ones would probably be a huge disappointment for Tan
I can so imagine, her going really overboard with her reaction and being in actual despair over the bad plot of the new movies... Val would be stuck between fits of uncontrollable laughter and trying to console Tan
Would Tanith know about the new Star Wars films? Because of the remnant? If not, I can totally see Val telling her about them and Tanith practically screaming with delight.
she goes to grimwood (grimwood???? i think it’s grimwood) and she and val marathon them together while tanith sneakily feeds xena popcorn
Do y´all reckon there´s a magic section of the internet?
Especially for symbol magic and scientific information about magic it would make a lot of sense. Normal people would just think it´s crazy shit that some lunatic wrote and even if they tried, they couldn´t use the symbols because they don´t have magic. The magical websites could even be disguised as being about some weird form of occultism and be only accessible with a password for more security.
And for mages it would be super useful. Why carry around lots of ancient tomes that are probably written in Latin or Gaelic when you could just google everything? Developing the Whispering is taking so much time anyways. Why not just use something the mortals have already created?
Militsa: We’re not naming our first child Skulduggery.
Skulduggery: You say that now but when you’re high on the pain meds and I’ve arranged for Valkyrie to be in another dimension without a shunter and I’m filling out the birth certificate how are you going to stop me.
Valkyrie: How much of this do you have planned.
I write stuff, sometimes I post it ~ Star Wars side blog: @leia-organa-fics ~ Criminal Minds side blog: @special-agent-prentiss
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