flo_nelja: (Default)
[personal profile] flo_nelja
Catégorie : Seriez-vous capable de l'arrêter ? (Thriller - Enquête - Suspense - Identité - Philosophie - Paradoxe - Manga)



Six jeunes adultes, qui étaient ensemble au lycée, se retrouvent pour visiter et critiquer un nouveau parc d'attraction. Très vite, cela bascule dans l'horreur, et leur seule façon de survivre est de trouver la sortie. Mais non seulement les "attractions" sont horribles, mais en plus, elles semblent basées sur leurs traumatismes personnels...

C'est une BD webtoon qui a eu assez de succès pour être publiée, et on ne trouve plus sur Webtoon que les 14 premiers chapitres, qui sont tout ce que j'ai lu. Je n'ai pas été happée. Cela comemnce comme un film d'horreur très classique, avec des persos stéréotypes de lycéens américains, les mascottes qui font peur et autres poupées tueuses... Oui, les flashbacks sur leurs traumatismes qui sont exploités dans le parc les rendent peu à peu plus intéressants et moins cliché, mais pas assez pour moi. Peut-être qu'ils auraient dû laisser plus de la moitié de la première saison sur le site.

Ceci dit, il est clair que la personne qui a créé le parc les vise personnallement, et la question de qui et pourquoi est intéressante. Mais pas assez pour que le paie pour la suite.
flo_nelja: (Default)
[personal profile] flo_nelja
Titre : L'héroïne d'un conte
Auteur : Nelja
Fandom : Notre-Dame de Paris
Persos : Gringoire, Djali, Esmeralda
Genre : Fluff et humour
Résumé : Gringoire retrouve son inspiration d'auteur. Il a un rôle tout trouvé pour Djali.
Rating : PG
Disclaimer : Tout a été créé par Victor Hugo
Nombre de mots : ~900
Notes : Ecrit d'après un prompt de Jyanadavega : Gringoire est vraiment reconnaissant à Esmeralda de l’avoir sauvé, il lui est encore plus reconnaissant de lui avoir permis de rencontrer une chèvre aussi intelligente que celle-ci. Humour, Fluff.

( Lien vers AO3 )

Phantom Islands

Sep. 2nd, 2025 04:18 pm
dannye_chase: (Default)
[personal profile] dannye_chase
 
 

On this day in 1968 divers discovered the Bimini Road, which is sadly not part of the lost Atlantis. But you can read all about Phantom Islands and get writing prompts on my Weird Wednesday blog!

Atlantis: no survey of phantom islands can be complete without this most famous of lost lands. The idea of Atlantis, an island (or continent) with an advanced society, which sank beneath the waves in a great catastrophe, traces back to Plato, and was probably always fictional. That hasn’t stopped people from looking for it, and putting it on maps pretty much anywhere there’s enough water to cover it. To my mind, one of the most interesting pieces of the Atlantis saga is the Bimini Road, which is a natural geological feature that resembles a human-made stone road. It was discovered beneath the sea near the Bahamas, close to (or by some sources in) the Bermuda Triangle. Some claim it’s part of Atlantis itself.

Check out the blog post for more and some mysterious writing prompts, such as:

Putting the phantom in phantom island. Perhaps a certain island is a gathering place for phantoms of all kinds: ghosts of the drowned from vessels lost in the area, sea monsters, wormholes through space/time, zombies, or demons. Perhaps someone has literally cursed the place, or maybe it’s the site of an evil relic or graveyard of the damned. It could even be the home port of the ghost ship Flying Dutchman.

DannyeChase.com ~ AO3 ~ Linktree ~ Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog ~ Resources for Writers

letzan: (Default)
[personal profile] letzan

High-level stats for week of 2025-08-19 - 2025-08-25


  • Total works categorized F/F on AO3: 10667 (+105 from last week)

  • Works I classified F/F: 6054 (+145 from last week) (2677 new, 3377 continued)

  • 0.65% of all 925982 AO3 works I've classified F/F were updated this week






A few callouts this week:


  • Another best-ever week for KPop Demon Hunters, with 544 new F/F works.
  • She-Ra returns to the chart for the first time since June, replacing Criminal Minds.
  • MCU celebrates 70 consecutive chart appearances (out of a lifetime total of 588).
  • Nominations/sign-ups are open for the Star Trek Femslash Drabble Exchange. Sign-ups close September 8, and fics of exactly 100 words are due September 22.
  • Sign-ups will be open from September 6 - September 16 for the Fire Emblem flash femslash exchange. Assignments for this one will be due September 28.



Full top-20 table and description of methodology after the jump )
flo_nelja: (Default)
[personal profile] flo_nelja
Titre : Le piège de l'amitié
Auteur : Nelja
Fandom : Epic: the Musical
Persos : Odysseus et Athena. Plein d'autres personnages mentionnés, certains qui viennent de Epic (Penelope, Polites), d'autres qui viennent de la mythologie grecque en général (Hélène, Palamède)
Genre : Amitié, angst
Résumé : Odysseus pense à la fin de sa relation avec Athena, se demande ce que cela a signifié pour eux deux.
Rating : PG
Disclaimer : Tout appartient à Jorge Rivera-Herrans, même s'il utilise des personnages dans le domaine public
Nombre de mots : ~3400
Avertissements : Mort de personnage (canon)
Notes : Ecrit d'après un prompt de Jyanadavega : Odysseus & Athena, Odysseus/Penelope en background. Peut-on réellement être ami avec un dieu ? C’est une question pour laquelle Odysseus a toujours répondu que oui… mais ce début de périple de retour commence à le faire douter… Angst, Psychology, Friendship ?

( Lien vers AO3 )
flo_nelja: (Default)
[personal profile] flo_nelja
Catégorie : Chaudron, Foudre, et Clair de Lune (Fantastique - Magie - Sorcière - Potion - Infusion - Herboristerie - Amour - Famille)



Une toute petite BD auto-éditée dans la catégorie "sapphic thriller". Notre personnage principal croise une très belle femme, qui porte un très beau manteau de fourrure, et devient peu à peu fascinée par elle.
Au lieu de juste aller lui parler, elle va se tourner vers l'occultisme.

C'était cruel et charmant, j'aime le dessin, j'ai beaucoup aimé le lire. Mais c'est trop court pour être vraiment marquant, trop abstrait (les personnages n'ont même pas de nom).
J'ai écrit un instant trop classique, puis je me suis rappelé que cela en dit plus sur ce que j'aime lire que sur le contenu effectif de la BD ^^

nine kinds of beans

NSFW Sep. 1st, 2025 09:12 pm
lunarriviera: favorite ex-carny failboat (barton)
[personal profile] lunarriviera
( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )
flo_nelja: (Default)
[personal profile] flo_nelja
Catégorie : Monster Mash (Halloween - Créature - Classique - Comédie - Danse)



Le premier tome d'un manga, qui pour l'instant est le seul à être traduit. L'héroïne est une lycéenne ordinaire. Du jour au lendemain, elle se réveille avec des cornes, et apprend que son père était un dragon, et sa mère ne le lui avait jamais dit.

Pour l'instant, c'est de la tranche de vie moe. Ruri, comme tout le monde est curieux, voit sa vie sociale augmenter énormément, et a des sentiments mêlés par rapport à ça. Ce n'est pas mal, c'est mignon, mais pour l'instant ça n'a rien d'original, et avec le buzz qui était fait autour, je m'attendais à quelque chose d'un peu plus remarquable.

Fic - Nevermore - Montresor/Will

Sep. 1st, 2025 03:39 pm
flo_nelja: (Default)
[personal profile] flo_nelja
This was technically jossed two days after I posted it, but only on facts, emotionally it still works (also it's mostly smut :D )


Title : What he wanted
Author : Nelja
Fandom : Nevermore
Characters/Ships : Montresor/Will
Genre : Angst and smut
Summary : Montresor's complicated feelings about Will no longer being dead.
Rating : NC-17
Disclaimer : It belongs to Red and Flynn!
Word Count : ~1700

( Link to AO3 )

Lectures d'août

Sep. 1st, 2025 03:13 pm
flo_nelja: (Default)
[personal profile] flo_nelja
The Left hand of Darkness, Ursula Le Guin ) 9/10

Un oiseau brûlé vif, Agustin Gomez Arcos ) 8/10

L'horreur tropicale et autres récits sur l'océan ) 6/10

Mon premier Larousse des contes du monde ) 8/10

Les fous de Bassan, Anne Hébert ) 8/10

The Emperor of Gladness, Ocean Vuong ) 8/10

Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys ) 8/10

A Master of Djinn, P. Djèli Clark ) 7/10


Progression : 73/52
"Risques de lecture" : The Left hand of darkness, Un oiseau brûlé vif, Les fous de Bassan, The Emperor of Gladness, Wide Sargasso Sea -> 34/26
Reddit fantasy bingo : 22/25

Code deploy happening shortly

Aug. 31st, 2025 07:37 pm
mark: A photo of Mark kneeling on top of the Taal Volcano in the Philippines. It was a long hike. (Default)
[staff profile] mark posting in [site community profile] dw_maintenance

Per the [site community profile] dw_news post regarding the MS/TN blocks, we are doing a small code push shortly in order to get the code live. As per usual, please let us know if you see anything wonky.

There is some code cleanup we've been doing that is going out with this push but I don't think there is any new/reworked functionality, so it should be pretty invisible if all goes well.

Poltergeists: Noisy Ghosts

Aug. 31st, 2025 02:04 pm
dannye_chase: (Default)
[personal profile] dannye_chase
 

On this day in 1977, single mother Peggy Hodgson reported the activities of the Enfield Poltergeist to police. (You may know the case from the Conjuring 2 movie).

So what’s a poltergeist?

A poltergeist (translated from German as noisy ghost, knocking ghost, or rumbling ghost) is not like other ghosts. While hauntings tend to stretch over years or even centuries, poltergeist activity often lasts only a few months. And unlike most ghosts, poltergeists often focus their energy on a particular person, rather than a place. But the biggest distinction is danger: while the White Lady who climbs the stairs may spook you, a poltergeist is said to be capable of doing you actual harm.

So how does one know they’ve got a noisy ghost? Oh, they’ll know. Phenomena involved with poltergeists include objects being flung around, particularly rocks; furniture moving across the floor; bad smells (it’s worth noting that many non-poltergeist hauntings include pleasant smells, such as Grandma’s perfume); doors and windows opening and shutting; and electrical effects: lights flickering, bulbs spinning in their sockets, and the creepiest bit, powered objects operating without electricity or batteries. 

That’s the more normal stuff. Also reported have been lit matches falling through the air, shrieking noises, telephones constantly dialing certain numbers, water pooling on the floor (that would actually be kind of helpful if it coincided with the matches), and even a pair of gloves floating around, touching things as if some invisible hand was wearing them. And of course, assaults: pinching, biting, hitting, and pushing. The Bell Witch was even said to have murdered a man via poison. 

But the most common sign of a noisy ghost is, well, noise: knocking sounds coming from the walls, floor, or furniture. Sometimes, the raps seem random, and other times they can function as a method of communication with the spirit: (rap once for yes, twice for no). 

There are, of course, conflicting explanations given for poltergeists, including plain old hallucinations, and credulous witnesses.

You can look at some major theories, and scare up a few writing prompts on my blog!

DannyeChase.com ~ AO3 ~ Linktree ~ Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog ~ Resources for Writers 

denise: Image: Me, facing away from camera, on top of the Castel Sant'Angelo in Rome (Default)
[staff profile] denise posting in [site community profile] dw_news

A reminder to everyone that starting tomorrow, we are being forced to block access to any IP address that geolocates to the state of Mississippi for legal reasons while we and Netchoice continue fighting the law in court. People whose IP addresses geolocate to Mississippi will only be able to access a page that explains the issue and lets them know that we'll be back to offer them service as soon as the legal risk to us is less existential.

The block page will include the apology but I'll repeat it here: we don't do geolocation ourselves, so we're limited to the geolocation ability of our network provider. Our anti-spam geolocation blocks have shown us that their geolocation database has a number of mistakes in it. If one of your friends who doesn't live in Mississippi gets the block message, there is nothing we can do on our end to adjust the block, because we don't control it. The only way to fix a mistaken block is to change your IP address to one that doesn't register as being in Mississippi, either by disconnecting your internet connection and reconnecting it (if you don't have a static IP address) or using a VPN.

In related news, the judge in our challenge to Tennessee's social media age verification, parental consent, and parental surveillance law (which we are also part of the fight against!) ruled last month that we had not met the threshold for a temporary injunction preventing the state from enforcing the law while the court case proceeds.

The Tennesee law is less onerous than the Mississippi law and the fines for violating it are slightly less ruinous (slightly), but it's still a risk to us. While the fight goes on, we've decided to prevent any new account signups from anyone under 18 in Tennessee to protect ourselves against risk. We do not need to block access from the whole state: this only applies to new account creation.

Because we don't do any geolocation on our users and our network provider's geolocation services only apply to blocking access to the site entirely, the way we're implementing this is a new mandatory question on the account creation form asking if you live in Tennessee. If you do, you'll be unable to register an account if you're under 18, not just the under 13 restriction mandated by COPPA. Like the restrictions on the state of Mississippi, we absolutely hate having to do this, we're sorry, and we hope we'll be able to undo it as soon as possible.

Finally, I'd like to thank every one of you who's commented with a message of support for this fight or who's bought paid time to help keep us running. The fact we're entirely user-supported and you all genuinely understand why this fight is so important for everyone is a huge part of why we can continue to do this work. I've also sent a lot of your comments to the lawyers who are fighting the actual battles in court, and they find your wholehearted support just as encouraging and motivating as I do. Thank you all once again for being the best users any social media site could ever hope for. You make me proud and even more determined to yell at state attorneys general on your behalf.

Writing a First Kiss

Aug. 27th, 2025 11:21 am
dannye_chase: (Default)
[personal profile] dannye_chase
 Welcome to the most popular article on my writing blog…

Writing a First Kiss

There are a million different ways to write a great first kiss. Here are some of my thoughts, and a few prompts!

We’ll deal with the physical first.

Writing physical intimacy is just logistics: who’s got their [specific body part] where? For kissing, you’re obviously dealing with mouths, but also usually hands, and eventually some sort of embrace.

Kisses are dynamic, meaning there’s some movement going on. Here are three of the many physical possibilities for kissing that are particularly suited for a first kiss:

1. Lean-lips-hands. This is a quiet kiss: First, character A leans close, or else they both do. There is often eye movement, where one or both gazes are shifting from eyes to lips and back again (sometimes this is written as silently seeking permission). Then their lips meet. For a first kiss, you may want to pause here, because this is probably a Big Deal. After that, hands move, usually to the other person’s shoulders, neck, or collar, where they rest. It’s not an attempt to move the partner, it’s a simple desire for more touch.

For a quiet kiss there’s probably not going to be a ton of movement, because usually when characters open their mouths and deepen a kiss, there is more hand/arm involvement. (Of course, that’s not a rule, feel free to write a passionate kiss where hands never move from lighting resting on shoulders.)

2. Embrace-kiss. A lot of first kisses start with hugs. But it needs to be a lasting hug, and it helps if it involves shoulder and neck contact. Then have the characters move back from the hug slowly, without breaking it. At this point, you can go for some super intense eye contact if you want, followed by both partners leaning in and starting the kiss, which can range from shy to suddenly passionate. The embrace will likely tighten back up at some point.

Or, instead of eye contact, you can have them moving from the full contact in the hug to resting their cheeks against each other, and then slowly shifting back just enough for mouths to meet. This is a kiss where there is no “seeking permission” phase, they just both move into it together. Because the shifting is slow, this kiss will probably at least start off quiet. And again, the embrace will probably renew itself.

3. Kissing everywhere but the lips. Oddly enough, this is good for both shy and really confident first kisses.

Read the rest of this article on my blog

DannyeChase.com ~ AO3 ~ Linktree ~ Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog ~ Resources for Writers

letzan: (Default)
[personal profile] letzan

High-level stats for week of 2025-08-12 - 2025-08-18


  • Total works categorized F/F on AO3: 10562 (-271 from last week)

  • Works I classified F/F: 5909 (-330 from last week) (2634 new, 3275 continued)

  • 0.64% of all 923305 AO3 works I've classified F/F were updated this week






A few callouts this week:


  • KPop Demon Hunters levels out at 500 F/F works per week. That's quite a lot!
  • Criminal Minds returns to the chart, replacing Murder Drones
  • The Tokusatsu Femslash Prompt Meme runs from August 20th to October 31st.
  • A KPop Demon Hunter Big Bang challenge is starting up. It's for big fanworks (20k+ words) and the deadline is in early 2026. The exchange isn't F/F-specific, but as discussed there's a lot of F/F in this fandom.
  • The hAPPy birthday flash exchange revealed this week with 13 F/F works in various fandoms. The Pining For You Flash Exchange revealed with 10 F/F works.



Full top-20 table and description of methodology after the jump )
denise: Image: Me, facing away from camera, on top of the Castel Sant'Angelo in Rome (Default)
[staff profile] denise posting in [site community profile] dw_news

I'll start with the tl;dr summary to make sure everyone sees it and then explain further: As of September 1, we will temporarily be forced to block access to Dreamwidth from all IP addresses that geolocate to Mississippi for legal reasons. This block will need to continue until we either win the legal case entirely, or the district court issues another injunction preventing Mississippi from enforcing their social media age verification and parental consent law against us.

Mississippi residents, we are so, so sorry. We really don't want to do this, but the legal fight we and Netchoice have been fighting for you had a temporary setback last week. We genuinely and honestly believe that we're going to win it in the end, but the Fifth Circuit appellate court said that the district judge was wrong to issue the preliminary injunction back in June that would have maintained the status quo and prevented the state from enforcing the law requiring any social media website (which is very broadly defined, and which we definitely qualify as) to deanonymize and age-verify all users and obtain parental permission from the parent of anyone under 18 who wants to open an account.

Netchoice took that appellate ruling up to the Supreme Court, who declined to overrule the Fifth Circuit with no explanation -- except for Justice Kavanaugh agreeing that we are likely to win the fight in the end, but saying that it's no big deal to let the state enforce the law in the meantime.

Needless to say, it's a big deal to let the state enforce the law in the meantime. The Mississippi law is a breathtaking state overreach: it forces us to verify the identity and age of every person who accesses Dreamwidth from the state of Mississippi and determine who's under the age of 18 by collecting identity documents, to save that highly personal and sensitive information, and then to obtain a permission slip from those users' parents to allow them to finish creating an account. It also forces us to change our moderation policies and stop anyone under 18 from accessing a wide variety of legal and beneficial speech because the state of Mississippi doesn't like it -- which, given the way Dreamwidth works, would mean blocking people from talking about those things at all. (And if you think you know exactly what kind of content the state of Mississippi doesn't like, you're absolutely right.)

Needless to say, we don't want to do that, either. Even if we wanted to, though, we can't: the resources it would take for us to build the systems that would let us do it are well beyond our capacity. You can read the sworn declaration I provided to the court for some examples of how unworkable these requirements are in practice. (That isn't even everything! The lawyers gave me a page limit!)

Unfortunately, the penalties for failing to comply with the Mississippi law are incredibly steep: fines of $10,000 per user from Mississippi who we don't have identity documents verifying age for, per incident -- which means every time someone from Mississippi loaded Dreamwidth, we'd potentially owe Mississippi $10,000. Even a single $10,000 fine would be rough for us, but the per-user, per-incident nature of the actual fine structure is an existential threat. And because we're part of the organization suing Mississippi over it, and were explicitly named in the now-overturned preliminary injunction, we think the risk of the state deciding to engage in retaliatory prosecution while the full legal challenge continues to work its way through the courts is a lot higher than we're comfortable with. Mississippi has been itching to issue those fines for a while, and while normally we wouldn't worry much because we're a small and obscure site, the fact that we've been yelling at them in court about the law being unconstitutional means the chance of them lumping us in with the big social media giants and trying to fine us is just too high for us to want to risk it. (The excellent lawyers we've been working with are Netchoice's lawyers, not ours!)

All of this means we've made the extremely painful decision that our only possible option for the time being is to block Mississippi IP addresses from accessing Dreamwidth, until we win the case. (And I repeat: I am absolutely incredibly confident we'll win the case. And apparently Justice Kavanaugh agrees!) I repeat: I am so, so sorry. This is the last thing we wanted to do, and I've been fighting my ass off for the last three years to prevent it. But, as everyone who follows the legal system knows, the Fifth Circuit is gonna do what it's gonna do, whether or not what they want to do has any relationship to the actual law.

We don't collect geolocation information ourselves, and we have no idea which of our users are residents of Mississippi. (We also don't want to know that, unless you choose to tell us.) Because of that, and because access to highly accurate geolocation databases is extremely expensive, our only option is to use our network provider's geolocation-based blocking to prevent connections from IP addresses they identify as being from Mississippi from even reaching Dreamwidth in the first place. I have no idea how accurate their geolocation is, and it's possible that some people not in Mississippi might also be affected by this block. (The inaccuracy of geolocation is only, like, the 27th most important reason on the list of "why this law is practically impossible for any site to comply with, much less a tiny site like us".)

If your IP address is identified as coming from Mississippi, beginning on September 1, you'll see a shorter, simpler version of this message and be unable to proceed to the site itself. If you would otherwise be affected, but you have a VPN or proxy service that masks your IP address and changes where your connection appears to come from, you won't get the block message, and you can keep using Dreamwidth the way you usually would.

On a completely unrelated note while I have you all here, have I mentioned lately that I really like ProtonVPN's service, privacy practices, and pricing? They also have a free tier available that, although limited to one device, has no ads or data caps and doesn't log your activity, unlike most of the free VPN services out there. VPNs are an excellent privacy and security tool that every user of the internet should be familiar with! We aren't affiliated with Proton and we don't get any kickbacks if you sign up with them, but I'm a satisfied customer and I wanted to take this chance to let you know that.

Again, we're so incredibly sorry to have to make this announcement, and I personally promise you that I will continue to fight this law, and all of the others like it that various states are passing, with every inch of the New Jersey-bred stubborn fightiness you've come to know and love over the last 16 years. The instant we think it's less legally risky for us to allow connections from Mississippi IP addresses, we'll undo the block and let you know.

Pumpkin Autumn Challenge 2025

Aug. 24th, 2025 09:48 am
flo_nelja: (Default)
[personal profile] flo_nelja
Encore une fois, je le fais seulement avec de la BD !
Si vous avez des BD (comics, manga, etc) qu'il faut que je lise, et qui collent aux thèmes, allez-y ! Si c'est du webcomic que je peux lire gratuitement, c'est encore mieux !


AUTOMNE FRISSONNANT

Monster Mash (Halloween - Créature - Classique - Comédie - Danse)
- Ruridragon 1 (Shindo Masaoki)

Seriez-vous capable de l'arrêter ? (Thriller - Enquête - Suspense - Identité - Philosophie - Paradoxe - Manga)
- GremoryLand (A. Rasen)

Ceux qui ignorent qu'ils n'existent pas (Fatalité - Deuil - Esprit - Fragment - Secret - Combat - Peintresse - Art - Oeuvre française)

Les songes maudits de Carmilla (Vampire - Manoir - Nuit - Surnaturel - Gothique - Horreur - Nouvelle)


AUTOMNE EXTRAORDINAIRE

La Bonne Auberge de la Pierre Levée (Fantasy - Quête - Médiéval - JDR - Livre dont vous êtes le héros - Voyageur - Musique)

Chaudron, Foudre, et Clair de Lune (Fantastique - Magie - Sorcière - Potion - Infusion - Herboristerie - Amour - Famille)
- The Fool, the Absolute Mad Woman (Vivian Nguyen)

Le Cercle de la Com'thé (Fête - Gourmandise - Récomfort - Joie - Diversité - Singularité - Empathie - Vivre ensemble)

Latte : Une variations sophistiquée et crémeuse (Une couverture aux couleurs d'un latte à la cannelle et à la cardamome, marron, beige)


AUTOMNE RAYONNANT

Je ne couperai pas mes cheveux, je ne parlerai pas moins fort (Mythologie - Chasseresse - Liberté - Emancipation - Féminisme)

Ma meilleure ennemie (Dualité - Hiérarchie - Inégalité - Résistance - Rebelle - Sacrifice - Enemies to lovers - Steampunk)

Pour nous qui avons besoin de souffler (Nature - Ecologie - Conscience - Espoir - Paix - Poésie - Solarpunk)

Rester tout le temps avec Brindille (Amitié - Animaux - Soin - Aventurière - Changement - Jeunesse - Bande dessinée)

Mysterious Visions

Aug. 20th, 2025 11:30 am
dannye_chase: (Default)
[personal profile] dannye_chase
 

Looking for writing inspiration from beyond the veil? There are 8 posts on my Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog about mysterious visions!

Including the Third Man Phenomenon, where people in life-threatening or highly stressful situations sense another person (of whatever gender) with them. The solo hiker has a companion, or the group of four becomes five, of which most or all report seeing the extra person.

The third man is usually a benevolent presence, giving comfort and hope of survival. Most people don’t get a good look at their extra companion, who seems to be always just ahead or behind them, or in shadow. Still, the presence can seem so real that people attempt to share food with them. Other times the third man is just a voice which dispenses advice and encouragement.

Occasionally, it’s more than that. Examples in the book The Third Man Factor by John Geiger include a solo sailor who believed an unseen companion steered his ship through a storm, a woman in a collapsed building who reported a monk gave her an apple, a solo mountaineer who believed he was roped to someone else and thus descended a peak cautiously enough to save his own life, and another mountaineer who believed someone was helping him carry an injured companion. 

A prompt:

The little man who wasn’t there. If the third man is a scientifically explainable brain phenomenon, you could have a plot where people try to induce it on purpose. Maybe a company sells a headband with an electric pulse that brings out a companion for lonely people, or perhaps it’s part of training for soldiers, a way to keep themselves calm in stressful situations. A horror plot could have a person uncertain whether a third man experience is an expected hallucination…or if someone is actually there.

DannyeChase.com ~ AO3 ~ Linktree ~ Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog ~ Resources for Writers

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