In the Spotlight | 29 June 2021

Entry posted by Bat Stitch Crazy in In the Spotlight June 30, 2021

513 views

In the Spotlight | June 29th, 2021

Welcome to the June edition of our monthly blog series In the Spotlight where we highlight site-wide award winners and give some brief news updates, along with spotlighting some new things being posted around the forums and the archives! Happy Pride month to all of our LGBTQIA+ community, and we hope you all are staying safe and cool where weather is being abnormal for you. :lgbtqia:

June's Staffer of the Month is the ever cool and mysterious moderator @grumpy cat!

I N T E R V I E W
| G R U M P Y C A T |

What are you currently reading (fic or otherwise)?
i'm still trying to keep up with my goal of continuing to read fics i started during the reviewing event but uh my life has been chaotic for the past two months and still continues to be so i haven't been great at that. but, i recently started reading the noble house of black by @Sapphire_Skies because we all know i'm a ride or die for house of black and i really loved the first chapter. i also haven't been quite able to properly focus on reading books even though this year i did pretty good with that up until may but i'm slowly reading project hail mary by andy weir.

What are you currently writing?
lol i haven't written much recently, but most of what i have written is stories in the favourite worst nightmare original flash fiction collection. i'd hoped i would start on the jaime lannister story i've got in my head for the anti-hero challenge but i guess i need someone to kick me into actually doing it. or something like that anyway.

What are you currently watching?
i'm doing a rewatch of billions what can i say, i'm a sucker for wendy rhoades, taylor mason and bobby axelrod. :bi:

Where do you hang out on the forums a lot right now?
i posted some blog posts recently (kris the fangirl v02 / disaster bi pride) which is something i've found i really enjoy doing, and i've also posted some thoughts that continue @lebensmude's blog entry on the relationship between the amount of fanfiction and the engagement that you can expect which i think is a really good read.

The Story of the Month for June is up in flames by @something wicked!

I N T E R V I E W W I T H T H E A U T H O R
| S O M E T H I N G W I C K E D |

What was the inspiration for up in flames?
up in flames is the kind of redo and new take on an old idea I had called yaxley. in short it was about a pure blood girl who's been raised her entire life to become a death eater but by the time the story starts doesn't want to be one, plus a whole load of marauders at hogwarts and sirius/oc shenanigans. i just ran out of steam with it, got bored, didn't really like the at-school nature of it and had kind written myself into a corner. so I deleted it. and up in flames is everything i wanted it to be in the first place! it's darker, and older, and more messed up in a lot of ways and deals more with being evtreamley morally grey and being very self aware of it in a way that old!yaxley didn't really. so yeah... it's totally inspired by me wanting to write the new version for my own self fulfilment really.

What three songs would you put on a soundtrack for this fic?
ahhhh only three?!

toxic by kehlani
monsters by ruelle
breathe by jax jones and ima wroldsen

Without giving too much away, what's one scene or event in this fic you're really looking forward to writing?
any of cassie and Sirius, omg i've done a couple of scenes of them already just waiting for the chapter and I've always loved their dynamic but it's all new and dark and a bit more broken now. it's just going to be so much fun. mainly because they both hate and totally completely love each other and it's just beautifully messy!

Read or watched anything good lately you'd recommend?
LOKI!! i started to watch it today and i'm now all caught up and just oh my gosh i'm in love with it! like... literally with everything about it it's great. i've got so many feelings about it that i won't go into here but just i cannot recommend enough.

Our Member of the Month for June is the lovely soul, @Felpata_Lupin!

I N T E R V I E W
| F E L P A T A _ L U P I N |

What are you currently reading (fic or otherwise)?
Honestly, I have too many books started and never finished... I've been a bit of mess reading-wise recently... :ninjavanish: but I've recently got back into Camilleri's Montalbano series (a series of mystery novels set in Sicily, with a lot of humour; they are really funny and a nice way to ease yourself back into reading... ) and I'm planning to read a few of those in the near future

As for fics, I mostly read for requests or swaps or similar, but there are a few that I'm enjoying quite a lot... Hardened Hearts by @prideofprewett, Irrational by @RonsGirlFriday, You are a minute of quiet by @shadowycorner, After Destiny by @CambAngst, Iris Albican by @Lost_Robin, A madness most discreet by @RogueSlytherin... to name a few... I've also recently run into Nemesis by @Chelts-rhj and there are only 3 chapters posted, but it's very intriguing, I really enjoyed it! And also Running out of time by @sapphicsunrise (I'm very into mystery at the moment, what can I say? ) Sorry, I think I might've got carried away a little bit here... but really, check all of these out, because they are excellent!

What are you currently writing?
My main focus at the moment is Not quite a honeymoon. I have around 1500 words of chapter 7 written at the moment, hopefully I'll be inspired to finish it soon I also have a couple of scenes already written for chapter 13 of TSW, although it's been a while since I've actually worked on it (I'll get back to Jimmy, but I need to finish Honeymoon first...) And I've been fantasizing about a lot of other projects... does that count as writing? Probably not...

What are you currently watching?
Another confession... I'm very antiquated and I don't have Netflix or other streaming platforms and I'm not very into TV shows anyway... I have a big DVD collection on the other hand, and I end up rewatching the same comfort movies over and over and over again For example, I've recently rewatched 17 again for the millionth time (I just thoroughly enjoy body-switches or age-changing stories... they are silly but so much fun... )

Where do you hang out on the forums a lot right now?
The review request thread I just enjoy leaving and receiving reviews, so that's the place you'll most likely find me around here! That, and our lovely Sett, because where would I be without my beloved Badgers? :hufflepuff:

:lgbtqia: It's the end of June, and traditionally July comes next, so you know what that means: Camp Nano! This time around, the NaNo Cafe includes another one of the site's popular gift tag threads, an idea started by @grumpy cat. Go forth and gift all the things to your fellow FFTers in support of their NaNo projects!

:lgbtqia: With NaNo and the gift-giving activity starting, it's really a great time for members both old and new to interact and meet new people -- and lately we've had a ton of new members join the site! Welcome to @Sapphire_Skies @Owlpost68 @knota @evil otter @MissLacybee @oultrepreu @A. Waiting @Anony Mous and @LilyEPotter! We hope you'll be just as home here as the rest of us.

:lgbtqia: And speaking of fic-related gift giving, every now and then an FFTer decides to just spend a day or an entire weekend sprinkling some love around the archives, inviting people to share what stories they'd like reviewed, with no expectation of anything in return -- and that's exactly what @grumpy cat and @Felpata_Lupin did this past weekend. Generosity and a voracious appetite for fics are the reasons these two are constantly at the top of the site's Most Prolific Reviewers list.

:lgbtqia: @sapphicsunrise and @sihaya got MARRIED!!! Read all about their love story in Lisa's blog post (with a bonus, super dreamy wedding photo!)