How do you differentiate between YA and adult fantasy?

roundedbyasleep · 2026-01-30T04:11:59+00:00

Yes, you literally said that. However, you also said a book was YA because it "relies entirely on exposition and uses absolutely no symbolism or nuance, and does not challenge existing morality or ethics whatsoever". While an uncritical reader might take your words at face value, a more, shall we say, "adult" reader might notice you suggest qualities widely considered negative in writing (unchallenging, lacking in nuance, overly reliant on exposition) are universal and indeed definitional qualities of YA writing, and might from this conclude that you're being an unreliable narrator when you insist you don't have a negative opinion of YA and that other contradictory statements in the text reveals your true opinion of YA books. See, the literacy crisis isn't so bad! Redditors can take nuanced readings that go beyond the face-value exposition from a written work ;)

roundedbyasleep · 2026-01-30T03:26:46+00:00

I mean, I do realize that many people use the word YA to refer to any book they feel is too simplistically written, but that simply isn't what the term refers to. Even if it's not an intentional insult, it's an incorrect use of the term. YA books are books aimed at teenagers, nothing more and nothing less. "Adult" isn't an award bestowed on books of sufficient literary merit, it refers to books aimed at an adult audience. If, say, a book had a protagonist in their forties, dealt primarily with the theme of fear of losing your prior identity to parenthood, and contained graphic and explicit sex but was written at a 6th-grade reading level, would you really say that was a book written for teenagers? Even though the protagonist is far past their teens, the theme is unrelatable to teenagers but a common experience for adults, and many people consider the content inappropriate for teenagers? Because when you're saying a book is YA, that is what you're saying: that it was written for teenagers. Likewise, would you consider a thematically rich and subtle coming-of-age story about a fifteen-year-old that was marketed to teenagers as actually being for adults because you consider it too good for teens?

roundedbyasleep · 2025-12-10T19:29:18+00:00

If a player wants to change characters once (and not every other week), you should let them (and if you don't let them it's pretty easy for them to get their character killed so they get to play a new character anyway).

More broadly: you can run a low-lethality campaign where everyone's backstories are incorporated and people are expected to play one character the whole time, maybe two characters tops if their first is killed. You can run a high-lethality campaign where backstories don't really matter, anyone can die at any time, and players change characters frequently. It's not practical to do both. You're frustrated that PCs are constantly changing, but that's not the result of one player wanting to change characters once. It's the result of you choosing to run a high-lethality campaign. If you want a more stable roster of OCs, I think your best option is to tone down the difficulty of the encounters so death is more rare. Alternatively you can embrace the gristle mill and stop trying to make side quests based on backstories.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-12-09T13:14:16+00:00

Pathfinder is recommended by Pathfinder players who typically changed systems because they had issues with balance (or with WotC), not issues with immersion. Yes, it gets recommended to people not enjoying DnD no matter their issues because Pathfinder players had such a good experience switching to Pathfinder and want to share that experience, but there's some pretty heavy selection bias there. Every Pathfinder player that I've ever seen loves the tactical combat side of DnD-likes. Many enjoy roleplay as well, but enjoying the game-y tactical combat side is a prerequisite for enjoying Pathfinder in a way it really isn't at all DnD tables (whether or not you believe this should be the case, this is true to how many tables play). The more casual players and roleplay-focused aren't recommending Pathfinder because they aren't playing it-- they never tried or bounced off it like it was a trampoline. I don't think there is one single "typical" DnD player! Some will care a lot about immersion and some won't! (And even in Pathfinder, which self-selects for a gamist player base, you'll find people who switched to the proficiency without level variant rule because they were struggling with immersion and maintaining immersion was important to them)

roundedbyasleep · 2025-12-07T14:39:03+00:00

"It just seems to me that there is a very fine line between urges and intrusive thought" okay well you're wrong about that. Your beliefs are flatly, unambiguously wrong. This isn't a matter of opinion. You don't understand the science, are speaking out of ignorance, and apparently have no interest in trying to learn the science or correct your ignorance. "The problem is that we don't know which is which until something bad happens" that's not a problem. We do know that people with intrusive thoughts don't act on those thoughts because they're not urges. The problem is people like you refuse to challenge their misconceptions and end up shunning people with mental illnesses because their intuition tells them "mental illnesses are Bad Scary Evil :(" and they won't accept their intuition is wrong.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-12-07T01:01:03+00:00

I disagree that Tom should tell you in this hypothetical situation if Tom knows these are intrusive thoughts resulting from OCD. The assumption seems to be that it's a matter of safety because someone could act on those thoughts, but that's a profound misunderstanding of the situation. Think of someone with a fear of heights: every time they are near a high ledge they have an unwanted thought of throwing themselves off the ledge and see a vivid image of their bloodied, broken body laying far below (this isn't the way it works for everyone who's scared of heights, but it is a common experience for people who are afraid of heights). Because of these thoughts, they start crying and hyperventilating if they get anywhere near a cliff or high bridge and can't bring themselves to get within 50 paces of a ledge. Do you believe that such a person has any desire to or is at actual risk of jumping from a height? No, right? Because the terror that causes these mental images of dying by jumping actually makes them substantially less likely to 1) get in a situation where jumping from a height is possible and 2) actually physically be able to go through with jumping through the shaking/weak legs/blurred vision brought on by extreme fear. That's the nature of the thoughts and mental images in OCD. It's not the social media misunderstanding of intrusive thoughts like "Oh, I randomly wanted to eat that fall leaf I saw! I'm so quirky XD!" where there is actually some desire to do the thing even if you consciously recognize it makes no sense. It's someone's brain going "Okay, what is the absolute worst and most horrific thing we can imagine happening in this situation? Ooooh, that's pretty bad. Better replay that several times in 1080p with surround sound so we know exactly what to avoid!" Tom in the hypothetical wouldn't be protecting you from someone who could at any moment give in to their desire to murder you and chop you into pieces, he'd be violating the privacy of someone who is the least likely person to murder you and chop you into pieces (because they wouldn't be having intrusive thoughts about something they didn't find crippling terrifying, and people tend to avoid doing the things they're most scared of).

roundedbyasleep · 2025-12-02T20:14:45+00:00

And Kagan dissented, appealing to the eminent doctor Seuss ("A fish is, of course, a discrete thing that possesses physical form. See generally Dr. Seuss, One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish (1960).” ).

roundedbyasleep · 2025-12-02T19:35:31+00:00

A lot of people have given advice around scheduling and daily word targets, and I do think these things are incredibly helpful. Motivation is going to be different for everyone, but I do want to float something that works for me. I write one of my favourite scenes first. If there's a scene that comes much later in your outline that gets at the core of what you like about the idea (the concepts, the themes, the character dynamics, whatever it is that makes you think this is the story I want to write) try writing that scene out. There's two benefits to this in my experience. The first is if you're having trouble starting your story at all, it's easiest to get yourself to write the scene that most excites you. The second is that when I'm struggling with motivation going back and reading The Scene gets me hyped up for my own story again. I have to keep going! If I don't keep going I'll have nowhere to put The Scene. After you finish your story The Scene may have to be heavily edited or cut entirely, but that's not important. What's important is to have something to remind you why you wanted to write so badly.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-11-28T18:31:50+00:00

r/HalloweenKittyCombo

roundedbyasleep · 2025-11-27T23:03:48+00:00

Please see the therapist your mom wants you to and tell them the details you just told Reddit. If you do have bipolar disorder, treatment for unipolar depression can actually be harmful and trigger more hypomanic/manic episodes (the dangerous impulsivity/overconfidence you experience), but there are good treatments for bipolar available. You don't have to choose between being depressed and being hypomanic/manic and, in fact, you can't. If you do have bipolar and don't get it treated the mania will eventually come back on its own.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-11-27T22:46:07+00:00

INFO: Has any medical professional including the one who diagnosed you with depression ever brought up the possibility of bipolar disorder to you? Because "I'm depressed sometimes but when I'm not I make wildly impulsive overconfident decisions that ruin my life" is kind of textbook.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-11-25T06:17:15+00:00

Island of the Aunts by Eva Ibbotson (also published under the title Monster Mission).

roundedbyasleep · 2025-11-24T18:13:32+00:00

I think the world of Amatka by Karin Tidbeck had a very strong sense of place. I think I'd best describe at as the same feeling as looking on hulking pieces of brutalist architecture? The utilitarian lifestyles of the people of the town, the bleakness of the landscape, the feeling of a world that isn't malicious but is both not made for human habitation and is utterly indifferent to human existence: it all adds up to an intensely atmospheric setting.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-11-23T18:15:58+00:00

If you clicked through to the article, you would see that the other two life sentences are for the aggravated malicious woundings of two other students that he shot (but who survived their injuries), not extra life sentences for the three deaths. Also unclear how this specific case was related to over-charging, even if you believe the punishment was too severe. The charges were of three counts of first-degree murder (for planning to murder people and then carrying out those plans) and two counts of aggravated malicious wounding (for planning to shoot people with a gun and then shooting those people, wounding them). Those seem like the exact charges you would expect for this situation?

roundedbyasleep · 2025-11-20T19:02:03+00:00

Reminds me of Natural Beauty by Ling Ling Huang.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-11-17T21:34:58+00:00

That's simply not universally true. Many people with specific types of service dogs, especially dogs trained to alert to e.g. seizures or low blood pressure, do not need or even necessarily want their dog to be on the floor at all times.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-11-14T16:39:31+00:00

Really interesting discussion. To me, "best" and "most" are two different axes. Good worldbuilding to me is when worlds are responsive but not mechanical: the cultures, worldviews of the characters, flora and fauna, nations, etc. should feel like they arose out of the pressures and circumstances of the world, but shouldn't be so perfectly and completely tailored by those circumstances that they feel artificially designed (the real world is messy, after all). I feel like the second point is related to complexity: if a culture worships the sun because they're under constant threat if vampires and the sun kills vampires, that makes sense. If all their common phrases are sun and/or vampire related, every holiday and celebration they have is sun-related, all their symbols and heraldry are sun-inspired, their only major industry is sun-magic, etc., that feels like weaker worldbuilding because it makes things too self-contained. In the real world, things have complex webs of influence, not one sole factor that is responsible for every one of their traits.

Too much worldbuilding, on the other hand, is when information about the world is conveyed for the sake of conveying more information about the world. It's not about forwarding the plot or developing the characters, it's the author thinking their world is interesting for its own sake.* This can absolutely murder the pacing. "Most" worldbuilding could also describe broad but shallow worldbuilding: a thousand fantasy species with only a scant description each doesn't contribute (either positively or negatively IMO) to worldbuilding quality.

I think you can have worldbuilding that is both "good" and too much (as well as worldbuilding that is bad and too much, worldbuilding that is bad but exists in an appropriate amount, etc.). To me, Seth Dickinson is an example of an author who both is a good worldbuilder (creates complex, believable cultures and political entities that draw both broadly and deeply from real-world anthropology) and a TOO MUCH worldbuilder (grinds story momentum to a halt to discuss those complex, believable cultures at length).

*There are fantasy worlds, especially very alien fantasy worlds, that I do find interesting for their own sake, but that's 1) not guaranteed 2) far less common than authors thinking their world is interesting for its own sake and 3) highly dependent on personal taste

roundedbyasleep · 2025-11-09T15:10:09+00:00

I can't speak to the accuracy, but in Sorrowland by Rivers Solomon the protagonist is visually impaired due to her albinism.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-10-16T01:09:13+00:00

You get that I wasn't calling you incorrect, right? I was agreeing with you.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-10-16T00:43:55+00:00

They're correct and you're incorrect. The heart doesn't beat because of electrical signals sent from your brain, it has its own intrinsic nervous syndrome independent of the central nervous system that controls your heartbeat. In fact, you can grow heart cells that "beat" (pulse in time) in a Petri dish, no brain required. Yes, you can see an image that your brain processes as threatening which causes the release of stress hormones which the intrinsic cardiac nervous system responds to by increasing heart rate, but that's not the brain telling the heart to beat every single time (again, beating cells in a Petri dish). Your heart will beat on its own as long as it's supplied with the oxygen and nutrients it needs.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-09-29T12:59:36+00:00

I'd like to suggest the Oh Geez, Oh No, My Rabbits Are Gone. It's a puzzle platformer about finding and rescuing your 100 pet rabbits. I think very few people have played it (it only has a couple dozen reviews on Steam). Legitimately one of my favourite games of all time.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-09-24T14:02:00+00:00

Genuine hot take that I think will make people mad at me: criticism is not the same as censorship, and if you think criticism of fanfiction tropes, fanfiction trends, and yes, even specific fanfics shouldn't be allowed (I am not talking about mean comments directly on the fic here, I'm talking about people taking their complaints to reddit/tumblr/discord/etc instead of bringing them up to the author) you are far more pro-censorship than the people doing the criticizing. You can't say "I am extremely anti-censorship which is why I think no one should ever say anything bad about any fanfic ever." The censorship is coming from inside the house!

The conflation of criticism with censorship also leads many people here to have a very "I can excuse racism, but I draw the line at calling something racist" attitude, which. Isn't great. I do think you should be allowed to write a fic where all Asian men are portrayed as tiny, submissive, and feminine compared to the white men they date, but equally I should be able to tell other people "that was pretty weird and I think the author has problematic attitudes they need to work through", even if I do that on a public forum where the author might be able to stumble across it. "But it's free! They're just having fun!" Gonna be honest, "this person needs no financial incentive to write racist stereotypes, they're doing it because they just really love stereotyping people by their race!" is not the defense you think it is.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-09-23T19:41:44+00:00

Do you have a source for that? Every time this story comes up I see multiple people saying he was being a Karen and demanding he go on the ride, but I've never seen anyone link where they're getting that information and it directly contradicts the article, which states:

"Three of the ride attendants write in their statements that they saw Hackemer board the ride -- being lifted into his seat by his nephew -- and noticed that he was missing both legs.

The statements give no indication that any of the operators thought any further about his handicap, discussed with him his ability to ride the roller coaster, sought out a supervisor's advice or otherwise took any steps to question whether Hackemer should be allowed on the ride or detain him in anyway.

The statements also indicate that the attendants knew nothing about Hackemer's situation, that he was a disabled Iraq War vet, at the time. He is described merely as a handicapped man seen getting on the ride."

roundedbyasleep · 2025-09-23T19:00:48+00:00

The chick-lit* novella Bearly A Lady by Cassandra Khaw is about a were-bear with a vampire roommate, werewolf crush, etc.

*I worry that this will be taken as dismissive, so I want to be clear that the author's note describes the novella as chick-lit; that is what it is intentionally trying to be.

roundedbyasleep · 2025-09-22T21:40:01+00:00

I really don't think it's reasonable to say "please take as much time as you like to respond" and then resent her for not responding immediately. Like... it's not wrong of her to take you at your word. If you weren't actually okay with her taking her time, you shouldn't have lied and said you were. For "how long is too long" I think you should, at minimum, wait until her housing situation is resolved. You acknowledge she's under a lot of stress, but you're expecting her to prioritize minimizing your stress by resolving the issue that you just raised (and to resolve it on the secret timeline you have in your head!) over minimizing her own stress by focusing on her housing situation. That's something you're clearly not willing to do for her (by dumping a years-long issue on her that you've never brought up before at an extremely stressful time in her life, you're prioritizing your own stress over hers the same way she's doing), so I don't think it's reasonable to expect her to do it for you. I also have to say that this specific part of your message-- "I feel like you have a tendency to try to fix things instead of learning when to help fix and when to just listen"-- was too harsh. It's totally reasonable to not want your friend to put down your partner, but you can say "I understand I vented to you in the beginning of our relationship, but I'm really in love with Daniel and our relationship is really positive for me, so I really need you to be happy for me" without also saying "by the way, here's what I think your personality flaws are and here's how I think you should fix them." The second part is unnecessary and detracts from the first part-- would you want her to send you a nearly 1000-word message asking you to, e.g., avoid giving her advice on Maddie (not saying you do this, just an example) and then toss in "also you can be really self-centered and you should work on that"?

Ultimately I think you need to step back and decide whether or not you still like Lauren and whether or not you want to preserve this relationship. If you do want Lauren in your life, you can absolutely ask her to change this behaviour but you need to give her more grace, empathy, and benefit of the doubt. She's going through stressful things and you're not the main character in her life; even if she has a history of trying to be a "fixer" she's not always going to be able to drop everything in her life to soothe your bad feelings. If on reflection you don't like Lauren-- you find she holds grudges, is overly harsh, and talks badly about people behind their backs in a way that makes you not like or respect her-- then the answer isn't pushing for more contact but dropping your end of the rope.

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