Writing In The Stars

As a young woman, I’m obsessed with Janeway. I imagine her being amazing representation back then, but I think that she’s still incredible representation now. Here are some things that I think still make her unique 30+ years later:

She’s “motherly” and she wants to have children, but she’s never made to feel bad or less than about not having children.

She’s so naturally commanding. There are no conversations about her being a woman in charge, she just is.

She has a mixture of stereotypically masculine and feminine interests and traits. As a starfleet captain, she gets to work a lot with science and engineering but in her spare time she plays gothic holonovels and knits.

She sacrifices her personal happiness with great stoicism. This feels like a trope I see used for male heroes, intended to show their strength of character, but I rarely see it used for female characters

She often argues for the pragmatic stance without being an emotionally closed off person. This is so refreshing since many female characters often argue for the moral and/or emotional stance. Female characters who argue for the pragmatic stance will often be shown as emotionless, cruel etc.

She has very realistic mental health problems and regrets, but she presents herself with incredible confidence. She has the same touch of overconfidence that Kirk has, but seeing a female character possess this trait (without being a villain) is still unusual.

She’s a middle aged woman who gets to be seen as beautiful and desirable without that being the focus of her character. The respect she gets from others is earned by her actions, but her beauty is also acknowledged.

When Julian says things like “my brother can’t love” or “he’s never been there for me in the way I have been for him”, that’s only Julian’s POV, not a fact of the caraval universe. This entire book leans on the idea of multiple POVs and multiple truths, and to toss it away is to throw away key points of the storyline.

I have blogged about this before but I see it so often I feel the need to say it again:

Julian believes these things about his brother because he suffers from the same younger sibling syndrome that Tella does re Scarlett. He believes those things because Dante shuts him out emotionally the same way he did to Tella in finale, and we can get into why on a different post. But under no circumstance does that make it a hard fact.

The narrative of Finale itself makes sure to challenge Julian’s assumptions. Why?

• Dante takes Julian’s feelings into consideration and listens to him re letting Tella go (for reasons we can get into on a separate post as well).

(Julian is hinting at himself and his brother in that highlighted line. Just FYI.)

• Because we see Dante absolutely refusing to allow Julian to get in harm’s way. Even to save Scarlett.

• Because we see how desperate Dante is when Julian is captured.

Straight up spelled out for you all in that last sentence.

• When Dante actively goes out there and sacrifices himself to save Julian, which is the exact moment in the narrative Julian realizes he was wrong about his brother.

• When everyone realizes how much Dante was actually willing to sacrifice for his brother.

Okay, I'm going to say it. I think Laia giving up her soul light and choosing a human life with Ezel was my favourite happy epilogue. (Even if the way she dumped poor Leo on my messy play through was absolutely brutal 😬)

Ezel and Laia seem genuinely happy and really well suited for each other, creating an art book together? I mean 🥹

Also they got a dog 😭😭😭

First, we properly meet Dante and we get to know him. From his tragic backstory of a bastard boy no one wanted, not even his first love, who he became magical for. What did he do? Shut down emotionally and build a fake identity who was much cooler and far more beloved than his real self ever was.

And then we have Tella and her equally large fear to love. Because she felt cursed and unwanted after being supposedly abandoned by her own mother, and being raised by a father who only loved himself. So she convinces herself love is for the poor stupid people who are willing to give their hearts to others (knowing they can be broken).

Dante wasn’t meant to fall for Tella. But he did. He let her past the mask of Legend and allowed her to truly know him, and himself to harbor feelings for her. By the end there he doesn’t care about getting the cards and the powers within them. He wants her love, and is even willing to make death pacts with powerful strangers to ensure she’s safe.

And Tella, who refused to fall even for the stories she was told of this fantastic magician, finds herself unable to match the image of the villain she made up in her mind with that of the guy she fell for. And she embraces him, and embraces that love, no longer being afraid of having her heart broken.

And then it all falls apart.

Because while Tella is not willing to give Dante up, she is still the little girl that wants her mother back. And so the love she just embraced within herself is used to sacrifice herself, and get trapped in one of the cards to save her mother.

Dante of course can’t deal with that. So he saves Tella and starts the apocalypse, but this is the second time loving so deeply had devastating results. So he shuts down again. Snaps the mask of Legend back into place and leaves Tella on those stairs because he is fucking terrified of being hurt again by someone he loves so deeply. And so fulfilling Tella’s own fear of having her own heart broken.

The cynic who still carries a childhood stuffed animal.

The liar who craves honesty.

The overthinker who makes reckless decisions.

The heartbreaker who believes in soulmates.

The pacifist who holds lifelong grudges.

The tough guy who cries during old movies.

The thrill-seeker who's terrified of commitment.

The grump who’s unfailingly polite to waitstaff.

(How your character defends their soft core and what could shatter it) Because protection becomes prison real fast.

their reasoning being that "we couldn't ban it even if we wanted to, every writer already uses it anyway"

"Every writer"?