[ SECRET POST #5442 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5442 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


01.



__________________________________________________



02.



__________________________________________________



03.



__________________________________________________



04.



__________________________________________________



05.



__________________________________________________



06.
















Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 29 secrets from Secret Submission Post #779.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

05. https://i.imgur.com/3eZD7XA.jpg

[(Anonymous)]

Holy Wall of Text, Batman.

Teal Deer, OP, sorry.

[(Anonymous)]

K

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah, despite the fact that this is written in what looks to me like a perfectly legible font, my eyes still glaze over when I try to read past the first sentence.

[(Anonymous)]

Er, who is Mags?

[(Anonymous)]

Fuck knows. This secret read like someone set an AI to scrape FS comment threads.

[feotakahari]

“I’m a woman now” seems like it would be a valid statement in a setting where it’s already valid to say “I’m a horse now.”

[(Anonymous)]

Or my wife...

[(Anonymous)]

Fair.

[(Anonymous)]

Rude.

[(Anonymous)]

I haven't read most of her recent work but IIRC, Lackey's always been a pretty formulaic writer. Lots of underdog characters with past trauma they overcome, lots of beautiful, androgynous men, etc.

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah, that's kinda her schtick, I mean she started out as a fan fic writer who caught a lucky break and really took off with it. Tbh it's a big part of why I like her stuff ngl

[(Anonymous)]

Wasn't there a character in one of her more recent elemental magic books who started out female and then at the end became male (major spoilers for the book as to how so I'm not going into detail) and then once it happened the character was like "ya know, it suddenly makes sense how comfortable and right this body feels"? I remember that bc it really stood out to me as pretty obviously a trans character

[(Anonymous)]

Yup. In "The Bartered Brides", new character Caro was born female, but after dying, being a ghost for a while, and then getting a new, male, body, he is now male and goes by Peter (the name of his new body. It's complicated).

[(Anonymous)]

Uuuuuuuuugh, Mags is so incredibly boring. I was fine with him for, like, a book or two. She's done one-offs and two-offs and they don't overstay their welcome and it's fine. (I still really like the first one in his series. Foundation is a pretty good entry as a standalone Valdemar book.)

But oh. my. god. Mags is just awful. I stopped reading after the fifth? one of his. I just didn't have it in me to care and I usually love all Valdemar books. :/

ALSO OH MY GOD. okay I was looking up info to figure out how many Mags books there are (and lmao at Spy, Spy Again as a book title) but-- She's started writing about the founding of Valdemar?! kjaldjglkagha

... *sticks it in my cart because, fuck yeah, the start of Valdemar*

[(Anonymous)]

I agree with you on everything, except I only made it three books into the whole Mags thing before I completely dropped the Valdemar series. Probably the most boring character that she has ever created and that's the one she decides to focus on for like a decade?!?

But then I saw the founding books when I was looking her up last week and now those are on my Christmas list, I am so there for that.

[bookblather]

Oh yeah, I remember that. I spite-wrote fanfic about a trans Healer and now he's like, a whole Thing in my head.

[(Anonymous)]

Such activism. Much edgy.

[(Anonymous)]

I've never really gotten into the Valdemar books. I like when she does a take on fairy tales, like Five Hundred Kingdoms and Elemental Masters, but I've only really liked The Black Gryphon, which is a prequel and barely counts.

[popkin16]

I haven't read Lackey in years and didn't even know she was still writing. I'm tempted to check out some of her newer stuff, though maybe I'll avoid 'Mags'...

[(Anonymous)]

She acknowledged that she had phrased things badly, affirmed that she agrees that trans men and men and trans women are women and I think that's really all you can ask of someone - people aren't always going to know the right terminology and I'd much rather have ten of her than one "of course I totally support trans people if they're trans enough for me but also trans women are men" Rowling.

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah, I'm not a fan of "you must include trans characters in you books to prove you're not transphobic" because trying to manipulate people into writing your pet minority only ends up in resentment and potentially really shitty tokenism.

[(Anonymous)]

1. Holy shit, Mercedes Lackey is still writing?!?!

2. Unless you're leaving something big out, it doesn't sound like you need to care about the issue. "Said something questionable about trans people a long time ago" and "has never written a trans character" is like, 90% of writers ever. It's also like 90% of people ever, but more understandable with the second point because most people aren't writers. Most of us didn't understand what trans was or why we should care until recently, and that's not great but it's not bad either as long as we've changed.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm trans and even I don't want trans people in my source material. I don't want realistic universes where people have to go through the medical and political minefield *but it all turns out fine in the end...* or magic 'click your fingers, now you're a boy/girl' worlds that just bring out envy and annoyance.

I want to read/watch/listen about people who aren't stereotypes. The athletic quarterback who also like knitting and baking. The tiny old women who loves video games and death metal. The teenager in a gang who has a passion for classical music. Give me interesting characters, regardless of what is in their underwear.

[(Anonymous)]

Eh, those examples sound tryhard woke and not organic at all. You're veering into the other extreme of stereotypical writing.