@majicmarker / majicmarker.tumblr.com
just discovered your hellcheer writing and i’ve only just come up for air and im still reeling — think you’re so good at writing eddie especially !!!!
this is so sweet, thank you so much! writing eddie in particular definitely cracked something open for me in my overall creative expression? so. it always means the world when my interpretation of him resonates with readers, because it tells me i'm going in the right direction for myself in my original work too. <3
tagged by: @woodswit
More secrets: Your reply to my secret was so affirming. I am happy, he is happy, I don't want him taking drugs for ED because they are hard on the heart. It's not anyone else's business, yet it feels somehow shameful that we don't do it "right."
I wonder if there's any fanfiction with old people sex that normalizes this.
Your rec of "What's your vibe?" Was actually helpful in my buying more toys (they are so much better than they used to be!)
Hilarious that in this day and age we’re making normal sex feel shameful given it feels like everything is about sex yet somehow nothing is sexy???? The idea of a couple figuring out how to stay sexy despite normal life changes is lovely to hear, and way more romantic in its own way, than new love/new sex.
I think about this all the time and how I wish more books/movies/shows romanticized normal sex that isn’t between two 20 year olds. I don’t need to SEE it, but for example, in The Crown in one of the Olivia Colman seasons, there’s a scene where Elizabeth has been hanging out with one of her horse guys (I forget the actual title) and Philip is like, very vaguely jealous. It’s shockingly romantic/sexy (especially because it’s just a stray moment and he doesn’t DO anything about it, like it’s just a very relatable moment). That moment struck me more than pretty much any other romantic moment in a show I’ve seen in YEARS. The weight of the years between them, and the ups and downs of their relationship, made that stray moment of jealousy so much hotter than if they were a newish couple.
Paging @majicmarker who wrote WYV and will be thrilled to hear this.
i AM indeed thrilled. but also kinda bummed for you, nonny? don't feel bad! there is no "right way" to do sex—there are safe ways, of course (not just condoms, but like... @ y'all STOP buying numbing agents for anal—go for muscle relaxants; numbing agents work, but the problem is that if something goes wrong, you're not going to feel it—and that sort of thing). as long as you and your partner(s) keep communication open and everybody's willing to keep learning, there isn't really a wrong way to do it.
and much agreed with woodsy—there's so much emphasis on sex, but not enough on eroticism. where is the SENSUALITY. i don't care about the characters' mind-blowing orgasms, show me what it feels like when they hold hands for the first time. there's so much more heat in these "innocent" moments than there is in sex scene #27 or whatever.
because, like. we get it, sex is sexy ig. but the concentration on the physicality of sex, rather than the emotion behind it, is... boring. it's like reading an instruction manual on how to put furniture together, "slot a into slot b" and all that.
there is no orgasm in the world powerful enough to sweep away all my stress for good. but talking honestly and vulnerably with someone about your relationship, your needs, and the relief and care you feel when y'all work things out that way? takes the whole world off your shoulders.
anyway. nonny, my dms are always open for you (very sorry you won't be able to stay anonymous with me, as i don't have anons on because fuck a couple of very specific people around here, so! totally understand if you pass, but just know i'm around if you need to vent more/get some reassurance or more toys & tools recs!).
So whenever I have time to actually read cause sometimes tv doesn’t do it much at the moment, I go to my shelves and I also get frustrated cause none of it is hellcheer fic or even adjacent
Trying to read this Emily Henry book and idk maybe I don’t like her characters but I’m not feeling butterflies like I do with fanfic, do you know what I mean?
Ughhh, I totally feel your pain! I have a tbr on my nightstand that's getting more precariously stacked by the day 😭😭😭 I haven't read any Emily Henry, but I feel like I've heard other people say they don't find her characters super likeable 😂 so it might not just be you!
If you're looking for something fun and fluffy and highly readable, may I suggest When Grumpy Met Sunshine by Charlotte Stein, a very fun ghostwriter-celebrity romance story, and What's Your Vibe? by our very own @majicmarker, a delightful demi sex shop rom-com?
Thanks for the ask, lovey 💛
first of all, thank you sm, doll! <3 second of all, i also just published how to survive a teen sex comedy, which does have some of my eddissy vibes, so that might hit the spot! (@sunnylune, in case you're interested!)
hi, is there a reason you removed everything from ao3? i miss it all so much!
it’s all still there! a while ago i restricted all my works so you can only view them if you’re logged in, mostly bc of all the ai stuff going on, and an even longer while ago i orphaned the bulk of my game of thrones fics (long story short, it just Bummed Me Out to look at them), but everything’s still posted :)
Missed seeing you on my dash! Hope you're doing okay 💚
my dude i am not gonna lie, the back half of 2023 and the kick-off of 2024 were not my best times. but! i am getting back into the swing of being a reasonably functional human person, so i'll probably be around a bit more bc i miss a bunch of u cool nerds too <3333
Hi hello just popping in to say I just stumbled upon your hellcheer sex shop au and um it might be the best thing I've ever read and will now proceed to read mmmm everything you have for them bc I LOVE your style of writing, and your characterization, and the format of texting is done so well, and everything is just pitch perfect and so fun and virgin demisexual eddie munson is,,,so special 2 me and ok gonna stop rambling now I hope you have the loveliest of lovely days💕💕💕
first of all, bc i am opportunistic (and that's simply the only way to ever get this done), if u think the fic is good... the book is even better (i mean. maybe? that's objective and probably dependent on if you prefer your romance spicier or less so. i like the book better since it's more in line with what i wanted to do with my stories from working at the shop, but anyway...)
this is so so lovely and i appreciate u to the moon and back 🌙💫 that fic really did help me work out a lot about what i wanted to do with my originals, so it will always be very up there in my personal favorites, and it's always The Best to hear what readers love about your writing <3
((ps if ur the ao3 commenter who complimented my use of italics and sentence structure in dialogue, i am in even MORE love with u.))
Just stopping by to tell you that your Eddie Munson is the biggest fucking sweetheart and that YOU have single-handedly made me fall in love with Chrissy. (Please don't tell Steve)
❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
omg this is so sweet AND i feel so powerful?? amazing
ps the question is would steve mind, or is this the throuple we’ve been waiting for 👀
Are you going to continue Sugar Me Sweet? 🥺
i have a google doc of one-shot bits and pieces for that series, so it'll probably happen somewhere down the line. i don't have a set schedule for fic updates, so i don't make promises about what will be updated and when it'll happen because then it just... doesn't happen.
these days my priorities are focused on my books, and either way tbh i've been struggling with writing anything for a few months now, so i'm trying to get through that before i make any decisions about what i'm doing next.
so, best i can say is subscribe to the series (if you haven't already!) and hopefully i'll get something new out there when the mood hits :)
Your hellcheer stuff is awesome, my dude. Any plans for future fics?
that’s so sweet, tysm!! 🥰
as for future fics… no plans, i’m afraid. i have lofty aspirations about finishing my wips at some point, but i’ve learned to take fic inspiration as it comes, otherwise it turns into a chore instead of the fun hobby it’s supposed to be and then suddenly i hate it, yk? that’s happened so often that it affects the way i feel about writing on the whole, and i just Cannot do that anymore.
right now my focus is finishing and publishing my next book this spring, but who knows what’ll happen with fic along the way. tbh i could use some kind of inspiration (😭) and maybe that’s where it is, we shall see what we shall see
f you get this, answer w/ three random facts about yourself and send it to the last seven blogs in your notifs. anon or not, doesn’t matter, let’s get to know the person behind the blog! 💛
first of all y’all already know way too much about me, second of all fine:
*the reason is my very correct opinion on matters of the divine
I’m sorry if I’m asking this to the incorrect tumblr for you, but something you said the other day really festered in my brain? It was about Stevie and Milo and the whole “I could have loved you longer but now maybe I can love you better” sort of thing.
When I was reading what’s your vibe I found it delightful and very true to life that they knew all the same people, particularly in a smaller city and a smaller lgbtq+ community within it.
Something about them is that they felt very cozy to me, and I think a lot of that was from the fact that there was this built in safety net of knowing the people they both surrounded themselves with. How important was the mutual friends aspect to them and their love story, do you think? Does it inform any other aspect of their relationship in a way that is surprising or not obvious?
(my “official” author/book tumblr is @katmajik but honestly it doesn’t matter, i’m always reblogging relevant posts back and forth between here and there anyway)
prepare for yet another one of maj’s patented long-winded responses as she talks in circles until she tuckers herself out and maybe somewhere in there she actually answers the question too (and fuck it, here’s a link to book stuff for anyone passing through who’s interested, the marketing never stops, babyyyy):
Just saw your chapter titles on instagram. LOVE. Which was the easiest to name? Which was the most difficult? Do you have a favorite? Does it coincide with your favorite chapter?
thank god someone finally asked me about the chapter titles, i’m erecting the Church of Our Lady She Gets It in your honor as soon as i’m done talking A Lot about this
easiest:
(8) “anatomy of a porn title” came to me before i even had the concept of this book. milo’s experiences working at the store are almost 100% my own, and one of my most memorable days was when i had to process 200+ dvds (this involved a lot of scanning, stickers, and organization). so i’d had this one in my back pocket for a while.
when i finally had a grasp on the story i wanted to tell around my personal sex shop chronicles, (1) “a crisis of sexual identity” was the easy-breeziest chapter title, because it captured the Point i wanted to make.
writing a demisexual romance, even being demi myself, is… not super easy? especially because i wanted to play with the idea of love at first sight, which is so often conflated with lust, and that just doesn’t work the same when you’re on the asexual spectrum.
so much of this book is about being queer and how our labels, however liberating, can also be suffocating, because—particularly in the age of social media expectations—we become so preoccupied with being queer The Right Way. and there is no goddamn Right Way, but we’re pressured into these kinds of performances, and then before you know it your priority is appeasing some dickweed on the internet who says m/f relationships can’t be queer, instead of your own happiness.
so, we start with milo’s crisis and we follow him through the journey of realizing that, hey, actually, this ain’t so bad.
hardest:
(4) “sick of dating apps, just gonna pygmalion myself a boyfriend” and (9) “the epic highs and lows of grocery store music” both went through several iterations, none of which i can remember now because mostly they were Fine, but they just didn’t pop.
when i landed on (4)’s, honestly i was a little miffed at myself for taking so long because that’s a phrase i made up and use a lot, so i should’ve had the chapter title from the get-go.
stevie’s story starts off with agitation with her dating app experience, which she worries is coloring her first impression of milo because he was nice to her and easy to talk to in ways that app matches aren’t—and then, BAM, he shows up to the bar where she’s sitting there thinking about him and proves her first impression right, as if she manifested him into existence.
now if only i could do the same thing for myself… that’s the dream, babyyyy.
favorite title vs favorite chapter:
i think both have to be (5) “how many degrees of separation are there between kevin bacon and your love life?”
there are several sociological concepts that have stuck with me since college (probably because the head of the department, who was the best dude but also the most notoriously ruthless grader, wanted me to major in soc, and i’m a sucker for a compliment). “six degrees of separation”—the idea that every person is connected to every person through no more than six other people—has a celebrity counterpart, “six degrees of kevin bacon,” which posits that you can trace every actor to kevin bacon.
i am a little bit obsessed with this, because the separation/kevin bacon rhyme alone is so deliciously SERENDIPITOUS, it blows my mind.
for milo and stevie, (5) is the moment where they realize the friends they’ve had in common for ~2 years, and it’s really only been timing that’s kept them from meeting until now (and the timing was a little tricky for me to sort out, too, but i’m happy with how i got there).
sometimes you just keep missing people until it’s Meant for you to run into each other, and i think there’s something deeply romantic about those prior missed connections. there’s a sense of “i could have been loving you longer, but maybe, this way, i get to love you better.”
and, even though milo doesn’t Love stevie yet at this point in the story, his pov in this chapter is circling this conclusion.
thank you SO MUCH for this ask, may love and light bless you for all time, forever and ever and etc. amen 💞✨
(if you’ve happened across this little ditty and want to know more about what’s your vibe?, here’s a link!)
what were your favorite things from this year? what were your not favorite things from this year?
favorites: really accepting my demisexuality enough to figure out how i actually want to write my romance books, publishing my first one, and getting to work on @woodswit’s debut. it’s honestly just so nice that i’m not doing this alone anymore? and to have woodsy on the indie road with me has been just so astronomically helpful, inspiring, validating, insert other positive adjectives here.
i also saw bruce springsteen in concert, thereby ascending✨
i’m gonna have to hard pass on my not-favorite parts of the year lmao in so many respects it’s been a rough ride and i need to get off it
How do you think you need to grow as a person to go into next year?
now that i’m back in therapy i know that updated and proper diagnoses + eventual medication will do me a world of good. i’ve been reflecting a lot lately on how just, fundamentally Sad i am (which we talked about the other day)? and when the fog clears enough for me to be rational about it, i know that’s not normal, and there’s no like, fluffy instagram self-care routine that’s going to fix it.
i know, too, that i need to find better people to surround myself with. the vast majority of my friendships have been toxic or otherwise unhealthy, draining, they’d stunted my self-esteem and i’m still unravelling the aftermath of that. some of that’s my fault and some of it’s not, and sometimes it’s just been the fact that some people don’t belong together in any variation of together (romantic, platonic, whatever).
i need to sort of, yk, put my money where my mouth is more too? in terms of creativity and my writing career. like there’s so much that i Know doesn’t matter in the scheme of things (ex: follower counts are useless. i’ve seen ppl with thousands of followers and zero engagement on most of their posts, bc so many ppl don’t follow out of any genuine interest in you, they do it for follow-backs or these trendy “follow for follow” trains that masquerade as support but it’s, uh. Not?)—but sometimes i do get wrapped up in the numbers, like when i’m already feeling down on myself so i figure, hey, let’s just throw this on the pile, too. i want to focus on the writing and publishing itself, and not on the social media fanfare that’s all aesthetic, no substance.
so i think ultimately it’s going to be a conscious effort to be introspective but staying present with it, rather than putting myself on autopilot and letting the bad feelings marinate.
that’s just what i’ve been considering lately, off the top of my head. it’s still hard, and i’m struggling a lot emotionally, worse than i have in something like six years now? so thinking through these things feels heavy and pointless in equal measure, but it’s an improvement on the autopilot, at least.
What was your biggest missed opportunity this year?
this is on my mind since i was just there yesterday (in SWEATPANTS, which is important), but every time i come to visit a particular friend we stop at the liquor store by her house, and every time the same tall handsome man with the long beautiful hair is working and once he told me he likes my tattoos and he always asks if we need help finding anything and i never take him up on it but i’m probably in love with him, so, maybe next year.
(my co-star year ahead says i’ll be falling in love far above the global average, so, unless ben barnes shows up already i have to assume it’s gonna be this guy.)
What was your biggest lesson this year?
i wish i had something more profound to say, but it was probably that there’s no way for me to typeset my books on my own bc apparently typesetting is among the most advanced branches of graphic design? took me like two weeks digging into google to find that out too.
anyway @ any aspiring indie authors, just buy the software, it’ll save you the emotional scars.
