Recommendations

Why Mary Sues and OCs Are Hated (and Why They’re Not the Same)

November 5, 2015 // 9 Comments

I don’t really mind OCs in fanfiction. Even if a writer uses an OC as a main character, I’m cool with it—as long as the character in question isn’t a Mary Sue. Now, I understand that Mary Sue is a somewhat subjective term. If you ask ten different people what it means, you’ll get ten different answers: A Mary Sue is the author’s wish fulfillment. A Mary Sue is a character whose name and physical traits overcompensate for her lack of personality. A Mary Sue pushes //

Exploring an Established Universe: A Highlight of China Miéville

October 20, 2015 // 0 Comments

There are worlds where superimposed city-states fight invisible wars and where outposts at the fringe of a barely-understood universe struggle to stay united despite impossible language barriers. There is a planet where scientists battle moths that eat dreams, where underground crime is conducted by ganglords with too many limbs, and where interdimensional spider-beings speak in unending free-verse—they call this place Bas-Lag. In fact, all of these places have names—they’ve already been //